Wheatland Bank

Man in the Middle Attack

When dealing with a trusted site such as your bank, security measures are in place to protect you and ensure your transactions are safe.  In addition to passwords, there are challenge questions, computer identifiers and other methods to correctly identify the account holder.

 

The ''Man in the Middle Attack" tries to circumvent these measures by impersonating the true account holder to gain privileged access.  A common "Man in the Middle" attack is to infect the user's computer with a virus which will redirect the account holder to a fake website, intended to look the same as their bank's website.

 

  

When the account holder inputs their credentials to the fake website, these are captured and rekeyed into the real website by the attacker.  Valid credentials and valid answers to the challenge questions then allow the attacker to manipulate accounts and set up their own transfers.

 

The first line of defense against these attacks is the use of valid, up-to-date antivirus software, but it is also critical that uses be alert to changes such as the website looking slightly different in combination with challenge questions being presented.  Such changes should alert the account holder that something may be wrong.

 

To help protect our customers, Wheatland sends an alert to the valid account holder when a wire transfer is initiated giving the account holder the opportunity to review the transaction during the two day waiting period before the wire is transmitted.  For your own protection, watch and monitor these email alerts.

 

Wheatland is constantly updating our security measures and will be making additional changes to protect our customers.  As we make these updates, we will be in contact with our business customers to explain and assist with these additional security measures.