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A Russian hacker who breached the security of RBS’ WorldPay service and stole $9m (£6m) has had his property sold to compensate the bank.

Viktor Pleshchuk’s two flats and two cars, a BMW and a Lada, were auctioned off in Saint Petersburg on Monday.

According to a Russian news portal RIA Novosti, the sale raised 10m roubles (£200,000).

It reported that the money had been transferred to RBS, something the bank was unable to confirm.

Mr Pleshchuk and seven other Eastern European hackers managed to get their hands on the personal data of thousands of RBS customers in 2008.

They used the information to create fake debit cards and withdraw huge amounts of cash from ATMs in as many as 280 cities around the world.

The money was taken from 2,100 bank cash machines within 12 hours in the US, Russia, Estonia, Italy, Hong Kong, Japan and Canada.

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Dutch security firm DigiNotar has filed for voluntary bankruptcy following a series of attacks by a hacker.

The attackers penetrated DigiNotar’s internal systems and then issued fake security certificates so they could impersonate web firms.

The certificates are believed to have been used to eavesdrop on the Google email accounts of about 300,000 people.

The hacker behind the attacks claims to have penetrated four other firms that issue security certificates.

No tears

DigiNotar’s parent company Vasco Data Security said the firm had been put into voluntary bankruptcy. A trustee for the business has been appointed who will oversee the winding up of DigiNotar.

The scale of the attack on DigiNotar began to be uncovered on 19 July when the firm said it first found evidence of an intrusion. It started to revoke certificates and an investigation was carried out to find out how much damage had been done.

An initial report found that hundreds of fake certificates had been issued and hackers had almost total access to DigiNotar’s network.

The security certificates it and many other firms issue act as a guarantee of identity so people can be sure they are connecting to the site they think they are.

The fake certificates DigiNotar revoked were for some of the biggest net firms including Google, Facebook, Twitter and Skype.

It is thought the fake certificates for Google were used in Iran to peep at the email accounts of about 300,000 people.

Soon after discovering the attack, DigiNotar stopped issuing certificates altogether. Once wound up, its business and assets will be folded into Vasco.

“We are working to quantify the damages caused by the hacker’s intrusion into DigiNotar’s system and will provide an estimate of the range of losses as soon as possible, ” said Vasco in a statement.

It added that its network and systems remained separate from DigiNotar and, as a result, “there is no risk for infection of Vasco’s strong authentication business”.

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Mitsubishi Heavy Industries, Japan’s biggest defense contractor, has revealed that it suffered a hacker attack in August that caused some of its networks to be infected by malware.

The firm – which is involved in a wide range of activities including space rockets, the production of jet fighters, shipbuilding, and running nuclear power plants – said that 45 network servers and 38 PCs became infected with malware at ten facilities across Japan.

The infected sites included its submarine manufacturing plant in Kobe and the Nagoya Guidance & Propulsion System Works, which makes engine parts for missiles.

The Japanese newspaper Yomiuri claimed that at least eight different pieces of malware, including some which stole data, were discovered at Mitsubishi sites.

A Mitsubishi spokesperson, however, was quoted as saying that “there is no possibility of any leakage of defense-related information at this point.”

The company first noticed the attack on August 11th, and expects to have the results of an investigation into the security breach by the end of September.

If Mitsubishi Heavy Industries was targeted by hackers, the obvious question to ask is who was behind the attack and what was the motive?

Earlier this year we saw a series of cyber attacks against US military contractors, including Lockheed Martin, L-3 Communications and Northrop Grumman, and US Deputy Defense Secretary William Lynn publicly claimed that a foreign intelligence agency was behind a hack attack that stole classified information about a top secret weapons system.

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