5 Critical Steps to Recover From a Ransomware Attack
Hackers are increasingly using ransomware as an effective tool to disrupt businesses and fund malicious activities. A recent analysis by cybersecurity company Group-IB revealed ransomware attacks doubled in 2020, while Cybersecurity Venture predicts that a ransomware attack will occur every 11 seconds in 2021. Businesses must prepare for the possibility
North Korea Exploited VPN Flaw to Hack South’s Nuclear Research Institute
South Korea’s state-run Korea Atomic Energy Research Institute (KAERI) on Friday disclosed that its internal network was infiltrated by suspected attackers operating out of its northern counterpart. The intrusion is said to have taken place on May 14 through a vulnerability in an unnamed virtual private network (VPN) vendor and
Cyber espionage by Chinese hackers in neighbouring nations is on the rise
A string of cyber espionage campaigns dating all the way back to 2014 and focused on gathering military intelligence from neighbouring countries have been linked to a Chinese military-intelligence apparatus. In a wide-ranging report published by Massachusetts-headquartered Recorded Future this week, the cybersecurity firm’s Insikt Group said it identified ties
Russia bans VyprVPN, Opera VPN services for not complying with blacklist request
Russia’s telecommunications and media regulator Roskomnadzor (RKN) on Thursday introduced restrictions on the operation of VyprVPN and Opera VPN services in the country. “In accordance with the regulation on responding to threats to circumvent restrictions on access to child pornography, suicidal, pro-narcotic and other prohibited content, restrictions on the use
Molerats Hackers Return With New Attacks Targeting Middle Eastern Governments
A Middle Eastern advanced persistent threat (APT) group has resurfaced after a two-month hiatus to target government institutions in the Middle East and global government entities associated with geopolitics in the region in a rash of new campaigns observed earlier this month. Sunnyvale-based enterprise security firm Proofpoint attributed the activity
Ukraine Police Arrest Cyber Criminals Behind Clop Ransomware Attacks
Ukrainian law enforcement officials on Wednesday announced the arrest of the Clop ransomware gang, adding it disrupted the infrastructure employed in attacks targeting victims worldwide since at least 2019. As part of a joint operation between the National Police of Ukraine and authorities from the Republic of Korea and the
Chinese Hackers Believed to be Behind Second Cyberattack on Air India
Even as a massive data breach affecting Air India came to light the previous month, India’s flag carrier airline appears to have suffered a separate cyber assault that lasted for a period of at least two months and 26 days, new research has revealed, which attributed the incident with moderate
Google Workspace Now Offers Client-side Encryption For Drive and Docs
Google on Monday announced that it’s rolling out client-side encryption to Google Workspace (formerly G Suite), thereby giving its enterprise customers direct control of encryption keys and the identity service they choose to access those keys. “With client-side encryption, customer data is indecipherable to Google, while users can continue to
Live Cybersecurity Webinar — Deconstructing Cobalt Strike
Organizations’ cybersecurity capabilities have improved over the past decade, mostly out of necessity. As their defenses get better, so do the methods, tactics, and techniques malicious actors devise to penetrate their environments. Instead of the standard virus or trojan, attackers today will deploy a variety of tools and methods to
Hackers Can Exploit Samsung Pre-Installed Apps to Spy On Users
Multiple critical security flaws have been disclosed in Samsung’s pre-installed Android apps, which, if successfully exploited, could have allowed adversaries access to personal data without users’ consent and take control of the devices. “The impact of these bugs could have allowed an attacker to access and edit the victim’s contacts,
Mozilla Says Google’s New Ad Tech—FLoC—Doesn’t Protect User Privacy
Google’s upcoming plans to replace third-party cookies with a less invasive ad targeted mechanism have a number of issues that could defeat its privacy objectives and allow for significant linkability of user behavior, possibly even identifying individual users. “FLoC is premised on a compelling idea: enable ad targeting without exposing
Emerging Ransomware Targets Dozens of Businesses Worldwide
An emerging ransomware strain in the threat landscape claims to have breached 30 organizations in just four months since it went operational, riding on the coattails of a notorious ransomware syndicate. First observed in February 2021, “Prometheus” is an offshoot of another well-known ransomware variant called Thanos, which was previously
Crypto-Mining Attacks Targeting Kubernetes Clusters via Kubeflow Instances
Cybersecurity researchers on Tuesday disclosed a new large-scale campaign targeting Kubeflow deployments to run malicious cryptocurrency mining containers. The campaign involved deploying TensorFlow pods on Kubernetes clusters, with the pods running legitimate TensorFlow images from the official Docker Hub account. However, the container images were configured to execute rogue commands
Feds Secretly Ran a Fake Encrypted Chat App and Busted Over 800 Criminals
In a huge sting operation, the U.S. Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) and Australian Federal Police (AFP) ran an “encrypted chat” service called ANoM for almost 3 years to intercept 27 million messages between criminal gang members globally. Dubbed Operation Ironside (AFP), Operation Greenlight (Europol), and Operation Trojan Shield (FBI),
Shifting the focus from reactive to proactive, with human-led secure coding
The same 10 software vulnerabilities have caused more security breaches in the last 20+ years than any others. And yet, many businesses still opt for post-breach, post-event remediation, muddling through the human and business ramifications of it all. But now, a new research study points to a new, human-led direction.
TikTok Quietly Updated Its Privacy Policy to Collect Users’ Biometric Data
Popular short-form video-sharing service TikTok quietly revised its privacy policy in the U.S., allowing it to automatically collect biometric information such as faceprints and voiceprints from the content its users post on the platform. The policy change, first spotted by TechCrunch, went into effect on June 2. TikTok users who
GitHub Updates Policy to Remove Exploit Code When Used in Active Attacks
Code-hosting platform GitHub Friday officially announced a series of updates to the site’s policies that delve into how the company deals with malware and exploit code uploaded to its service. “We explicitly permit dual-use security technologies and content related to research into vulnerabilities, malware, and exploits,” the Microsoft-owned company said.
Google to Let Android Users Opt-Out to Stop Ads From Tracking Them
Google is tightening the privacy practices that could make it harder for apps on Android phones and tablets to track users who have opted out of receiving personalized interest-based ads. The change will go into effect sometime in late 2021. The development, which mirrors Apple’s move to enable iPhone and