Every organization has data moving to the multi-cloud; digital transformation is occurring rapidly, is here to stay, and is impacting every major industry. Organizations are working hard to adopt Zero Trust architectures as their critical information, trade secrets, and business applications are no longer stored in a single datacenter or location. As a result, there
How peering into the innards of a future satellite can make cybersecurity in space more palatable Here at DEF CON 29, the Aerospace Village is alive and well, and aside from the repeated wailing of the neighboring car hacking village setting the car alarm off every 30 seconds, the hardware sitting here, called a Flat
A critical vulnerability has been disclosed in hardware random number generators used in billions of Internet of Things (IoT) devices whereby it fails to properly generate random numbers, thus undermining their security and putting them at risk of attacks. “It turns out that these ‘randomly’ chosen numbers aren’t always as random as you’d like when
Autonomous farming equipment that can be controlled remotely now helps to feed humanity. But what if that farming equipment were hacked? On August 8, at the DEF CON 29 conference, an Australian researcher known only as ‘Sick Codes‘ detailed what he referred to as a “tractor load of vulnerabilities” that, if exploited by an attacker,
by Paul Ducklin [00’26”] Timezone curiosities – when modular arithmetic gets weird [04’38”] Microsoft researcher found Apple 0-day in March, didn’t report it [13’18”] Retro computing – the TRS-80 arrived in August 1977 [19’17”] BazarCaller – the crooks who talk you into infecting yourself [33’02”] Oh! No! A billionaire… but only for 5 minutes With
In the last week there has been change, but a lot remains the same, too. First, we are now McAfee Enterprise, a pure-play enterprise cybersecurity company under the new ownership of Symphony Technology Group (STG). It’s an exciting change and true focus for our company, allowing us to concentrate on enterprise and commercial business needs.
The first in our series on IIS threats looks at a malicious IIS extension that intercepts server transactions to steal credit card information ESET researchers have discovered and analyzed a previously undocumented trojan that steals payment information from e-commerce websites’ customers. The trojan, which we named IIStealer, is detected by ESET security solutions as Win64/BadIIS.
Koo, India’s homegrown Twitter clone, recently patched a serious security vulnerability that could have been exploited to execute arbitrary JavaScript code against hundreds of thousands of its users, spreading the attack across the platform. The vulnerability involves a stored cross-site scripting flaw (also known as persistent XSS) in Koo’s web application that allows malicious scripts
There may be little if any argument about the vast impact that social media platforms have on the lives of hundreds of millions of people around the world. Social media has also had a profound influence on elections. In a session at the DEF CON 29 conference on August 7, Sebastian Bay, a researcher at
This is the third in a series of blogs on the Cybersecurity EO, and I encourage you to read those you may have missed. (Part 1, Part 2). Between the initial publication of the Executive Order (EO) for Improving the Nation’s Cybersecurity on May 12 and late July, a flurry of activity by departments and
Is the net closing in on cyber-extortionists and can bounties on their collective heads ultimately help stem the ransomware scourge? Here at Black Hat, the CISA keynote promises to deliver increased cooperation within government agencies over cybercriminals, especially those focused on critical infrastructure and ransoms against systems that might cripple the country. But that’s not
Amazon earlier this April addressed a critical vulnerability in its Kindle e-book reader platform that could have been potentially exploited to take full control over a user’s device, resulting in the theft of sensitive information by just deploying a malicious e-book. “By sending Kindle users a single malicious e-book, a threat actor could have stolen
No attack type has been as impactful as ransomware in 2021. According to a panel of experts at the DEF CON 29 conference, the rising notoriety and impact of ransomware in 2021 has accelerated the need for both government and the private sector to act—though there was no clear consensus on the panel on exactly
by Paul Ducklin If you like a touch of irony in your cybersecurity news, then this has been the week for it. Yesterday, we wrote about an exploitable security hole… …inside a hacking tool that helps you exploit security holes. Today, we’re writing about a ransomware-related data breach that leaked organisational information… …from inside a
Excel-based malware has been around for decades and has been in the limelight in recent years. During the second half of 2020, we saw adversaries using Excel 4.0 macros, an old technology, to deliver payloads to their victims. They were mainly using workbook streams via the XLSX file format. In these streams, adversaries were able to enter code straight into cells (that’s why they were called macro-formulas). Excel 4.0 also used API level functions like
Why companies and their security teams need to engage with a lawyer before an incident occurs Presentations at Black Hat often involve slides full of data or code. Rarely, or maybe never, have I seen a slide that details parts of a policy, contract or general legal text. Nick Merker, a partner at ICE Miller
Apple on Thursday said it’s introducing new child safety features in iOS, iPadOS, watchOS, and macOS as part of its efforts to limit the spread of Child Sexual Abuse Material (CSAM) in the U.S. To that effect, the iPhone maker said it intends to begin client-side scanning of images shared via every Apple device for
by Paul Ducklin If you’re a regular reader of Naked Security and Sophos News, you’ll almost certainly be familiar with Cobalt Strike, a network attack tool that’s popular with cybercriminals and malware creators. For example, by implanting the Cobalt Strike “Beacon” software on a network they’ve infiltrated, ransomware crooks can not only surreptitiously monitor but
If you are part of an organization aspiring to evolve and modernize your SecOps practice with greater efficiencies with XDR, this read is for you. So, what’s all the continuous hype about XDR? Is it for you and what does it mean to your organization? If you haven’t already, I invite you to read our
Drowning in spam? A study presented at Black Hat USA 2021 examines if sharing your personal information with major companies contributes to the deluge of nuisance emails, texts and phone calls. Every day my inbox seems to receive more and more spam. Understanding what generates it and how to avoid it is essential in the
VMware has released security updates for multiple products to address a critical vulnerability that could be exploited to gain access to confidential information. Tracked as CVE-2021-22002 (CVSS score: 8.6) and CVE-2021-22003 (CVSS score: 3.7), the flaws affect VMware Workspace One Access (Access), VMware Identity Manager (vIDM), VMware vRealize Automation (vRA), VMware Cloud Foundation, and vRealize
Summary Ransomware attacks have evolved as threat actors continually seek ways to expand the scope of their operations and increase profitability. The ransomware-as-a-service (RaaS) model became popular because the use of affiliates enables ransomware operators to attack more victims with little effort. It also created opportunities for threat actors with limited technical skills to benefit
McAfee Enterprise is pleased to announce that the Network Security Platform (NSP), our industry leading next-gen Intrusion Prevention System (IPS) solution, has been awarded Miercom Certified Secure for superior security and performance. About Miercom Miercom has been reviewing network products for over 30 years, forming standardized test programs that have grown into a worldwide evaluation
How is Black Hat USA 2021 different from the past editions of the conference and what kinds of themes may steal the show this year? Black Hat this year is, well, sparse. I get it… With masks at every turn and some attending virtually, it’s hard to have a conference, especially with the uncertainty of
Networking equipment major Cisco has rolled out patches to address critical vulnerabilities impacting its Small Business VPN routers that could be abused by a remote attacker to execute arbitrary code and even cause a denial-of-service (DoS) condition. The issues, tracked as CVE-2021-1609 (CVSS score: 9.8) and CVE-2021-1610 (CVSS score: 7.2), reside in the web-based management
The majority of insider data breaches are non-malicious, according to new research released today by American cybersecurity software company Code42 in partnership with Aberdeen Research. The report Understanding Your Insider Risk and the Value of Your Intellectual Property found that at least one in three (33%) reported data breaches involve someone with authorized access to the impacted data. A key finding of the
The Biden administration has announced the cancellation of a $10bn massive cloud-computing contract awarded to Microsoft. After Microsoft won a lengthy bidding process for the Joint Enterprise Defense Infrastructure (JEDI) cloud contract in 2019, competing contractor Amazon Web Services (AWS) complained that the decision wasn’t fair. Yesterday the DoD issued a statement declaring that the contract had passed its sell-by date
The United States has been given leave to appeal a British court’s decision not to extradite WikiLeaks founder Julian Paul Assange to America. In Westminster Magistrate’s court in January, district judge Vanessa Baraitser ruled that Australian citizen Assange should not be extradited to the United States to face 17 charges under the Espionage Act and one charge under the
Microsoft has now released a patch for all Windows versions affected by the PrintNightmare zero-day, but researchers have already found a way to bypass the fix in attacks. As predicted, Microsoft this week pushed an out-of-band patch for CVE-2021-34527, which now has a CVSS “high severity” score of 8.2. The incomplete initial release on Tuesday
The UK’s data protection regulator has launched an investigation into whether the former health secretary broke the law in using his private email account to conduct official departmental business. Concerns were raised by the Labour Party late last month after Matt Hancock resigned following leaked CCTV footage showing the married Tory MP in a romantic