Local Editor

"Israeli" officials announced Friday that they were concerned that the Zionist entity may be under cyber attack after a wave of credit card code thefts in the past week by a hacker who claims to be operating out of Saudi Arabia.

Credit card company officials said 14,000 numbers had been posted on line on Tuesday and another 11,000 on Thursday. However, they said some of the codes had expired and that the active cards were all being canceled.

The hacker has identified himself as OxOmar and says he is part of a Saudi Arabian hacker team. In a post on Thursday he said he had leaked information about more than 400,000 "Israelis" and said the "Jewish lobby" was hiding the scale of the attack.

"Israeli" officials say the hacker has also released e-mail addresses and passwords, but have yet to confirm where he is based.

"This incident should be treated as a cyber attack," the so-called "Israeli" Justice Ministry official Yoram Hacohen told "Maariv" daily.

The data theft was one of the worst that "Israel" has said it has faced, and while the financial damage was reportedly minimal, the breaches have heightened concerns about the potential use of stolen information by "Israel's" enemies.

"These matters are worrisome," Science and Technology Minister Daniel Hershkowitz told "Israeli" Radio, calling the incident "a sample of the great danger out in cyberspace."

On the back of the credit card theft, a parliamentary committee has scheduled a session for the coming week to review "Israel's" readiness to defend itself from cyber attacks.

"We must prepare to cope with cyber threats in anticipation of any attempts to use Internet terror to strike at "Israel"," said lawmaker Ronit Tirosh, the committee chairwoman.

The hacker wrote in his Web post: "So, I've started thinking of sending all "Israeli" credit cards I own which reaches 1M data."

"Enjoy it world! Purchase stuff for yourself online, buy anything you want," he added.

Dov Kotler, CEO of "Isracard", a unit of Bank Hapoalim , said 5,200 credit card numbers listed by the hacker on Thursday, belonged to his customers.


Source: News Agencies, Edited by moqawama.org