News / Politics

‘Hack for Trump’ group blackmails Bahamas Fidelity Bank

Saturday, 19 September 2015 4:38 PM [ Last Update: Saturday, 19 September 2015 4:43 PM ]

Republican presidential candidate Donald Trump speaks in Rochester, New Hampshire, September 17, 2015. (AFP photo)

A hacking group calling itself “Hack for Trump” has successfully stolen sensitive data from Bahamas’ Fidelity Bank, and said it will publish it unless they are paid $30,000 to contribute to the GOP hopeful’s presidential campaign.

“If Fidelity does pay us, we plan on using those funds to help Donald Trump get elected to the White House, as he is the only candidate who can restore America to its former glory,” the group said in a message.

The group also clarified in the message that although they failed to get a hold of customer data, they have still “managed to dump three databases serving their main website.”

“This data contains various confidential details about the bank, as well as hundreds of emails sent by prospective and existing customers, both local and foreign ones,” it said.

In an official statement over the weekend, the Bahamas-based bank confirmed the attack and informed its customers that it has taken its website offline for the time being.

Andrew Sunderji, Fidelity’s chairman, also confirmed the attacks and said that the bank will not be paying the group.

“We’re not going to pay them $30,000. It’s blackmail; a shakedown,” he said on Friday.

In their message, the group put three screenshots that showed the names of the hacked website databases, the structure of a table within one database and two anonymized customer email enquiries.

The bank had until September 18 to pay the ransom. However, no data has yet been published.

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