According to security firm IntelCrawler, a 17 year old Russian teenager is the root of the Target holiday cyber-attack.
The attack which took place on the 27th of November and lasted for approximately 3 weeks, saw 40 million cards compromised and the private details of 70 million people exposed. The attack did not stop with Target, as Neiman Marcus stores were also hit alongside other retailers which currently remain unnamed.
A report authored by government agencies and security firm iSight Partners, presents the origins of the malware responsible for the security breach. The malware was written partially in Russian, and component of the program have been on sale for a few months through the black market.
IntelCrawler investigated the matter further and claims the malware to be a piece of code called BlackPOS. Further investigation shows the origins of the program to be from internet handle “ree4”, a 17 year old teenager from St Petersburg Russia. The program has been widely sold since this last spring through Eastern European black market forums.
According to IntelCrawler the "off-the-shelf" malware which has been available since March and has seen 40 different international versions. Traces of infected terminals due to the malware have been found in the US, Canada, and Australia.
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