Hacker cracks open over half of South Korea's bank accounts in massive data breach

South Korea is in shock again after the authorities uncovered another massive data breach, this time exposing personal information on a whopping 27 million people which was then used to swindle them out of online gaming funds.

According to The Korea Joongang Daily, a 24-year old hacker known only by the surname "Kim" broke into 220 million data records using a cache of login credentials. At the moment reports are muddled, but it seems the breach affected between 27 million and 220 million people. It is believed that the youngest victim was just 15 years old, while the oldest was 65.

Cash-hungry Kim reportedly gained these login details in 2011 by a Chinese hacker he made friends with through an online game forum. Over the years, Kim used the information to hack into several online services, such as websites selling ringtones and cinema tickets.

He then extracted personal information records from these sites, including bank details, which he sold on to mortgage fraudsters and illegal gamblers for the paltry sum of 20p each. That doesn't sound like much, but when you consider that Kim scooped up the equivalent of £235,000 in profit, the scale of his victims becomes clear.

The buyer used the creds to steal items from gaming accounts and sold off to other players. They were said to have used a hack tool dubbed "extractor" that would log into user accounts and pilfer the loot. Whenever passwords were incorrect, Kim would buy user information from South Korea identity cards and issue dates from a dodgy mobile phone provider in order to change the login information. The unscrupulous Kim also sold off the personal information to mortgage fraudsters and illegal gamblers for less than 30 cents a pop.

Police are apparently searching for seven other suspects, including the infamous Chinese hacker who effectively enabled the chain of events which led to this massive data breach. Despite the high numbers breached in this incident, it’s not the worst such exposure of personal information in the world’s most wired nation.

In 2011, 35 million people (70 per cent of the population) had their details stolen when a Cyworld, a South Korean social network and Nate, a search engine, was hacked. Earlier this year, 20 million South Koreans had their registration numbers stolen when an employee of the Korea Credit Bureau stole details of residents.