Tag: vulnerabilities
Cybercriminals ramp up AI-driven deepfake scams
Cyber toolkits for threat actors are now harnessing the latest deepfake technology and artificial intelligence (AI) for targeted email attacks, known as ‘spear-phishing.’ According to cloud cybersecurity firm Egress, a staggering 82 percent of phishing toolkits mentioned deepfakes, and 75 percent referenced AI. The growing threat presented by the use of deepfakes by cybercriminals was highlighted earlier this year at InfoSecurity Europe in London. Widely available toolkits now enable even relatively unskilled hackers to create highly convincing video and audio clips of chief executives (CEOs) and other senior staff members in any specific organization. All the threat actor needs is a short video clip of the person they wish to impersonate. This can easily be copied from a corporate seminar or from a video podcast.
Latest Microsoft outage ‘triggered’ by a cyber-attack
A second outage of several Microsoft services in two weeks, this one attributed to a cyber-attack, is fuelling further questions about the underlying security of the Windows operating system. According to Microsoft: "While the initial trigger event was a Distributed Denial-of-Service (DDoS) attack... initial investigations suggest that an error in the implementation of our defenses amplified the impact of the attack rather than mitigating it.” Services affected included Outlook, Azure, and Microsoft 365, with some people complaining on social media that they were unable to work. Starbucks customers also reported issues with the Starbucks app in Boston, New York, Washington DC, Dallas, Chicago, Los Angeles, Tampa and other cities. The disruption caused by this latest outage is, however, minor compared with the Windows outage caused by a mishandled CrowdStrike security upgrade, which resulted in canceled flights and marooned passengers in major international airports around the world last week.
Adobe Applies Patches to Critical Flaws – June 12th
Yesterday, June 11th, Adobe announced that they rolled out security patches for 6 critical vulnerabilities affecting Adobe After Effects, Photoshop, and Illustrator. According to Adobe, the vulnerabilities could have led to successful arbitrary code execution and/or memory leaks in the current user's context.
Organizations’ staff are their biggest security risk
Careless employees are the main root cause of data loss in organizations. According to the cybersecurity and compliance company Proofpoint, almost three-quarters (74 percent) of CISOs believe human error is their biggest cyber vulnerability. This is up from 60 percent in 2023 and 56 percent in 2022. Even more (80 percent) believe human risk and employee negligence will be the key cybersecurity concerns for the next two years. “Our research shows that CISOs generally believe their people are aware of their critical role in defending the business from cyber threats. That CISOs still see their people as the primary risk factor suggests a disconnect between employees’ understanding of cyber threats and their ability to keep them at bay,” says Proofpoint.
Rise in ‘brute force’ attacks on VPNs
The past four weeks have seen a sharp global increase in ‘brute force’ attacks on virtual private network (VPN) services, which supply private networks using encryption over the internet. ‘Brute force’ attacks use trial and error to crack passwords, login credentials, and encryption keys. New life has been breathed into what is an old hacking technique with widely available software using artificial intelligence (AI) that can carry out large numbers of attempts automatically. Cisco Talos Intelligence Group reports a sharp rise worldwide in this type of attack against targets, including virtual private network (VPN) services and web authentication interfaces. “Cisco Talos has been actively monitoring a global increase in brute-force attacks against a variety of targets, including Virtual Private Network (VPN) services, web application authentication interfaces, and SSH services since at least March 18, 2024. The traffic related to these attacks has increased with time and is likely to continue to rise,” predicts Cisco Talos
‘INC Ransom’ Group Threatens to Release NHS Data – March 28th
The 'INC Ransom' ransomware group publicly threatened to release three terabytes of NHS Scotland sensitive patient and staff data, after publishing a smaller sample size proving the viability of the threat. NHS Dumfries and Galloway's efforts to prevent the attack from being repeated are underway in collaboration with Police Scotland and the National Cyber Security Centre (NCSC).
North Korea Continues Crypto Theft Campaign – December 4th
A joint advisory by the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI), the Environmental Protection Agency, and the Cybersecurity Infrastructure and Security Agency (CISA) announced the Iranian-based threat actor group “Cyber Av3ngers” compromised over 200 internet-connected devices in the US. Suspected to be anti-Israeli by motive, the “Cyber Av3ngers” group was behind the Pennsylvania Water Authority hacks, disrupting an industrial control device that was made in Israel.
Palo Alto Networks Acquires Talon Cyber Security – November 8th
Palo Alto Networks announced its purchase of Talon Cyber Security for $625 million to ramp up its merger and acquisition efforts. Palo Alto Networks credited the acquisition of Talon to its ability to navigate the challenges of today's connected digital environments.