Unknown people in Shanghai have cloned the Citadel Investment Group Web site and established a link to investor passwords, thereby exposing clients of the $17 billion hedge fund, Chicago Tribune reports. The cyber crime is said to have posed a “grave risk of theft of confidential information,” according to a federal lawsuit that closed the fake site.
“It's not that they're heading in through the back door,” said David Fisher, ceo of the online brokerage OptionsXpress. “It's people coming in through the front door with a user name and password.” Still the issue remains that even risk management that results in little harm to the company leaves the hackers at large.
“Over the next few years, these issues are going to come so far to the forefront that there are going to be more efforts by lawmakers to provide specific laws to remedy these harms,” said lawyer Scott Kamber, who represents customers of TD Ameritrade in a class-action lawsuit. “It's incumbent on corporate America to get religion on fortifying their security. If they don't, it's going to get very expensive for them.”
It seems Citadel isn’t alone is being a victim of cyber crimes. Sandler O'Neill and Partners had an intruder to its site, after which risk management issues forced it to shut down its site for four days.
