One of the banking industry’s biggest vendors is responding to a cyberattack that has compromised some of its clients’ sensitive data.
SitusAMC, which major banks use to manage their real-estate loans and mortgages, announced on Saturday that hackers broke into its systems on Nov. 12 and stole data that included banks’ “accounting records and legal agreements,” as well as information belonging to some of those banks’ customers.
“The incident is now contained and our services are fully operational,” the company said in a statement, adding that the attack, which remains under investigation, did not involve ransomware.
SitusAMC did not respond to an email requesting more information, including how many of its more than 1,500 clients the breach affected and whether the company had identified the attacker.
The FBI said in a statement that it was helping SitusAMC probe the hack. “While we are working closely with affected organizations and our partners to understand the extent of potential impact, we have identified no operational impact to banking services,” FBI Director Kash Patel said in the statement. “We remain committed to identifying those responsible and safeguarding the security of our critical infrastructure.”
The cyberattack on SitusAMC highlights the serious supply-chain risks facing even well-defended critical infrastructure sectors. Security experts consider the financial-services industry to have the best digital defenses of any sector, given its vast resources and strict regulations. But the sector, like many others, is still vulnerable to attacks that exploit weaknesses at its third-party suppliers. Vital but little-known vendors such as SitusAMC typically receive far less scrutiny than the critical infrastructure providers that they serve, creating security gaps that sometimes manifest as widespread digital compromises.