TWINO: ‘8% investors affected by cyberattack’

Peer-to-peer lending platform TWINO was the target of a cyberattack on 15 and 16 October. An unauthorized third party got access to personal data of investors. According to the platform, around 8 percent of current investors are affected.

TWINO is a Latvian peer-to-peer lending platform, that was founded in 2009. It is active in six countries. It currently has over 58,000 registered users, who have invested around 1 billion euros in total.

Vulnerability fixed on October 17

In a recent blog post, TWINO apologized for the fact that it was not able to fully protect user data from the cyberattack. On 15 and 16 October, a series of cyberattacks was carried out against the platform. It was identified by TWINO’s IT specialists on 16 October, and action was taken to limit impact. Analysis later showed that personal data of 8 percent of users had been accessed.

Attackers did not access accounts nor carry out unauthorized transactions

A day later, the affected data and users were identified and according to TWINO, the vulnerability was fixed. Attackers did not access investor accounts, no passwords were obtained and no unauthorized transactions or withdrawals were made.

AI-driven attacks

The platform mentioned that cyberattacks have changed, as autonomous AI agents can now scan systems and plan their own attacks. Financial institutions in Japan and South Korea reported attacks that were carried out with these tools. According to TWINO, its preliminary findings indicate that a similar autonomous AI-tool was used in the attack.

“AI-driven attacks are a reality that the entire financial sector must prepare for – this does not reduce our responsibility, and we are adapting our defenses accordingly”, reads the blog post. The platform announced that it is implementing additional technical and organizational security measures.