不用帶頭罩就能搶銀行？

Once upon a time, bank robbers wore balaclavas and dug tunnels. No longer. Three months ago, the world experienced the biggest bank robbery in history when thieves stole $101m from the central bank of Bangladesh.

在過去，搶銀行得穿著黑頭套和挖地道。現(xiàn)在不復(fù)如此了。三個(gè)月前，孟加拉國央行被盜走1.01億美元，這是有史以來最大的銀行盜竊案。

But these 21st-century fraudsters did not use guns; instead they acquired the access code for the global cross-border bank payment messaging system known as Swift, and used these to persuade the US Federal Reserve to transfer money to their accounts. Then they tampered with the banks’ software to erase their cyber fingerprints.

但這些21世紀(jì)的罪犯并沒有用槍，而是獲得了環(huán)球銀行金融電信協(xié)會(huì)(SWIFT)的接入碼，并用這些代碼誘導(dǎo)美聯(lián)儲(chǔ)(Fed)將資金轉(zhuǎn)入他們的賬戶，然后又篡改這些銀行的軟件以消除自己的網(wǎng)絡(luò)痕跡。

That is alarming. More worrying still, this is not an isolated heist. This week Swift officials confirmed that a Vietnamese bank suffered a similar attack six months ago when robbers tried (and happily failed) to take more than $1m.

這令人震驚。不過更令人擔(dān)憂的是，這起盜竊并非孤立事件。最近SWIFT官員證實(shí)，越南的一家銀行6個(gè)月前遭遇了類似攻擊，當(dāng)時(shí)盜賊試圖轉(zhuǎn)走逾100萬美元(幸運(yùn)的是沒有成功)。

And Swift officials have now told their customers that they are investigating “multiple” cases of seemingly similar attempted breaches, using those access codes and software which erases fingerprints.

SWIFT官員現(xiàn)在向客戶表示，他們正在調(diào)查“多起”看起來類似的盜竊企圖個(gè)案，盜賊使用了那些接入碼和消除痕跡的軟件。

Unsurprisingly, this has sent shockwaves around the world and led banks such as JPMorgan to tell its employees that it is limiting access to Swift codes. In a 21st-century version of Bonnie and Clyde , this would be the moment when spooky music starts to play and bankers fear that robbers are in the vaults with a magic key capable of unpicking their locks.

并不令人意外的是，這在全世界引發(fā)沖擊波，促使摩根大通(JPMorgan)等銀行告訴其員工，將限制獲得SWIFT代碼。在21世紀(jì)版本的《雌雄大盜》(Bonnie and Clyde)里，這時(shí)候應(yīng)該會(huì)有陰森可怖的音樂響起，銀行家擔(dān)心盜賊們用一把神奇鑰匙打開門進(jìn)入金庫。

How should the financial world respond? There are at least two clear priorities. First, this saga shows why global regulators and private sector financial officials urgently need to improve their level of cyber defence.

金融世界應(yīng)該如何回應(yīng)?這里至少有兩個(gè)明顯的當(dāng)務(wù)之急。首先，這個(gè)故事表明，為何全球監(jiān)管機(jī)構(gòu)和私人部門金融官員亟需提高網(wǎng)絡(luò)防御水平。

In recent years, cyber defences at most large western banks have improved; indeed, what is striking about the situation on Wall Street, say, is just how few cyber attacks actually succeed, given that the largest financial institutions are now suffering “tens of thousands” of attacks every minute according to one bank chief executive.

近年，西方多數(shù)大銀行的網(wǎng)絡(luò)防御水平有所改善;的確，鑒于一位銀行業(yè)高管表示，各大金融機(jī)構(gòu)現(xiàn)在每分鐘遭受“數(shù)萬次”攻擊，華爾街真正引人注目的一點(diǎn)是網(wǎng)絡(luò)攻擊很少成功。

But while the level of security at individual banks is high, cross-border co-operation is often slow and there are some surprising gaps in the system. This week, for example, insurance industry executives in London alleged that barely a tenth of financial groups have effective insurance against cyber hacking. The legal framework to prosecute hackers is also very patchy and information-sharing between banks is often poor. And while the central banks in the UK and Sweden have demanded that private sector banks now strengthen surveillance of their Swift codes, there has been little public response from governments in emerging market.

但是盡管個(gè)別銀行的安全水平很高，但跨境合作往往遲緩，而且這個(gè)系統(tǒng)存在一些意外漏洞。例如，最近倫敦保險(xiǎn)業(yè)高管宣稱，只有十分之一的金融集團(tuán)針對(duì)網(wǎng)絡(luò)黑客的風(fēng)險(xiǎn)安排了有效保險(xiǎn)。起訴黑客的法律框架也很不完善，而且銀行間往往不會(huì)共享信息。盡管英國和瑞典的央行要求私人部門銀行強(qiáng)化對(duì)SWIFT代碼的控管，但新興市場的政府幾乎沒有公開回應(yīng)。

The second, related lesson from these heists is that regulators and investors alike need to pay more attention to the “nodes” of the financial system; after all, a chain is only as strong as its weakest link. And the Swift link is one node that deserves far more scrutiny — and public debate.

其次，與這些盜竊相關(guān)的教訓(xùn)是，監(jiān)管機(jī)構(gòu)和投資者都需要更加注意金融系統(tǒng)的“節(jié)點(diǎn)”;畢竟，一根鏈條的強(qiáng)度就是其最薄弱環(huán)節(jié)的強(qiáng)度。SWIFT環(huán)節(jié)就是一個(gè)值得加大關(guān)注和公共辯論的節(jié)點(diǎn)。

The group, officially called the Society for Worldwide Interbank Financial Telecommunication, was set up in 1973, as a non-profit co-operative in Brussels, owned by its 10,000-odd member banks. Until recently, its messaging network seemed so mind-numbingly dull that it rarely attracted attention. But while Swift has just 2,400 employees (and revenues of €650m) it punches way above its size in geopolitical terms: its messages are used to transmit around half of all high-value cross-border payments.

SWIFT的官方名稱是環(huán)球銀行金融電信協(xié)會(huì)(Society for Worldwide Interbank Financial Telecommunication)，成立于1973年，是一家位于布魯塞爾的非盈利合作機(jī)構(gòu)，由1萬多家會(huì)員銀行所有。直至不久前，它的金融電文交換網(wǎng)絡(luò)似乎還是枯燥得令人頭昏腦漲，以至于很少引起注意。但是盡管SWIFT只有2400名員工(和6.5億歐元收入)，但在地緣政治意義上，它的重要性大得很：在所有高價(jià)值跨境支付當(dāng)中，大約一半是利用其電文匯款的。

To some observers, this mismatch looks alarming. It raises questions, for example, about whether Swift’s corporate governance structure is sufficiently nimble and well resourced to cope with today’s fast-moving innovation. Little surprise, then, that fintech entrepreneurs argue that it is high time that Swift is replaced with something else, such as blockchain, the technology underlying bitcoin, or other systems being created by Silicon Valley whizz-kids.

對(duì)一些觀察人士來說，這種不相稱令人擔(dān)憂。例如，人們懷疑，SWIFT的企業(yè)治理結(jié)構(gòu)是否足夠靈活以及是否擁有充足資源來應(yīng)對(duì)如今日新月異的創(chuàng)新。因此并不令人意外的是，金融科技企業(yè)家辯稱，是時(shí)候用區(qū)塊鏈(blockchain)或者硅谷怪才創(chuàng)造的其他系統(tǒng)取代SWIFT了。區(qū)塊鏈?zhǔn)潜忍貛疟澈蟮募夹g(shù)。

But the problem is that these technologies are vulnerable, too; blockchain, say, has suffered its own frauds. And in a world in which US technology companies are sowing as much discord as trust, the fact that this corner of finance is still controlled by a non-American, non-profit utility is, in some senses, cheering; after all, the world needs as many platforms for neutral cross-border collaboration as possible.

但問題在于，這些技術(shù)也非常脆弱;比如區(qū)塊鏈也曾遭受欺詐。在一個(gè)美國科技公司既播種信任、也播種不和的世界里，金融的這個(gè)角落仍被美國以外的非盈利機(jī)構(gòu)控制，這個(gè)事實(shí)在某種意義上令人振奮;畢竟，世界需要盡可能多的中立跨境協(xié)作平臺(tái)。

Either way, if Swift is to have any future, it must now prove beyond doubt that its codes can be secure — and, above all, persuade its members to install better cyber locks. It is the biggest challenge in Swift’s four-decade history. We had better hope that it can meet it. If it not, (yet) another link in global finance will look alarmingly weak.

無論是那種方式，如果SWIFT想要有未來的話，它現(xiàn)在必須無可辯駁地證明其代碼是安全的，而且最重要的是說服其會(huì)員銀行提升網(wǎng)絡(luò)防御水平。在SWIFT長達(dá)40年的歷史上，這是最為艱巨的挑戰(zhàn)。我們最好還是希望，它能夠迎接這種挑戰(zhàn)，如果它應(yīng)對(duì)不了，全球金融的又一個(gè)環(huán)節(jié)將顯得極為薄弱。