. Now , over a year later , the database has surfaced online . Its resurrection places 3.3 million Hello Kitty fans in the hot seat . On December 19 , 2015 , Salted Hash broke the news that a MongoDB installation for Sanrio , the company behind Hello Kitty , was exposed to the public . The database was discovered by security researcher Chris Vickery . Learn about top security certifications : Who they 're for , what they cost , and which you need . At the time , Sanrio speculated the exposure was due to maintenance conducted several weeks prior , on November 20 , 2015 . The database contained just over 3.3 million records from sanriotown.com , including 186,261 records assigned to people under the age of 18 . Three days after the story broke , on December 22 , 2015 , Sanrio said they investigated the problem and fixed it . “ In addition , new security measures have been applied on the server ( s ) ; and we are conducting an internal investigation and security review into this incident . To the Company ’ s current knowledge , no data was stolen or exposedAttack.Databreach, ” the statement concluded . Unfortunately , someone did copyAttack.Databreachthe database before the configuration error was fixed . On Sunday , Salted Hash learned that the Sanrio database was added to the LeakedSource index . Examining the LeakedSource records and comparing the field names to the screenshots shared by Vickery in 2015 , the data is a match . For example , both sets of data use the “ _createdFrom ” field , as well as “ dateOfBirth ” , “ gender ” , “ firstName ” , “ lastName ” , etc . In both databases , the records contain the account holder ’ s first and last name , birthday ( encoded , but easily reversed ) , gender , country of origin , email addresses , user name , password ( unsalted SHA-1 hash ) , password hint question , and the corresponding answer . However , there is a field in the LeakedSource records that is new to this story , “ incomeRange ” with values running from 0 to 150 . It isn ’ t clear what these values represent , but not every record has them . As was the case previously , the fear is that the exposed database could cause problems for those registered , especially the children . It ’ s hard enough to deal with ID theft related issues as an adult . Such issues are only compounded for children , as the problems might not materialize for several years . This is true today as well , but there ’ s no telling who followed the advice . Also , there is no way to track who had access to this database , as it ’ s been circulating out of the public eye for a least a year before it was shared with LeakedSource . Salted Hash has reached out to Sanrio for comment . Anyone with concerns about the information exposed can checkout Consumer.gov for advice on recovering from identity theft . In it , they briefly recap the events from 2015 , including their previous alert . The statement goes on to dismiss the latest news , despite sample records matching the previously exposed database . `` Recently , reports have surfaced claiming that the 2015 data breachAttack.Databreachwas not corrected . At this time , there is no evidence to support this claim . The original data breachAttack.Databreachfrom SanrioTown.com users in 2015 did not include credit card information or other payment information . Users ’ passwords are encrypted with the cryptographic hash function SHA-1 . `` SanrioTown and Sanrio Digital notified users about the incident , advising them to change their passwords . It should be noted that this current Sanrio database currently circulating onlineAttack.Databreachdoes n't have any financial data , and there have been no claims otherwise . Salted Hash has asked additional questions surrounding the sample data sharedAttack.Databreachwith Sanrio . After reviewing the sample data sets sharedAttack.Databreachby Salted Hash , Sanrio has confirmed that the data indexed by LeakedSource `` looks real '' and likely originated from the exposed database in 2015 . However , the company stopped short of confirming that LeakedSource 's records and the records exposed two years ago are one in the same . “ Sanrio Digital recently received evidence that a 2015 data breachAttack.Databreachof the SanrioTown web site involved some user data theftAttack.Databreach, ” the company said in a statement . “ At the time , we had no evidence of data theftAttack.Databreach, however we have now learned from reporter Steve Ragan of CSO Online that personal information of SanrioTown.com users was stolenAttack.Databreachduring the 2015 data breachAttack.Databreach. According to Mr. Ragan , a database containing information of 3,345,168 SanrioTown users has been circulatingAttack.Databreachsince the time of the incident . “ He received the sample records from LeakedSource containing information of 30 SanrioTown users . We have verified that these sample records appear to be real . We can not , however , relate the source of such sample records to the 2015 data breachAttack.Databreachand we are unable to verify whether the database of LeakedSource contains information of 3,345,168 SanrioTown users stolenAttack.Databreachduring the 2015 SanrioTown data breachAttack.Databreach”
Attackers h ave been phishing Attack.Phishingdevelopers as a way of compromising Chrome extensions into spreading affiliate program ads that scare victims into paying for PC repairs . Proofpoint researcher Kafeine has identified six compromised Chrome extensions that have been recently modified by an attacker after p hishing Attack.Phishinga developer 's Google Account credentials . Web Developer 0.4.9 , Chrometana 1.1.3 , Infinity New Tab 3.12.3 , Copyfish 2.8.5 , Web Paint 1.2.1 , and Social Fixer 20.1.1 were compromised in late July and early August . Kafeine believes TouchVPN and Betternet VPN were also comprised in late June with the same technique . Developers of several of the extensions h ave removed Vulnerability-related.PatchVulnerabilitythe threat in recent updates to their affected apps , including Web Developer , Copyfish , Chrometana , and Social Fixer . The main intent of the attack on Chrome extension developers is to divert Chrome users to affiliate programs and switch out legitimate ads with malicious ones , ultimately to generate money for the attacker through referrals . The attackers h ave also been gathering Attack.Databreachcredentials of users of Cloudflare , an availability service for website operators , which probably could be used in future attacks . The hijacked extensions were coded mostly to substitute banner ads on adult websites , but also a range of other sites , and to steal traffic from legitimate ad networks . `` In many cases , victims w ere presented Attack.Phishingwith fake JavaScript alerts prompting them to repair their PC , then redirecting them to affiliate programs from which the threat actors could profit , '' notes Kafeine . At least one of the affiliate programs receiving the hijacked traffic promoted PCKeeper , a Windows-focused tool originally from ZeobitLLC , the maker of the MacKeeper security product that was the subject of a class action suit a few years ago over false security claims . A snippet of JavaScript in the compromised extensions also downloaded a file that was served by Cloudflare containing code with a script designed to collect Cloudflare user credentials after login . Cloudflare stopped serving the file after it was alerted to the issue by Proofpoint . The phishing emails that compromised developers ' Google Accounts p urported to come from Attack.PhishingGoogle 's Chrome Web Store team , which claimed the developer 's extension did n't comply with its policies and would be removed unless the issue w as fixed.Vulnerability-related.PatchVulnerabilityAs Bleeping Computer recently reported , Google 's security team has sent an email warning to Chrome extension developers to be on the lookout for p hishing attacks.Attack.PhishingThe attackers h ad created Attack.Phishinga convincing copy of Google 's real account login page . It 's not the first time Chrome extensions have been targeted to spread adware and promote affiliate networks . In 2014 , adware firms bought several popular Chrome extensions from legitimate developers , which up to that point had maintained trustworthy products .
The toys -- which can receive and send voice messages from children and parents -- have been involved in a data breachAttack.Databreachdealing with more than 800,000 user accounts . The breachAttack.Databreach, which grabbed headlines on Monday , is drawing concerns from security researchers because it may have given hackers accessAttack.Databreachto voice recordings from the toy 's customers . But the company behind the products , Spiral Toys , is denying that any customers were hackedAttack.Databreach. Absolutely not , '' said Mark Meyers , CEO of the company . Security researcher Troy Hunt , who tracks data breachesAttack.Databreach, brought the incidentAttack.Databreachto light on Monday . Hackers appear to have accessedAttack.Databreachan exposed CloudPets ' database , which contained email addresses and hashed passwords , and they even sought to ransomAttack.Ransomthe information back in January , he said in a blog post . The incidentAttack.Databreachunderscores the danger with connected devices , including toys , and how data passing through them can be exposedAttack.Databreach, he added . In the case of CloudPets , the brand allegedly made the mistake of storing the customer information in a publicly exposedAttack.Databreachonline MongoDB database that required no authentication to access . That allowed anyone , including hackers , to view and stealAttack.Databreachthe data . On the plus side , the passwords exposedAttack.Databreachin the breachAttack.Databreachare hashed with the bcrypt algorithm , making them difficult to crack . Unfortunately , CloudPets placed no requirement on password strength , meaning that even a single character such as letter `` a '' was acceptable , according to Hunt , who was given a copy of the stolen data last week . As a result , Hunt was able to decipher a large number of the passwords , by simply checking them against common terms such as qwerty , 123456 , and cloudpets . `` Anyone with the data could crack a large number of passwords , log on to accounts and pull down the voice recordings , '' Hunt said in his blog post . Security researcher Victor Gevers from the GDI Foundation said he also discovered the exposed database from CloudPets and tried to contact the toy maker in late December . However , both Gevers and Hunt said the company never responded to their repeated warnings . On Monday , California-based Spiral Toys , which operates the CloudPets brand , claimed the company never received the warnings . `` The headlines that say 2 million messages were leakedAttack.Databreachon the internet are completely false , '' Meyers said . His company only became aware of the issue after a reporter from Vice Media contacted them last week . `` We looked at it and thought it was a very minimal issue , '' he said . A malicious actor would only be able to accessAttack.Databreacha customer 's voice recording if they managed to guess the password , he said . `` We have to find a balance , '' Meyers said , when he addressed the toy maker 's lack of password strength requirements . He also said that Spiral Toys had outsourced its server management to a third-party vendor . In January , the company implemented changes MongoDB requested to increase the server 's security . Spiral Toys hasn ’ t been the only company targeted . In recent months , several hacking groups have been attackingAttack.Databreachthousands of publicly exposed MongoDB databases . They ’ ve done so by erasing the data , and then saying they can restore it , but only if victims pay a ransom feeAttack.Ransom. In the CloudPets incident , different hackers appear to have deleted the original databases , but leftAttack.Ransomransom notes on the exposed systems , Hunt said . Although the CloudPets ’ databases are no longer publicly accessible , it appears that the toy maker hasn ’ t notified customers about the breachAttack.Databreach, Hunt said . The danger is that hackers might be using the stolen information to break into customer accounts registered with the toys . But Meyers said the company found no evidence that any hackers broke into customer accounts . To protect its users , the company is planning on a password reset for all users . `` Maybe our solution is to put more complex passwords , '' he said .
Radisson Hotel Group has confirmed that it has suffered a data breachAttack.Databreachon affecting “ a small percentage of our Radisson Rewards members ” . Business Traveller was alerted to the incident by one of our readers , who had received an email from Radisson confirming that his details had been compromisedAttack.Databreach. Radisson says that it identified the breach on October 1 , although it ’ s not clear exactly when the incident occured . A statement on the group ’ s website states : “ This data security incident did not compromiseAttack.Databreachany credit card or password information . Our ongoing investigation has determined that the information accessedAttack.Databreachwas restricted to member name , address ( including country of residence ) , email address , and in some cases , company name , phone number , Radisson Rewards member number and any frequent flyer numbers on file . “ Upon identifying this issue Radisson Rewards immediately revoked access to the unauthorized person ( s ) . All impacted member accounts have been secured and flagged to monitor for any potential unauthorized behavior . “ While the ongoing risk to your Radisson Rewards account is low , please monitor your account for any suspicious activity . You should also be aware that third parties may claim to beAttack.PhishingRadisson Rewards and attempt to gather personal information by deception ( known as “ phishingAttack.Phishing” ) , including through the use of links to fake websites . Radisson Rewards will not ask for your password or user information to be provided in an e-mail . “ Radisson Rewards takes this incident very seriously and is conducting an ongoing extensive investigation into the incident to help prevent data privacy incidents from happening again in the future. ” Radisson says that affected members will have receives an email notification from Radisson Rewards either yesterday ( October 30 ) or today ( October 31 ) . In the FAQs Radisson stresses that credit card data was not exposed by the breachAttack.Databreach, nor were members ’ passwords or travel histories / future stays . The hotel group is the latest in a line of travel companies to suffer data breachesAttack.Databreach, with British Airways and Cathay Pacific both admitting to compromisedAttack.Databreachdata in the last couple of months .
Cyber attacks are becoming commonplace in 2017 and the most recent one might be a credit card breachAttack.Databreachwhich hit the popular retail chain Kmart , reported first on May 16 , but only confirmed by parent company Sears Holding on Wednesday . `` Our Kmart store payment data systems were infected with a form of malicious code that was undetectable by current anti-virus systems and application controls . Once aware of the new malicious code , we quickly removed it and contained the event . We are confident that our customers can safely use their credit and debit cards in our retail stores , '' Howard Riefs , a spokesman for Sears Holding , said in a statement to Patch . The company further explained the risk to its customers . “ Based on the forensic investigation , NO PERSONAL identifying information ( including names , addresses , social security numbers , and email addresses ) was obtainedAttack.Databreachby those criminally responsible . However , we believe certain credit card numbers have been compromisedAttack.Databreach. Nevertheless , in light of our EMV compliant point of sale systems , which rolled out last year , we believe the exposureAttack.Databreachto cardholder data that can be used to create counterfeit cards is limited , '' it said . The breach was first reported by security website Krebs on Security on May 16 . Many small banks and credit unions received complaints about batches of stolen cards , all of which had been used at Kmart locations . The company didn ’ t reveal which of its 735 locations were hit , but did say how the breach occurred . The company ’ s systems were hit with a malware designed to stealAttack.Databreachcredit card data from point-of-sale devices installed at kiosks . The malware copiesAttack.Databreachcredit card information from the card ’ s magnetic strip , when the cards are swiped at payment kiosks . Using this information , the cards can be cloned and purchases made using these clones would be debited from the credit card user ’ s account . This not the first time Kmart suffered such a breach . The retail chain had a similar breachAttack.Databreachin 2014 and had also claimed at the time the stolen data did not include customer names , emails addresses and personal information . `` We are actively enhancing our defenses in light of this new form of malware . Data security is of critical importance to our company , and we continuously review and improve the safeguards that protect our data in response to changing technology and new threats , '' it said . It was however confirmed the breachAttack.Databreachdid not target all Kmart locations , in which case credit card companies would have themselves issued warnings to customers against using their cards at retail stores . Sears Holdings has set up a helpline for customers who might be affected by the breach . If you think you are one of them , you can call 888-488-5978 to get your queries answered .
INDIANAPOLIS , Ind.– Officials at Scotty ’ s Brewhouse are working to inform thousands of employees across the company about an email data breachAttack.Databreach, leakingAttack.Databreachemployees ’ W-2 forms to an unknown suspect . Company officials called IMPD Monday afternoon to report the breachAttack.Databreach, which apparently resulted from an email phishing scamAttack.Phishing. According to the police report , an individual posing asAttack.Phishingcompany CEO Scott Wise sentAttack.Phishingan email to a payroll account employee . The email requested the employee to send all 4,000 employees W-2 forms in PDF form . Chris Martin , director of HR/Payroll for the company , told police the email did not really come from Wise . However , the payroll account employee did email all 4,000 W-2 forms to the unknown individual . The report says Martin contacted the IRS to inform the agency of the breach . The IRS recommended Martin also file a report with IMPD . Scotty ’ s Brewhouse officials are now in the process of informing all employees , and providing them with precautionary measures to take in order to protect their financial and personal information . The company says it will offer one year of credit monitoring at no cost to employees , in addition to providing information regarding available resources for its employees to monitor their credit . Scotty ’ s says no customer information was obtainedAttack.Databreachduring the phishing scamAttack.Phishing. The company is working with law enforcement and the credit bureaus to limit any potential misuse of the information that was obtainedAttack.Databreachand to identify and apprehend the scammers . Scott Wise , CEO of Scotty ’ s Holdings , LLC , issued the following statement : “ Unfortunately , Scotty ’ s was the target of and fell victim to scammers , as so many other companies have , ” said Wise . “ Scotty ’ s employees and customers are of tremendous importance to the company and Scotty ’ s regrets any inconvenience to its employees that may result from this scamming incident . Scotty ’ s will continue to work with federal and local law enforcement , the Internal Revenue Service and credit bureaus to bring the responsible party or parties to justice ” . The incident appears to match the description of an email phishingAttack.Phishingscheme the IRS issued warnings about last year . This scheme involves scammers posing asAttack.Phishingcompany executives to request financial and personal information on employees . The IRS has online tutorials on the proper steps to take if you have become the victim of identity theft or your personal information has been leakedAttack.Databreach
Attackers continue to take aim at the e-commerce platform Magento . Researchers said last week they came across a malicious function snuckAttack.Databreachinto one of the platform ’ s modules in order to stealAttack.Databreachcredit card information . Code for the function was injected into a .php file for SF9 Realex , a module that helps sites store customer credit card data for the one-click checkout functionality commonly used by repeat customers . The module interacts with the Realex RealAuth Remote and Redirect systems , “ very popular solutions in the Magento community , ” according to Bruno Zanelato , a researcher with the firm Sucuri , who foundVulnerability-related.DiscoverVulnerabilitythe malicious function . The function , sendCCNumber ( ) , reroutes credit card information entered by a customer from Magento to an attacker ’ s email address , hidden inside a variable later in the code . The data , encoded in JSON , arrives in the attacker ’ s inbox without the victim being any the wiser . According to researchers , the attacker uses binlist.net , a public web service for searching issuer identification numbers ( IIN ) , to help identify which bank each card is associated with . Zanelato said Friday that attackers are going greater lengths to target credit card data , especially in e-commerce platforms like Magento . “ Magento credit card stealers are indeed on the rise , ” Zanelato wrote Friday , “ While the information here is specific to Magento , realize that this can affect any platform that is used for ecommerce . As the industry grows , so will the specific attacks targeting it ” . Zanelato is quick to point outVulnerability-related.DiscoverVulnerabilitythat there wasn ’ t a vulnerability in Magento that enabled the theft of credit card data . From there the attacker was able to inject script and takeover SF9 Realex . It ’ s the latest in a line of credit card stealers Sucuri researchers have observed taking advantage of Magento , however . Last summer Cesar Anjos , a researcher with the firm looked at one stealer that was loaded from another source . The stealer essentially performedAttack.Databreacha man-in-the-middle attack between the user and the checkout page after credit card information was entered . Last October , Ben Martin , a different researcher with the firm , discovered attackers scrapingAttack.Databreachcredit card numbers and exfiltratingAttack.Databreachthem in obscure , sometimes publicly viewable image files . Researchers with RiskIQ monitored attacks similar to ones described by Sucuri last year . The firm said the attacks it had been monitoring originated from a single hacking group targeting e-commerce platforms such as Powerfront CMS and OpenCart with a web-based keylogger in March 2016
Morphisec researchers have spotted another attack campaign using fileless malware that is believed to be mounted by the infamous FIN7 hacking group . The goal of the campaign is to gain control of the target businesses ’ systems , install a backdoor , and through it perform continual exfiltrationAttack.Databreachof financial information . “ Like past attacks , the initial infection vector is a malicious Word document attached to a phishing email that is well-tailoredAttack.Phishingto the targeted business and its day-to-day operations , ” the researchers noted . “ The Word document executes a fileless attack that uses DNS queries to deliver the next shellcode stage ( Meterpreter ) . However , in this new variant , all the DNS activity is initiated and executed solely from memory – unlike previous attacks which used PowerShell commands. ” The researchers attribute this one important change to the group ’ s efforts to stay one step ahead of the defenders , and they are succeeding : “ After decryption of the second stage shellcode , the shellcode deletes the ‘ MZ ’ prefix from within a very important part of the shellcode . This prefix indicates it may be a DLL , and its deletion helps the attack to evade memory scanning solutions , ” the researchers found . “ If this DLL was saved on disk , many security solutions would immediately identify it as a CobaltStrike Meterpreter , which is used by many attackers and pen testers. ” But it ’ s not , and it passes undetected . In-memory resident attacks and the use of fileless malware are on the rise , and FIN7 is one group that has been employing this approach regularly . There can be no doubt other attackers will try to implement the same tactic . FIN7 has previously been tied to a sophisticated spear-phishing campaign hittingAttack.PhishingUS-based businesses with emails purportedly coming fromAttack.Phishingthe US Securities and Exchange Commission ( SEC ) , and Morphisec researchers believe that the series of attacks leveraged against 140+ banks and other businesses earlier this year is also their work . FIN7 is also associated with the infamous Carbanak gang , but whether they are one and the same it ’ s still impossible to say for sure .
Advanced Persistent Threat group linked to China said to be attacking companies by targeting their suppliers - scale of operation said to be unprecedented . A Chinese hacking group is thought to be behind attacks on managed service providers as a way into their client companies , to facilitate the theft of intellectual property . The hacking group , called APT10 , used custom malware and spear-phishing attacksAttack.Phishingto gain access to victims ' systems . Once inside , they used the company 's credentials to attack their client companies . The security of the supply chain has been a recognised weakness in security systems since at least 2013 when it was discovered that attackers had gained access to the Target retail chain in America through an HVAC service provider . Now it appears that APT10 is using that approach on a large scale . The group was discovered by PwC 's cyber-security practice and BAE Systems , working alongside the UK 's National Cyber Security Centre ( NCSC ) . The scale of the espionage campaign only became apparent in late 2016 , but the attack is thought to be the largest sustained global cyber-espionage campaign ever seen . PwC and BAE Systems said APT10 conducted the espionage campaign by targeting providers of managed outsourced IT services as a way in to their customers ' organisations around the world , gaining unprecedented accessAttack.Databreachto intellectual property and sensitive data . It is thought the group launched the campaign in 2014 and then significantly ramped it up in early 2016 , adding new developers and intrusion operators to continually enhance capability . The group is known to have exfiltratedAttack.Databreacha high volume of data from multiple victims and used compromised networks to stealthily move this data around the world . A number of Japanese organisations have also been targeted directly in a separate , simultaneous campaign by the same group , with APT10 masquerading asAttack.Phishinglegitimate Japanese government entities to gain access . Forensic analysis of the timings of the attack , as well as tools and techniques used , led investigators to conclude that the group may be based in China , but apart from that , it is not known precisely who is behind APT10 or why it targets certain organisations . Kris McConkey , partner for cyber-threat detection and response at PwC , said that the indirect approach of this attack highlights the need for organisations to have a comprehensive view of the threats they 're exposed to – including those of their supply chain . “ This is a global campaign with the potential to affect a wide range of countries , so organisations around the world should work with their security teams and providers to check networks for the key warning signs of compromise and ensure they respond and protect themselves accordingly , ” he said . Richard Horne , cyber-security partner at PwC , added that “ operating alone , none of us would have joined the dots to uncover this new campaign of indirect attacks . “ Together we 've been working to brief the global security community , managed service providers and known end victims to help prevent , detect and respond to these attacks , ” he added . Ilia Kolochenko , CEO of High-Tech Bridge , told SC Media UK that until there is more detail on the attacks , it would not be possible to make a reliable conclusion as to who was behind the so-called APT10 . “ Taking into consideration how careless and negligent some managed IT providers are , I would n't be surprised if all the attacks were conducted by a group of teenagers – something we have already seen in the past , ” he said . “ IT services providers should better enumerate and assess their digital risks , and implement appropriate security controls to mitigate related threats and vulnerabilities . Security standards , like ISO 27001 , can significantly help assure that the risks are continuously identified and are being duly addressed . For cyber-security service providers , accreditation by CREST is also an important factor to demonstrate the necessary standard of care around security , confidentiality and integrity for their own and client data , ” he added . “ Companies looking to secure their supply-chain can oblige their suppliers to get certified by ISO 27001 for example , or to provide solid and unconditional insurance to cover any data breachesAttack.Databreachand data leaksAttack.Databreach, including direct and consequent damages . ''
In March 2014 , Boston Children ’ s Hospital learned the worst possible security news—from a third-party vendor with no formal relationship to the facility . That vendor told the pediatric facility that it had seen online documents threatening the hospital , as well as postedAttack.Databreachdocuments with information on physicians such as cell phone numbers , addresses and work locations . And the information also included details of Boston Children ’ s infrastructure , such as the main IP address of its organizational web site . Any kid could find this stuff easily online , but it was clear someone was trying to damage the reputation of Boston Children ’ s , said Daniel Nigrin , MD , senior vice president and CIO in the division of endocrinology , during the Cybersecurity Forum at HIMSS17 . Then came a video from the activist hacking organization Anonymous , accusing the hospital of having tortured a child . “ I ’ ve been a CISO for 16 years ; this was a new one me , ” Nigrin recalled . In particular , the charge from Anonymous centered on a teenage girl that the hospital determined was suffering from malnutrition . The case went to court , where a judge ’ s ruling removed the child from parental custody . The family fought the decision , and the controversy found its way to Anonymous , which decided that Boston Children ’ s needed to be taught a lesson . “ We wondered if it was the real Anonymous ; thankfully , the decision was to take the threat seriously , ” Nigrin said . The hospital convened an incident response team and starting forming contingency plans for an expected attack , which included “ going dark ” and cutting itself off from the Internet while assessing the systems and processes still necessary to keep the facility running . In the meantime , Boston Children ’ s contacted local police and the FBI , who were reluctant to step in proactively , and told hospital executives to get back to them if anything happened . Three weeks went by without incident , and the facility was hit with low-value distributed denial of service attacks that were handled . But then , tactics started to change as attacks increased in volume . One week later on a Saturday night , the cat-and-mouse game ended with a dramatic uptick in attacks and a third party was engaged to help the hospital defend itself . The concerted Anonymous cyber attack started April 14 and ended on April 27 . At its peak , the hackers were sending 30-day levels of malicious traffic in very short periods of time .
Researchers identified over 70 organizations targeted in these attacks , with most located in Ukraine , and especially in the self-declared separatist states of Donetsk and Luhansk , near the Russian border . The target list includes editors of Ukrainian newspapers , a scientific research institute ; a company that designs remote monitoring systems for oil & gas pipeline infrastructures ; an international organization that monitors human rights , counter-terrorism and cyberattacks on critical infrastructure in Ukraine ; and an engineering company that designs electrical substations , gas distribution pipelines , and water supply plants ; among many others . According to CyberX security experts , attacksAttack.Phishingare mostly driven by spear-phishing emails that spread Word documents that contain malicious macros . AttacksAttack.PhishinglureAttack.Phishingvictims into allowing the macros in these documents to execute by telling them the document was created in a newer version of Word , and enabling macros allows them to view their content . Enabling macros downloads several malware families in multiple stages . The downloaded malware does n't include destructive features and uses several mechanisms to remain hidden , an important clue pointing to the fact its authors are using it for reconnaissance only . Using Dropbox instead of a custom web server for collecting dataAttack.Databreachis yet another sign that hackers are trying to stay hidden as long as possible . This is because it would be much easier to detect malicious traffic sent to a remote web server compared to Dropbox , an application whitelisted by firewalls and other security products . CyberX researchers named this particular campaign BugDrop because crooks used the PC 's microphone 's to bug victims , and Dropbox to exfiltrateAttack.Databreachdata . After they analyzed the malware deployed in this campaign , CyberX security experts claim the malware and techniques used in the BugDrop operation are similar to Groundbait , another cyber-espionage campaign discovered in May 2016 by ESET researchers .
A hacker allegedly used a vulnerability in MySQL to stealAttack.Databreach6.5 million emails and poorly encrypted passwords from Dueling Network , a card game in the style of Yu-Gi-Oh , announced Motherboard . The website ’ s forum has been kept online , although Dueling Network was shut down in 2016 following a cease-and-desist order . The request was made by a law firm on behalf of the animation company holding the rights to Yu-Gi-Oh . “ Only our forum site was still up as a way for our users to communicate with each other ( login used DN [ Dueling Network ] credentials ) , ” an administrator wrote in an email to Motherboard . “ Now that is down and warns users to change passwords on any other sites they may have used the same password on. ” The passwords were hashed with the MD5 algorithm , known to have extensive vulnerabilities that allow hackers to getAttack.Databreachplaintext passwords . A company administrator said not all stolen emails and passwords are associated with individual players , as some accounts appear to be duplicates .
Officials at a medical practice in Blue Springs say they are taking steps to strengthen privacy protections after a ransomware attackAttack.Ransomaffected nearly 45,000 patients . Blue Springs Family Care discovered in May that hackers had installed malware and ransomware encryption programs on its computer system , giving them full accessAttack.Databreachto patient records . Ransomware is a kind of malware that locks up a computer . The attackers typically demand a ransomAttack.Ransom, often in Bitcoin or other cryptocurrencies , as a condition of unlocking the computer and allowing access to the system . Melanie Peterson , Blue Springs Family Care ’ s privacy officer , says the medical practice did not pay a ransomAttack.Ransom. Rather , it was able to use backups to regain computer access . In a letter to patients , Blue Springs Family Care said it had no evidence patients ’ information had been used by unauthorized individuals . But it said it had taken steps to strengthen its defenses against similar attacks in the future . Peterson says the family medical practice has essentially rebuilt its computer system from scratch “ to make sure that no traces of any kind of virus were left in the system. ” The number of affected patients was as large as it was because the medical practice is required to keep medical records going back 10 years . Peterson says both the FBI and Blue Springs Police Department were notified of the attack . So far , the hackers have not been identified , she says . Blue Springs Family Care ’ s computer vendor discovered the ransomware attackAttack.Ransomon May 12 . In its letter to patients , Blue Springs Family Care said it hired a forensic IT company to help quarantine the affected systems and to install software to monitor whether any unauthorized person was accessing the system . The attack on Blue Springs Family Care was not an anomaly . Health care businesses in particular have been targeted by ransomware attacksAttack.Ransom. According to Beazly , a cybersecurity insurance company , 45 percent of ransomware attacksAttack.Ransomin 2017 targeted the health care industry . Financial services , which accounted for 12 percent of ransomware attacksAttack.Ransom, were a distant second . Last month , Cass Regional Medical Center in Harrisonville , Missouri , reported a ransomware attackAttack.Ransomhad briefly cut off access to its electronic health record system on July 9 . Hospital officials said there was no indication patient data was accessedAttack.Databreach. Cass Regional was just the latest of many Missouri health care institutions targeted in the last few months by cyber-attackers . Others include Children ’ s Mercy Hospital in Kansas City , Barnes Jewish Hospital in St. Louis , Barnes-Jewish St. Peters Hospital in St. Peters and John J. Pershing VA Medical Center in Poplar Bluff . In Kansas , the Cerebral Palsy Research Foundation of Kansas , the Kansas Department for Aging and Disability Services , Atchison Hospital Association and a private medical practice in McPherson have all been hit with cyberattacks since March . “ If you think about what ’ s in a health or medical record , there ’ s a lot of information that could be used to create or falsify documents on an individual , ” says Madeline Allen , an assistant vice president in the cybertech practice at Lockton Companies , a Kansas City-based insurance broker . “ So think about your medical record that contains not only your health information but also your name and address , your social security number , your date of birth , oftentimes a driver ’ s license number . “ All of those things can be used to impersonate you , whether it be to open a line of credit , apply for a loan , file a tax return – all of those things . Pretty much everything you need would be found in your health record , '' Allen says . `` If you can get a full health record on someone , it ’ s pretty valuable information to the bad guys as they ’ re looking to monetize that information. ” For health care institutions , Allen says , it ’ s not so much a question of whether they will be attacked as when . As such , she says , apart from instituting technical measures , the most important thing they can do to ward off cyberattacks is to educate their employees . “ Let them know that people are constantly trying to attack from all angles and the attacks are pretty sophisticated , ” she says . “ It ’ s very easy to click on a link thinking it ’ s legitimate or respond to an email that looks legitimate when in fact it ’ s not . So I think the education of employees and staff is perhaps the biggest step that health care facilities can take . ”
According to the Graham Cluley , hackers are conducting phishing attacksAttack.Phishingon gamers using two types of emails to steal their login credentials . Hackers are sendingAttack.Phishingemails to World of Warcraft players making them believe that they have won a prize followed by a link to claim it by putting their Blizzard account credentials . The items used in the email are “ Battlepaw ” an in-game pet , and a flying mount called “ Mystic Runesaber ” . Both these items are legitimate and can be bought in the game , which makes these emails more believable , but of course , it ’ s all just a lie . Once you click the email , a new window will appearAttack.Phishingasking you to enter the login details of your blizzard account , and if you do that , the hacker will receiveAttack.Databreachyour information , which can either be sold or used personally . “ You are receiving this e-mail because your friend has purchased World of Warcraft In-Game Pet : Brightpaw for you as a gift ! This would have been a perfect scam if not for the two obvious flaws in the email . First one is the suspicious looking question mark after Battle dot net , and the second one is named Blizzard Entertainment wrote at the end of the email . Like all the other phishing scamsAttack.Phishing, this one also relies on the poor judgment of the recipients and to make sure that you do not fall into this trap you must be very careful when you receive an email from an unknown sender
Here are five best practices that can help you boost end-user experiences , simplify performance management , and reduce the cost of your AWS environment . The number of successful cyberattacks per year per company has increased by 46 % over the last four years . But what really needs to be considered when exploring a solution ? The leaked database weighs in at 52.2GB , and according to ZDNet comes via business services firm Dun & Bradstreet , which sells it to marketers that send targeted email campaigns . After examining the data , Hunt has revealed that the data dumpAttack.Databreachcontains details belonging exclusively to US-based companies and government agencies . California is the most represented demographic with over four million records , followed by New York with 2.7 million records and Texas with 2.6 million records . The leading organisation by records is the Department of Defense , with 101,013 personnel records exposed in the dumpAttack.Databreach. It is followed by the United States Postal Service ( USPS ) with 88,153 leaked employee records and AT & T with 67,382 . Other firms affected by the leakAttack.Databreachincludes CVS with 40,739 records , Citigroup with 35,292 and IBM with 33,412 . The database contains dozens of fields , some including personal information such as names , job titles and functions , work email addresses , and phone numbers . While the database does n't contain more sensitive information , such as credit card numbers or SSNs , Hunt says it 's an `` absolute goldmine for targeted spear phishingAttack.Phishing. '' `` From this data , you can piece together organisational structures and tailor messagingAttack.Phishingto create an air of authenticity and that 's something that 's attractive to crooks and nation-state actors alike , '' he said . `` I often work with companies attempting to mitigate the damage of their organisational data being publicly exposedAttack.Databreach( frequently due to data breachesAttack.Databreach) , and I can confidently say that knowing this information is out there circulating would concern many of them . '' Dun & Bradstreet has denied responsibility for the leakAttack.Databreachand said it could have come from come from any of its thousands of clients . `` Based on our analysis , it is our determination that there has been no exposureAttack.Databreachof sensitive personal information from , and no infiltration of our system . The information in question is data typically found on a business card . `` As general practice , Dun & Bradstreet uses an agile security process and evaluates and evolves security controls to protect the integrity of our data , '' a spokesperson told the INQUIRER
International war monitor the Organization for Security and Co-operation in Europe ( OSCE ) last week revealed it has been on the receiving end of a “ major ” cyber-attack . The 57-member state body – which also monitors elections , and plays a role in arms control and cybersecurity – told AFP that it first became aware of a “ major information security incident ” back in early November . The attack apparently “ compromised the confidentiality '' of its IT network and put its “ integrity at risk ” . Although there ’ s no obvious official statement up on the OSCE site , spokeswoman Mersiha Causevic Podzic told the newswire that “ the way in which the attacker accessed the OSCE was identified , as have some of the external communication destinations ” . There are rumors , emanating from a Western intelligence agency , that the notorious Russian hacking group APT28 is behind the attack . There would certainly seem to be speculative evidence for this assumption , given that OSCE currently has 700 monitors overseeing the conflict with Russia in eastern Ukraine . The conflict has been at the center of numerous cyber espionage campaigns tracked back to the Kremlin , most recently one aimed at tracking Ukrainian troop movements via the RAT Sofacy ( X-Agent ) . That particular campaign was also tied back to APT28 ( aka Fancy Bear/Sofacy/Pawn Storm ) . More infamously , the group has been linked to a hacking campaignAttack.Databreachagainst Democratic Party members which resulted in the publication of private emails designed to destabilize the Hillary Clinton presidential campaign and undermine the US democratic process . Last week , President Obama decided to expel 35 suspected Russian spies and place sanctions on the GRU , which is thought to be linked to APT28 , as well as another Russian intelligence service : the FSB . However , France 's ambassador to the OSCE , Veronique Roger-Lacan , tried to play down the seriousness of the attack . “ Diplomats at the OSCE are warned that attempted spying , in whatever form , are part and parcel of this organization , ” she told AFP
Cybersecurity experts and companies on Long Island are looking for ways to shore up the weakest link on company computer networks : the employee . Local cybersecurity professionals are creating interactive comic books , testing employees with simulated phishing emails — tailored messages that seek to obtain key information , such as passwords — and seeking to convince top executives that the threat of business disruption from hacking requires their attention . “ The biggest problem is not the technology ; it ’ s the people , ” said Laurin Buchanan , principal investigator at Secure Decisions , a division of Northport software developer Applied Visions Inc. Sixty percent of cyber-assaults on businesses can be traced to insiders ’ actions , either inadvertent or malicious , according to a 2016 study by IBM Security . The average cost of a data breachAttack.Databreachfor U.S. companies is $ 7.4 million , or $ 225 per lost or stolen record , a June 2017 study by IBM and the Ponemon Institute , a Traverse City , Michigan , researcher , found . Costs related to data breachesAttack.Databreachcan include the investigation , legal costs to defend against and settle class-action lawsuits , credit monitoring for affected customers , and coverage of fraud losses . Harder to gauge is the cost to a company ’ s reputation . One of the largest hacksAttack.Databreachever was disclosed this month , when credit reporting company Equifax Inc. revealed that sensitive data from 143 million consumers , including Social Security numbers and birth dates , was exposedAttack.Databreach. A stock analyst from Stifel Financial Corp. estimated that the attack will cost Equifax about $ 300 million in direct expenses . Investors seem to think the incident will have a much greater impact on At a seminar in Garden City this month , Henry Prince , chief security officer at Shellproof Security in Greenvale , explained how in a ransomware attackAttack.Ransom— one of many types — cybercriminals can buy specialized tools such as those used to sendAttack.Phishingphishing emails . The easy availability of that software means that hackers require “ no programming experience , ” Prince said . Phishing emails can be blocked by company email filters , firewalls and anti-virus software . But if one gets throughAttack.Phishingand an employee clicks on the link in the phishing email , the business ’ network is compromised . Hackers can then encrypt files , preventing access to them by the company and crippling the business , Prince said at the seminar . Hackers then can demand paymentAttack.Ransom, typically in an untraceable cryptocurrency like Bitcoin — a digital asset that uses encryption — before agreeing to decrypt the files . “ Ransomware is a business to these people , ” Prince said . “ Ninety-nine percent of the time , ransomware requires user interaction to infect. ” Della Ragione echoed that sentiment : “ The greatest risk at a company is the employees . Training employees is one of the best steps in shoring up your defenses. ” In response , many local experts and companies focus on teaching employees how to resist hackers ’ tricks . Secure Decisions has developed interactive comics to teach employees ways of detecting “ phishing ” emails and other hacking attempts . The company has gotten more than $ 1 million for research related to the interactive comic project , known as Comic-BEE , from the Department of Homeland Security , as well as a grant for $ 162,262 from the National Science Foundation . The comics , inspired by children ’ s “ Choose Your Own Adventure ” books , feature different plots depending on the reader ’ s choices . “ If you can give people the opportunity to role-play , some of the exhortations by the experts will make more sense , ” Buchanan said . The comics are being field-tested at several companies and Stony Brook University . They were featured in July at a DHS cybersecurity workshop in Washington , D.C. Radu Sion , a computer science professor at Stony Brook and director of its National Security Institute , which studies how to secure digital communications , acknowledged that security is far from a priority for most users . “ Ultimately , the average Joe doesn ’ t care , ” he said . “ You [ should ] treat the vast majority of your users as easily hackable. ” Northwell Health , the New Hyde Park-based health care system that is the largest private employer in New York State , is trying to find and get the attention of those inattentive employees . Kathy Hughes , Northwell vice president and chief information security officer , sends out “ phishing simulations ” to the workforce . The emails are designed to mimicAttack.Phishinga real phishing campaignAttack.Phishingthat seeks passwords and personal information . In April , for instance , Northwell sent outAttack.Phishingphishing emails with a tax theme . Hughes collects reports on which employees take the baitAttack.Phishingby user , department and job function . “ We present them with a teachable moment , ” she said . “ We point out things in the email that they should have looked at more carefully. ” The emails are supplemented with newsletters , screen savers and digital signage reminding users that hackers are lurking . Another tool : Non-Northwell emails have an “ external ” notation in the subject line , making it harder for outsiders to pretend to beAttack.Phishinga colleague . “ We let [ the employees ] know that they are part of the security team , ” she said . “ Everybody has a responsibility for security. ” One of the most important constituencies for security is top executives . Drew Walker , a cybersecurity expert at Vector Solutions in Tampa , Florida , said many executives would rather not know about vulnerabilities to their computer systems , because knowledge of a hole makes them legally vulnerable and casts them in a bad light . “ Nine times out of 10 , they don ’ t want to hear it , ” he said . “ It makes them look bad. ” Richard Frankel , a former FBI special agent who is of counsel at Ruskin Moscou , said that company tests of cybersecurity readiness often snare CEOs who weren ’ t paying attention to training . But attorney Della Ragione said high-profile attacks are getting notice from executives . “ Everyone ’ s consciousness is being raised , ” she said . Data leaksAttack.Databreachat Long Island companies have caused executives to heighten security . In 2014 , Farmingdale-based supermarket chain Uncle Giuseppe ’ s Marketplace said that foreign hackers had breachedAttack.Databreachthe credit card database of three stores . Joseph Neglia , director of information technology at Uncle Giuseppe ’ s , said that after the data breachAttack.Databreach, which affected about 100 customers , the company began scheduling “ monthly vulnerability scans ” and upgraded its monitoring and security systems . For businesses , Stony Brook ’ s Sion said , the cybersecurity threat is real and immediate . “ I need one second with your machine to compromise it forever and ever , ” he said . “ It ’ s an uphill battle . ”
In 2015 , the FBI shuttered malware marketplace Darkode , and then at the end of last year a small group of hackers launched their own eponymous copycat version . Almost immediately , however , other hackers attackedAttack.Databreachthat new site , and stoleAttack.Databreachuser account information . `` It 's a shit show on what happened , '' a Darkode staff member who used the handle Bullets told Motherboard . Hackers managed to stealAttack.Databreacha database of Darkode 's users , including usernames and hashed passwords . Paid breach notification site LeakBase provided Motherboard with a copy of the data . The database included this reporter 's Darkode account , used to briefly visit the site when it launched . The data also includes users ' email addresses and IP addresses ; something that might be particularly worrying if those who signed up were involved in any illegal activity—it probably does n't help to have an IP address linked to your identity floating around the internet . It 's fucked up , '' one of the hackers behind the breach , who used the moniker FuckInterpol , told Motherboard . `` Dear fake darkode wannabes , you 're [ sic ] forum has been owned , and your admins have terrible opsec , '' one message posted to the forum read . The hackers also deleted other threads on the site . Bullets , the staff member , claimed the hackers got in , at least in part , because he reused a password from another previously hacked site . `` The only reason I joined in the first place was just to see what the hell was actually going on . I used a common password I use when I signed up thinking nothing of it seeing I never thought I 'd stay on the site & if anyone got access to it , it would n't be a big deal , '' Bullets said
( Reuters ) - Sabre Corp said on Tuesday there had been a breach in its hospitality unit ’ s hotel reservation system and had hired FireEye Inc ’ s Mandiant forensics division to probe the incident . `` The unauthorized access has been shut off and there is no evidence of continued unauthorized activity , '' Sabre said in a statement . The company , which offers hotel and airline booking services , said it had informed law enforcement about the breach in its SynXis Central Reservations . Sabre does not believe any other system was affected . “ 32,000 properties use Sabre ’ s reservation system , so the attackers were able to penetrate a single system and potentially access 32,000 additional targets , ” said Jeff Hill , Director of Product Management , Prevalent , which manages third-party risk . Mandiant did not immediately respond to a request for comment . Hotel groups are increasingly coming under attacksAttack.Databreachfrom hackers , who seek to stealAttack.Databreachpayment card data . InterContinental Hotels Group Plc said last month 1,200 of its franchised hotels in the United States , including Holiday Inn and Crowne Plaza , were victims of a three-month cyber attack . Hyatt Hotels Corp , Hilton , and Starwood Hotels , now owned by Marriott International Inc had also been victims of hacking attacks .
Earlier this week , private photos and video clip of the famous WWE Divas Lisa Marie Varon known by her WWE name Victoria and Charlotte Flair were leakedAttack.Databreachonline the internet . The photos showed Charlotte taking selfies of herself in front of the mirror using her iPhone while in Lisa ’ s case a video clip in her private moments along with selfies taken from her iPhone have been leakedAttack.Databreach. Her original name being Ashley Fliehr , the WWE woman wrestler is the daughter of Ric Flair , who is again a well-known wrestling legend . She is considered as one of the most popular WWE stars having been the women ’ s champion for up to four times . She began her career by first appearing on NXT in 2013 , and after a year , she managed to win NXT Women ’ s Championship . Later , she won the WWE Divas Championship after being promoted to the main roster in 2015 . She had also been married twice . Her first marriage was in 2010 with Riki Johnson . They later filed for divorce and Flair then married Bram in 2013 . They got divorced in 2015 . Flair also had a brother , Reid , who was found dead in March 2013 , in Charlotte ’ s bed and it was revealed that he died from heroin overdose . Flair tweeted about her photos being leakedAttack.Databreachsaying that her photos were shared online without her consent and demanded that they should be removed immediately . Upon this , there were a plethora of supporters who emerged on Twitter , showing their support for Flair with the hashtag Flair , however , is not the only victim whose photos have been leakedAttack.Databreachso unscrupulously . Alexa Bliss , who currently holds the title of RAW Women ’ s Champion , had her photos leakedAttack.Databreachas well on April 28 . Alexa tweeted that the photos are fake and demanded that they should be taken down immediately . Similarly , Paige , who was WWE Divas Champion , had her private photos hackedAttack.Databreachalong with explicit videos that were made public online . She later wrote that she felt quite bad and wanted to harm herself for days after the leak . Furthermore , private photos of WWE Divas including Maria Kanellis , Melina Perez , Kaitlyn and Summer Rae were also leakedAttack.Databreachon different online platforms . That ’ s not all , it was about two months ago when hackers leakedAttack.Databreachprivate photos of prominent Hollywood celebrities like Amanda Seyfried , Emma Watson . However , It is quite unnerving and yet troubling to see how these WWE stars are being exploited and no attention is being paid to the security standards of mobile communication . It is vital that network operators look into the issue immediately and build proper security features to prevent such infiltrations .
State officials are investigating the theftAttack.Databreachlast week of equipment from a Cobb County precinct manager ’ s car that could make every Georgia voters ’ personal information vulnerable to theftAttack.Databreach. The equipment , used to check-in voters at the polls , was stolenAttack.DatabreachSaturday evening , Secretary of State Brian Kemp said Monday . Cobb County elections director Janine Eveler said the stolen machine , known as an ExpressPoll unit , can not be used to fraudulently vote in Tuesday ’ s election but that it does contain a copy of Georgia ’ s statewide voter file . “ We have managed that so that what ’ s stolen could not impact the election , ” Eveler said . While the file includes drivers ’ license numbers , addresses and other data , it does not include Social Security numbers , Eveler said . But , she said , “ the poll book that was stolenAttack.Databreachdid have a flash card with a voter list on it . But , it does require some knowledge or expertise to use machine to retrieve the information. ” Cobb County Police and the State Election Board are investigating . Kemp said it was “ unacceptable ” that Cobb officials waited two days to notify him of the theftAttack.Databreach. “ We have opened an investigation , and we are taking steps to ensure that it has no effect on the election tomorrow , ” Kemp said in a statement . “ I am confident that the results will not be compromised. ” Nearly 55,000 votes were cast in early voting ahead of Tuesday ’ s election , the culmination of a campaign that brought national attention to the state .
The UK 's Foreign Office was targeted by highly motivated and well-resourced hackers over several months in 2016 . The BBC understands the government has investigated the previously unreported attack that began in April last year . The UK 's National Cyber Security Centre would not say whether data was stolenAttack.Databreach. But a source told the BBC that the most sensitive Foreign Office information is not kept on the systems targeted by the hackers . Research published on Thursday by cybersecurity firm F-Secure suggested the attackAttack.Phishingwas a "spear-phishing" campaignAttack.Phishing, in which people were sentAttack.Phishingtargeted emails in attempts to foolAttack.Phishingthem into clicking a rogue link or handing over their username and password . To do this , the attackers created a number of web addresses designed to resembleAttack.Phishinglegitimate Foreign Office websites , including those used for accessing webmail . F-Secure does not know whether the attack was successful . The company says the domains were created by hackers that it calls the Callisto Group , which it says is still active . However the UK 's National Cyber Security Centre ( NCSC ) declined to say who was behind the attack on the Foreign Office . The targeted emails that were sent outAttack.Phishingtried to foolAttack.Phishingtargets into downloading malware which was first developed for law enforcement by the Italian software company Hacking Team . Hacking Team 's surveillance tools were previously exposed in a cyberattack , first reported in 2015 . There is no suggestion that Hacking Team had any involvement in the attacks . F-Secure said that the use of the software should remind governments that they `` do n't have monopolies on these [ surveillance ] technologies '' , and that once created the software can fall into the hands of hackers . The BBC has not seen evidence conclusively identifying the origin of the attack . A cybersecurity expert at another company , who wished to remain anonymous , found a link to information uncovered in the investigation of Russian efforts to influence the US election . Two of the phishing domains used by the hackers were once linked to an IP address mentioned in a US government report into Grizzly Steppe . Grizzly Steppe is the name given by the US government to efforts by `` Russian civilian and military intelligence services to compromise and exploit networks and endpoints associated with the US election '' . However , the cybersecurity expert noted that this connection between the phishing domain and Grizzly Steppe may be a coincidence , as over 300 other domains - many of them not hacking-related - were linked to the same IP address . F-Secure told the BBC that it did notice some similarity between the Callisto Group 's hacking and previous attacks that have been linked to Russia . However , it said despite some similarities in the tactics , techniques , procedures and targets of the Callisto Group , and the Russia-linked group known as APT28 , it believed the two were `` operationally '' separate . It noted that the Callisto Group was also less `` technically capable '' than APT28 .
Called Chrysaor , the Android variant can stealAttack.Databreachdata from messaging apps , snoop overAttack.Databreacha phone ’ s camera or microphone , and even erase itself . On Monday , Google and security firm Lookout disclosed the Android spyware , which they suspect comes from NSO Group , an Israeli security firm known to develop smartphone surveillance products . Fortunately , the spyware never hit the mainstream . It was installed less than three dozen times on victim devices , most of which were located in Israel , according to Google . Other victim devices resided in Georgia , Mexico and Turkey , among other countries . Users were probably trickedAttack.Phishinginto downloading the malicious coding , perhaps though a phishing attackAttack.Phishing. Once it installs , the spyware can act as keylogger , and stealAttack.Databreachdata from popular apps such as WhatsApp , Facebook and Gmail . In addition , it possesses a suicide function that ’ ll activate if it doesn ’ t detect a mobile country code on the phone -- a sign that the Android OS is running on an emulator . The surveillance features are similar to those found in Pegasus , which has also been linked with NSO Group . At the time , Lookout called the spyware the most sophisticated attack it ’ s ever seen on a device . The iOS variant exploited three previously unknown vulnerabilities to take over a phone and surveil the user . The spyware was uncovered when a human rights activist in the United Arab Emirates was found infected by it . His phone had receivedAttack.Phishingan SMS text message , which contained a malicious link to the spyware . But Lookout had also been investigating into whether NSO Group developed an Android version . To find out , the security firm compared how the iOS version compromises an iPhone and matched those signatures with suspicious behavior from a select group of Android apps . Those findings were then shared with Google , which managed to identify who was affected . However , unlike the iOS version , the Android variant doesn ’ t actually exploit any unknown vulnerabilities . Instead , it taps known flaws in older Android versions . Chrysaor was never available on Google Play , and the small number of infected devices found suggests that most users will never encounter it , the search giant said
An unsecured Kubernetes container management console allowed cyber-attackers to breachAttack.Databreacha Tesla cloud account that contained sensitive data , including telemetry data from the company ’ s electric cars , according to a report by security company RedLock . Details about Tesla cloud account breachAttack.Databreachwhere included in RedLock report as an example of the cyber-security threats face enterprises that store sensitive data and run important business applications on cloud services . RedLock ’ s Cloud Security Intelligence team found that the Tesla breachAttack.Databreachresulted from the exposureAttack.Databreachof Amazon Web Services security credentials after hackers penetratedAttack.DatabreachTesla ’ s Kubernetes console , which was not password protected This led to the exposureAttack.Databreachof the company ’ s Amazon S3 cloud account , which contained sensitive data including the Tesla vehicle telemetry . What was most remarkable about the CSI report was that the problems that affect on premises infrastructure are the same ones that affect cloud infrastructure . The difference is that most organizations have learned over the years to provide at least some level of protection for their on premises infrastructure and assets . Unfortunately , it appears that the same isn ’ t true of their cloud resources . Part of the problem , it appears , comes from a lack of familiarity with managing cloud services . But security for those services does exist is readily available . Amazon , for example regularly sends out emails to AWS users explaining what security measures , products and services are available for its cloud environments . Unlike private , on-premises environments , the public cloud is just that—public . That means it can be accessed by anyone , including an attacker that possesses the credentials that can enable access from anywhere . What that means is that access security is even more important , because you have no means of preventing a criminal from trying to gain access . But it also means that monitoring your cloud environment is just as important as your on premises physical environment . Monitoring at least provides a way to find an attacker that ’ s gotten past your access controls . The CSI team also recommends a “ deny all ” setting on your firewall for outbound cloud traffic , and setting your cloud so that configuration changes are automatically reported . The key here is to remember that while the cloud provider can play a role in helping ensure your cloud is secure , they can ’ t do it alone . It ’ s your part of the cloud , your data , and you ’ re paying for those computing assets . It ’ s your job to make sure they ’ re secure .
A critical vulnerability in Kubernetes open-source system for handling containerized applications can enable an attacker to gain full administrator privileges on Kubernetes compute nodes . Kubernetes makes it easier to manage a container environment by organizing application containers into pods , nodes ( physical or virtual machines ) and clusters . Multiple nodes form a cluster , managed by a master that coordinates cluster-related activities like scaling , scheduling , or updating apps . Each node has an agent called Kubelet that facilitates communication with the Kubernetes master via the API . The number of nodes available in a Kubernetes system can be hundreds and even thousands . Pulling this off is easy on default configurations , where `` all users ( authenticated and unauthenticated ) are allowed to perform discovery API calls that allow this escalation , '' says Jordan Liggitt , staff software engineer at Google . The security bug was discoveredVulnerability-related.DiscoverVulnerabilityby Darren Shepherd , co-founder of Rancher Labs company that provides the Kubernetes-as-a-Service solution called Rancher . Now tracked asVulnerability-related.DiscoverVulnerabilityCVE-2018-1002105 , the flaw is critical , with a Common Vulnerability Scoring System ( CVSS ) score of 9.8 out of 10 . According to the latest version of the vulnerability severity calculator , exploiting the security glitch has low difficulty and does not require user interaction . Red Hat 's OpenShift Container Platform uses Kubernetes for orchestrating and managing containers is also impactedVulnerability-related.DiscoverVulnerabilityby the vulnerability . In an advisory on the matter , the company explains that the flaw can be used in two ways against its products . One involves a normal user with 'exec , ' 'attach , ' or 'portforward ' rights over a Kubernetes pod ( a group of one or more containers that share storage and network resources ) ; they can escalate their privileges to cluster-admin level and execute any process in a container . The second attack method exploits the API extension feature used by ‘ metrics-server ’ and ‘ servicecatalog ’ in OpenShift Container Platform , OpenShift Online , and Dedicated . No privileges are required and an unauthenticated user can get admin rights to any API extension deployed to the cluster . `` Cluster-admin access to ‘ servicecatalog ’ allows creation of service brokers in any namespace and on any node , '' the advisory details . The problem has been addressedVulnerability-related.PatchVulnerabilityin the latest Kubernetes revisions : v1.10.11 , v1.11.5 , v1.12.3 , and v1.13.0-rc.1 . Kubernetes releases prior to these along with the products and services based on them are affectedVulnerability-related.DiscoverVulnerabilityby CVE-2018-1002105 . Red Hat releasedVulnerability-related.PatchVulnerabilitypatches for the OpenShift family of containerization software ( OpenShift Container Platform , OpenShift Online , and OpenShift Dedicated ) and users receivedVulnerability-related.PatchVulnerabilityservice updates they can install at their earliest convenience . The software company warns that a malicious actor could exploit the vulnerability to stealAttack.Databreachdata or inject malicious code , as well as `` bring down production applications and services from within an organization ’ s firewall . ''
According to cybersecurity firm Avast , you probably did n't , and that 's the number one cause of cybersecurity incidents . Avast just released a new report , entitled Avast PC Trends Report January 2017 . It is based on insights from the company ’ s AVG TuneUp product , and says that more than half ( 52 per cent ) of the most popular PC applications are outdated . That way , Avast claims , people are exposingAttack.Databreachtheir data to cybercriminals , as their machines become vulnerable to malware and ransomware . Drawing intel from 116 million Windows machines worldwide , here are the ten most out-of-date programs : “ In the online world , your security habits , such as keeping your software updated , play a big role in your level of your protection on the Internet , ” said Ondrej Vlcek , Chief Technology Officer , GM and EVP Consumer Business at Avast . “ Running outdated programmes leaves PC users susceptible to attacks from savvy hackers exploiting easy-to-find or known vulnerabilities . The cause of people using outdated software may be that updates don ’ t install properly or they postpone or forget to update even when prompted
Allrecipes , the self-described `` food-focused social network '' , has sent an email out to some of its users warning that their email addresses and passwords may have been interceptedAttack.Databreachby an unknown third-party . In the email , the site warns that users who registered an allrecipes.com account or logged on as a registered member of the site prior to June 2013 ( yes , that 's almost four years ago ) , may have had their email address and password stolenAttack.Databreach. Part of the email reads as follows : We recently determined that the email address and password typed into allrecipes.com by members when they created or logged into their accounts prior to June 2013 may have been interceptedAttack.Databreachby an unauthorized third party . Based on information available to us , we can not determine with certainty who did this or how this occurred . Our best analysis is that email addresses and allrecipes.com passwords were interceptedAttack.Databreachduring account registration or login by our members . To its credit , the site has advised affected users to change their Allrecipes password , and ensure that they are not using the same password anywhere else on the net : Out of an abundance of caution , we recommend that all members who registered or logged into allrecipes.com prior to June 2013 promptly change their password . We are taking other steps as well and will continue to work diligently to deter unauthorized activity . You should promptly change your password on allrecipes.com and on any other sites for which you use the same username and password . From what I have seen , Allrecipes has only mentioned the breach when asked direct questions about it via Twitter . How hard would it have been to post a link to an advisory on the front page of its website , and tweet out a link to it ? . Clearly plenty of questions remain about how this security breach might have happened , and Allrecipes ' response to it . But at the very least I would have been pleased to see them be more transparent with their users . The data breachAttack.Databreachhas , understandably , left an unpleasant taste in the mouths of affected users - some of whom turned to Twitter to express themselves . That Twitter user is correct . It 's not just a problem that their password has been exposedAttack.Databreach. Passwords , after all , can be changed fairly easily and if you 're only using it one place than the risks are , at least , reduced . Most users , however , only have one email address and are n't keen to change them that often . A hacker who has stolenAttack.Databreachyour email address and password may not only attempt to use those credentials to unlock other online accounts you own , but might also monetise their theft by launching spam or phishing attacks against your inbox .
RawPOS continues to evolve , and has recently been equipped with the capability to stealAttack.Databreachdata contained in the victims ’ driver ’ s license ’ s 2-dimensional barcode . “ Although the use of this barcode is less common than credit card swipes , it is not unheard of . Some people might experience getting their driver ’ s license barcode scanned in places like pharmacies , retail shops , bars , casinos and others establishments that require it , ” Trend Micro researchers explained . “ Traditionally , PoS threatsAttack.Databreachlook for credit card mag stripe data and use other components such as keyloggers and backdoors to getAttack.Databreachother valuable information . RawPOS attempts to gatherAttack.Databreachboth in one go , cleverly modifying the regex string to captureAttack.Databreachthe needed data. ” This particular variant is geared towards collectingAttack.Databreachdata from driver ’ s licenses issued in the US . Thus , along with payment card data , criminals also getAttack.Databreachinformation such as the victims ’ full name , date of birth , full address , gender , height , hair and eye color . This additional info could definitely help criminals impersonate the card holder in many identity theft scenarios , as well as while effecting fraudulent card-not-present transactions . RawPOS is one of the oldest known Point-of-Sale RAM scraper malware families . It ’ s first incarnation was spotted all the way back in 2009 . According to the researchers , it is mainly used by threat actors that focus on targeting businesses operating in the hospitality industry .
Cyberattacks on banks and others have seemingly disappeared , making them all the more dangerous . Malicious software , the type criminals use to stealAttack.Databreachonline banking login credentials from customer or employee desktops , has been getting more stealthy and effective over time , as its authors get progressively better at evading antivirus and antimalware programs . But there ’ s an emerging generation of malware that ’ s even sneakier . It ’ s not only designed to escape detection , it can lurk in computer memory or a legitimate computer tool , where normal security software can ’ t see it . Malicious code that runs in memory is called “ fileless ” .
If any students or teachers logged on to social media or opened their email inbox using certain computers at Carleton University in Canada 's capital city of Ottawa recently , their every keystroke w as likely recorded Attack.Databreachby an unknown hacker . According to an emailed statement , the university discovered USB sticks loaded with what 's known as `` keylogger '' software on computers in six classrooms during a routine inspection . Keylogger software i ntercepts Attack.Databreachthe commands a keyboard sends to your computer , l ogging Attack.Databreachthe keystrokes that make up your passwords and messages . A university spokesperson would n't clarify when the discovery was made . According to the university , the USB keyloggers in question would have required someone to physically pick them up in order to access any data they recorded , and there 's no evidence that someone ever came by . `` These computers are used solely for instructional purposes in classrooms and do not store any university , personal or confidential information , '' an emailed statement from Carleton University stated . `` We have no evidence that any information w as retrieved Attack.Databreachfrom these devices or that any university data w ere compromised.Attack.Databreach`` Even so , it 's a concerning state of affairs for students and teachers , who may use instructional computers for personal correspondence or professional obligations at the school . Carleton was the victim of a ransomware attack Attack.Ransomin November of last year , which locked down dozens of computers that would only unlock if the university p aid a ransom Attack.Ransomin bitcoin . `` I do n't think at this point there 's been any formal link between these two events , '' said Steven Reid , a university spokesperson , in an interview . `` An investigation is ongoing into the keylogger incident , but nothing specific related to anything in the past . '' Even though there 's no evidence that the hacker got a chance to come collect the goods , it 's probably a great idea for any Carleton students to change their passwords right about now
GameStop customers received breachAttack.Databreachnotification warnings this week , cautioning them that their personal and financial information could have been compromisedAttack.Databreachnine months ago . According to postal letters sent to customers , GameStop said an undisclosed number of online customers had their credit card or bankcard data stolenAttack.Databreach, including the card numbers , expiration dates , names , addresses and the three-digit card verification values ( CVV2 ) . The breachAttack.Databreachoccurred between Aug 10 , 2016 to Feb 9 , 2017 , according to GameStop . In April , the company publicly acknowledged the breach . But , it wasn ’ t until last week that affected customers were individually notified that their cards were likely stolenAttack.Databreach. “ I ’ m pretty upset at GameStop . I should have been notified when they knew about it in April , ” said GameStop customer Ryan Duff , a former cyber operations tactician at U.S. Cyber Command . As a security professional , he said he expected better of GameStop when it came to notifying him of a possible breachAttack.Databreachof his credit card information . Subsequently , Duff said , the card used on GameStop.com back in November had been compromisedAttack.Databreach, according to his bank . “ There is no way it should have taken months to be notified , ” he said . Breach notification laws differ from state to state . But many states , such as Massachusetts , mandate victims be notified “ as soon as practicable and without unreasonable delay ” or the company may face civil penalties . The rules are there , in part , to allow for consumers to freeze accounts and avoid paying fees associated with having their card stolen . “ After receiving a report that data from payment card used on www.GameStop.com may have been obtainedAttack.Databreachby unauthorized individuals , we immediately began an investigation and hired a leading cybersecurity firm to assist us , ” wrote J. Paul Raines , chief executive officer of GameStop in a letter dated June 2 that was sent sent to impacted customers . “ Although the investigation did not identify evidence of unauthorized accessAttack.Databreachto payment card data , we determined on April 18 , 2017 that the potential for what to have occurred existed for certain transactions , ” he wrote . GameStop operates 7,500 retail stores and its consumer product network online includes GameStop.com , game site Kongregate.com and online retailer ThinkGeek . No retail customers were impacted by the breach , according to the company . “ GameStop identified and addressed a potential security incident that was related to transactions made on GameStop ’ s website during a specific period of time , ” the company said in a statement provided to Threatpost . “ GameStop mailed notification letters to customers who made purchases during that time frame advising them of the incident and providing information on steps they can take. ” Still unknown about the breachAttack.Databreachare how many customers may have been impacted , how was the data stolenAttack.Databreachand how was GameStop alerted to the fact the data had been stolenAttack.Databreach. In April , GameStop issued the statement : “ GameStop recently received notification from a third party that it believed payment card data from cards used on the GameStop.com website was being offered for sale on a website. ” Krebs on Security reported in April that GameStop had received an alert from a credit card processor stating that its website was potentially comprised . Originally , it was believed that the breachAttack.Databreachinvolved GameStop retail stores and that the company ’ s point-of-sale system may have been infected with malware . That was because the breachAttack.Databreachoccurred at the height of the holiday sales season and that stolen data included card verification values ( CVV2 ) . Online merchants are not supposed to store CVV2 codes on their e-commerce sites . However , since GameStop said no retail customers were impacted , it is now believed that GameStop.com was hacked and that the data was stolenAttack.Databreachthrough the use of malware . Over the past 12 months , there has been an unprecedented number of data breachesAttack.Databreach. Some of those impacted have been ecommerce sites running vulnerable versions of Magento and WordPress and ecommerce platforms Powerfront CMS and OpenCart . Criminals have used a number of techniques to siphonAttack.Databreachoff credit card data from these sites ranging from compromised ecommerce plugins that can perform reflected XSS ( cross-site scripting ) attacks , web-based keyloggers , and DOM-based XSS attacks . Over 2,000 WordPress sites are infected as part of a keylogger campaign that leverages an old malicious script .
Now , the same vendor is selling something that is not just unique but also highly sensitive and something the Intelligence agencies around the world would consider an excellent opportunity to get their hands on . The vendor is selling a database containing personal and cell phone number details of 126,761,168 citizens of the United States takenAttack.Databreachfrom United States Cellular Corporation ( U.S. Cellular ) , a regional carrier which owns and operates the fifth-largest wireless telecommunications network in the United States , serving 4.9 million customers in 426 markets in 23 U.S. states . DoubleFlag claims the database is updated till January 2017 and never been leakedAttack.Databreachon the Internet before . The database according to him contains details such as first name , last name , address , city , state and phone numbers of one hundred twenty-six million seven hundred sixty-one thousand one hundred sixty-eight ( 126,761,168 ) Americans . The price set for this database is 0.5497 Bitcoin ( USD 500 ) . This means anyone with access to this database can scan and check cell phone number details of millions of American citizens .
Ransomware is perhaps the most ingenious cybercrime in the history of the Internet in terms of its simplicity and effectiveness . It has caused absolute terror in nearly every industry , affecting almost 50 % of organizations in 2016 , and is considered one of the top cyberthreats to the enterprise for 2017 . According to the FBI , ransomware — malware that holds systems and data for ransomAttack.Ransom— cost victims $ 209 million in the first three months of 2016 , yet totaled only $ 24 million in all of 2015 . This astronomical rise in ransomware is motivated , in large part , by a lack of preparedness . And the problem will get worse before it gets better . But in order to understand the rise of ransomware , you need to understand its economics . The Business of RansomwareTraditional data from major breachesAttack.Databreachis starting to be worth less and less as the black market gets flooded with stolen records . Just call a toll-free number and the problem is fixed in minutes . Even the cost of prized electronic healthcare records is down 50 % to 60 % from last year . But at the same time , the price per ransomAttack.Ransomhas continued to climb , and much of the data being ransomedAttack.Ransomis completely worthless on the black market . Innovations in online payments have also helped pave the way for the current ransomware epidemic . Similar to how some sites are the middlemen for sellers , Web-based `` businesses '' started to appear in early 2016 to act as proxies for data extortionists to postAttack.Databreachsensitive stolen data to add urgency to payment demandsAttack.Ransom, sell the stolen data to a third-party , or utilize it in other ways . These Web vendors use a `` Business 101 '' approach by providing an easy Bitcoin-based payment interface — currently worth $ 768 each ( at the time of writing this ) — and take a cut of every payment . Popularity Breeds PandemicBecause of ransomware 's massive success , its creators are pushing new technologies to their limits , with the potential to infiltrate every data storage device between the Internet and any given company . And with the massive success of Mirai — the Internet of Things botnet that took down a portion of the Internet last fall — connected devices are poised to become the next big target , translating into even more ransomware .
Criminals are still trying to shake downAttack.Ransomusers of the Ashley Madison dating/cheating online service . As you might remember , the service was hackedAttack.Databreachin 2015 , and the attackers stoleAttack.Databreachsensitive personal and financial data of 37 million users , and later dumped it online . Since then , cyber criminals have been attempting to monetize this data by sending emails to users whose info they found in the dump , threatening to reveal all of it to the target ’ s nearest and dearest , and asking for moneyAttack.Ransomin exchange for silence . The emails generally contain some of the target ’ s personal data as to make the threat believable , and often claims that the attackers have found the target ’ s Facebook account and , therefore , have the means to contact their friends , family , and employer . In this latest round of blackmail attemptsAttack.Ransom, they are threatening to set up a site and publish all the stolen information . “ On May 1 2017 we are launching our new site – Cheaters Gallery – exposing those who cheat and destroy families . We will launch the site with a big email to all the friends and family of cheaters taken from Facebook , LinkedIn and other social sites . This will include you if do not pay to opting out , ” the email says , as noted by ZDNet ’ s Robin Harris , who received one . The extortionists are asking forAttack.Ransomsome $ 500 ( in Bitcoin ) . It ’ s impossible to tell whether these crooks are the same ones that mounted previous email blackmail attemptsAttack.Ransom. What is definitely obvious is that they are betting on there still being some users with too much to lose if the information gets out . Harris did not share the contents of the email he received , but recipients can be sure that if their Facebook or other social media account isn ’ t specified in it , the blackmailers haven ’ t actually connected the two accounts . More likely than not , they have simply written a script that takes specific info from the Ashley Madison data dumpAttack.Databreach, inserts it in a template email , and fires these emails off to as many recipients as possible .
In the wake of a weekend cyber attack , ECMC officials say the hospital ’ s IT staff discovered the virus and shut down the hospital ’ s computer network , before it could infect their files . ECMC spokesman Peter Cutler said , State Police and the FBI are investigating . “ We do know that a virus was launched into our system and the good news , again , is that we reacted to it immediately. ” With the medical center ’ s computer network still offline , ECMC is conducting business the old fashioned way , on paper—no website , no email—and Cutler says they don ’ t believe patient files were compromisedAttack.Databreachin any way . “ Through the assessments that we have been running , we have seen no indication that there has been a compromiseAttack.Databreachof patient health information. ” Investigators would not say how hackers attacked ECMC ’ s computers , but authorities in the field of cyber security say , this attempted intrusion has all the hallmarks of ransomware . University at Buffalo cyber security expert Arun Vishwanath says ransomware attacksAttack.Ransomhave grown exponentially in the last two years , and likens them to Internet extortionAttack.Ransom. “ They are very successful , and so that is why we are seeing an exponential growth in ransomware attacksAttack.Ransom. We are talking about somewhere between 5,000 attacks per day that are reported–let alone the ones that are not even reported. ” Vishwanath says ransomware attacksAttack.Ransomare big reward low risk ventures , since the hackers are usually from other countries , and rarely get caught . Unwitting victims download an infected attachment from an email and the virus spreads quickly . “ The moment you click on the malware , this malware basically locks down your computer , and all the files in it , and any file that is connected to any other computer that you are connected to . So this can spread through your network in minutes. ” The hacker then demandsAttack.Ransomthe target pay a ransomAttack.Ransomto get their files unencrypted , and in just about every ransomware attackAttack.Ransom, the hackers cover their tracks by demanding paymentAttack.Ransomin bitcoin–a virtual currency that is hard , if not impossible to trace . Once the ransom is paidAttack.Ransom, the hackers send their victim an electronic key to unlock their encrypted files , but if the payment is not made within a certain time frame the hacked files are lost forever .
Disney boss Bob Iger has said the mass media giant is being targeted by hackers who are trying to extort moneyAttack.Ransomfrom the firm by threatening to release a film they claim to have stolenAttack.Databreach. The CEO of the entertainment behemoth told ABC employees of the stand-off at a town hall meeting in New York , multiple sources told The Hollywood Reporter . The hackers are said to have demandedAttack.Ransoma substantial paymentAttack.Ransomin Bitcoin , and threatened to release five minutes of the unnamed film and then subsequent 20-minute chunks if their demandsAttack.Ransomaren ’ t met . There are rumors circulating that the film in question could be upcoming blockbuster Pirates of the Caribbean : Dead Men Tell No Tales , although the hackers are running out of time if so as it ’ s due to open next Friday . The news calls to mind a similar incident last month when a hacker uploaded the upcoming series of Netflix prison drama Orange is the New Black to The Pirate Bay after the streaming giant refused to pay upAttack.Ransom. In that instance , Netflix claimed that “ a production vendor used by several major TV studios had its security compromised ” , highlighting the need for organizations in the entertainment sector to revisit their cyber-defenses and those of their partners . Mark James , security specialist at Eset , argued that anything of high value will be a target for thieves , be it digital or physical . “ Disney has refused to pay the ransomAttack.Ransomand rightly so . If you ’ re going to download the film from an unofficial or dodgy source anyway then a month before or a month after is not going to make much of a difference , ” he added . `` The film industry has been plagued with piracy issues as early as the 1960s and this is n't going to change anytime soon . Paying the ransomAttack.Ransomor indeed any ransomAttack.Ransomis generally frowned upon for many reasons . Funding other criminal activity , rewarding the bad guys or funding future attacks are all good reasons to not pay as the chances are it ’ s going to get released anyway . ”
The hackers left a deface page along with a brief message explaining the reason for defacing the site and criticizing the role of “ political elite ” for the problems faced by “ common people ” . The message also criticized the role of Bilderberg group for planning wars for personal interests . The hackers also warned the group members to start working for human beings and their benefits rather than personal interests or expect more hacks since “ they ” the hackers will be watching them . “ Dear Bilderberg members , from now , each one of you has 1 year ( 365 days ) to truly work in favor of humans and not your private interests . Each TopIc you discuss or work you achieve through Your uber private meetings should from now benefit world population and not X or Y group of people otherwise , we will find you and we will hack you , ” according to the message . Here is a full preview of the deface page left by Anonymous and HackBack movement : If you are not aware of the HackBack hacker and their movement then HackBack also goes by the online handle of “ Phineas Phisher ” “ Hack Back ! ” and “ @ GammaGroupPR ” who came in the news some months ago after donating around €10,000 ( about £8,000 ) Bitcoin to a Kurdish anticapitalist group “ Rojava Plan ” that is based in Rojava . The hacker then hackedAttack.Databreachthe Catalan Police Union server and leakedAttack.Databreachhighly sensitive data against police brutality . The same hacker then hackedAttack.DatabreachSpanish Police server and ended up leakingAttack.Databreachpersonal details of police officers against the infamous Gag Law . Remember , it was the same law that forced a woman to pay a fine of 800 euros/ $ 889 for uploading a picture on Facebook showing a police car parked in a disabled spot
Sensors used to detect the level of ambient light can be used to stealAttack.Databreachbrowser data , according to privacy expert Lukasz Olejnik . Over the past decade , ambient light sensors have become quite common in smartphones , tablets , and laptops , where they are used to detect the level of surrounding light and automatically adjust a screen 's intensity to optimize battery consumption ... and other stuff . The sensors have become so prevalent , that the World Wide Web Consortium ( W3C ) has developed a special API that allows websites ( through a browser ) to interact with a device 's ambient light sensors . Browsers such as Chrome and Firefox have already shipped versions of this API with their products . Last month , in a discussion of the W3C Generic Sensor specification , the Google team proposed that ambient light sensors ( ALS ) , together with gyroscope , magnetometer , and accelerometer sensors , should be exempt from the browser permissions system . In other words , websites using these sensors wo n't have to ask users for explicit permission before accessing the any of these four sensors . Google 's opinion is that by removing this permission requirement , browsers will be on par with mobile applications , which also do n't have to ask the user for permission before accessing these sensors . This proposal did n't go well with Olejnik and fellow researcher Artur Janc , who in a series of demos , have proved that light radiating from the device 's screen , is often picked up by the ambient light sensors . A determined attacker that can lureAttack.Phishingvictims to his site , or one that can insert malicious code on another site , can determine which URLs a user has visited in the past . The whole attack relies on using different colors for normal and previously visited links , which produce a small light variation that ambient light sensors can pick up . Furthermore , Olejnik and Janc also proved that ambient light sensors can stealAttack.DatabreachQR codes , albeit this attack takes longer to perform . Right now , ambient light sensors readings are blocked in Chrome behind settings flags , as the API is experimental , but they 're supported in Firefox via DeviceLight events . According to Olejnik , mitigating this attack is simple , as it only requires browser makers and the W3C to adjust the default frequency at which the sensors report their readings . Furthermore , the researcher also recommends that browser makers quantize the result by limiting the precision of the sensor output to only a few values in a preset range . Both attacks Olejnik and Janc devised take from seconds to minutes to execute . With these mitigations in place , the attacks would n't be stopped , but they would take even longer to perform , making any of them impractical in the real world . In the long run , Olejnik and Janc hope to see access to these sensors behind a dedicated browser permission . The two researchers filedVulnerability-related.DiscoverVulnerabilitybug reports with both Chrome and Firefox in the hopes their recommendations will be followed . Olejnik has previously showed how battery readouts can allow advertisers to track users online , how the new W3C Web Bluetooth API is riddled with privacy holes , and how the new W3C Proximity Sensor API allows websites and advertisers to query the position of nearby objects .
There are so many data breachesAttack.Databreachthese days that it ’ s almost impossible to keep a track of them . From billions of Yahoo accounts to millions of LinkedIn and MySpace accounts the whole thing is out of control . But then there are people dedicating time to track large-scale breaches . One of them is Troy Hunt from Australia whose running Have I been pwned ( HIBP ) platform and has recently discovered two different “ combo lists ” containing 593,427,119 and 457,962,538 = 1,051,389,657 user login credentials . According to Hunt blog post , While discussing the second list Hunt said that : For now , Hunt has uploaded over 1 billion breached accounts on HIBP containing collections of email addresses and passwords from around the world , the authentication of which has been confirmed by Hunt himself . Although unconfirmed yet , it seems like the hackers , scammers , and cybercriminals developed these lists from various systems and previous large-scale data breachesAttack.Databreachincluding VerticalScope , MySpace , LinkedIn , Twitter , Dropbox , Yahoo , Tumblr and Adobe Systems etc . Hunt has also revealed , “ 75.78 % of the leaked addresses were already in HIBP database. ” This means the lists were defiantly developed with the help of previous data breachesAttack.Databreach. As a security journalist , I can confirm my personal email account is also on the list . 1 billion new records in @ haveibeenpwned from different unknown sources.Lot of people will be notified they 're pwned https : //t.co/qDkz7t3IbR — John Opdenakker ( @ j_opdenakker ) May 5 , 2017 Meanwhile , we highly recommend visiting Hunt ’ s post here and his Have I been pwned ( HIBP ) platform to check whether your email is on the list . If it is , change its password right now and also use a password manager to get hold of a strong password . Furthermore , make sure you are not using the same password on other sites but if you are ; make sure to change all passwords before it ’ s too late . Remember , hackers , scammers , and cyber criminals can conduct identity theft scams , social engineering attacks and even stealAttack.Databreachyour banking details using your personal data . DDoS attacks are increasing , calculate the cost and probability of a DDoS attack on your business with this DDoS Downtime Cost Calculator .
While combing through WikiLeaks’ Vault 7 data dumpAttack.Databreach, Cisco has unearthedVulnerability-related.DiscoverVulnerabilitya critical vulnerability affecting 300+ of its switches and one gateway that could be exploitedVulnerability-related.DiscoverVulnerabilityto take over the devices . The flaw is presentVulnerability-related.DiscoverVulnerabilityin the Cisco Cluster Management Protocol ( CMP ) processing code in Cisco IOS and Cisco IOS XE Software . “ The vulnerability is due to the combination of two factors : the failure to restrict the use of CMP-specific Telnet options only to internal , local communications between cluster members and instead accept and process such options over any Telnet connection to an affected device , and the incorrect processing of malformed CMP-specific Telnet options , ” Cisco explained . An exploit could allow an attacker to execute arbitrary code and obtain full control of the device or cause a reload of the affected device ” . The extensive and complete list of affected devices is provided in the security advisory . Cisco says that they are not aware of any public announcements or active malicious use of the vulnerability , and that they will provideVulnerability-related.PatchVulnerabilityfree software updates to addressVulnerability-related.PatchVulnerabilityit ( they don ’ t say when ) . In the meantime , users can mitigate the risk by disabling the Telnet protocol and switching to using SSH . If that ’ s not possible , they can reduce the attack surface by implementing infrastructure access control lists . It also includes indicators of compromise that can be used to detect exploitation attempts
WASHINGTON — President Donald Trump ’ s homeland security adviser said Monday that the malware that has infected 300,000 computers in 150 countries is “ in the wild , ” but so far has not infiltrated U.S. government systems . Tom Bossert , assistant to the president for homeland security and counterterrorism , said three variants of the malware have been discovered and the U.S. government was closely monitoring the situation with officials in Britain . “ Overall , the U.S. infection rate has been lower than many parts of the world , but we may still see significant impacts in additional networks as these malware attacks morph and change , ” Bossert told reporters at the White House . “ We had a small number of affected parties in the U.S. , including FedEx . As of today , no federal systems are affected. ” Computers across the world were locked up Friday and users ’ files held for ransomAttack.Ransomwhen dozens of countries were hitAttack.Ransomin a cyber-extortion attackAttack.Ransomthat targeted hospitals , companies and government agencies . Cybersecurity experts say the unknown hackers who launched the “ransomware” attacksAttack.Ransomused a hole in Microsoft software that was discovered by the National Security Agency and exposed when NSA documents were leakedAttack.Databreachonline . The Department of Homeland Security is taking the lead on the investigation in the United States . The Cyber Threat Intelligence Integration Center is keeping the U.S. government informed about classified information concerning the investigation , he said . If Americans follow the patching information issued by the FBI , Microsoft and the Homeland Security Department , they will be protected from the malware and the variants , Bossert said . “ While it would be satisfying to hold accountable those responsible for this hack — something that we are working on quite seriously — the worm is in the wild , so to speak at this point , and patching is the most important message as a result , ” he said . “ Despite appearing to be criminal activity intended to raise money , it appears that less than $ 70,000 has been paid in ransomsAttack.Ransomand we are not aware of paymentsAttack.Ransomthat have led to any data recovery. ” Neither the FBI or NSA would comment Monday . Trump signed an executive order on Friday aimed at boosting the nation ’ s cybersecurity , as well as building and maintaining “ a modern , secure , and more resilient executive branch IT architecture. ” “ The trend is going in the wrong direction in cyberspace , and it ’ s time to stop that trend and reverse it on behalf of the American people , ” Bossert said after that signing last week . “ We have seen increasing attacks from allies , adversaries , primarily nation-states , but also non-nation-state actors , and sitting by and doing nothing is no longer an option. ” Homeland Security Advisor Tom Bossert announces May 11 that Trump signed an executive order to bolster the government 's cyber security and protect the nation 's critical infrastructure from cyber attacks , during a news briefing at the White House in Washington , D.C .
A group of hackers are allegedly threatening to remotely wipe millions of iPhones and iCloud accounts , unless Apple agrees to pay a ransomAttack.Ransomby April 7th . As Motherboard reports , the hackers – who are calling themselves the “ Turkish Crime Family ” – are demandingAttack.RansomApple pay a ransomAttack.Ransomof $ 75,000 ( in either the Bitcoin or Ethereum cryptocurrencies ) , or hand over $ 100,000 worth of iTunes gift cards . Motherboard ‘ s Joseph Cox reports that one of the hackers shared screenshots of emails that had allegedly been exchanged with Apple , including one where a member of Apple ’ s security team asked if the group would be willing to share a sample of the stolen data . If emails shared by the hackers are legitimate , then it appears that Apple ’ s security team also requested that a YouTube video be removed of an unnamed member of the gang using stolen credentials to access an elderly woman ’ s iCloud account and view photos that had previously been backed up online . The alleged emails from Apple go on to underline that the technology firm will “ not reward cyber criminals for breaking the law ” . What we don ’ t know is whether the email exchanges between the hackers and Apple are real or faked , and – indeed – whether the so-called “ Turkish Crime Gang ” really has accessAttack.Databreachto a large number of Apple users ’ credentials . Other than the video of the elderly woman ’ s iCloud account being broken into , there has been no evidence shared with the media to suggest that the hackers ’ claims of having gained accessAttack.Databreachto a large database of Apple usernames and passwords are legitimate . However , if it ’ s true that the hackers are attempting to engage with the media in an attempt to increase their chances of a substantial payout then that would be in line with an increasingly common technique deployed by extortionists . For instance , we have discussed before how an individual hacker or hacking group known as The Dark Overlord has targeted investment banks – stealing internal documents and bringing them to the public ’ s attention in an attempt to extort more moneyAttack.Ransom. In another extortionAttack.Ransomattempt , The Dark Overlord stoleAttack.Databreachhundreds of gigabytes of files from the Gorilla Glue adhesive company , and attempted to increase their chances of crowbarring more money out of corporate victims by sharing details with security industry media . For the record , when The Dark Overlord contacted me to help them blackmailAttack.Ransomcompanies , I declined . I believe that companies should do everything in their power to protect their customers and prevent criminals from profiting from extortionAttack.Ransom. We simply don ’ t know the truth of the Turkish Crime Family ’ s claims , and whether Apple users are at risk . But I do hope that the media stories will help remind Apple users of the importance of using a strong , unique password to secure their account and enable two-factor authentication to make their accounts harder to break into .
Unfortunately , Yahoo did n't , according to a new internal investigation . The internet pioneer , which reported a massive data breachAttack.Databreachinvolving 500 million user accounts in September , actually knew an intrusionAttack.Databreachhad occurred back in 2014 , but allegedly botched its response . The findings were made in a Yahoo securities exchange filing on Wednesday that offered more details about the 2014 breach , which the company has blamed on a state-sponsored hacker . That breachAttack.Databreach, which only became public last year , involved the theftAttack.Databreachof user account details such as email addresses , telephone numbers , and hashed passwords . After Yahoo went public with it , the company established an independent committee to investigate the matter . The committee found that Yahoo ’ s security team and senior executives actually knew that a state-sponsored actor had hacked certain user accounts back in 2014 , according to the filing . But even as the company took some remedial actions , such as notifying 26 users targeted in the hack and adding new security features , some senior executives allegedly failed to comprehend or investigate the incident further . For instance , in December 2014 , Yahoo 's security team knew the state-sponsored actor had stolenAttack.Databreachcopies of backup files that contained users ' personal data . But it 's unclear whether this information was ever `` effectively communicated and understood '' outside the security team , Wednesday 's filing said . No intentional suppression of information was found , although Yahoo 's legal team had enough reason to investigate the breaches further , the committee concluded . `` As a result , the 2014 security Incident was not properly investigated and analyzed at the time , '' the filing said . It was only about two years later when Yahoo publicly disclosed the breach . That came after a stolen database from the company allegedly went upAttack.Databreachfor sale on the black market . However , after Yahoo disclosed the breachAttack.Databreach, a few months later , the company learned of an even bigger hackAttack.Databreachthat involved 1 billion Yahoo user accounts and further rocked the company 's reputation . That breachAttack.Databreachoriginally occurred in August 2013 but wasn ’ t noticed until law enforcement provided Yahoo with a copy of the stolen data last November . According to Wednesday 's filing , Yahoo still hasn ’ t learned how this data was stolenAttack.Databreach, although it appears to be separate from the 2014 breach . In addition , the company has been investigating an another incident involving a hacker forging cookies as a way to break into user accounts . Wednesday 's filing said that about 32 million user accounts were affected .
A flaw in unpatched versions of Window 10 could leave machines vulnerableVulnerability-related.DiscoverVulnerabilityto EternalBlue , the remote kernel exploit behind the recent WannaCry ransomware attackAttack.Ransom. WannaCry targeted a Server Message Block ( SMB ) critical vulnerability that Microsoft patchedVulnerability-related.PatchVulnerabilitywith MS17-010 on March 14 , 2017 . While WannaCry damageAttack.Ransomwas mostly limited to machines running Windows 7 , a different version of EternalBlue could infect Windows 10 . Researchers at RiskSense stripped the original leaked version of EternalBlue down to its essential components and deemed parts of the data unnecessary for exploitation . They found they could bypass detection rules recommended by governments and antivirus vendors , says RiskSense senior security researcher Sean Dillon . This version of EternalBlue , an exploit initially released by Shadow Brokers earlier this year , does not use the DoublePulsar payload common among other exploits leaked by the hacker group . DoublePulsar was the main implant used in WannaCryAttack.Ransomand a key focus for defenders . `` That backdoor is unnecessary , '' says Dillon , noting how it 's dangerous for businesses to only focus on DoublePulsar malware . `` This exploit could directly load malware onto the system without needing to install the backdoor . '' EternalBlue gives instant un-credentialed remote access to Windows machines without the MS17-010 patch update . While it 's difficult to port EternalBlue to additional versions of Windows , it 's not impossible . Unpatched Windows 10 machines are at risk , despite the fact that Microsoft 's newest OS receives exploit mitigations that earlier versions do n't . The slimmed-down EternalBlue can be ported to unpatched versions of Windows 10 and deliver stealthier payloads . An advanced malware would be able to target any Windows machine , broadening the spread of an attack like WannaCry , Dillon explains . It 's worth noting WannaCry was a blatant , obvious attack , he says , and other types of malware , like banking spyware and bitcoin miners , could more easily fly under the radar . `` These can infect a network and you wo n't know about it until years later , '' he says . `` It 's a threat to organizations that have been targets , like governments and corporations . Attackers may try to get onto these networks and lay dormant … then stealAttack.Databreachintellectual property or cause other damage . '' Dillon emphasizes the importance of updatingVulnerability-related.PatchVulnerabilityto the latest version of Windows 10 , but says patchingVulnerability-related.PatchVulnerabilityalone wo n't give complete protection from this kind of threat . Businesses with SMB facing the Internet should also put up firewalls , and set up VPN access for users who need external access to the internal network . Businesses should have a good inventory of software and devices on their networks , along with processes for identifying and deployingVulnerability-related.PatchVulnerabilitypatches as they are releasedVulnerability-related.PatchVulnerability, says Craig Young , computer security researcher for Tripwire 's Vulnerability and Exposures Research Team ( VERT ) . This will become even more critical as attackers move quickly from patch to exploit . There will always be a window of opportunity for attackers before the right patches are installedVulnerability-related.PatchVulnerability, Young notes . EternalBlue is a `` very fresh vulnerability '' given that most breaches that use exploits leverage flaws that have been publicly knownVulnerability-related.DiscoverVulnerabilityfor an average of two years or more . `` EternalBlue is a particularly reliable exploit that gives access to execute code at the very highest privilege level , so I would expect that hackers and penetration testers will get a lot of use out of it for years to come , '' he says .
GREENVILLE , NC ( WITN ) - A dozen Eastern Carolina hotels are among the 1200 locations that were victims of a lengthy cyber attackAttack.Databreachlast year . InterContinental Hotels Group says customer credit card information was stolenAttack.Databreachfrom franchised locations that include Holiday Inn , Holiday Inn Express , Candlewood Suites and Staybridge Suites . The hackingAttack.Databreachbegan on September 29th and continued at some locations for three months . Hackers used malware that searched for track dataAttack.Databreachstored on magnetic stripes , which includes name , card number , expiration date and internal verification code , the company said . Those hotels in Eastern Carolina affected , and the dates of hacking were : Greenville - Holiday Inn at 203 Greenville Boulevard . Hacked from September 29 to December 29.Havelock - Holiday Inn Express . Hacked from September 29 to December 1.Jacksonville - Staybridge Suites on Cobia Court . Hacked from September 29 to December 29.Morehead City - Holiday Inn Express . Hacked from September 29 to November 4.Nags Head - Holiday Inn Express Oceanfront on South Virginia Dare Trail . Hacked from September 29 to December 29.New Bern - Holiday Inn Express on Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. Boulevard . Hacked from September 29 to December 12.New Bern - Candlewood Suites on Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. Bouvevard . Hacked from September 29 to December 29.Plymouth - Holiday Inn Express . Hacked from September 29 to December 29.Roanoke Rapids - Holiday Inn Express . Hacked from September 29 to December 15.Wilson - Holiday Inn Express at I-95 . Hacked from September 29 to December 29.Wilson - Holiday Inn Express Downtown . Hacked from September 29 to December 29.Wilson - Candlewood Suites . Hacked from September 29 to October 17 . IHG says it has since installed an encryption system that makes front desk payments more secure , while it is telling people who stayed at the hotels during that time that they should review their credit card statements for any fraudulent purchases .
In an email sent to users on 26th December , the site explainedVulnerability-related.DiscoverVulnerabilitythat hackers were able to conduct this breach by exploitingVulnerability-related.DiscoverVulnerabilitya known vulnerability in outdated vBulletin forum software . Although PakWheels didn ’ t reveal the number of affected users , we at HackRead have inside details on this breachAttack.Databreachaccording to which the number of targeted users impacted by this breachAttack.Databreachgoes over 674,775 users including names , emails , encrypted passwords , mobile number and Facebook sessions . PakWheels was started back in 2003 to fill the missing space between automotive enthusiasts and absence of a platform that discusses automotive industry related topics in the country . In May 2016 , Pakistan ’ s real estate giant Zameen was hackedAttack.Databreachby a Bangladeshi hacker who leakedAttack.Databreachits entire database after being ignored by Zameen ’ s administration . As far as vBulletin forum software , the year 2016 , has been a bad year for anyone using vBulletin and not updating it to its latest version . Until now , the forums hackedAttack.Databreachdue to vulnerability in outdated vBulletin forum software include Clash of Kings forum with 1.6 million data stolen , Epic games forum with 800,000 accounts stolen , Grand Theft Auto ( GTA ) forum , Russia ’ s Mail.ru with 27 million accounts stolen , LifeBoat forum with 7 million accounts stolen and Exile Mod gaming forum with 12,000 accounts stolen .
New statements from Apple make it clear that they do not believe a hacker , or group of hackers , breached any of their systems . This comes after a recent report from Motherboard that a hacker gang called the `` Turkish Crime Family '' is threatening to remotely wipe up to 559 million iPhones by April 7 . The hackers claim they hold an alleged cache of stolen accounts , and their goal is to shake downAttack.Ransomthe big Apple for $ 75,000 in Bitcoin or Ethereum cryptocurrency . Alternatively , in lieu of those options , they will even acceptAttack.Ransom$ 100,000 in iTunes gift cards ( a potentially risky option for them ) . Apple responded to the allegation that the hackers breachedAttack.Databreachits systems , assuring their systems were not compromisedAttack.Databreach, but did not confirm if the hackers do in fact holdAttack.Databreachan entire collection of Apple IDs and passwords . Whatever information they do have , probably came from previously comprised third-parties . `` If the list is legitimate , it was not obtainedAttack.Databreachthrough any hackAttack.Databreachof Apple , '' an Apple spokesperson told Fortune in an email . `` There have not been any breachesAttack.Databreachin any of Apple 's systems including iCloud and Apple ID . '' Even if the data did n't come from an Apple breachAttack.Databreach, it could still mean your iCloud login details are out there . Fortune suggested that the logins could be from the LinkedIn hackAttack.Databreach, in which login info from 117 million accounts was sold on the black market site `` The Real Deal . '' Though , if the Turkish Crime Family really has 559 million accounts , well , a mere fraction of the 117 million from LinkedIn does n't really cut it . The hackers have been sending login information to media companies in an effort to gather attention to their scam . For example , The Next Web received a small fraction of the alleged data from the hackers , and cross-referenced the info with the site Have I Been Pwned , which checks to see if your email or username has been compromisedAttack.Databreachin a hack . Most of the samples provided to TNW do n't appear to have been involved in the LinkedIn hack or other hacks in the Pwned database , but TNW was able to accessAttack.Databreachthe accounts with the login information provided by the hackers , so the info looks legitimate . They ca n't test every login , so the small sample may not be indicative of the whole . The Turkish Crime Family also noted to TNW that all conversations with Apple were actually kept private and never reported to Motherboard . Instead , the conversation between the Turkish Crime Family and Motherboard were led by a member that has now been removed for his `` inaccuracy '' and `` lack of professionalism , '' an the group denies the authenticity of Motherboard 's report . Overall , the hacking team seems to have a hard time sticking to one story . Now , the hacker group is confirming Apple 's statement that its systems have not been breachedAttack.Databreach, and that the stolen data was obtainedAttack.Databreachthrough previously compromised systems over the last five years . The Turkish Crime Family is , in fact , not contradicting Apple . They did not breachAttack.Databreachthe company , nor did they ever state to Motherboard that they stoleAttack.Databreachthe info directly from Apple . Rather , after Motherboard 's breaking March 21 report , a breach was assumed by some news outlets such as BGR , though most media sites never directly stated that the hackers breached Apple . The Turkish Crime Family 's initial response to Motherboard , and the group 's only statement , was to extortAttack.RansomApple over an alleged cache of iCloud and other Apple email accounts . The group never stated where their cache of data came from until today when they contacted TNW in response to Apple .
The attack was discovered when the perpetrators attempted a fraudulent wire transfer of money . A link has been posted to your Facebook feed . A phishing email attackAttack.Phishingpotentially compromised the accounts of as many as 18,000 current and former employees of media company Gannett Co. As of Tuesday there was no indication of accessAttack.Databreachto or acquisition of any sensitive personal data from employees ’ accounts , said the company . Gannett Co. ( GCI ) is the owner of USA TODAY , the publisher of this report , and 109 local news properties across the United States . The attack was discovered on March 30 and investigated by Gannett ’ s cybersecurity team . It appeared to originate in emails to human resources staff . The 18,000 current and former employees of the company will be sent notices about the incident and offer of credit monitoring via the US Postal Service . No customer account information was touchedAttack.Databreachby the phishing attackAttack.Phishing. They will be provided with an offer of credit monitoring because employee information was potentially available through some of the affected account login credentials before the accounts were locked down . Phishing attacksAttack.Phishingare a common method used by attackers to infiltrate computer networks . They typically consist of faked emails sent toAttack.Phishingan employee that enticeAttack.Phishingthem to click on a link that unleashes malicious software that can compromiseAttack.Databreachtheir computer accounts . Once in a network , attackers can then leapfrog to other accounts , working their way deeper into the system . In the Gannett attack , the infiltration was discovered when the perpetrator attempted to use a co-opted account for a fraudulent corporate wire transfer request . The attempt was identified by Gannett 's finance team as suspicious and was unsuccessful .
The hacker who wants to remain anonymous is part of an underground hacker platform and maintains that the forum was hacked in January 2017 . The data was first discovered by data mining company Hacked-DB who found out that the total number of stolen user accounts is 70,000 , but after an in-depth scan it turned out that 5,000 accounts were a duplicate and the exact number of stolen accounts are 65,215 . The data includes personal details of registered user such as user id , username , email account , IP address and password hashed with bcrypt , Blowfish . Among the data , there are 40,521 Gmail accounts , 3,261 Yahoo accounts , 2,760 Outlook and 2,760 Hotmail accounts . The forum SSL certificate is already expired and Chrome users can see “ Not Secure Connection ” warning . Also , the forum which is based on phpBB ( Free and Open Source Forum Software ) is vulnerable to simple SQL injection attack making it easier for the hackers to stealAttack.Databreachwhatever is stored on the server . Airsoft GI is based in California with offices in Taxes and Virginia but , when it comes to the targeted platform , it shows that the last activity on the forum was on Apr 28 , 2015 . This means the forum is not only unsecure but inactive .