Cyberattacks Affect Citizens Bank Website

An online Islamist group protesting an anti-Muslim video on YouTube is to blame for a recent series of cyberattacks against Citizens Bank and other banks, the Pittsburgh Tribune-Review reported.

Bank officials confirmed that customers have had trouble accessing mobile and online banking services due to a distributed denial of service [DDoS] attack.

Rather than attempt to break into customer accounts or otherwise violate a bank's online security, a distributed denial of service attack is intended to overwhelm a website with bogus requests so that legitimate vistors can not access it. Typically, thousands of computers ― often computers belonging to people who are unaware their machines have been compromised ― are remotely controlled by third parties in order to carry out the attack.

PNC Bank, Bank of America, and Wells Fargo are among other banks that have been affected by similar attacks in recent weeks.