CyberCartel used AI to attack Latin American financial institutions
CyberCartel, a hacking group, has used AI agents to automate attacks on banks and payment apps in Latin America.
By Aever Bundji ·
CyberCartel has used AI agents, including Grok and Claude, to automate attacks on financial institutions in Latin America. Passwords and customer data have been stolen, and individuals' bank accounts have been accessed with little input from criminals. This is the latest example of criminals using AI-powered cyberattacks.
CyberCartel has been an active threat since at least 2012, but its new use of AI has made its attacks faster and more efficient. Straiker, a cybersecurity startup, shared its research on these attacks with both SpaceX and Anthropic. Both companies are working to lock CyberCartel out of their services. Anthropic has already blocked access to Claude.
CyberCartel has used Moonshot AI's agent as well, but Straiker is still trying to get in touch with the company. AI models normally have protections in place to prevent them from being used in cyberattacks, but they have proven surprisingly easy to bypass. In this case, CyberCartel told the models they were being used in test environments. If one model refused to proceed, the hackers used a different model. If that also refused, the AI agents would be tasked with deploying malware instead.
CyberCartel doesn't appear to be using Anthropic's Mythos for its recent attacks. Anthropic caused a stir earlier this year when it announced the new model, warning that hackers could use it and models like it for attacks like those carried out by CyberCartel. Its release also saw security teams around the globe rush to address thousands of vulnerabilities that the model had identified.
Raiker's research on AI-powered attacks on Latin American financial institutions comes just days after news broke that South Korean authorities are investigating a similar issue affecting local banks. Hana Bank, KB Kookmin Bank, and Shinhan Bank are among the South Korean banks affected, with at least 25,000 Shinhan Bank customers having their personal credit information leaked.
AI companies are well aware of the risks their products pose. Nvidia recently launched the Open Agent Safety Platform, a software platform and reference system design developed to secure rogue AI agents via a new hardware and software security stack. It is hoped that this will go some way toward preventing agents from escaping their sandboxes, executing unauthorized code, gaining unauthorized access to critical infrastructure, or bypassing guardrails.
Source: Tom's Hardware
