2022

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Hacktivism and DDOS Attacks Rise Dramatically in 2022

Lohrman on Security

2022 has brought a surge in distributed denial-of-service attacks as well as a dramatic rise in patriotic hacktivism. What’s ahead for these trends as the year continues?

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Zero Trust and the Failure of Sampling: Two Important Cybersecurity Trends

Joseph Steinberg

Last week, I attended an excellent briefing given by Tom Gillis, Senior Vice President and General Manager of VMware’s Networking and Advanced Security Business Group, in which he discussed various important cybersecurity-related trends that he and his team have observed. Gillis shared how VMware’s customers’ attitudes towards security appear to be evolving in light of both recent developments within the cybersecurity industry and events going on in the world at large; among the developmen

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Inserting a Backdoor into a Machine-Learning System

Schneier on Security

Interesting research: “ ImpNet: Imperceptible and blackbox-undetectable backdoors in compiled neural networks , by Tim Clifford, Ilia Shumailov, Yiren Zhao, Ross Anderson, and Robert Mullins: Abstract : Early backdoor attacks against machine learning set off an arms race in attack and defence development. Defences have since appeared demonstrating some ability to detect backdoors in models or even remove them.

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The Cybersecurity Skills Gap is Another Instance of Late-stage Capitalism

Daniel Miessler

It’s common to hear that it’s hard to get into cybersecurity, and that this is a problem. That seems to be true, but it’s informative to ask a simple follow-up: The current cybersecurity jobs gap sits at around 2.7 million people. A problem for who? I think what we’re facing is an instance of the Two-Worlds Problem that’s now everywhere in US society.

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Prevent Data Breaches With Zero-Trust Enterprise Password Management

Keeper Security is transforming cybersecurity for people and organizations around the world. Keeper’s affordable and easy-to-use solutions are built on a foundation of zero-trust and zero-knowledge security to protect every user on every device. Our next-generation privileged access management solution deploys in minutes and seamlessly integrates with any tech stack to prevent breaches, reduce help desk costs and ensure compliance.

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How Phishers Are Slinking Their Links Into LinkedIn

Krebs on Security

If you received a link to LinkedIn.com via email, SMS or instant message, would you click it? Spammers, phishers and other ne’er-do-wells are hoping you will, because they’ve long taken advantage of a marketing feature on the business networking site which lets them create a LinkedIn.com link that bounces your browser to other websites, such as phishing pages that mimic top online brands (but chiefly Linkedin’s parent firm Microsoft ).

Phishing 347
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What Is a Firewall and Do you Need One?

Adam Levin

A firewall is a network security device or program designed to prevent unauthorized and malicious internet traffic from entering a private network or device. It is a digital safety barrier between public and private internet connections, allowing non-threatening traffic in and keeping malicious traffic out, which in theory includes malware and hackers.

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Sending Spammers to Password Purgatory with Microsoft Power Automate and Cloudflare Workers KV

Troy Hunt

How best to punish spammers? I give this topic a lot of thought because I spend a lot of time sifting through the endless rubbish they send me. And that's when it dawned on me: the punishment should fit the crime - robbing me of my time - which means that I, in turn, need to rob them of their time. With the smallest possible overhead on my time, of course.

Passwords 363
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The Top 23 Security Predictions for 2023 (Part 1)

Lohrman on Security

After a year full of data breaches, ransomware attacks and real-world cyber impacts stemming from Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, what’s next? Here’s part 1 of your annual roundup of security industry forecasts for 2023 and beyond.

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SHARED INTEL: The cybersecurity sea change coming with the implementation of ‘CMMC’

The Last Watchdog

Finally, Uncle Sam is compelling companies to take cybersecurity seriously. Related: How the Middle East paved the way to CMMC. Cybersecurity Maturity Model Certification version 2.0 could take effect as early as May 2023 mandating detailed audits of the cybersecurity practices of any company that hopes to do business with the Department of Defense.

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New Paper: “Future Of The SOC: Process Consistency and Creativity: a Delicate Balance” (Paper 3 of…

Anton on Security

New Paper: “Future Of The SOC: Process Consistency and Creativity: a Delicate Balance” (Paper 3 of 4) Sorry, it took us a year (long story), but paper #3 in Deloitte/Google collaboration on SOC is finally out. Enjoy “Future Of The SOC: Process Consistency and Creativity: a Delicate Balance” [PDF]. If you missed them, the previous papers are: “Future of the SOC: Forces shaping modern security operations” [PDF] (Paper 1 of 4) “Future of the SOC: SOC People?

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Optimizing The Modern Developer Experience with Coder

Many software teams have migrated their testing and production workloads to the cloud, yet development environments often remain tied to outdated local setups, limiting efficiency and growth. This is where Coder comes in. In our 101 Coder webinar, you’ll explore how cloud-based development environments can unlock new levels of productivity. Discover how to transition from local setups to a secure, cloud-powered ecosystem with ease.

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Writing the perfect resignation letter

Javvad Malik

Over here in the UK we’ve had dozens of MPs (members of parliament) tender their resignation over the last day or so. While I’m not interested in politics, seeing so many resignation letters did provide me with the template to create the perfect letter. It consists of a few steps. 1. Yellow paper (not the white one peasants write on). 2.

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“Cybersecurity For Dummies” Second Edition Now Available

Joseph Steinberg

The second edition of Cybersecurity For Dummies , Joseph Steinberg’s best-selling introductory-level book about cybersecurity, is now available. Like its first-edition counterpart, CyberSecurity For Dummies: Second Edition is written for general audiences, and can help people of all backgrounds stay cyber-secure, regardless of their technical skillsets.

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Recovering Smartphone Voice from the Accelerometer

Schneier on Security

Yet another smartphone side-channel attack: “ EarSpy: Spying Caller Speech and Identity through Tiny Vibrations of Smartphone Ear Speakers “: Abstract: Eavesdropping from the user’s smartphone is a well-known threat to the user’s safety and privacy. Existing studies show that loudspeaker reverberation can inject speech into motion sensor readings, leading to speech eavesdropping.

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My Philosophy and Recommendations Around the LastPass Breaches

Daniel Miessler

If you follow Information Security at all you are surely aware of the LastPass breach situation. It started back in August of 2022 as a fairly common breach notification on a blog, but it, unfortunately, turned into more of a blog series. The initial blog was on August 25th, saying there was a breach, but it wasn’t so bad because they had no access to customer data or password vaults: Two weeks ago, we detected some unusual activity within portions of the LastPass development environment.

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The Tumultuous IT Landscape Is Making Hiring More Difficult

After a year of sporadic hiring and uncertain investment areas, tech leaders are scrambling to figure out what’s next. This whitepaper reveals how tech leaders are hiring and investing for the future. Download today to learn more!

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FBI’s Vetted Info Sharing Network ‘InfraGard’ Hacked

Krebs on Security

InfraGard , a program run by the U.S. Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) to build cyber and physical threat information sharing partnerships with the private sector, this week saw its database of contact information on more than 80,000 members go up for sale on an English-language cybercrime forum. Meanwhile, the hackers responsible are communicating directly with members through the InfraGard portal online — using a new account under the assumed identity of a financial industry CEO tha

Hacking 363
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Follow the 3-2-1 Rules of Data Backups

Adam Levin

When it comes to backing up your data, IT and cybersecurity experts alike consistently advise what’s known as the “3-2-1” rules, which are: Keep at least three copies of your data: The emphasis here is on at least. Backups are inherently fallible, and can fall prey to malware, ransomware, power surges, and hardware failure. The only way to make sure your data is truly secured is by having backups of your backups.

Backups 293
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Failures in Twitter’s Two-Factor Authentication System

Schneier on Security

Twitter is having intermittent problems with its two-factor authentication system: Not all users are having problems receiving SMS authentication codes, and those who rely on an authenticator app or physical authentication token to secure their Twitter account may not have reason to test the mechanism. But users have been self-reporting issues on Twitter since the weekend, and WIRED confirmed that on at least some accounts, authentication texts are hours delayed or not coming at all.

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Detecting Deepfake Audio by Modeling the Human Acoustic Tract

Schneier on Security

This is interesting research : In this paper, we develop a new mechanism for detecting audio deepfakes using techniques from the field of articulatory phonetics. Specifically, we apply fluid dynamics to estimate the arrangement of the human vocal tract during speech generation and show that deepfakes often model impossible or highly-unlikely anatomical arrangements.

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The Importance of User Roles and Permissions in Cybersecurity Software

How many people would you trust with your house keys? Chances are, you have a handful of trusted friends and family members who have an emergency copy, but you definitely wouldn’t hand those out too freely. You have stuff that’s worth protecting—and the more people that have access to your belongings, the higher the odds that something will go missing.

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Iran’s Digital Surveillance Tools Leaked

Schneier on Security

It’s Iran’s turn to have its digital surveillance tools leaked : According to these internal documents, SIAM is a computer system that works behind the scenes of Iranian cellular networks, providing its operators a broad menu of remote commands to alter, disrupt, and monitor how customers use their phones. The tools can slow their data connections to a crawl, break the encryption of phone calls, track the movements of individuals or large groups, and produce detailed metadata summari

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Hacking Automobile Keyless Entry Systems

Schneier on Security

Suspected members of a European car-theft ring have been arrested : The criminals targeted vehicles with keyless entry and start systems, exploiting the technology to get into the car and drive away. As a result of a coordinated action carried out on 10 October in the three countries involved, 31 suspects were arrested. A total of 22 locations were searched, and over EUR 1 098 500 in criminal assets seized.

Hacking 362
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Facebook Is Now Encrypting Links to Prevent URL Stripping

Schneier on Security

Some sites, including Facebook, add parameters to the web address for tracking purposes. These parameters have no functionality that is relevant to the user, but sites rely on them to track users across pages and properties. Mozilla introduced support for URL stripping in Firefox 102 , which it launched in June 2022. Firefox removes tracking parameters from web addresses automatically, but only in private browsing mode or when the browser’s Tracking Protection feature is set to strict.

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USB “Rubber Ducky” Attack Tool

Schneier on Security

The USB Rubber Ducky is getting better and better. Already, previous versions of the Rubber Ducky could carry out attacks like creating a fake Windows pop-up box to harvest a user’s login credentials or causing Chrome to send all saved passwords to an attacker’s webserver. But these attacks had to be carefully crafted for specific operating systems and software versions and lacked the flexibility to work across platforms.

Passwords 363
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IDC Analyst Report: The Open Source Blind Spot Putting Businesses at Risk

In a recent study, IDC found that 64% of organizations said they were already using open source in software development with a further 25% planning to in the next year. Most organizations are unaware of just how much open-source code is used and underestimate their dependency on it. As enterprises grow the use of open-source software, they face a new challenge: understanding the scope of open-source software that's being used throughout the organization and the corresponding exposure.

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On the Dangers of Cryptocurrencies and the Uselessness of Blockchain

Schneier on Security

Earlier this month, I and others wrote a letter to Congress, basically saying that cryptocurrencies are an complete and total disaster, and urging them to regulate the space. Nothing in that letter is out of the ordinary, and is in line with what I wrote about blockchain in 2019. In response, Matthew Green has written —not really a rebuttal—but a “a general response to some of the more common spurious objections …people make to public blockchain systems.” In it, he

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Clever Cryptocurrency Theft

Schneier on Security

Beanstalk Farms is a decentralized finance project that has a majority stake governance system: basically people have proportiona votes based on the amount of currency they own. A clever hacker used a “flash loan” feature of another decentralized finance project to borrow enough of the currency to give himself a controlling stake, and then approved a $182 million transfer to his own wallet.

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Undetectable Backdoors in Machine-Learning Models

Schneier on Security

New paper: “ Planting Undetectable Backdoors in Machine Learning Models : Abstract : Given the computational cost and technical expertise required to train machine learning models, users may delegate the task of learning to a service provider. We show how a malicious learner can plant an undetectable backdoor into a classifier. On the surface, such a backdoored classifier behaves normally, but in reality, the learner maintains a mechanism for changing the classification of any input, with

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You Can Now Ask Google to Remove Your Phone Number, Email or Address from Search Results

Krebs on Security

Google said this week it is expanding the types of data people can ask to have removed from search results, to include personal contact information like your phone number, email address or physical address. The move comes just months after Google rolled out a new policy enabling people under the age of 18 (or a parent/guardian) to request removal of their images from Google search results.

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Beware of Pixels & Trackers on U.S. Healthcare Websites

The healthcare industry has massively adopted web tracking tools, including pixels and trackers. Tracking tools on user-authenticated and unauthenticated web pages can access personal health information (PHI) such as IP addresses, medical record numbers, home and email addresses, appointment dates, or other info provided by users on pages and thus can violate HIPAA Rules that govern the Use of Online Tracking Technologies by HIPAA Covered Entities and Business Associates.

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Bypassing Two-Factor Authentication

Schneier on Security

These techniques are not new, but they’re increasingly popular : …some forms of MFA are stronger than others, and recent events show that these weaker forms aren’t much of a hurdle for some hackers to clear. In the past few months, suspected script kiddies like the Lapsus$ data extortion gang and elite Russian-state threat actors (like Cozy Bear, the group behind the SolarWinds hack) have both successfully defeated the protection. […].

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Top-Ranked New Jersey School District Cancels Final Exams Following Ransomware Cyberattack

Joseph Steinberg

The Tenafly, New Jersey, Public School District has canceled final exams for its high school students after a ransomware cyberattack crippled the district’s computer infrastructure. In addition to having cancelled finals, the district, which ranks in many surveys as being among the top 50 school districts in the country, has been forced to revert for its final days of instruction for the 201-2022 academic year to using paper, pencils, and pre-computer-era overhead projectors instead of its usual

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Welcoming the Bulgarian Government to Have I Been Pwned

Troy Hunt

Data breaches impact us all as individuals, companies and as governments. Over the last 4 years, I've been providing additional access to data breach information in Have I Been Pwned for government agencies responsible for protecting their citizens. The access is totally free and amounts to APIs designed to search and monitor government owned domains and TLDs.

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Not All MFA is Equal, and the Differences Matter a Lot

Daniel Miessler

People are starting to get the fact that texts (SMS) are a weak form of multi-factor authentication (MFA). Fewer people know that there’s a big gap between the post-SMS MFA options as well. As I talked about in the original CASSM post , there are levels to this game. In that post we talked about 8 levels of password security, starting from using shared and weak passwords and going all the way up to passwordless.

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Software Composition Analysis: The New Armor for Your Cybersecurity

Speaker: Blackberry, OSS Consultants, & Revenera

Software is complex, which makes threats to the software supply chain more real every day. 64% of organizations have been impacted by a software supply chain attack and 60% of data breaches are due to unpatched software vulnerabilities. In the U.S. alone, cyber losses totaled $10.3 billion in 2022. All of these stats beg the question, “Do you know what’s in your software?