The Secret Service is currently investigating an attack on the Kendall County Appraisal District in which someone used a virus to hack the county's computers.
According to the Kendall County Appraisal District, someone hacked into the system on or before January 27, setting up at least four fictitious accounts. Each account was set up to receive a payment from the appraisal district when the office issued its payments.
Employees at the office noticed the suspicious accounts and contacted Frost Bank. The bank froze all the accounts and notified federal authorities.
For almost 24 hours, the Kendall County Appraisal District was closed while investigators checks computer systems to make sure the virus was no longer setting up dummy accounts.
Kendall County says because of the quick action by employees, no money was transferred to the accounts.
Investigators say the virus may have come from any number of sources and was specifically designed to bypass the security and anti-virus software currently in use. Furthermore, the dummy accounts were traced back to a computer system in Las Vegas, NV and from there it is suspected that the trail leads overseas.
Attacks like this on banks, governmental bodies and even private companies are increasingly common. Since 2003 when the Bugbear virus ran through more than 1,300 banks, the feds have been working to track down hackers who target account information.
In response to the security breach, the Kendall County Appraisal District is installing several new security measures.
