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Random freezes, missing sound and display glitches usually trace back to one bad driver. Find and replace yours safely.Free scan · under a minuteIn 2013, the FBI briefed bank security executives about Operation Ababil, a distributed denial-of-service (DDoS) campaign that disrupted access to major U.S. financial websites. The briefings were part of a wider response: federal agencies shared threat information and attack indicators with banks so they could prepare for and mitigate subsequent attacks.
What the FBI briefed banks about
A May 14, 2013, Dark Reading report said FBI officials used secure videoconferences to brief bank executives and security officers on Operation Ababil. The report, citing FBI executive assistant director Richard McFeely at the Reuters Cybersecurity Summit, said the briefings covered who officials believed was behind the attacks. It described recurring attacks against major U.S. banks and said customers sometimes could not access online or mobile banking.
The campaign’s label and public claims of responsibility appeared in contemporaneous coverage, but those claims should not be treated as a settled account of attribution. A later official description came from the Justice Department, which announced charges and summarized allegations in an indictment; those allegations were not court findings.
How the campaign affected banking services
In testimony to the Senate Banking Committee on December 10, 2014, FBI Cyber Division Assistant Director Joseph M. Demarest said that actors began launching powerful DDoS attacks against major U.S. banking institutions in September 2012. He described attackers combining bandwidth from numerous web servers in a botnet to overwhelm targets.
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In its March 24, 2016, announcement of charges against seven Iranian nationals, the U.S. Department of Justice said the indictment alleged a campaign against 46 major companies, primarily in the U.S. financial sector, from late 2011 through mid-2013. The DOJ described attacks that became near-weekly after September 2012. According to the allegations, on some days victim servers received as much as 140 gigabits per second of traffic, and hundreds of thousands of customers were cut off from online account access. The announcement said the campaign disrupted services but did not result in theft of customer account data.
The DOJ explicitly said the charges were accusations and that defendants are presumed innocent unless and until proven guilty. The figures and description above refer to the indictment allegations, not adjudicated findings or current threat levels.
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How agencies and banks coordinated their response
Demarest’s 2014 testimony described an effort involving the FBI, the Department of Homeland Security, Treasury, and financial institutions. The FBI and DHS distributed Joint Indicator Bulletins containing thousands of IP addresses associated with the attacks; banks used those indicators to help mitigate later incidents. Government briefings also gave bank security teams threat context and a place to share practices.
| Measure reported by the FBI | What Demarest reported |
|---|---|
| Classified threat briefings | Approximately 36 from March 2013 to July 2014, for private-sector financial institutions and government agencies. |
| Initial briefing | More than 300 chief information security officers attended on March 19, 2013, by secure video conference from 33 FBI field offices. |
| FBI Liaison Alert System messages | 34 messages from April 2013 to July 2014; about 20 dealt with financial-sector threats. |
| Compromised-system indicators | Indicators for approximately 115,000 compromised systems were disseminated in those messages. |
These are separate measures reported in Demarest’s December 10, 2014, Senate testimony. They describe the scale of that historical response, not a present-day FBI program or a single count of affected banks or customers.
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What the episode means for bank readiness
The practical lesson is about service continuity as much as cybersecurity: a DDoS attack can make a bank’s public website or account access unavailable even when the stated DOJ account says customer account data was not stolen. The OCC’s April 3, 2014, Bulletin 2014-14, summarizing joint FFIEC guidance, said institutions should include DDoS readiness in ongoing information-security and incident-response plans.
- Monitor incoming traffic to public websites so unusual surges can be identified.
- Activate incident-response plans when an attack is suspected.
- Plan staffing for the duration of an incident, including suitable previously contracted third-party services where appropriate.
- Community banks should ensure their IT units or service providers take appropriate action.
The OCC bulletin is dated 2014 guidance; financial institutions should verify current regulatory requirements independently rather than treating it as a complete statement of today’s compliance obligations.
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- Terms & Details: More information about this protection plan is available within the “Product guides and documents” section. Simply click “User Guide” for more info. Terms & Conditions will be available in Your Orders on Amazon. Asurion will also email your plan confirmation with Terms & Conditions to the address associated with your Amazon account within 24 hours of purchase.
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