OSAKA - Japanese brokerage IwaiCosmo Securities Co. on Wednesday said a malicious third party was behind a cyberattack on a contracted system provider that allowed unauthorized trades, leaving the possibility open that artificial intelligence was used.
The securities firm said earlier in the day that there had been a "malicious" third-party use of AI to launch a full-scale cyberattack exploiting system vulnerabilities.
IwaiCosmo later retracted its claim blaming AI as the cause has yet to be identified, with Trade Works Co., which operates and maintains the online trading system, saying that it could not say for sure that AI was to blame.
Buy and sell orders were placed through seven customer accounts, with transactions executed in five of them. The Osaka-based brokerage restored the affected accounts, returning each to its state before the unauthorized trades.
According to IwaiCosmo, such trades were ordered after Trade Works was hit by an unauthorized access incident. It has confirmed that the names and email addresses of 4,975 customers were leaked.
