Attacks on E-Banking The Kenyan Prime Bank, Development bank, and CFC Stanbic Bank websites which were
hacked by Rwandan hacker is one example of how the system is vulnerable to hackers. Hackers
have many different ways that they can try to break into the system. The problems of the systems
today are inherent within the setup of the communications and also within the computers itself.
The current focus of security is on session-layer protocols and the flaws in end-to-end
computing. A secure end-to-end transaction requires a secure protocol to communicate over
untrusted channels, and a trustee code at both endpoints. It is really important to have a secure
protocol because the trusted channels really don’t exist in most of the environment.
There are various types of attacks that e-banking can suffer. They include
1. Social Engineering One of the most common attacks does not involve knowledge of any type of computer system.
Tricking consumer s into revealing sensitive information by posing as a system administrator or
customer service representative is known as social engineering. Social engineers use surveillance
and a consumer’s limited knowledge of computer systems to their advantage by collecting
information that would allow them to access private accounts.
2. Port Scanners Attackers can use port scanners to ascertain entry points into a system and use various techniques
to steal information. This type of software sends signals to a machine or router and records the
IJCSI International Journal of Computer Science Issues, Vol. 9, Issue 4, No 3, July 2012
ISSN (Online): 1694-0814
www.IJCSI.org
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message the machine responds with to ascertain information and entry points (Cobb, 2007). The
main purpose of a port scanner is to gather information related to hardware and software that a
system is running so that a plan of attack can be developed.
