A number of Australian superannuation funds have been hit with suspected cyber attacks, with members of one fund losing $500,000 between them in retirement savings.
Stressed fund members have told ABC News they can’t access their accounts, adding to the anxiety.
AustralianSuper has been hit with 600 attempted cyber attacks in the past month, ABC News understands, with four members losing half a million dollars combined.
AustralianSuper is the nation’s biggest retirement fund, with at least 3.5 million members and billions of dollars of their superannuation invested.
Super members unable to login to accounts
AustralianSuper confirmed on Friday afternoon that members had been struggling to get into their accounts, and that some accounts were showing zero funds.
“We are experiencing a high volume of traffic to our call centre, member online accounts and mobile app that is causing intermittent outages,” it said in a statement.
“Even though you may not be able to see your account, or you are seeing a $0 balance, your account is secure.
“This is a temporary situation and we’re working hard to resolve it as quickly as possible. We apologise for any inconvenience.”
Dozens of people have reported to ABC News about being unable to access their superannuation accounts online or through apps, or that it is difficult or slow to gain access.
“I assume it’s difficult to log in as everyone anxiously trying to,” one AustralianSuper member told ABC News.
“Hopefully AustralianSuper have taken steps to secure all members accounts until the threat is dealt with.”
“We are extremely concerned — we cannot access our accounts online, and there is no contact by phone,” another said.
“Very disconcerting to have $0 in your super account on a Friday,” one member experiencing this issue said.
The industry body that represents superannuation funds, Association of Superannuation Funds of Australia (ASFA), said in a statement that other funds had experienced attempted cyber attacks over the weekend.
“While the majority of the attempts were repelled, unfortunately a number of members were affected,” ASFA said in its statement.
“Funds are contacting all affected members to let them know and are helping any whose data has been compromised.”
Rest, Hostplus, Insignia and Australian Retirement were also impacted.
ABC News understands none of their members lost retirement savings, but Hostplus was still investigating. Some members of those funds are also struggling to access their accounts.
“At this stage, we believe that some of our members may have had limited personal information accessed and we are currently working through this with those impacted members,” Rest said in a statement.
PM says cyber attacks ‘a regular issue’
The prime minister just told reporters that he was aware of the cyber attacks.
“I have been informed about that,” Anthony Albanese said while on the campaign trail.
“We will respond in time. We are considering what has occurred. Bear in the mind, the context here, there is a cyber attack in Australia roughly every six minutes. This is a regular issue.”
He reiterated federal funding to tackle cyber criminal activity, which was boosted in the wake of a wave of cyber attacks on major companies including Optus, Medibank and Latitude.
In the case of Medibank, the health insurer’s members’ private and sensitive details were posted to the dark web.
The impacted superannuation funds are working with the federal bureau that tackles cyber security, the National Cyber Security Coordinator.
What are your thoughts on this concerning incident, YourLifeChoicers? Is your super fund one of those affected? Let us know below.
The benefit of having your own SMSF.
Surely these super funds will have to guarantee their members funds ? If they haven’t got proper protection against these cyber attacks, they are @ fault not the poor customers