Billion Dollar Heist (2023)

Billion Dollar Heist,
A true story, the most daring cyber theft ever happened, which is an example of the possible many more threats like this if not controlled responsibly. This documentary has been well described by security experts on how the theft was done. Bangladesh Bank cyber theft took place in February 2016; almost one billion dollars could have been lost forever; luckily, the numbers are stuck at 81 million dollars. You may have heard or learned about the story already, go through the documentary for more insight and knowledge.

📸 source

Starting from an employee whose computer has been compromised through an email containing the malicious code, sent as an attachment via email. In general, it was a zip file containing a CV, but deep down, it contained way more than that. That email was sent to many, and three of them fell for the trap. Also, the computers that were interconnected with one another with very cheap, just around 10$ priced switches, which should have been dealt more seriously. The fun fact is that the hackers stayed inside the network for almost a year, jumping from one computer to another to make a full map of the infrastructure and find out the one computer with the required access to transfer the funds.

Let's leave the story aside; Bangladesh Bank was quite lucky to save almost 90% of what could have been lost. The hackers made a typo which was the reason for almost 30 transactions being stuck, and their impatience; if they had stayed inside the terminal for one more hour, then they could have drained the rest of the money; lucky us! What's more important to learn from the documentary is the threats around us if we stay a little bit unconscious.

"Malware is much more difficult to control than nuclear weapons."

Yeap, I do completely agree with this, if you are wondering how then try to dig a little more after watching the documentary.

We all may have heard about the WannaCry malware that has created havoc in the past; also, the malware like ILOVEYOU, one can't really predict where it's been coming from or control when it's just spreading to infect millions. If we compare the threats on the ground with the ones on the cyber, which one seems deadly? One kills you directly, and the other just indirectly strangles you to death without any trace behind you. Days are coming when things will be more devastating in cyberspace; the more we progress, the more dependent we are on it.

This documentary also points to the coming threats, taking that heist as an example. We should have been more active in improving the infrastructure, but we are still vulnerable; we would fade away even with a tiny wave of such activities. And Hackers groups like that are constantly keeping an eye on such vulnerable infrastructure to exploit.

This writing is an urge to watch the documentary; this writing is not so well organized or a review, it's just to recommend you to go for it, less than one hour and thirty minutes. Trust me; you would be benefitted to survive in this vastly spread cyber world that we can't even escape. Happy Watching!!