US-based mining company NioCorp Developments informed the SEC on Wednesday that it recently lost a significant amount of money after its systems were hacked.
NioCorp, which is currently developing a critical minerals project in the United States, revealed that it discovered a cybersecurity incident on February 14. The incident involved a breach of its information systems, including a portion of its email systems.
Based on NioCorp’s brief description, the attacker leveraged the compromised email system for what appears to be a business email compromise (BEC) scheme that resulted in “misdirected vendor payments” totaling roughly $500,000.
Hackers likely used their access to the company’s emails to send legitimate-looking messages designed to convince the recipient to redirect payments to or from a vendor to a bank account controlled by the cybercriminals.
The company has notified financial institutions and law enforcement in an effort to recover the money. Its investigation into the incident is ongoing.
“Although the Company believes that the cybersecurity incident is limited to the misdirected vendor payments, the Company’s investigation of the cybersecurity incident remains ongoing and the full scope, nature and impact of the cybersecurity incident are not yet known,” NioCorp told the SEC.
It added, “As of the date of this filing, the Company has not yet determined whether the cybersecurity incident is reasonably likely to materially impact the Company’s overall financial condition or its results of operations, including whether the Company will ultimately be able to recover all or a portion of the misdirected vendor payments.”
Every year the FBI releases a report on cybercrime losses, including losses caused by BEC scams. According to the agency, BEC attacks caused losses totaling $2.9 billion in 2023 and $55 billion between 2013 and 2023.
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