HSBC Trojan warning tracked down as false alarm A false alert left users of Kaspersky's internet security software fearing there was malware on HSBC's website last weekend. Users of Kaspersky Internet Security logging onto HSBC's Personal Internet Banking site were incorrectly informed that a malicious file containing the HTLM-Agent-CE Trojan had been loaded onto their …
As the person who reported this to The Reg and by phone to HSBC, it was a nuisance as I was trying to pay a bill - but the payment recipient's web site also has a bill paying function, so I swapped to that. And HSBC did indeed fix the problem within the hour that they told me was their target. Its 47 years ago at about this time of the year when my Dad took me into the branch of the Midland Bank at which my parents had banked for some time (and his use of Midland I have tracked back to at least 1940 and records of very interesting transactions at that time) and said "This is my son, he is going to university. Please open an account for him". And they did.
It seems to be a week for over-sensitivity. Trying to purchase a National Express coach ticket online yesterday, Firefox's NoScript (in an XP system with FF3.5.2) completely blocked me when I tried to move to the payment stage - claimed a potential XSS cross site scripting attack. Moving to a Win2K system with FF3.0.13 and no NoScript I completed the transaction - and the system isn't showing any sign of distress (yet).
Does anyone else feel irritated like me about the way their website empties the login textboxes on onload, wiping about credentials you've already entered? Or the way they don't email notify you of responses to secure messages? Or how they don't let you see secure messages you've sent to them? Or their failure to fix a SQL injection problem? Still, that's nothing compared to the 78-day saga I had in moving my ISA from a variable to fixed-rate account (both with them!). Well done bankers!
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