Hacking Spreads to Securities Firms and Asset Managers... Industry on Alert

Hacking incidents spread from the banking sector to the financial investment industry
Industry-wide push to review security systems

As hacking incidents that began in the banking sector have spread to securities firms and asset management companies, the financial investment industry is once again reviewing and strengthening its security systems.

According to the financial investment industry on October 29, Daishin Securities and Mirae Asset Global Investments confirmed the previous day that some information had been leaked in hacking incidents, prompting securities firms and asset managers to review their security measures. “Although they had not come to light, I understand that there have been persistent hacking attempts targeting the financial sector,” an industry source said. “We have continued to strengthen security and will conduct another review in the wake of these incidents.”

Daishin Securities said in a press release the previous day that information belonging to a total of 38,409 customers had been leaked in a hacking incident. The breach came to light after signs of abnormal access by a hacker were detected on October 17 on a server linked to the opening of non-face-to-face securities accounts for discretionary investment services. The leaked information was confirmed to include customers’ names, addresses and telecom IDs, as well as encrypted deposit and withdrawal account numbers, Daishin Securities’ comprehensive account numbers and mobile phone numbers.

In the case of Mirae Asset Global Investments, abnormal access from an external IP address was confirmed, but no sensitive information was leaked and no financial losses occurred. The company explained that the system involved was not used for services targeting individual customers, so information on retail investors was not affected.

Concerns appear to have grown particularly in the asset management industry following the incidents. Until now, companies had been less concerned about hacking because, given the nature of their business, they did not have services or information targeting individual customers. “We hardly worried about hacking because asset managers do not conduct direct transactions or hold information on retail customers, but we were surprised to see this incident,” an executive at a small or midsize asset management company said.

No additional cases of damage have emerged in the industry, but signs of efforts to strengthen security systems are apparent. Korea Investment Management has established an information security organization led by its Chief Security Information Officer (CSIO) and operates a security management system. “All personal information handled internally is encrypted, and we regularly check for vulnerabilities and operate a security monitoring system,” said Ryu Jihae, a managing director and CSIO. “Recently, we have been jointly pursuing stronger security management at the holding company level, and we also checked for any security irregularities in connection with the recent incidents in the industry.”

“We are responding to the recent incidents in accordance with our internal information security guidelines,” another asset management company representative said. “We share threat intelligence and response measures every week, monitor systems exposed to external access daily, and focus on detecting unusual signs through security monitoring.”

This content was produced with the assistance of AI translation services.