Hacked Payment Terminals Lead to Hundreds of Canadian Credit Cards Stolen

Canadian security firm IntelCrawler LLC says that a piece of malware known as JackPOS is responsible for lifting credit card information from 700 cards at two gas stations. The malware affects the point of sale terminals where the credit cards are swiped. Sadly, the malware seems closely related to the program that ended up stealing credit card information from tens of millions of customers at Target’s retail stores in North America.

As per the security company, JackPOS struck venues in both Longueuil, Quebec, and Vancouver British Columbia. In all, the total number of cards hacked were 280 and 400 respectively. The malware has not affected Canada alone. It has struck in India nabbing 420 cards, Spain where it claimed 230 cards, and Brazil where it made off with a booty of 2,000 credit cards.

Thus far, the two areas where the malware has struck in Canada were a petrol stations. The report from the security firm attributes the low rate of attack to Canadians using more secure credit cards which contain a security chip and require the use of a PIN. The JackPOS malware is quite stealthy as it poses a nothing more than a version of the popular programming language Java.

Source:
Hundreds of Canadian credit cards hacked by infected terminals, firm warns
http://www.theglobeandmail.com/technology/tech-news/hundreds-of-canadian-credit-cards-hacked-by-infected-terminals-firm-warns/article16785563/