GMO Founder Says Own Security Unit Flagged Flaws Before FX Server Hack
GMO Internet Group's founder Masatoshi Kumagai revealed that the company's own security unit flagged server vulnerabilities in April 2024 that were later exploited by hackers, with the warning never reaching management.
The April 2024 warning was never passed to management, and four emergency fixes left the problem in place. Masatoshi Kumagai gives up 30% of monthly pay for three months as three other officers take smaller reductions.
The service, Onamae.com Desktop Cloud, rented out Windows servers that run MetaTrader around the clock. Up to 26,739 servers may have been exposed, and brokers confirmed that hackers used stolen logins to place trades on client accounts. The service remains offline.
We were unable to put it to use in running the service.
Warning Did Not Reach Management
Kumagai told a news conference in Tokyo that subsidiary GMO Cyber Security by Ierae reported a vulnerability in April 2024, according to Nikkei. Four rounds of emergency maintenance in April and May that year did not fix the underlying problem.
The 2024 report was not passed up to management under the group's internal reporting rules, Kumagai said, adding that the group is discussing how to change the way information is shared.
Pay Cuts Reach the Unit
Tadashi Ito, deputy to the group chief executive and president of GMO Internet, takes a 25% cut. Hirofumi Yamashita and Kimihiro Kodama, two senior officers of the same subsidiary, take 20% each.
All four cuts start with December pay and run for three months. GMO said in its filing that the cuts reflect its current assessment and that it will reconsider how management should take responsibility once it has verified how the breach happened.
The group has already offered ¥5,000 (about $31) to every user of the service and promised to repay realized losses from unauthorized trades. It said it would publish the claims procedure by Friday, and in a stock exchange filing last Wednesday it said the total cost cannot yet be calculated.
Brokers Report Unrelated Issues
Two of the brokers whose clients were hit by the breach told customers today about separate problems that neither tied to the hack. OANDA Japan said a system failure at its partner bank, docomo SMTB Net Bank, is blocking its withdrawal instructions.
Clients who asked for payouts between 11:00 on Friday and 11:00 today are affected, and the bank has given no time for a fix. Payouts due today will be sent again on Wednesday, without clients having to reapply.
FXTF, which runs more than 280,000 accounts, said a setting error made its MT4 platform check client margin at 13:30 instead of the usual window between 15:30 and 15:45. The check tests whether an account holds more than 100% of the required margin.
OANDA also said new accounts requested since Friday will take three to four business days to open, citing internal workload. The company continues to deal with fallout from the security breach that affected its clients.
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