Reuters reported that in one of the biggest ever bank heists, a global cyber crime ring stole $45 million from two Middle Eastern banks by hacking into credit card processing firms and withdrawing money from ATMs in 27 countries, U.S. prosecutors said on Thursday.

The U.S. Justice Department accused eight men of allegedly forming the New York-based cell of the organization, and said seven of them have been arrested. The eighth, allegedly a leader of the cell, was reported to have been murdered in the Dominican Republic on April 27.

The ringleaders are believed to be outside the United States but prosecutors declined to give details, citing the ongoing investigation. What’s clear is the sheer scope and speed of the crimes: in one of the attacks, in just over 10 hours, $40 million was raided from ATMs in 24 countries involving 36,000 transactions.

“In the place of guns and masks, this cyber crime organization used laptops and the Internet,” U.S. Attorney for the Eastern District of New York Loretta Lynch said at a news conference. “Moving as swiftly as data over the Internet, the organization worked its way from the computer systems of international corporations to the streets of New York City.”

The case demonstrates the major threat that cyber crime poses to banks around the world. It also shows how increasingly international and sophisticated criminal gangs have become, particularly those using the Internet.

Prosecutors highlighted the “surgical precision” of these hackers, the global nature of their organization, and the speed and coordination with which they executed operations in 27 countries.

As technology applications increase, we will actually face more of a lockdown than the Internet freedom we started off with? Hacking, cyber theft are becoming too common nowadays. Maybe we shouldn’t have anything online, not subscribe to any forums, delete our social networks and just use a dumb phone. Sadly, that wouldn’t help. We all have bank accounts. Banks store are personal data, and that will get stolen by hackers at some point.

Maybe the ultimate solution is cash under the bed and a dumb phone? What do you think?