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One Love, One Fuzz - ASW #122

This week, we welcome Justin Massey, Product Manager, Security Monitoring at Datadog, to discuss Visualizing and Detecting Threats For Your Custom Application! In the Application Security News, Microsoft announces new Project OneFuzz framework, an open source developer tool to find and fix bugs at scale, Bluetooth Spoofing Bug Affects Billions of IoT Devices, Firefox bug lets you hijack nearby mobile browsers via WiFi, Safeguarding Secrets Within the Pipeline, and more!

 

Show Notes: https://wiki.securityweekly.com/asw122

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11 Tons of Typewriters - PSW #667

This week, we welcome we welcome Mike Ware, Senior Director of Technology at Synopsys, to talk about the Key Findings From The Newly Released BSIMM11 Report! In our second segment, we welcome James Spiteri, Solutions Architect and Cyber Security Specialist Global Solutions Lead at Elastic, to discuss how Elastic Security Opens Public Detections Rules Repo! In the Security News, Three Cybersecurity Lessons from a 1970s KGB Key Logger, MFA Bypass Bugs Opened Microsoft 365 to Attack, How Hackers Can Pick Your LocksJust By Listening, U.S. House Passes IoT Cybersecurity Bill, the Largest Hacking Campaign Since 2015 Targeted Magento Stores Via Unpatched Bug, and 5 Security Lessons Humans Can Learn From Their Dogs!

 

Show Notes: https://wiki.securityweekly.com/psw667

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QAnon Shut Down, Mozi Botnet, & Trump Bans TikTok - Wrap Up - SWN #66

This week, Dr. Doug discusses Microsoft OneFuzz, Tik Tok, QAnon, Mozi, and more news from the sunny shores of Venus!

 

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This Week in Security News: AWS Outposts Ready Launches With 32 Validated Partners and Staples Hit by a Data Breach

Welcome to our weekly roundup, where we share what you need to know about the cybersecurity news and events that happened over the past few days. This week, learn about how solutions from 32 Amazon Web Services partners – including Trend Micro – are now available for AWS customers to use with their deployments of AWS Outposts. Also, read about a data breach at U.S. office-supply retailer Staples.

 

Read on:

Boosting Impact for Profit: Evolving Ransomware Techniques for Targeted Attacks

As described in Trend Micro’s 2020 Midyear Roundup, the numbers pertaining to ransomware no longer tell the full story. While the number of infections, company disclosures, and ransomware families has gone down, the estimated amount of money exchanged for the retrieval of encrypted data has steadily gone up. By going after institutions and companies with the urgent need to retrieve their data and get their systems running again, cybercriminals are able to demand exorbitant amounts of ransom.

AWS Outposts Ready Launches with 32 Validated Partners

Solutions from 32 Amazon Web Services partners, including Trend Micro, are available now for AWS customers to use with their deployments of AWS Outposts, the on-premises version of the industry’s leading public cloud.

Analysis of a Convoluted Attack Chain Involving Ngrok

The Trend Micro Managed XDR team recently handled an incident involving one of Trend Micro’s customers. The incident revealed how a malicious actor incorporated certain techniques into an attack, making it more difficult for blue teams and security researchers alike to analyze the chain of events in a clean and easily understandable manner. In this blog, Trend Micro further analyzes the attack.

39% of Employees Access Corporate Data on Personal Devices

A large proportion of employees are using their own devices to access data belonging to their company, according to a new study by Trend Micro. Researchers found that 39% of workers use personal smartphones, tablets, and laptops to access corporate data, often via services and applications hosted in the cloud.

A Blind Spot in ICS Security: The Protocol Gateway Part 2: Vulnerability Allowing Stealth Attacks on Industrial Control Systems

In this blog series, Trend Micro analyzes the impacts of the serious vulnerabilities detected in the protocol gateways and shares the security countermeasures that security administrators in smart factories must take. In the second part of this series, Trend Micro presents an overview of the verification methods, results of this research, and describes “flaws in the protocol conversion function,” one of the security risks revealed through Trend Micro’s experiments.

Staples Hit by Data Breach: What to Do Now

U.S. office-supply retailer Staples says its recent data breach affected fewer than 2,500 customers. Australian security researcher Troy Hunt, who runs the HaveIBeenPwned website, used his Twitter account to post a copy of an email message sent to an unknown number of Staples online customers.

“Zerologon” and the Value of Virtual Patching

A new CVE was released recently that has made quite a few headlines – CVE-2020-1472, also known as Zerologon. This CVE can allow an attacker to take advantage of the cryptographic algorithm used in the Netlogon authentication process and impersonate the identity of any computer when trying to authenticate against the domain controller.

Billions of Devices Vulnerable to New ‘BLESA’ Bluetooth Security Flaw

Billions of smartphones, tablets, laptops, and IoT devices are using Bluetooth software stacks that are vulnerable to a new security flaw disclosed this summer. Named BLESA (Bluetooth Low Energy Spoofing Attack), the vulnerability impacts devices running the Bluetooth Low Energy (BLE) protocol. BLE is a slimmer version of the original Bluetooth (Classic) standard but designed to conserve battery power while keeping Bluetooth connections alive as long as possible.

California Elementary Kids Kicked Off Online Learning by Ransomware

As students head back to the classroom, the wave of ransomware attacks against schools is continuing. The latest is a strike against a California school district that closed down remote learning for 6,000 elementary school students, according to city officials. The cyberattack, against the Newhall School District in Valencia, affected all distance learning across 10 different grade schools.

Mobile Messengers Expose Billions of Users to Privacy Attacks

When installing a mobile messenger like WhatsApp, new users can instantly start texting existing contacts based on the phone numbers stored on their device. For this to happen, users must grant the app permission to access and regularly upload their address book to company servers in a process called mobile contact discovery. A new research study shows that currently deployed contact discovery services severely threaten the privacy of billions of users.

Should employees be able to access company data via their personal devices? Share your thoughts in the comments below or follow me on Twitter to continue the conversation: @JonLClay.

The post This Week in Security News: AWS Outposts Ready Launches With 32 Validated Partners and Staples Hit by a Data Breach appeared first on .

Pointing Fingers - ESW #199

This week, first we talk Enterprise News, discussing Acunetix new data retention policies, 5 things you should ask your web app pen test provider, Microsoft's open source tool for sniffing out Windows 10 bugs, Datadog unveils support for distributed tracing for AWS Step Functions via AWS X-Ray, and Gravwell's Data Fusion platform breaks the mold of legacy data ingestion engines! In our second segment, we welcome Ferruh Mavituna, CEO of Netsparker, to discuss Current Security Needs Of Modern Enterprise Companies! In our final segment, we welcome Jimmy Mesta, Director of Security Research at Signal Sciences, to discuss Securing Enterprise Digital Transformations!

 

Show Notes: https://securityweekly.com/esw199

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Wrong Movie - SCW #43

This week, we welcome David King, Founding Member and Owner at Cyber Support Alliance and Governing Goliath Media, to discuss How We Lost the Cybersecurity War (and What Happens Next), in this two part interview!

 

Show Notes: https://wiki.securityweekly.com/scw43

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Ransom from Home – How to close the cyber front door to remote working ransomware attacks

Coronavirus has caused a major shift to our working patterns. In many cases these will long outlast the pandemic. But working from home has its own risks. One is that you may invite ransomware attacks from a new breed of cyber-criminal who has previously confined his efforts to directly targeting the corporate network. Why? Because as a remote worker, you’re increasingly viewed as a soft target—the open doorway to extorting money from your employer.

So how does ransomware land up on your front doorstep? And what can a home worker do to shut that door?

The new ransomware trends

Last year, Trend Micro detected over 61 million ransomware-related threats, a 10% increase from 2018 figures. But things have only gotten worse from there. There has been a 20% spike in ransomware detections globally in the first half of 2020, rising to 109% in the US. And why is that?

At a basic level, ransomware searches for and encrypts most of the files on a targeted computer, so as to make them unusable. Victims are then asked to pay a ransom within a set time frame in order to receive the decryption key they need to unlock their data. If they don’t, and they haven’t backed-up this data, it could be lost forever.

The trend of late, however, has been to focus on public and private sector organizations whose staff are working from home (WFH). The rationale is that remote workers are less likely to be able to defend themselves from ransomware attacks, while they also provide a useful stepping-stone into high-value corporate networks. Moreover, cybercriminals are increasingly looking to steal sensitive data before they encrypt it, even as they’re more likely to fetch a higher ransom for their efforts than they do from a typical consumer, especially if the remote employee’s data is covered by cyber-insurance.

Home workers are also being more targeted for a number of reasons:

  • They may be more distracted than those in the office.
  • Home network and endpoint security may not be up to company levels.
  • Home systems (routers, smart home devices, PCs, etc.,) may not be up-to-date and therefore are more easily exposed to exploits.
  • Remote workers are more likely to visit insecure sites, download risky apps, or share machines/networks with those who do.
  • Corporate IT security teams may be overwhelmed with other tasks and unable to provide prompt support to a remote worker.
  • Security awareness programs may have been lacking in the past, perpetuating bad practice for workers at home.

What’s the attack profile of the remote working threat?

In short, the bad guys are now looking to gain entry to the corporate network you may be accessing from home via a VPN, or to the cloud-hosted systems you use for work or sharing files, in order to first steal and then encrypt company data with ransomware as far and wide as possible into your organization. But the methods are familiar. They’ll

  • Try to trick you into dangerous behavior through email phishing—the usual strategy of getting you to click links that redirect you to bad websites that house malware, or getting you to download a bad file, to start the infection process.
  • Steal or guess your log-ins to work email accounts, remote desktop tools (i.e., Microsoft Remote Desktop or RDP), and cloud-based storage/networks, etc., before they deliver the full ransomware payload. This may happen via a phishing email spoofed to appear as if sent from a legitimate source, or they may scan for your use of specific tools and then try to guess the password (known as brute forcing). One new Mac ransomware, called EvilQuest, has a keylogger built into it, which could capture your company passwords as you type them in. It’s a one-two punch: steal the data first, then encrypt it.
  • Target malware at your VPN or remote desktop software, if it’s vulnerable. Phishing is again a popular way to do this, or they may hide it in software on torrent sites or in app stores. This gives them a foothold into your employer’s systems and network.
  • Target smart home devices/routers via vulnerabilities or their easy-to-guess/crack passwords, in order to use home networks as a stepping-stone into your corporate network.

How can I prevent ransomware when working from home?

The good news is that you, the remote worker, can take some relatively straightforward steps up front to help mitigate the cascading risks to your company posed by the new ransomware. Try the following:

  • Be cautious of phishing emails. Take advantage of company training and awareness courses if offered.
  • Keep your home router firmware, PCs, Macs, mobile devices, software, browsers and operating systems up to date on the latest versions – including remote access tools and VPNs (your IT department may do some of this remotely).
  • Ensure your home network, PCs, and mobile devices are protected with up-to-date with network and endpoint AV from a reputable vendor. (The solutions should include anti-intrusion, anti-web threat, anti-spam, anti-phishing, and of course, anti-ransomware features.)
  • Ensure remote access tools and user accounts are protected with multi-factor authentication (MFA) if used and disable remote access to your home router.
  • Disable Microsoft macros where possible. They’re a typical attack vector.
  • Back-up important files regularly, according to 3-2-1 rule.

How Trend Micro can help

In short, to close the cyber front door to ransomware, you need to protect your home network and all your endpoints (laptops, PCs, mobile devices) to be safe. Trend Micro can help via

  • The Home Network: Home Network Security (HNS) connects to your router to protect any devices connected to the home network — including IoT gadgets, smartphones and laptops — from ransomware and other threats.
  • Desktop endpoints: Trend Micro Security (TMS) offers advanced protection from ransomware-related threats. It includes Folder Shield to safeguard valuable files from ransomware encryption, which may be stored locally or synched to cloud services like Dropbox®, Google Drive® and Microsoft® OneDrive/OneDrive for Business.
  • Mobile endpoints: Trend Micro Mobile Security (also included in TMS) protects Android and iOS devices from ransomware.
  • Secure passwords: Trend Micro Password Manager enables users to securely store and recall strong, unique passwords for all their apps, websites and online accounts, across multiple devices.
  • VPN Protection at home and on-the-go: Trend Micro’s VPN Proxy One (Mac | iOS) solution will help ensure your data privacy on Apple devices when working from home, while its cross-platform WiFi Protection solution will do the same across PCs, Macs, Android and iOS devices when working from home or when connecting to public/unsecured WiFi hotspots, as you venture out and about as the coronavirus lockdown eases in your area.

With these tools, you, the remote worker, can help shut the front door to ransomware, protecting your work, devices, and company from data theft and encryption for ransom.

The post Ransom from Home – How to close the cyber front door to remote working ransomware attacks appeared first on .

Zoom Rolls Out 2FA, Fancy Bear Returns, & Massive Mailfire Leak - SWN #65

This week, Dr. Doug talks Candiru fish, Office Phishing attacks with a twist, Fancy Bear, Zhenhua data leaks, TikTok and Oracle, and Big Eyed Beans from Venus! Jason Wood returns for Expert Commentary on a Russian hacker selling a how-to video on exploiting unsupported Magento installations to skim credit card details for $5,000!

 

Show Notes: https://wiki.securityweekly.com/swn65

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Deep Cover - BSW #187

This week, we welcome back John Loucaides, VP of Research & Development at Eclypsium, to discuss Cracks in the Foundation: Understanding the New Endpoint Challenge! In the Leadership and Communications section, we're playing 3 questions - Does Your Board Really Understand Your Cyber Risks?, How can the C-suite support CISOs in improving cybersecurity?, Think You're Spending Enough on Security?, and more!

 

Show Notes: https://wiki.securityweekly.com/bsw187

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The Wire Stripper - ASW #121

This week, we welcome Frank Catucci, Sr. Director GTP of Application Security at Gartner, to discuss The People & Process of DevOps! In the Application Security News, BLURtooth vulnerability lets attackers overwrite Bluetooth authentication keys, Microsoft Patch Tuesday, Sept. 2020 Edition, XSS->Fix->Bypass: 10000$ bounty in Google Maps, Academics find crypto bugs in 306 popular Android apps, none get patched, using CRYLOGGER to detect crypto misuses dynamically, Remote Code Execution as SYSTEM/root via Backblaze, and more!

 

Show Notes: https://wiki.securityweekly.com/asw121

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1H 2020 Cyber Security Defined by Covid-19 Pandemic

When we published our 2020 Predictions report in December, we didn’t realize there was a global pandemic brewing that would give cybercriminals an almost daily news cycle to take advantage of in their attacks against people and organizations around the world. Malicious actors have always taken advantage of big news to use as lures for socially engineered threats, but these events tend to be fairly short news cycles.

When Covid-19 started making headlines in early 2020, we started seeing new threats using this in the attacks. As you see below, April was the peak month for email-based Covid-19 related threats.

The same was true for phishing URLs related to Covid-19, but for files using Covid-19 in their naming convention, the peak month in the first half was June.

Impact on Cybercrime

The constant 24×7 news around cases, cures and vaccines makes this pandemic unique for cybercriminals. Also, the shift to remote working and the challenges posed to supply chains all gave cybercriminals new content they could use as lures to entice victims into infecting themselves.

As we’ve seen for many years now, email-based threats were the most used threat vector by malicious actors, which makes sense as the number one infection vector to penetrate an organization’s network is to use a socially engineered email against an employee.

We even saw malicious mobile apps being developed using Covid-19 as a lure, as you see below.

In this case it was supporting potential cures for the virus, which many people would have wanted.

Other Highlights in 1H 2020

While Covid-19 dominated the threat landscape in the 1H 2020, it wasn’t the only thing that defined it. Ransomware actors continued their attacks against organizations, but as we’ve been seeing over the past year, they’ve become much more selective in their victims. The spray and pray model using spam has been shifted to a more targeted approach, similar to how nation-state actors and APT groups perform their attacks. Two things showcase this trend:

  1. The number of ransomware detections has dropped significantly from 1H 2019 to 1H 2020, showing that ransomware actors are not looking for broad infection numbers.

 

 

2. The ransom amounts have increased significantly over the years, showing ransomware actors are selecting their victims around how much they feel they can extort them for and whether they are more likely to pay a ransom.

 

Home network attacks are another interesting aspect of the threat landscape in the first half of this year. We have millions of home routers around the world that give us threat data on events coming into and out of home networks.

Threat actors are taking advantage of more remote workers by launching more attacks against these home networks. As you see below, the first half of 2020 saw a marked increase in attacks.

Many of these attacks are brute force login attempts as actors try to obtain login credentials for routers and devices within the home network, which can allow them to do further damage.

The above are only a small number of security events and trends we saw in just six months of 2020. Our full roundup of the security landscape so far this year is detailed out in our security roundup report – Securing the Pandemic-Disrupted Workplace. You can read about all we found to help prepare for many of the threats we will continue to see for the rest of the year.

The post 1H 2020 Cyber Security Defined by Covid-19 Pandemic appeared first on .

This Week in Security News: First Half of 2020 Led to Nearly 800 Disclosed Vulnerabilities and Cisco Jabber Bug Could Let Hackers Target Windows Systems Remotely

week in security

Welcome to our weekly roundup, where we share what you need to know about the cybersecurity news and events that happened over the past few days. This week, learn about Trend Micro’s midyear roundup report which found that published vulnerabilities in the first half of 2020 grew to 786, compared to 583 during the same time period last year. Also, read about vulnerabilities in Cisco’s Jabber app that could allow an attacker to execute arbitrary code.

 

Read on:

1H 2020 Cyber Security Defined by Covid-19 Pandemic

When thinking about 2020 security predictions, no one thought that there was a global pandemic brewing that would give cybercriminals an almost daily news cycle to take advantage of in their attacks against people and organizations around the world. While Covid-19 dominated the threat landscape in the first half of 2020, it wasn’t the only threat that defined it. Learn more about the 2020 threat landscape in Trend Micro’s recent blog.

Cisco Jabber Bug Could Let Hackers Target Windows Systems Remotely

Networking equipment maker Cisco has released a new version of its Jabber video conferencing and messaging app for Windows that includes patches for multiple vulnerabilities—which, if exploited, could allow an authenticated, remote attacker to execute arbitrary code. The flaws, which were uncovered by cybersecurity firm Watchcom during a pentest, affect all currently supported versions of the Jabber client (12.1-12.9) and has since been fixed by the company.

The Life Cycle of a Compromised (Cloud) Server

Trend Micro Research has developed a go-to resource for all things related to cybercriminal underground hosting and infrastructure. This week, Trend Micro released the second report in a three-part series which details the what, how, and why of cybercriminal hosting. Trend Micro dives into the common life cycle of a compromised server from initial compromise to the different stages of monetization preferred by criminals.

Instagram ‘Help Center’ Phishing Scam Pilfers Credentials

Turkish-speaking cybercriminals are sending Instagram users seemingly legitimate messages from the social media company, with the aim of stealing their Instagram and email credentials. Trend Micro researchers said that the campaign has been targeting hundreds of celebrities, startup business owners, and other entities with sizeable followings on Instagram.

What is a VPN and How Does it Increase Your Online Security and Privacy?

The number of VPN users has grown considerably over the past few years. According to a report from Go-Globe, 25% of netizens worldwide have used a VPN at least once in the last 30 days. Recently, VPN usage has surged in many countries and its popularity may see VPN usage surpass the estimated profit of USD$27.10 billion by the end of 2020. In this blog, Trend Micro takes a deeper look at all of the benefits a VPN can provide.

First Half of 2020 Led to Nearly 800 Disclosed Vulnerabilities: Report

Published vulnerabilities in January through June of 2020 grew to 786, compared to 583 during the same time period last year, according to Trend Micro’s midyear cybersecurity report. Bad actors most often targeted enterprise software, including Apache Struts and Drupal frameworks, between 2017 and the first half of this year. In this article, Trend Micro’s director of global threat communications, Jon Clay, shares his thoughts on the first half of 2020.

A Blind Spot in ICS Security: The Protocol Gateway Part 1: Importance of the Protocol Gateway

Trend Micro released a white paper summarizing potential protocol gateway security risks in early August. This blog series follows up on that paper, analyzing the impacts of the serious vulnerabilities detected in the protocol gateways essential when shifting to smart factories and outlining the security countermeasures that security administrators in factories must take. In the first blog of this series, part one describes the importance of the protocol gateway in ICS environments.

Evilnum Group Targets FinTech Firms with New Python-Based RAT

Evilnum, a group known for targeting financial technology companies, has added new malware and infection tricks to its arsenal, researchers warn. The group is suspected of offering APT-style hacker-for-hire services to other entities, a growing and worrying trend that’s changing the threat landscape.

Are Employees the Weakest Link in Your Security Strategy?

Email is the number one threat vector. Data from Trend Micro Smart Protection Network shows that for the first five months of 2020, 92% of all the cyberthreats leveraging Covid-19 were spam or phishing email messages. Email scams can have a big impact, both on the organization and the individual. This was highlighted in a recent report from BBC News where a finance professional from Glasgow, Scotland was targeted by a business email compromise (BEC) scam.

55% of Cybersquatted Domains are Malicious or Potentially Fraudulent

In a single month, cyber-squatters registered almost 14,000 domain names, more than half of which went on to host malicious or likely fraudulent content, Palo Alto Networks states in a report released this week. The company, which collected information on newly registered domains in December 2019, found 13,857 domains classified by its software as cybersquatting based on lexical analysis.

What are your thoughts on Evilnum’s APT-style hacker-for-hire services? Share your thoughts in the comments below or follow me on Twitter to continue the conversation: @JonLClay.

The post This Week in Security News: First Half of 2020 Led to Nearly 800 Disclosed Vulnerabilities and Cisco Jabber Bug Could Let Hackers Target Windows Systems Remotely appeared first on .

One Hell of a Show - PSW #666

This week, we welcome we welcome David Asraf, C++ Developer at Vicarius, and Roi Cohen, Co-Founder & VP Sales at Vicarius, to discuss The Patchless Horseman! In our second segment, we welcome back Sumedh Thakar, President and Chief Product Officer at Qualys, to talk about Building Security Into the DevOps Lifecycle! In the Security News, Cisco Patches Critical Vulnerability in Jabber for Windows, Expert found multiple critical issues in MoFi routers, TeamTNT Gains Full Remote Takeover of Cloud Instances, Bluetooth Bug Opens Devices to Man-in-the-Middle Attacks, Former NSA chief General Keith Alexander is now on Amazon’s board, and the Legality of Security Research is to be Decided in a US Supreme Court Case!

 

Show Notes: https://wiki.securityweekly.com/psw666

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Insider Threats, BLURtooth Flaw, & More 0-Days - Wrap Up - SWN #64

This week, Dr. Doug talks Cisco patching Jabber Flaw, Insider Threats are huge, BLURtooth, Apple COVID-19 opt ins, and pretty much everyone is trying to interfere with the election!

 

Show Notes: https://wiki.securityweekly.com/swn64

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This Week in Security News: Microsoft Fixes 129 Vulnerabilities for September’s Patch Tuesday and Trend Micro’s XDR Offerings Simplify and Optimize Detection and Response

Welcome to our weekly roundup, where we share what you need to know about the cybersecurity news and events that happened over the past few days. This week, read about this month’s Patch Tuesday update from Microsoft. Also, learn about Trend Micro’s Worry-Free XDR: a new version of its XDR platform designed to extend the power of correlated detection and response beyond the endpoint for smaller businesses.

Read on:

Exposed Docker Server Abused to Drop Cryptominer, DDoS Bot

Malicious actors continue to target environments running Docker containers. Trend Micro recently encountered an attack that drops both a malicious cryptocurrency miner and a distributed denial-of-service (DDoS) bot on a Docker container built using Alpine Linux as its base image. A similar attack was also reported by Trend Micro in May; in that previous attack, threat actors created a malicious Alpine Linux container to also host a malicious cryptocurrency miner and a DDoS bot.

Microsoft Fixes 129 Vulnerabilities for September’s Patch Tuesday

Microsoft released patches for 129 CVEs (common vulnerabilities and exposures) as part of its monthly Patch Tuesday rollout. Dustin Childs from Trend Micro’s Zero Day Initiative shared that this marks seven consecutive months of more than 110 bugs fixed and brings the yearly total close to 1,000.

Purple Fox EK Relies on Cloudflare for Stability

A year ago, Trend Micro talked about Purple Fox malware being delivered by the Rig exploit kit. Malwarebytes later found evidence that it had its own delivery mechanism, and thus named it the Purple Fox exploit kit. Trend Micro recently found a spike in the Purple Fox exploit kit with improved delivering tactics in our telemetry. Some of the improvements include use of full HTTPS infrastructure based on Cloudflare as frontend, fully encrypted landing page, and disguised redirection.

New Raccoon Attack Could Let Attackers Break SSL/TLS Encryption

A group of researchers has detailed a new timing vulnerability in Transport Layer Security (TLS) protocol that could potentially allow an attacker to break the encryption and read sensitive communication under specific conditions. Dubbed “Raccoon Attack,” the server-side attack exploits a side-channel in the cryptographic protocol (versions 1.2 and lower) to extract the shared secret key used for secure communications between two parties.

War of Linux Cryptocurrency Miners: A Battle for Resources

The Linux ecosystem is regarded as more secure and reliable than other operating systems, which possibly explains why Google, NASA, and the US Department of Defense (DoD) utilize it for their online infrastructures and systems. Unfortunately, the adoption of Linux systems is also an attractive target for cybercriminals. In this blog, learn about the ruthless battle for computing power among the different cryptocurrency-mining malware that target Linux systems. 

Trend Micro’s XDR Offerings Simplify and Optimize Detection and Response

Trend Micro announced Worry-Free XDR is a new version of its XDR platform designed to extend the power of correlated detection and response beyond the endpoint for smaller businesses. This unmatched channel offering is available now as a standalone or managed solution tailored for SMBs.

Securing Enterprise Security: How to Manage the New Generation of Access Control Devices

Enterprises are increasingly deploying contactless security solutions to control access to their spaces, especially now in the midst of a pandemic. These solutions mostly rely on devices that use facial recognition to manage entry to enterprise premises in an effective and efficient manner. Considering that these access control devices are the first line of defense for employees and assets on enterprise premises, Trend Micro set out to test the security of the devices and to find out whether they are susceptible to cyber as well as physical attacks.

Zeppelin Ransomware Returns with New Trojan on Board

The Zeppelin ransomware has sailed back into relevance, after a hiatus of several months. A wave of attacks were spotted in August by Juniper Threatlab researchers, making use of a new trojan downloader. These, like an initial Zeppelin wave observed in late 2019, start with phishing emails with Microsoft Word attachments (themed as “invoices”) that have malicious macros on board. Once a user enables macros, the infection process starts.

Published New Ebook: Strategic Investment to Secure Smart Factories

Security is undergoing a digital transformation in the manufacturing industry. As the fusion of the cyber world and the physical world progresses, various security issues are mounting. Manufacturing executives must view security as a management issue, not as a system issue. Trend Micro has published an ebook that focuses on security issues in the convergence of IT and OT.

Ransomware Accounted for 41% of All Cyber Insurance Claims in H1 2020

Ransomware incidents have accounted for 41% of cyber insurance claims filed in the first half of 2020, according to a report published today by Coalition, one of the largest providers of cyber insurance services in North America. The high number of claims comes to confirm previous reports from multiple cybersecurity firms that ransomware is one of today’s most prevalent and destructive threats.

What do you think about the Zeppelin ransomware attacks and the rise in ransomware overall? Share your thoughts in the comments below or follow me on Twitter to continue the conversation: @JonLClay.

The post This Week in Security News: Microsoft Fixes 129 Vulnerabilities for September’s Patch Tuesday and Trend Micro’s XDR Offerings Simplify and Optimize Detection and Response appeared first on .

The Impossible Traveler - ESW #198

This week, first we talk Enterprise News, discussing how Yubico Delivers New Security Key the YubiKey 5C NFC, ManageEngine ADSelfService Plus now supports MFA for VPNs to protect remote workforce, Sysdig partners with VulnDB to strengthen vulnerability intelligence reporting, 3 Signs it’s Time for a Penetration Test, and CrowdStrike Expands Support for AWS Workloads and Container Deployments! In our second segment, we welcome Corey Williams, VP Marketing/Idaptive by CyberArk at CyberArk, to talk about Exploring Identity Security and Its Role in the Modern Enterprise! In our final segment, we welcome Bradon Rogers, SVP of Global Pre-Sales Engineering at Mimecast, to discuss Cloud Based Cyber Resiliency!

 

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The Dark Side - SCW #42

This week, we welcome Oleg Shomonko, Head of Business Development, Co-founder at Ekran System for an interview! Ekran System is a universal insider threat protection platform that combines three essential insider security controls: activity monitoring, access management, and identity management. Functionality is provided in a single universal software platform delivering light-weight agents for all types of endpoints. This segment is sponsored by Ekran System.

 

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WhatsApp Bugs, Argentina Ransomware, & Cisco Jabber RCE - SWN #63

This week, Dr. Doug talks Security Weekly sold to Cyber Risk Alliance, Argentina and Newcastle ransomwared, Cisco Jabber, the NSA wants to educate you, and Jason Wood returns for Expert Commentary on how Creepy ‘Geofence’ Finds Anyone Who Went Near a Crime Scene!

 

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Will Robo-Helpers Help Themselves to Your Data?

Over the coming years, organizations will experience growing disruption as threats from the digital world have an impact on the physical. Invasive technologies will be adopted across both industrial and consumer markets, creating an increasingly turbulent and unpredictable security environment. The requirement for a flexible approach to security and resilience will be crucial as a hybrid threat environment emerges.

While robots may seem like the perfect helpers, by 2022, the Information Security Forum (ISF) anticipates that a range of robotic devices, developed to perform a growing number of both mundane and complex human tasks, will be deployed in organizations and homes around the world. Friendly-faced, innocently-branded, and loaded with a selection of cameras and sensors, these constantly connected devices will roam freely. Poorly secured robo-helpers will be weaponized by attackers, committing acts of corporate espionage and stealing intellectual property. Attackers will exploit robo-helpers to target the most vulnerable members of society, such as the elderly or sick at home, in care homes or hospitals, resulting in reputational damage for both manufacturers and corporate users.

Organizations will be caught unawares as compromised robo-helpers such as autonomous vacuum cleaners, remote telepresence devices and miniature delivery vehicles roam unattended and unmonitored. The potential for these invasive machines to steal intellectual property and corporate secrets through a range of onboard cameras and sensors will become a significant concern. Organizations developing and using care-bots, a type of robo-helper designed for healthcare, will face significant financial and reputational damage when vulnerable individuals suffer emotional, physical, psychological and financial harm when care-bots are compromised.

This proliferation of robo-helpers into the home, offices, factories and hospitals will provide attackers with a range of opportunities to make financial gains and cause operational damage. Nation states and competitors will target robo-helpers that have access to sensitive areas in order to steal critical information. Organized criminal groups and hackers will also use manipulative techniques to frighten and coerce individuals into sending money or giving up sensitive information.

Imagine this scenario: the building maintenance division of a large pharmaceutical organization decides to replace its staff at the research and development (R&D) site with a range of outsourced, automated robots. These robo-helpers carry out building maintenance and sanitation operations in place of their human counterparts. Each unit is fitted with cameras and sensors and requires network connectivity in order to operate. Shortly after their deployment, details of an early phase experimental drug trial are leaked to the media.

Are you sure that your robo-helpers are secure?

What is the Justification for This Threat?

The extent to which robo-helpers are adopted and used, especially in homes and office spaces, currently differs significantly depending on geography and culture. Japan, China and South Korea, amongst other Asian nations, are typically more accepting of robots, whereas Western nations are currently less so. Robo-helpers are particularly seen in a positive light in Japan, with The International Federation of Robotics attributing the cultural influence of the Japanese religion of Shinto – where both people and objects are believed to possess a spirit – as a key enabler for the high rate of robotics adoption in Japan. China, the US and Japan are currently the biggest exporters of robots in the world, with overall growth expected to increase worldwide.

There is a growing acceptance of robots in the home and workplace, which may indicate that organizations are ready to accelerate the rate of robo-helper adoption. In offices and homes, a growing number of semi-autonomous robo-helpers are due to hit global consumer markets as early as 2020, all built with a range of networked cameras and sensors. As with poorly secured IoT devices that are constantly connected to an organization’s network, a security flaw or vulnerability in a robo-helper will further broaden attack surfaces, presenting yet another access point for attackers to exploit.

Robotics have been used in manufacturing for decades, but as they become more popular these robo-helpers will perform a greater range of tasks, giving them access to a wealth of sensitive data and locations. In the education sector robots will soon be used in schools, with developers in Silicon Valley creating robo-helpers for teachers that can scan students’ facial expressions and provide one-to-one support for logical subjects such as languages and mathematics. In healthcare there have also been breakthroughs – in November 2019 the world’s first brain aneurysm surgery using a robo-helper was completed, demonstrating that robot-assisted procedures enhance flexibility, control and precision.

As these robots gain greater autonomy and perform a greater number of surgeries over time, the need to secure them will become ever more urgent. In logistics, delivery-bots have seen significant investment and improvement, now using onboard cameras and sensors to navigate difficult terrain and unfamiliar environments.

Robo-helpers will make their way into the lives of more vulnerable individuals in care homes, schools and community centers and people will increasingly feel comfortable sharing sensitive information about their lives with them. Attackers will realize this, aiming to exploit these non-tech-savvy members of society into transferring funds or giving up sensitive information. Organizations developing these products or using them in their business will face serious reputational damage, as well as legal and financial repercussions when their customers become victims.

With the proliferation of robo-helpers across a growing number of countries and into a greater number of industries and homes, the opportunities for attackers to compromise individuals and organizations that use them will be alarming.

How Should Your Organization Prepare?

Organizations using robo-helpers in their business, or providing them to others, should ensure that devices are properly protected against attacks and cannot be used to compromise the privacy and rights of customers.

In the short term, organizations should restrict robo-helper access to sensitive locations. We recommend that they segregate access and monitor traffic between robo-helpers and the corporate network and ensure that robo-helpers using cameras and sensors comply with data protection regulations. Finally, dispose of robo-helpers securely.

In the long term, gain assurance over robo-helpers used in the organization and limit the capabilities of robo-helpers to ensure that ethical norms are not breached. Monitor specific robo-helpers for signs of fraudulent or dangerous activities and provide training and awareness around appropriate use and behaviors.

About the author: Steve Durbin is Managing Director of the Information Security Forum (ISF). His main areas of focus include strategy, information technology, cyber security and the emerging security threat landscape across both the corporate and personal environments. Previously, he was senior vice president at Gartner.

Copyright 2010 Respective Author at Infosec Island

This Week in Security News: First Half of 2020 Led to Nearly 800 Disclosed Vulnerabilities and Cisco Jabber Bug Could Let Hackers Target Windows Systems Remotely

Welcome to our weekly roundup, where we share what you need to know about the cybersecurity news and events that happened over the past few days. This week, learn about Trend Micro’s midyear roundup report which found that published vulnerabilities in the first half of 2020 grew to 786, compared to 583 during the same time period last year. Also, read about vulnerabilities in Cisco’s Jabber app that could allow an attacker to execute arbitrary code.

Read on:

1H 2020 Cyber Security Defined by Covid-19 Pandemic

When thinking about 2020 security predictions, no one thought that there was a global pandemic brewing that would give cybercriminals an almost daily news cycle to take advantage of in their attacks against people and organizations around the world. While Covid-19 dominated the threat landscape in the first half of 2020, it wasn’t the only threat that defined it. Learn more about the 2020 threat landscape in Trend Micro’s recent blog.

Cisco Jabber Bug Could Let Hackers Target Windows Systems Remotely

Networking equipment maker Cisco has released a new version of its Jabber video conferencing and messaging app for Windows that includes patches for multiple vulnerabilities—which, if exploited, could allow an authenticated, remote attacker to execute arbitrary code. The flaws, which were uncovered by cybersecurity firm Watchcom during a pentest, affect all currently supported versions of the Jabber client (12.1-12.9) and has since been fixed by the company.

The Life Cycle of a Compromised (Cloud) Server

Trend Micro Research has developed a go-to resource for all things related to cybercriminal underground hosting and infrastructure. This week, Trend Micro released the second report in a three-part series which details the what, how, and why of cybercriminal hosting. Trend Micro dives into the common life cycle of a compromised server from initial compromise to the different stages of monetization preferred by criminals.

Instagram ‘Help Center’ Phishing Scam Pilfers Credentials

Turkish-speaking cybercriminals are sending Instagram users seemingly legitimate messages from the social media company, with the aim of stealing their Instagram and email credentials. Trend Micro researchers said that the campaign has been targeting hundreds of celebrities, startup business owners, and other entities with sizeable followings on Instagram.

What is a VPN and How Does it Increase Your Online Security and Privacy?

The number of VPN users has grown considerably over the past few years. According to a report from Go-Globe, 25% of netizens worldwide have used a VPN at least once in the last 30 days. Recently, VPN usage has surged in many countries and its popularity may see VPN usage surpass the estimated profit of USD$27.10 billion by the end of 2020. In this blog, Trend Micro takes a deeper look at all of the benefits a VPN can provide.

First Half of 2020 Led to Nearly 800 Disclosed Vulnerabilities: Report

Published vulnerabilities in January through June of 2020 grew to 786, compared to 583 during the same time period last year, according to Trend Micro’s midyear cybersecurity report. Bad actors most often targeted enterprise software, including Apache Struts and Drupal frameworks, between 2017 and the first half of this year. In this article, Trend Micro’s director of global threat communications, Jon Clay, shares his thoughts on the first half of 2020.

A Blind Spot in ICS Security: The Protocol Gateway Part 1: Importance of the Protocol Gateway

Trend Micro released a white paper summarizing potential protocol gateway security risks in early August. This blog series follows up on that paper, analyzing the impacts of the serious vulnerabilities detected in the protocol gateways essential when shifting to smart factories and outlining the security countermeasures that security administrators in factories must take. In the first blog of this series, part one describes the importance of the protocol gateway in ICS environments.

Evilnum Group Targets FinTech Firms with New Python-Based RAT

Evilnum, a group known for targeting financial technology companies, has added new malware and infection tricks to its arsenal, researchers warn. The group is suspected of offering APT-style hacker-for-hire services to other entities, a growing and worrying trend that’s changing the threat landscape.

Are Employees the Weakest Link in Your Security Strategy?

Email is the number one threat vector. Data from Trend Micro Smart Protection Network shows that for the first five months of 2020, 92% of all the cyberthreats leveraging Covid-19 were spam or phishing email messages. Email scams can have a big impact, both on the organization and the individual. This was highlighted in a recent report from BBC News where a finance professional from Glasgow, Scotland was targeted by a business email compromise (BEC) scam.

55% of Cybersquatted Domains are Malicious or Potentially Fraudulent

In a single month, cyber-squatters registered almost 14,000 domain names, more than half of which went on to host malicious or likely fraudulent content, Palo Alto Networks states in a report released this week. The company, which collected information on newly registered domains in December 2019, found 13,857 domains classified by its software as cybersquatting based on lexical analysis.

What are your thoughts on Evilnum’s APT-style hacker-for-hire services? Share your thoughts in the comments below or follow me on Twitter to continue the conversation: @JonLClay.

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The Squeegee Guy - PSW #665

This week, we welcome Fredrick "Flee" Lee, Chief Security Officer at Gusto, to discuss Lovable Security: Be a Data Custodian, Not a Data Owner! In our second segment, we welcome Justin Armstrong, Security Architect at MEDITECH, to talk about Cybersecurity & Patient Safety! In the Security News, The NSA Makes Its Powerful Cybersecurity Tool Open Source, The bizarre reason Amazon drivers are hanging phones in trees near Whole Foods, Elon Musk Confirms Serious Russian Bitcoin Ransomware Attack On Tesla, Foiled By The FBI, Attackers are exploiting two zero-day flaws in Cisco enterprise-grade routers, and the FBI is investigating after an alarmed pilot tells the LAX tower: We just passed a guy in a jet pack!

 

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Tesla Dodges Attack, 'Sepulcher' Malware, & Snowden Vindicated? - Wrap Up - SWN #62

This week, Dr. Doug talks Snowden Vindicated? Hermain Cain tweets from beyond the grave, APT TA413, Iranian cats again, Carolyn Meinel, hard coded credentials, and KryptoCibule!

 

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Absolute Nightmare - ESW #197

This week, first we talk Enterprise News, discussing Proofpoint's $300 Million buyback program, LogRhythmn Power Users share their use cases, Bitdefender Enhances MDR Service to Increase Proactive Protection and Advanced Detection, Anchore Unveils Enterprise 2.4 With Expanded & Updated Capabilities, and Auth0's new bot detection! In our second segment, we air two pre recorded interviews from Security Weekly Virtual Hacker Summer Camp with Corey Bodzin from Deepwatch, and Michael Sanders from Extrahop! In our final segment, we air two more pre-recorded interviews from Security Weekly Virtual Hacker Summer Camp with Ian McShane of Crowdstrike, and Michael Borohovski from Synopsys!

 

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1H 2020 Cyber Security Defined by Covid-19 Pandemic

When we published our 2020 Predictions report in December, we didn’t realize there was a global pandemic brewing that would give cybercriminals an almost daily news cycle to take advantage of in their attacks against people and organizations around the world. Malicious actors have always taken advantage of big news to use as lures for socially engineered threats, but these events tend to be fairly short news cycles.

When Covid-19 started making headlines in early 2020, we started seeing new threats using this in the attacks. As you see below, April was the peak month for email-based Covid-19 related threats.

The same was true for phishing URLs related to Covid-19, but for files using Covid-19 in their naming convention, the peak month in the first half was June.

Impact on Cybercrime

The constant 24×7 news around cases, cures and vaccines makes this pandemic unique for cybercriminals. Also, the shift to remote working and the challenges posed to supply chains all gave cybercriminals new content they could use as lures to entice victims into infecting themselves.

As we’ve seen for many years now, email-based threats were the most used threat vector by malicious actors, which makes sense as the number one infection vector to penetrate an organization’s network is to use a socially engineered email against an employee.

We even saw malicious mobile apps being developed using Covid-19 as a lure, as you see below.

In this case it was supporting potential cures for the virus, which many people would have wanted.

Other Highlights in 1H 2020

While Covid-19 dominated the threat landscape in the 1H 2020, it wasn’t the only thing that defined it. Ransomware actors continued their attacks against organizations, but as we’ve been seeing over the past year, they’ve become much more selective in their victims. The spray and pray model using spam has been shifted to a more targeted approach, similar to how nation-state actors and APT groups perform their attacks. Two things showcase this trend:

  1. The number of ransomware detections has dropped significantly from 1H 2019 to 1H 2020, showing that ransomware actors are not looking for broad infection numbers.
  2. The ransom amounts have increased significantly over the years, showing ransomware actors are selecting their victims around how much they feel they can extort them for and whether they are more likely to pay a ransom.

Home network attacks are another interesting aspect of the threat landscape in the first half of this year. We have millions of home routers around the world that give us threat data on events coming into and out of home networks.

Threat actors are taking advantage of more remote workers by launching more attacks against these home networks. As you see below, the first half of 2020 saw a marked increase in attacks.

Many of these attacks are brute force login attempts as actors try to obtain login credentials for routers and devices within the home network, which can allow them to do further damage.

The above are only a small number of security events and trends we saw in just six months of 2020. Our full roundup of the security landscape so far this year is detailed out in our security roundup report – Securing the Pandemic-Disrupted Workplace. You can read about all we found to help prepare for many of the threats we will continue to see for the rest of the year.

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Pound Sand - SCW #41

This week, we welcome Priya Chaudhry, Jedi Warrior Princess, at ChaudhryLaw PLLC (Criminal Defense Trial Lawyer), to discuss the Uber Indictments in a special two part interview!

 

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Across State Lines - BSW #186

This week, we welcome Carlos Becerra, Co-Founder at CB Universal, to discuss Role of the CISO, Why Do You Need a vCISO? In the Leadership and Communications section, the lucky 7's have it: 7 Keys to Effective Leadership in Our New Normal, The 7 elements of an enterprise cybersecurity culture, 7 Quotes from Military Leaders to Help You Win at Life, and more!

 

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Securing the Hybrid Workforce Begins with Three Crucial Steps

The global shift to a remote workforce has redefined the way organizations structure their business models. As executives reestablish work policies to accommodate remote employees well beyond the initially anticipated duration, a new era of work will emerge: the hybrid workforce, one more largely split between office and remote environments. While this transition brings a wave of opportunity for organizations and employees, it also opens new doors for bad actors to capitalize on strained IT departments who have taken on additional responsibility to ensure sensitive data remains secure, whether on or off the corporate network.

While threats to company data range in attack method, ransomware continues to be the most prominent risk known to organizations worldwide, with a 41% increase in 2019 alone. It’s important that companies focus on acknowledging this threat and deploying strategies to prepare, defend and repair incidents, before adapting to a hybrid workforce model. This process will prevent organizations from falling victim to attacks where data loss or ransom payment are the only unfortunate options. To win the war on ransomware, organizations should incorporate a plan for IT organizations that ensures they have the resilience needed to overcome any attack. Let’s explore three crucial steps for ransomware resilience in more detail.

Focus on education first, avoid reactive approaches to threats later

Education – beginning after threat actors are identified – should be the first step taken on the path towards resilience. To avoid being caught in a reactive position, should a ransomware incident arise, it’s important to understand the three main mechanisms for entry: internet-connected RDP or other remote access, phishing attacks and software vulnerabilities. Once organizations know where the threats lie, they can tactfully approach training with strategies to refine IT and user security, putting additional preparation tactics in place. Identifying the top three mechanisms can help IT administration isolate RDP servers with backup components, integrate tools to assess the threat of phishing attacks to help spot and respond correctly, and inform users on recurrent updates to critical categories of IT assets, such as operating systems, applications, databases and device firmware.

Additionally, preparing how to use the ransomware tools in place will help IT organizations familiarize themselves with different restore scenarios. Whether it be a secure restore process that will abort when malware is detected or software that can detect ransomware ahead of restoring a system, the ability to perform different restore scenarios will become invaluable to organizations. When an attack does happen, they will recognize, understand and have confidence in the process of working towards recovery. By taking the education aspect of these steps seriously, organizations can decrease the ransomware risks, costs and pressure of dealing with a ransomware incident unprepared.

Implement backup solutions that maintain business continuity 

An important part of ransomware resiliency is the implementation of backup infrastructure to create and maintain strong business continuity. Organizations need to have a reliable system in place that protects their servers and keeps them from ever having to pay to get their data back. Consider keeping the backup server isolated from the internet and limit shared accounts that grant access to all users. Instead, assign specific tasks within the server that are relevant for users and require two-factor authentication for remote desktop access. Additionally, backups with an air-gapped, offline or immutable copy of data paired with the 3-2-1 rule will provide one of the most critical defenses against ransomware, insider threats and accidental deletion.

Furthermore, detecting a ransomware threat as early as possible gives IT organizations a significant advantage. This requires tools in place to flag possible threat activity. For endpoint devices displaced remotely, backup repositories that are set up to identify risks will give IT further insight into an incredible surface area to analyze for potential threat introduction. If implementations don’t prohibit attacks, another viable option is encrypting backups wherever possible for an additional layer of protection – threat actors charging ransom to prevent leaking data do not want to have to decrypt it. When it comes to a ransomware incident, there isn’t one single way to recover, but there are many options aside from these that organizations can take. The important thing to remember is that resiliency will be predicated on how backup solutions are implemented, the behavior of threat and the course of remediation. Take time to research the options available and ensure that solutions are implemented to protect your company.

Prepare to remediate an incident in advance

Even when there are steps in place that leverage education and implementation techniques to combat ransomware before an attack hits, organizations should still be prepared to remediate a threat if introduced. Layers of defense against attacks are invaluable, but organizations need to also map out specifically what to do when a threat is discovered. Should a ransomware incident happen, organizations need to have support in place to guide the restore process so that backups aren’t put at risk. Communication is key, having a list of security, incident response, and identity management contacts in place if needed – inside the organization or externally – will help ease the process towards remediation.

Next, have a pre-approved chain of decision makers in place. When it comes time to make decisions, like whether to restore or to fail over company data in an event of an attack, organizations should know who to turn to for decision authority. If conditions are ready to restore, IT should be familiar with recovery options based on the ransomware situation. Implement additional checks for safety before putting systems on the network again – like an antivirus scan before restoration completes – and ensure the right process is underway. Once the process is complete, implement a sweeping forced change of passwords to reduce the threat resurfacing.

The threat that ransomware poses to organizations both large and small is real. While no one can predict when or how an attack will happen, IT organizations that have a strong, multi-layered defense and strategy in place have a greater chance for recovery. With the right preparation, the steps outlined here can increase any organization’s resiliency – whether in office, remote or a combination of the two – against a ransomware incident and avoid data loss, financial loss, business reputation damage or more.

About the author: Rick Vanover is senior director of product strategy for Veeam.

Copyright 2010 Respective Author at Infosec Island

Charming Kitten, Slack RCE, & KryptoCibule Malware - SWN #61

This week, Dr. Doug talks Tesla, Slack, Charming Kitten returns, KryptoCibule, and Tweets from the great beyond! In the Expert Commentary, we welcome Ian McShane, VP, Product Marketing at CrowdStrike, to discuss remote work/return to office, and the challenges therein!

 

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Little Bit Too High - ASW #120

This week, we welcome Marc Tremsal, Director of Product Management of Security at Datadog, to discuss Detecting Threats & Avoiding Misconfigs In The Cloud-Age! In the Application Security News, A Tale of Escaping a Hardened Docker container, Four More Bugs Patched in Microsoft’s Azure Sphere IoT Platform, Upgrading GitHub to Ruby 2.7, Upgrading GitHub to Ruby 2.7, Redefining What CISO Success Looks Like, and Lessons from Uber: Be crystal clear on the law and your bug bounty policies!

 

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The Life Cycle of a Compromised (Cloud) Server

Trend Micro Research has developed a go-to resource for all things related to cybercriminal underground hosting and infrastructure. Today we released the second in this three-part series of reports which detail the what, how, and why of cybercriminal hosting (see the first part here).

As part of this report, we dive into the common life cycle of a compromised server from initial compromise to the different stages of monetization preferred by criminals. It’s also important to note that regardless of whether a company’s server is on-premise or cloud-based, criminals don’t care what kind of server they compromise.

To a criminal, any server that is exposed or vulnerable is fair game.

Cloud vs. On-Premise Servers

Cybercriminals don’t care where servers are located. They can leverage the storage space, computation resources, or steal data no matter what type of server they access. Whatever is most exposed will most likely be abused.

As digital transformation continues and potentially picks up to allow for continued remote working, cloud servers are more likely to be exposed. Many enterprise IT teams, unfortunately, are not arranged to provide the same protection for cloud as on-premise servers.

As a side note, we want to emphasize that this scenario applies only to cloud instances replicating the storage or processing power of an on-premise server. Containers or serverless functions won’t fall victim to this same type of compromise. Additionally, if the attacker compromises the cloud account, as opposed to a single running instance, then there is an entirely different attack life cycle as they can spin up computing resources at will. Although this is possible, however, it is not our focus here.

Attack Red Flags

Many IT and security teams might not look for earlier stages of abuse. Before getting hit by ransomware, however, there are other red flags that could alert teams to the breach.

If a server is compromised and used for cryptocurrency mining (also known as cryptomining), this can be one of the biggest red flags for a security team. The discovery of cryptomining malware running on any server should result in the company taking immediate action and initiating an incident response to lock down that server.

This indicator of compromise (IOC) is significant because while cryptomining malware is often seen as less serious compared to other malware types, it is also used as a monetization tactic that can run in the background while server access is being sold for further malicious activity. For example, access could be sold for use as a server for underground hosting. Meanwhile, the data could be exfiltrated and sold as personally identifiable information (PII) or for industrial espionage, or it could be sold for a targeted ransomware attack. It’s possible to think of the presence of cryptomining malware as the proverbial canary in a coal mine: This is the case, at least, for several access-as-a-service (AaaS) criminals who use this as part of their business model.

Attack Life Cycle

Attacks on compromised servers follow a common path:

  1. Initial compromise: At this stage, whether a cloud-based instance or an on-premise server, it is clear that a criminal has taken over.
  2. Asset categorization: This is the inventory stage. Here a criminal makes their assessment based on questions such as, what data is on that server? Is there an opportunity for lateral movement to something more lucrative? Who is the victim?
  3. Sensitive data exfiltration: At this stage, the criminal steals corporate emails, client databases, and confidential documents, among others. This stage can happen any time after asset categorization if criminals managed to find something valuable.
  4. Cryptocurrency mining: While the attacker looks for a customer for the server space, a target attack, or other means of monetization, cryptomining is used to covertly make money.
  5. Resale or use for targeted attack or further monetization: Based on what the criminal finds during asset categorization, they might plan their own targeted ransomware attack, sell server access for industrial espionage, or sell the access for someone else to monetize further.

 

lifecycle compromised server

The monetization lifecycle of a compromised server

Often, targeted ransomware is the final stage. In most cases, asset categorization reveals data that is valuable to the business but not necessarily valuable for espionage.

A deep understanding of the servers and network allows criminals behind a targeted ransomware attack to hit the company where it hurts the most. These criminals would know the dataset, where they live, whether there are backups of the data, and more. With such a detailed blueprint of the organization in their hands, cybercriminals can lock down critical systems and demand higher ransom, as we saw in our 2020 midyear security roundup report.

In addition, while a ransomware attack would be the visible urgent issue for the defender to solve in such an incident, the same attack could also indicate that something far more serious has likely already taken place: the theft of company data, which should be factored into the company’s response planning. More importantly, it should be noted that once a company finds an IOC for cryptocurrency, stopping the attacker right then and there could save them considerable time and money in the future.

Ultimately, no matter where a company’s data is stored, hybrid cloud security is critical to preventing this life cycle.

 

The post The Life Cycle of a Compromised (Cloud) Server appeared first on .

What is a VPN and How Does it Increase Your Online Security and Privacy?

The number of VPN users has grown considerably over the past few years. According to the report of Go-Globe, 25% of netizens worldwide have used a VPN at least once in the last 30 days. Recently, VPN usage has surged in many countries and its popularity may see VPN usage surpass the estimated profit of USD$27.10 billion by the end of 2020. The VPN global market only seems to increase as time goes by. So, why is that? What do VPNs provide that make them so attractive?

What is a VPN?

A VPN, or a Virtual Private Network, creates a secure communication “tunnel” from your computer to the internet. It encrypts your connection and prevents others from seeing the data you’re transferring. This keeps your data secure from any spying attempts—including from home over your wired connection, but particularly on public Wi-Fi networks, when you’re out and about in places such as coffee shops, restaurants, airports and hotels. It helps ensure that no one can steal your personal details, passwords, or credit card information.

How does a VPN work and why you need a VPN service?

Among other things, a VPN can conceal your IP address to make your online actions virtually untraceable and anonymous, providing greater privacy for everything you do. In fact, there are so many ways a VPN can protect your privacy and security, we need to take a deeper look at what other benefits a VPN can provide.

    1. Safeguard personal information

    This is the era of mobility and most transactions are being done by people on-the-go using their mobile devices to exchange data over public networks. From online shopping, to mobile banking or simply checking emails and social media accounts, these activities can expose your personal information and sensitive data to hackers and cybercriminals. This particularly applies to users relying on public Wi-Fi. Using a VPN will help to mitigate unwanted leakage or theft by securing data in transit to and from the systems that typically try to collect and store your private data.

      1. Access better streaming contents from other locations

      One of the main drivers for using a VPN is to access better streaming content and restricted websites from the region you’re accessing the internet from. This may be true in your own country, but when traveling abroad, there are also chances that you cannot visit a popular website or a social media platform from the country you’re visiting. While using a VPN, you can connect to an IP address in your country and have full access to your favorite media contents and avoid wasting membership fees that you will likely pay for this streaming service.

        1. Enhance browsing privacy

        Some retail apps, social media platforms, and search engines continuously collect and analyze results of your search history. They keep track of all your browsing activities such as items you viewed, contents you liked, and things you tapped and clicked, so they can provide you with more targeted contents and monetize these by showing the same information in your feed through ads.

        Note that, simply clearing your browsing history does not completely remove traces of these searches, and targeted ads can get annoying. This is where a VPN can help enhance your browsing privacy. The VPN hides your browser cached data and location from advertisers, which prevents them from serving up content based on your searches and location.

          1. Save cost on communicating with family and friends abroad

          Another motivating factor for the use of a VPN is to save on the cost of communicating with families and friends abroad. There are countries implementing restrictions on the use of certain messaging apps, banning their services. If you are planning to visit a country with such a restriction, a VPN can bypass this constraint, which allows you to make use of your trusted messaging app, eliminate the cost of long-distance calls to family and friends while abroad—and at the same time, maintain the level of security and encryption the messaging app provides.

            1. Escape content-based bandwidth-throttling

            The internet has evolved into streaming more content—videos, music, and more—and ISPs have responded by making higher data usage and higher throughput (bandwidth) pay-as-you-use-more services. But content is still at issue, particularly after the December 2017 FCC ruling. Potential ISP throttling based on content type, source, or destination (e.g., BitTorrent traffic), which could give priority to business over personal usage, is one of the reasons why everyday people are using VPN services, because a VPN provides more usage anonymity, preventing ISPs from potentially tracking your activities and limiting your bandwidth usage accordingly.

            Choosing the right VPN for you

            Now that you have some understanding of what a VPN is, and what benefits it can give you, it is also important to choose the right VPN for you.

            Due to regulatory requirements and laws governing data privacy and securing personal information online, the demand for VPNs is growing. In response, there are a large number of VPN providers in the market today. So how do you choose a reliable VPN? Here are some criteria to help you pick one that best suits your needs:

            • Faster and more data is better. Using a VPN can often decrease the speed of your internet connection, so you should pick a provider that has a good number of servers and locations and doesn’t pre-throttle your bandwidth. Some also have data limits, so you should opt for those with a higher data limit per month
            • Provides the best encryption. Look for a VPN providing sophisticated ciphers such as 256-bit AES end-to-end encryption.
            • Ensures safe browsing. Look for VPN that can filter and block malicious websites, online fraud, and internet scams and automatically safeguard your internet connection.
            • Provides full anonymity. It is crucial that a VPN vendor has a clear privacy policy. Trusted VPNs will not track the user’s websites, payment information, or online transactions, and do not keep logs.
            • Supports simultaneous devices. Select a VPN that is compatible with your devices and operating systems and can provide you a good number of simultaneous connections on your devices.
            • Cost versus use case. Heavier business usage should be contrasted with everyday consumer use. To pay less for the service (VPNs typically cost from $5 to $12 per month per device, though multi-device bundles are less), you might accept some data limits, if your use case is lighter; sacrifice some speed, if you’re not streaming movies when you’re out and about, (unlikely during the coronavirus lockdown); or some cross-regional server-selection capability, if you’re not travelling in content-restricted regions (since out-of-country travel is also being hampered by the pandemic).

            Trend Micro’s Home Division provides two low-cost, safety-focused VPN solutions for everyday users: Trend Micro VPN Proxy One and Trend Micro Wi-Fi Protection, both of which can address light-to-medium VPN needs and meet most of the checklist criteria above.

            Trend Micro VPN Proxy One offers fast, secure, stable and anonymous proxy connections for you to access various websites and applications. It connects to the best Trend Micro VPN server intelligently, without you having to do it, and does not limit bandwidth consumption. Trend Micro VPNs do not track your online activities, ensuring you a secure digital life and protecting your online privacy. Trend Micro VPN Proxy One is targeted to Mac and iOS devices.

            Trend Micro Wi-Fi Protection turns any public hotspot into a secure Wi-Fi network and VPN with bank-grade data encryption to keep your information safe from hackers. While your VPN is active, Trend Micro Wi-Fi Protection provides exceptional web threat protection and checks websites you visit to safeguard your browsing from online fraud and internet scam. The VPN automatically kicks in when connecting to a Wi-Fi network with low security, such as one with no encryption. Trend Micro Wi-Fi Protection is available for all platforms (PC, Mac, Android, and iOS). Bundles can be purchased for multiple devices and platforms and some bundles can include other Trend Micro products, depending on the region.

            Go to the Apple App Store for more details on Trend Micro VPN Proxy One; or for a 30-day trial or to buy, go here: Mac | iOS.

            Or visit Trend Micro Wi-Fi Protection for more information, or to buy the multi-platform solution.

            The post What is a VPN and How Does it Increase Your Online Security and Privacy? appeared first on .

            Floppies Are Burning In The Driveway - PSW #664

            This week, first we talk Security News! We'll be discussing how a Google Researcher Reported 3 Flaws in Apache Web Server Software, Medical Data Leaked on GitHub Due to Developer Errors, Experts hacked 28,000 unsecured printers to raise awareness of printer security issues, Tesla Is Cracking Down On Performance-Enhancing Hacks For The Model 3, Former Uber CSO Charged Over Alleged Breach Cover-Up, and Researchers Sound Alarm Over Malicious AWS Community AMIs! In our second segment, we air two pre recorded interviews from Security Weekly's Virtual Hacker Summer Camp, with Ferruh Mavituna, CEO of Netsparker, and Paul Battista, CEO and Founder of Polarity! In our final segment, we air one more pre recorded interview with Roi Cohen, Co-Founder and VP of Sales at Vicarius, and Shani Dodge, C++ Developer at Vicarius, discussing Predicting Vulnerabilities in Compiled Code!

             

            Show Notes: https://wiki.securityweekly.com/psw664

            Visit https://securityweekly.com/vicarius to learn more about them!

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            Visit https://securityweekly.com/netsparker to get a trial of the best dynamic application scanning solution on the market!

             

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            Let That Sink In - ESW #196

            This week, first we talk Enterprise News, discussing Checkmarx Announces GitLab Integration, Panaseer Automates IRM with Archer Integration, How Attivo Networks Strengthens Active Directory Defense, Elastic Security 7.9 delivers a major milestone toward endpoint security integrated into the Elastic Stack, VMware brings Kubernetes to its VMware Fusion and VMware Workstation solutions, and more! In our second segment, we welcome Kwan Lin, Principal Data Scientist at Rapid7, to discuss "Under the Hoodie:" Rapid7's 2020 Pen Testing Report! In our final segment, we welcome Patrick Carey, Director of Product Marketing at Synopsys, to talk about Building Security into Application Development!

             

            Show Notes: https://securityweekly.com/esw196

            Visit https://securityweekly.com/rapid7 to learn more about them!

            Visit https://securityweekly.com/synopsys to learn more about them!

             

            Visit https://www.securityweekly.com/esw for all the latest episodes!

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            MITRE Shield Matrix, Zoom Outages, & 'SourMint' - Wrap Up - SWN #60

            This week, Dr. Doug talks MITRE, COBALT, SNYK, CISOs behaving badly at Uber, Zoom says it's all better now, and Amazon AI wants you to send nudes for criticism, and all the show wrap ups from this past week!

             

            Show Notes: https://wiki.securityweekly.com/swn60

            Visit https://www.securityweekly.com/swn for all the latest episodes!

             

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            This Week in Security News: Trend Micro and Snyk Partner to Fight Open Source Security Flaws and Ransomware Has Gone Corporate

            Welcome to our weekly roundup, where we share what you need to know about the cybersecurity news and events that happened over the past few days. This week, learn about Trend Micro and Snyk’s new co-developed solution to help manage the risk of open source vulnerabilities. Also, read about a new ransomware strain that emulates the practices of a legitimate enterprise.

            Read on:

            Trend Micro, Snyk Fight Open Source Security Flaws

            This week, Trend Micro announced plans for a new, co-developed solution with Snyk, which expands on the company’s ongoing strategic partnership to enhance DevOps security. The joint solution will help security teams manage the risk of open source vulnerabilities from the moment open source code is introduced without interrupting the software delivery process. Trend Micro’s COO Kevin Simzer shares more details on the solution in this article.

            Securing the Pandemic-Disrupted Workplace: Trend Micro 2020 Midyear Cybersecurity Report

            Trend Micro’s 2020 Midyear Security Roundup examines pressing security issues during the first half of this year, including Covid-19-related threats and targeted ransomware attacks, and offers recommendations to help enterprises secure their systems from cybercriminals in the new normal terrain.

            Ransomware Has Gone Corporate—and Gotten More Cruel

            DarkSide is the latest strain of ransomware built to shake down big-game targets for millions—with attacks that seem legitimate by including guaranteed turnaround times, real-time chat support and brand awareness. As ransomware becomes big business, its purveyors have embraced the tropes of legitimate enterprises, down to corporate responsibility pledges. Ed Cabrera, chief cybersecurity officer at Trend Micro, comments on the serious risks of ransomware in this article.

            Probing Attempts on Home Routers Increase in 1H 2020

            The current reality of having many connected devices in the home has given rise to incidents of potential home network intrusions. In the first half of 2020, Trend Micro detected more than 10.6 billion suspicious connection attempts on routers’ unavailable TCP ports. TCP port 23, in particular, had the most detections of suspicious connection attempts, with more than 5.3 billion.

            Hackers Exploit Autodesk Flaw in Recent Cyberespionage Attack

            Threat actors exploited a vulnerability in the popular 3D computer graphics Autodesk software to launch a recent cyber-espionage attack against an international architectural and video production company. Researchers said that further analysis of the attack points to a sophisticated, APT-style group that had prior knowledge of the company’s security systems and used software applications, carefully planning their attack to infiltrate the company and exfiltrate data undetected.

            CVE-2020-1380: Analysis of Recently Fixed IE Zero-Day

            Microsoft recently patched a zero-day vulnerability that targeted Internet Explorer (IE) 11. It’s a use-after-free (UAF) bug in IE’s JavaScript engine, jscript9.dll. Previously, Trend Micro observed that zero-day attacks against IE usually exploit vbscript.dll and jscript.dll to run shellcode. This time, the target changed to jscript9.dll and used the modern JavaScript engine’s Just-In-Time (JIT) engine to trigger the bug, so Trend Micro decided to dive into the jscrtip9.dll JIT engine to figure out the root cause of CVE-2020-1380.

            CSO Insights: Ricoh USA’s David Levine on Employing a Cloud- and Cybersecurity-First Strategy

            In this blog, David Levine, vice president of corporate and information security and CSO for Ricoh USA, Inc., shares how his organization accommodates mobility by reinforcing a security-first mindset, employing a cloud-first strategy, managing risk, and enabling employees in the ‘new normal’.

            Is the Electric Grid Closer to a Devastating Cyberattack that Could Mean Lights Out?

            Could the electric grid be taken down with a $50 device secreted in the bottom of a coffee cup as researchers have claimed? Maybe, but the more likely threat comes from bad actors with improved capabilities who’ve ramped up their attacks on critical infrastructure and utilities. Seventy percent of industrial controls system (ICS) vulnerabilities disclosed in the first half of 2020 can be exploited remotely, according to a report from Claroty.

            The Basics of Keeping Your Kubernetes Cluster Secure: Part 1

            With Kubernetes’ popularity and increasingly high adoption rates, its security should always be prioritized. In this blog, Trend Micro provides vital tips and recommendations on keeping the master node, the API server, etcd, RBAC, and network policies secure.

            After a Decade, Qbot Trojan Malware Gains New, Dangerous Tricks

            The Qbot Trojan has been plaguing computer users and businesses for over a decade and the cybercriminals behind it are still coming up with new tricks that keep it one of the most prevalent and successful malware threats. The latest technique observed by security researchers involves the malware inserting itself into the legitimate email threads of their victims to spread.

            Surprised by the DarkSide ransomware’s professionalism? Share your thoughts in the comments below or follow me on Twitter to continue the conversation: @JonLClay.

            The post This Week in Security News: Trend Micro and Snyk Partner to Fight Open Source Security Flaws and Ransomware Has Gone Corporate appeared first on .

            Are employees the weakest link in your security strategy? Train them!

            Email is the number one threat vector. There’s no exception, even with a global pandemic, on the contrary: COVID-19 has been used as an appealing hook by cyber criminals. Data from Trend Micro Smart Protection Network shows that for the first five months of 2020, 92 per cent of all the cyber threats leveraging COVID-19 were spam or phishing email messages.

            Email scams can have a big impact, both on the organization and the individual. This was highlighted in a recent report from BBC News where a finance professional from Glasgow, Scotland was targeted by a business email compromise scam. The hackers disguised themselves as the employee’s CEO, and managed to convince her to transfer £200k to their bank account. When the organization realized what happened, they were able to retrieve half of the loss. However, the employee was fired and then pursued in the courts for the remaining sum. Her lawyers argued successfully that she had not received any training to identify these scams and the case was subsequently dismissed. This took a big personal toll on the employee who not only lost her job, but worried about losing her home as well. Her employer suffered financially and their reputation also took a hit. There were no winners in this case, but it really emphasized the importance of security awareness; companies need to arm their employees with the knowledge to protect the business, and ultimately themselves.

            A great email security solution can block the majority of threats, but no product can catch 100 per cent of email scams. This means that humans are our last line of defense. Trend Micro Phish Insight service helps you to increase your employees’ awareness of phishing emails and other cyber threats. Best of all, it is completely free, allowing you to increase your cybersecurity while using this budget for other critical initiatives.

            Let’s take a look at a customer use case:

            A Phish Insight customer in the U.S. launched two phishing simulation campaigns for 1,500 employees in the first half of 2020.  The two campaigns were four months apart and targeted the same employees.
            The first campaign was a fake email from CDC with a link that claimed to check new COVID-19 cases. It asked for the user’s log-in information after the link was clicked.

             

             

            The second campaign is an email pretending to be from the organization’s IT department. It requested users to verify their account due to an Office 365 inbox storage limitation.

             

             

            Both emails are very realistic looking with important and engaging topics that users care about.

            So, what do the results look like?

            Among the employees getting the emails, the result for the two campaigns shows a positive behavior change in recognizing a phishing email.

            • Percentage of employees that clicked the embedded URL in email reduced significantly (11 per cent vs. 7 per cent)
            • Percentage of employees that reported the phishing email to IT has increased significantly (11 per cent vs. 24 per cent)

            However, when introducing a more challenging phishing attack (the 2nd campaign), the percentage of employees who posted their credentials to the phishing site has significantly increased (0.3 per cent vs. 3.4 per cent). While the company’s overall phishing awareness increased (reduced clicks), those who fell victim had a higher chance of giving out their credentials.

            The result also shows that back office teams have a higher percentage of phished employees and the importance of on-going training. In addition to continuing phishing awareness training to all employees, the IT department will focus more on back office teams.

            Using Phish Insight, the company successfully increased employees’ awareness while being able to target more at risk user groups and identify those that need more help.

            Want to train your organization?

            To start a phishing simulation for your users, you need $0 budget and only five minutes. With a really simple user experience, you can get up and running with your first simulation today.

            Try Phish Insight with no obligation: phishinsight.trendmicro.com

            The post Are employees the weakest link in your security strategy? Train them! appeared first on .

            The Memes Are Killing Me - SCW #40

            This week, Jeff, John, Josh, and Scott talk Pragmatic Approaches to Cybersecurity Maturity! There are a lot of ways to measure/assess the level of organizational maturity of security programs. But, how do you mature your organization? We will discuss practical steps, like prioritizing the to-do list, the balance between people, process, and technology, as well as the balance between policies, standards, procedures vs. technical controls, to develop a pragmatic approach to mature your cybersecurity program.

             

            Show Notes: https://wiki.securityweekly.com/scw40

            Reference Slides: https://securityweekly.com/scw-episode-40-reference-slides/

             

            Visit https://www.securityweekly.com/scw for all the latest episodes!

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            A New Strategy for DDoS Protection: Log Analysis on Steroids

            Anyone whose business depends on online traffic knows how critical it is to protect your business against Distributed Denial of Service (DDoS) attacks. And with cyber attackers more persistent than ever – Q1 2020 DDoS attacks surged by 80% year over year and their average duration rose by 25%—you also know how challenging this can be.

            Now imagine you’re responsible for blocking, mitigating, and neutralizing DDoS attacks where the attack surface is tens of thousands of websites. That’s exactly what HubSpot, a top marketing and sales SaaS provider, was up against. How they overcame the challenges they faced makes for an interesting case study in DDoS response and mitigation.

            Drinking from a Firehouse

            HubSpot’s CMS Hub powers thousands of websites across the globe. Like many organizations, HubSpot uses a Content Delivery Network (CDN) solution to help bolster security and performance.

            CDNs, which are typically associated with improving web performance, are built to make content available at edges of the network, providing both performance and data about access patterns across the network. To handle the CDN log data spikes inherent with DDoS attacks, organizations often guesstimate how much compute they may need and maintain that higher level of resource (and expenditure) for their logging solution. Or if budgets don’t allow, they dial back the amount of log data they retain and analyze.

            In HubSpot’s case, they use Cloudflare CDN as the first layer of protection for all incoming traffic on the websites they host. This equates to about 136,000 requests/second, or roughly 10TB/day, of Cloudflare log data that HubSpot has at its disposal to help triage and neutralize DDoS attacks. Talk about drinking from a firehouse!

            HubSpot makes use of Cloudflare’s Logpushservice to push Cloudflare logs that contain headers and cache statuses for each request directly to HubSpot’s Amazon S3 cloud object storage. In order to process that data and make it searchable, HubSpot’s dedicated security team deployed and managed their own open-source ELK Stack consisting of Elasticsearch (a search database), Logstash (a log ingestion and processing pipeline), and Kibana (a visualization tool for log search analytics). They also used open source Kafka to queue logs into the self-managed ELK cluster.

            To prepare the Cloudflare logs for ingestion into the ELK cluster, HubSpot had created a pipeline that would download the Cloudflare logs from S3 into a Kafka pipeline, apply some transformations on the data, insert into a second Kafka queue whereby Logstash would then process the data, and output it into the Elasticsearch cluster. The security team would then use Kibana to interact with the Cloudflare log data to triage DDoS attacks as they occur.

            Managing an Elasticsearch cluster dedicated to this Cloudflare/DDoS mitigation use case presented a number of continuing challenges. It required constant maintenance by members of the HubSpot Elasticsearch team. The growth in log data from HubSpot’s rapid customer base expansion was compounded by the fact that DDoS attacks themselves inherently generate a massive spike in log data while they are occurring. Unfortunately, these spikes often triggered instability in the Elastic cluster when they were needed most, during the firefighting and mitigation process. 

            Cost was also a concern. Although Elasticsearch, Logstash, and Kibana open source applications can be acquired at no cost, the sheer volume of existing and incoming log data from Cloudflare required HubSpot to manage a very large and increasingly expensive ELK cluster. Infrastructure costs for storage, compute, and networking to support the growing cluster grew faster than the data. And certainly, the human capital in time spent monitoring, maintaining, and keeping the cluster stable and secure was significant. The team constantly had discussions about whether to add more compute to the cluster or reduce data retention time. To accommodate their Cloudflare volume, which was exceeding 10TB/day and growing, HubSpot was forced to limit retention to just five days. 

            The Data Lake Way

            Like many companies whose business solely or significantly relies on online commerce, HubSpot wanted a simple, scalable, and cost-effective way to handle the continued growth of their security log data volume.

            They were wary of solutions that might ultimately force them to reduce data retention to a point where the data wasn’t useful. They also needed to be able to keep up with huge data throughput at a low latency so that when it hit Amazon S3, HubSpot could quickly and efficiently firefight DDoS attacks.

            HubSpot decided to rethink its approach to security log analysis and management. They embraced a new approach that consisted primarily of these elements:

            - Using a fully managed log analysis serviceso internal teams wouldn’thave to manage the scaling of ingestion or query side components and could eliminate compute resources

            - Leveraging the Kibana UIthat the security team is already proficient with

            - Turning their S3 cloud object storage into a searchable analytic data lakeso Cloudflare CDN and other security-related log data could be easily cleaned, prepared, and analyzed in place, without data movement or schema management

            By doing this, HubSpot can effectively tackle DDoS challenges. They significantly cut their costs and can easily handle the 10TB+/day flow of Cloudflare log data, without impacting performance.

            HubSpot no longer has to sacrifice data retention time. They can retain Cloudflare log data for much longer than 5 days, without worrying about costs, and can dynamically scale resources so there is no need to invest in compute that’s not warranted. This is critical for long-tail DDoS protection planning and execution, and enables HubSpot to easily meet SLAs for DDoS attack response time.

            Data lake-based approaches also enable IT organizations to unify all their security data sources in one place for better and more efficient overall protection. Products that empower data lake thinking allow  new workloads to be added on the fly with no provisioning or configuration required, helping organizations gain even greater value from log data for security use cases. For instance, in addition to storing and analyzing externally generated log data within their S3 cloud object storage, HubSpot will be storing and monitoring internal security log data to enhance insider threat detection and prevention.

            Incorporating a data lake philosophy into your security strategy is like putting log analysis on steroids. You can store and process exponentially more data volume and types, protect better, and spend much less.

            About the author: Dave Armlin is VP of Customer Success and Solutions Architecture at ChaosSearch. Dave has spent his 25+ year career building, deploying, and evangelizing secure enterprise and cloud-based architectures.

            Copyright 2010 Respective Author at Infosec Island

            COVID-19 Aside, Data Protection Regulations March Ahead: What To Consider

            COVID-19 may be complicating organizations’ cybersecurity efforts as they shift more of their operations online, but that doesn’t lessen the pressure to comply with government regulations that are placing increased scrutiny on data privacy.

            Despite the pandemic, companies are obligated to comply with many laws governing data security and privacy, including the two most familiar to consumers -- the European Union’s General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR) and the California Consumer Privacy Act (CCPA). With CCPA enforcement set to begin July 1, organizations’ regulatory responsibilities just got tougher.

            The CCPA is similar to GDPR in that it is designed to improve privacy rights and consumer protection, giving Californians the right to know when their personal data is being collected, whether their personal data is being disclosed or sold, and to whom. It allows them to access their personal data, say no to its sale, and request that a business delete it.

            The law applies to any business with gross revenues over $25 million and that has personal information on 50,000 or more California citizens, whether the company is based in California or not. Violations can result in stiff fines.

            Like GDPR before it, CCPA makes data security and regulatory compliance more of a challenge and requires businesses to create a number of new processes to fully understand what data they have stored in their networks, who has access to it, and how to protect it.

            The challenge is especially rigorous for large organizations that collect and store high volumes of data, which is often spread across multiple databases and environments. And CCPA’s enforcement date comes as companies have already been scrambling to deal with COVID-19’s impact – enabling remote workforces while guarding against hackers trying to exploit fresh openings to infiltrate networks.

            Here are four things that every business should consider in maintaining a rigid security posture to protect its most important asset – its data – and meet rising regulatory requirements:

            1.    Protect headcount.

            We may be in an economic downturn, but now is not the time to lay off anyone with data security and privacy responsibility. Oftentimes when a company is forced to fire people, the pain is spread equally across the organization – say 10 percent for each department. Because the CISO organization (as well as the rest of IT) are usually considered “general and administrative” overhead, the target on its back can be just as large.

            In the current environment, security staff certainly needs to be exempt from cuts. Most security teams have little to no overlap – there is a networking expert, an endpoint specialist, someone responsible for cloud, etc. And one person who focuses on data and application security, if you’re lucky enough to have this as a dedicated resource.

            The data and application security role has never been more vital, both to safeguard the organization as more data and applications move online and to handle data security regulatory compliance, an onus companies continue to carry despite the pandemic. This person should be considered untouchable in any resource action.

            2.    Don’t drop the ball on breach notification.

            It’s a question mark to what extent officials are aggressively conducting audits to vigorously enforce these laws during the pandemic. However, I would advise companies to assume that stringent enforcement remains the norm.

            This is another reason that fostering strong security is all the more crucial now. For example, companies are still required to notify the relevant governing body if it suffers a breach. This initiates a process involving its IT, security, and legal teams, and any other relevant departments. Who wants that distraction anytime, and especially during a global crisis?

            Beyond regulatory factors, companies simply owe it to their customers to handle their data responsibly. This was of course true before COVID-19 and CCPA enforcement, but its importance has intensified. A Yahoo-style scandal now could cause reputational damage that the company never recovers from.

            3.    Ask the critical questions that regulations raise.

            Where is personal data stored? Companies must scan their networks and servers to find any unknown databases, identify sensitive data using dictionary and pattern-matching methods, and pore through database content for sensitive information such as credit card numbers, email addresses, and system credentials

            Which data has been added or updated within the last 12 months? You need to monitor all user database access -- on-premises or in the cloud -- and retain all the audit logs so you can identify the user by role or account type, understand whether the data accessed was sensitive, and detect non-compliant access behaviors.

            Is there any unauthorized data access or exfiltration? Using machine learning and other automation technologies, you need to automatically uncover unusual data activity, uncovering threats before they become breaches.

            Are we pseudonymizing data? Data masking techniques safeguard sensitive data from exposure in non-production or DevOps environments by substituting fictional data for sensitive data, reducing the risk of sensitive data exposure.

            4.    Assume more regulation will come.

            As digital transformation makes more and more data available everywhere, security and privacy concerns keep growing. One can assume that GDPR and CCPA may just be the tip of the regulatory iceberg. Similar initiatives in Wisconsin, Nevada, and other states show that it behooves organizations to get their data protection houses very much in order. Compliance will need to be a top priority for organizations for many years into the future.

            About the author: Terry Ray has global responsibility for Imperva's technology strategy. He was the first U.S.-based Imperva employee and has been with the company for 14 years. He works with organizations around the world to help them discover and protect sensitive data, minimize risk for regulatory governance, set data security strategy and implement best practices.

            Copyright 2010 Respective Author at Infosec Island

            Dharma Ransomware, Zoom Crash, & Elon Musk's Neuralink - SWN #59

            This week, Dr. Doug talks Zoom crash, Apple insecurities, Dharma, MITRE, Elon Musk is about to eat your brain, and Jason Wood returns with Expert Commentary on Ex-Uber chief security officer charged, accused of covering up theft of personal info from databases by hackers!

             

            Show Notes: https://wiki.securityweekly.com/swn59

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            Set It & Forget It - BSW #185

            This week, we welcome Ed Amoroso, CEO at TAG Cyber, to discuss Disrupting Traditional Security Research & Advisory! In the Leadership and Communications section, Why Do Your Employees Resist New Tech?, Who’s Responsible for a Safer Cloud?, Publicly Reported Data Breaches Stand at its Lowest Point in 5 Years, and more!

             

            Show Notes: https://wiki.securityweekly.com/bsw185

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            Removing Open Source Visibility Challenges for Security Operations Teams

             

            Identifying security threats early can be difficult, especially when you’re running multiple security tools across disparate business units and cloud projects. When it comes to protecting cloud-native applications, separating legitimate risks from noise and distractions is often a real challenge.

             

            That’s why forward-thinking organizations look at things a little differently. They want to help their application developers and security operations (SecOps) teams implement unified strategies for optimal protection. This is where a newly expanded partnership from Trend Micro and Snyk can help.

             

            Dependencies create risk

             

            In today’s cloud-native development streams, the insatiable need for faster iterations and time-to-market can impact both downstream and upstream workflows. As a result, code reuse and dependence on third-party libraries has grown, and with it the potential security, compliance and reputational risk organizations are exposing themselves to.

             

            Just how much risk is associated with open source software today? According to Snyk research, vulnerabilities in open source software have increased 2.5x in the past three years. https://info.snyk.io/sooss-report-2020. What’s more, a recent report claimed to have detected a 430% year-on-year increase in attacks targeting open source components, with the end goal of infecting the software supply chain. While open source code is therefore being used to accelerate time-to-market, security teams are often unaware of the scope and impact this can have on their environments.

             

            Managing open source risk

             

            This is why cloud security leader Trend Micro, and Snyk, a specialist in developer-first open source security, have extended their partnership with a new joint solution. It’s designed to help security teams manage the risk of open source vulnerabilities from the moment code is introduced, without interrupting the software delivery process.

             

            This ambitious achievement helps improve security for your operations teams without changing the way your developer teams work. Trend Micro and Snyk are addressing open source risks by simplifying a bottom-up approach to risk mitigation that brings together developer and SecOps teams under one unified solution. It combines state-of-the-art security technology with collaborative features and processes to eliminate the security blind spots that can impact development lifecycles and business outcomes.

             

            Available as part of Trend Micro Cloud One, the new solution being currently co-developed with Snyk will:

            • Scan all code repositories for vulnerabilities using Snyk’s world-class vulnerability scanning and database
            • Bridge the organizational gap between DevOps & SecOps, to help influence secure DevOps practices
            • Deliver continuous visibility of code vulnerabilities, from the earliest code to code running in production
            • Integrate seamlessly into the complete Trend Micro Cloud One security platform

            CloudOne

             

             

            This unified solution closes the gap between security teams and developers, providing immediate visibility across modern cloud architectures. Trend Micro and Snyk continue to deliver world class protection that fits the cloud-native development and security requirements of today’s application-focused organizations.

             

             

             

            The post Removing Open Source Visibility Challenges for Security Operations Teams appeared first on .

            Heavy Pressure - ASW #119

            This week, we welcome Sundar Krish, CEO & Co-Founder at Sken.ai, to talk about DevOps-First Application Security For Mid-Markets! In the Application Security News, The Confused Mailman: Sending SPF and DMARC passing mail as any Gmail or G Suite customer, ATM makers Diebold and NCR deploy fixes for 'deposit forgery' attacks, Control Flow Guard for Clang/LLVM and Rust, Fuzzing Services Help Push Technology into DevOps Pipeline, and 7 Things to Make DevSecOps a Reality!

             

            Show Notes: https://wiki.securityweekly.com/asw119

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            Hacking Naked & Not Afraid - PSW #663

            This week, we welcome back Harry Sverdlove, Founder and CTO of Edgewise, and Dan Perkins, Principal Product Manager at ZScaler, to talk about Protecting Critical Infrastructure and Workloads In Hybrid Clouds! In our second segment, it's the Security News! We'll be talking about how New Microsoft Defender ATP Capability Blocks Malicious Behaviors, Voice Phishers Targeting Corporate VPNs, IBM finds vulnerability in IoT chips present in billions of devices, Marriott faces London lawsuit over vast data breach, US firm accused of secretly installing location tracking SDK in mobile apps, and Disrupting a power grid with cheap equipment hidden in a coffee cup! In our final segment, we air two pre recorded interviews from Security Weekly's Virtual Hacker Summer Camp, with Corey Thuen, Co-Founder of Gravwell, and Deral Heiland, Principal Security Researcher for IoT at Rapid7!

             

            Show Notes: https://wiki.securityweekly.com/psw663

            Visit https://securityweekly.com/edgewise to learn more about them!

            To learn more, visit: https://www.gravwell.io/summercamp2020

            Visit https://securityweekly.com/rapid7 to learn more about them!

             

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            Locate X, FritzFrog Botnet, & 'Spear Vishing' - Wrap Up - SWN #58

            This week, Dr. Doug White talks 3D keys, Emotet returns, FritzFron, Voice Phishing, ICS, coffee cup magnets, and how the Secret Service is buying your location data!

             

            Show Notes: https://wiki.securityweekly.com/swn58

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            This Week in Security News: Trend Micro’s Zero Day Initiative Celebrates 15 Years and 24 Million Customers Affected after Experian Data Breach

            Welcome to our weekly roundup, where we share what you need to know about the cybersecurity news and events that happened over the past few days. This week, read how the Zero Day Initiative (ZDI) has awarded more than $25 million in bounty rewards to security researchers over the past decade and a half as it celebrates its 15th birthday. Also, learn about a new data breach from Experian affecting 24 million customers in South Africa.

            Read on:

            Bug Bounty Platform ZDI Awarded $25M to Researchers Over the Past 15 Years

            Bug bounty platform pioneer Zero-Day Initiative (ZDI) awarded more than $25 million in bounty rewards to security researchers over the past decade and a half. In an anniversary post celebrating its 15-year-old birthday, ZDI said the bounty rewards represent payments to more than 10,000 security researchers for more than 7,500 successful bug submissions.

            24 Million Customers Affected after Experian Data Breach

            Leading consumer credit reporting agency Experian is in news again for a data breach. This week, a fraudster contacted the agency posing as a representative of a ‘legitimate client’ and obtained personal details of its South African customers. The company notes that it is an ‘isolated incident in South Africa involving a fraudulent data inquiry.’

            Connected Security Solutions Helps City of Tyler’s CIO to Reduce Costs While Enabling Delivery of Enhanced Community & Public Safety Services

            Benny Yazdanpanahi, CIO for the City of Tyler, knows that a highly secure IT environment is essential to the city’s continued success. To accomplish their security goals with limited resources and staff, Tyler’s leaders have been collaborating with Trend Micro for several years. Read this blog to learn more about how Trend Micro has strengthened the city’s security posture and empowers the IT team to focus on serving the community.

            Over 94% of Cyber Attacks Involve Email: VP of Trend Micro’s Cyber Security

            Greg Young, vice president of cybersecurity at Trend Micro, joins BNN Bloomberg to discuss his take on the Canada Revenue Agency (CRA) attack and Trend Micro’s new report on security risks for remote working since the pandemic lockdown. Watch the video to learn more.

            The Cybersecurity Blind Spots of Connected Cars

            With more people relying on connected car technologies for safety, accessibility, and infotainment—and with connected cars producing up to 30 terabytes of data each day—it’s important to keep connected cars protected against a range of ever-evolving risks and threats. Trend Micro’s recent research paper offers an examination of the cybersecurity blind spots of connected cars to help developers and manufacturers create secure and smart vehicles.

            How Unsecure gRPC Implementations Can Compromise APIs, Applications

            In this blog, Trend Micro discusses the security pitfalls that developers might face when shifting to gRPC and implementing gRPC in their projects. Because secure gRPC APIs play a pivotal role in overall application security, Trend Micro provides recommendations on how to protect gRPC implementations from threats and mitigate against risks.

            Human Error Threatens Cloud Security

            Virtually all security professionals believe that human error could put the security of cloud data at risk, according to new research published this week. A survey commissioned by Tripwire and carried out last month by Dimensional Research found that 93% of security professionals were concerned that human error could result in the accidental exposure of their cloud data.

            Influential Facebook Brand Pages Stolen via Credential Phishing

            Trend Micro has observed an increase in the number of compromised Facebook pages of influential personalities since June. Through an analysis of the surge, we found fake Facebook accounts posting notification messages on pages allegedly hacked with an attached link. The fake accounts also steal the owner or admins’ credentials to sell the page, change the details and name, and/or disguise the page to make another phishing account. 

            Malicious Docker Hub Container Images Used for Cryptocurrency Mining

            Increased adoption of containers has given rise to a range of potential threats to DevOps pipelines. Many of the attacks Trend Micro observed involved the abuse of container images to carry out malicious functionalities. For Docker-related threats, Trend Micro recently encountered an attack where the threat actor uploaded two malicious images to Docker Hub for cryptocurrency mining.

            How Hackers Bled 118 Bitcoins Out of Covid Researchers in U.S.

            Hackers locked down several servers used by the epidemiology and biostatistics department at the University of California at San Francisco and wanted a $3 million ransom to give them the keys. Transcripts reveal University of California at San Francisco’s weeklong negotiation to free its ransomware-locked servers. The haggling worked, sort of.

            Threat Recap: Darkside, Crysis, Negasteal, Coinminer

            In the past few weeks, Trend Micro has spotted notable developments for different types of threats. For ransomware, a new family named Darkside surfaced, while operators behind Crysis/Dharma released a hacking toolkit. For messaging threats, a targeted email campaign was used to propagate Negasteal/Agent Tesla. For fileless threats, a coinminer was seen bundled with legitimate applications.

            Diving into End-to-End Deep Learning for Cybersecurity

            New methods for detecting threats using AI challenges the need for human input and involves end-to-end deep learning solutions, which are being touted as the next big thing in malware detection. In the pipeline of such solutions, expert handcrafted input is replaced with ones provided by automated processes. The absence of expert handcrafted input gives rise to the question of whether human input is still relevant in the process of developing an efficient AI-powered cybersecurity solution.

            Black Hat Trip Report – Trend Micro

            At Black Hat USA 2020, Trend Micro presented two important talks on vulnerabilities in Industrial IoT (IIoT). The first discussed weaknesses in proprietary languages used by industrial robots, and the second talked about vulnerabilities in protocol gateways. Any organization using robots, and any organization running a multi-vendor OT environment, should be aware of these attack surfaces. In this blog, find a summary of the key points from each talk.

            Have you seen an uptick in hacked Facebook pages recently? Share your thoughts in the comments below or follow me on Twitter to continue the conversation: @JonLClay.

            The post This Week in Security News: Trend Micro’s Zero Day Initiative Celebrates 15 Years and 24 Million Customers Affected after Experian Data Breach appeared first on .

            Snake Oil - ESW #195

            This week, first we talk Enterprise News, discussing how ThreatConnect Integrates with Microsoft Graph Security API to Strengthen Security Automation, Sectigo unveils Sectigo Quantum Labs to help orgs prepare for quantum computers, Trend Micro to offer comprehensive network and endpoint protection for IoT and 5G private networks, Thycotic Releases Thycotic Identity Bridge, and more! In our second segment, we air two pre recorded interviews from Security Weekly Virtual Hacker Summer Camp with Chris Morales from Vectra, and Anton Chuvakin from Google Cloud & Matt Hastings from Tanium! In our final segment, we air two more precorded interviews from Virtual Hacker Summer Camp with Dan DeCloss from PlexTrac, and Gabe Gumbs from Spirion!

             

            Show Notes: https://securityweekly.com/esw195

            To get one month of PlxTrac for free, visit: https://securityweekly.com/plextrac

            Visit https://securityweekly.com/spirionbh to learn more about them!

            Visit https://securityweekly.com/tanium to learn more about them!

            To see how Vectra can detect attacks in SaaS like Office 365, please visit: https://www.vectra.ai/o365

             

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            Connected Security Solutions Helps City of Tyler’s CIO to Reduce Costs While Enabling Delivery of Enhanced Community & Public Safety Services

            “We’re here to serve” is Benny Yazdanpanahi’s motto as CIO for City of Tyler located in Texas. Supporting a population of approximately 107,000, Yazdanpanahi’s vision for his city relies on the use of data to deliver exceptional services to citizens, today and into the future.

             

            Since joining the city nearly 19 years ago, Yazdanpanahi has continually challenged himself and his small IT team to stay agile and to keep the needs of the city’s citizens at the forefront. Today, Yazdanpanahi and his team use IT systems to make more informed decisions, enhance community services, and improve public safety.

             

            “Our citizens, and especially the younger generation, want immediate access to information and online services,” said Yazdanpanahi. “We want to keep pace with the latest technologies, not only for citizens but also to make our city employees more effective and efficient.”

            But Yazdanpanahi knows that a highly secure IT environment is essential to their continued success. “Many US cities have been hacked, so security is on top of everyone’s mind. As a city, we want to provide great services, but we have to provide them in a highly secure manner.”

            To accomplish those security goals with limited resources and staff, Tyler’s leaders have been collaborating with Trend Micro for several years. The cybersecurity giant has brought a hands-on approach and an ability to stay ahead of the threats. Their adaptability to the threat landscape strengthens the city’s security posture and empowers the IT team to focus on serving the community.

             

            The city has been able to stay secure without additional staff and resources. City employees don’t spend time resolving IT issues and improve their productivity to focus on things that mater for the city.

             

            “If you don’t collaborate with a partner that’s highly experienced in the security field, you can easily get blindsided,” said Yazdanpanahi. “We need someone there, day in and out, focused on security. Trend Micro knows how to protect cities like us. They provide the kind of north, south, east, and west protection that makes my job easier and allows us to use our data to accomplish new, exciting things for our city.”

             

            Read more about Benny’s journey to securing the city:

            https://www.trendmicro.com/en_ca/about/customer-stories/city-of-tyler.html

             

             

            The post Connected Security Solutions Helps City of Tyler’s CIO to Reduce Costs While Enabling Delivery of Enhanced Community & Public Safety Services appeared first on .

            Keys to the Castle - SCW #39

            This week, we welcome Matt Tarr, Principal Solutions Engineer at CyberArk! He talks about how his 15 years in Systems and Sales Engineering roles adds a layer of experience at CyberArk. Matt will then explain how CyberArk provides Security for the Heart of the Enterprise by adding a layer of security around privileged accounts. Matt will also discuss the overarching importance of securing privileged access throughout the organization as it relates to the overall security posture and compliance requirements!

             

            Show Notes: https://wiki.securityweekly.com/scw39

            Visit https://securityweekly.com/cyberark to learn more about them!

            Endpoint Privilege Manager Free Trial: https://www.cyberark.com/products/privileged-account-security-solution/endpoint-privilege-manager/endpoint-privilege-manager-free-trial/

            Blueprint for PAM Implementation: https://www.cyberark.com/blueprint/

             

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            'EmoCrash' Exploit, IcedID, & TeamTNT - SWN #57

            This week, Dr. Doug talks Russel Kirsch, Carol Baskin, IcedID, Emotet, TeamTNT, and the CRA! Jason Wood returns for Expert Commentary on how the Secret Service reportedly paid to access phone location data!

             

            Show Notes: https://wiki.securityweekly.com/swn57

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            The Juicy Secrets - BSW #184

            This week, we welcome Jeff Costlow, Deputy CISO at ExtraHop, to discuss the challenges of detecting and patching Ripple20! Ripple 20 is a series of zero-day vulnerabilities in a widely used low-level TCP/IP software library developed by Treck, Inc. In the Leadership and Communications section, CISOs say new problem solving strategies required, How Remote Work is Reshuffling Your Security Priorities and Investments, Security Jobs With a Future -- And Ones on the Way Out and more!

             

            Show Notes: https://wiki.securityweekly.com/bsw184

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            Black Hat Trip Report – Trend Micro

            At Black Hat USA 2020, Trend Micro presented two important talks on vulnerabilities in Industrial IoT (IIoT). The first discussed weaknesses in proprietary languages used by industrial robots, and the second talked about vulnerabilities in protocol gateways. Any organization using robots, and any organization running a multi-vendor OT environment, should be aware of these attack surfaces. Here is a summary of the key points from each talk.

            Rogue Automation

            Presented at Black Hat, Wednesday, August 5. https://www.blackhat.com/us-20/briefings/schedule/index.html#otrazor-static-code-analysis-for-vulnerability-discovery-in-industrial-automation-scripts-19523 and the corresponding research paper is available at https://www.trendmicro.com/vinfo/us/security/news/internet-of-things/unveiling-the-hidden-risks-of-industrial-automation-programming

            Industrial robots contain powerful, fully capable computers. Unlike most contemporary computers, though, industrial robots lack basic information security capabilities. First, at the architectural level, they lack any mechanism to isolate certain instructions or memory. That is, any program can alter any piece of storage, or run any instruction. In traditional mainframes, no application could access, change, or run any code in another application or in the operating system. Even smartphone operating systems have privilege separation. An application cannot access a smartphone’s camera, for instance, without being specifically permitted to do so. Industrial robots allow any code to read, access, modify, or run any device connected to the system, including the clock. That eliminates data integrity in industrial robots and invalidates any audit of malfunctions; debugging becomes exceptionally difficult.

            Industrial robots do not use conventional programming languages, like C or Python. Instead, each manufacturer provides its own proprietary programming language. That means a specialist using one industrial robot cannot use another vendor’s machine without training. There are no common information security tools for code validation, since vendors do not develop products for fragmented markets. These languages describe programs telling the robot how to move. They also support reading and writing data, analyzing and modifying files, opening and closing input/output devices, getting and sending information over a network, and accessing and changing status indicators on connected sensors. Once a program starts to run on an industrial robot, it can do anything any fully functional computer can do, without any security controls at all. Contemporary industrial robots do not have any countermeasures against this threat.

            Most industrial robot owners do not write their own programs. The supply chain for industrial robot programs involves many third-party actors. See Figure 1 below for a simplified diagram. In each community, users of a particular vendor’s languages share code informally, and rely on user’s groups for hints and tips to solve common tasks. These forums rarely discuss security measures. Many organizations hire third-party contractors to implement particular processes, but there are no security certifications relevant to these proprietary languages. Most programmers learned their trade in an air-gapped world, and still rely on a perimeter which separates the safe users and code inside from the untrusted users and code outside. The languages offer no code scanners to identify potential weaknesses, such as not validating inputs, modifying system services, altering device state, or replacing system functions. The machines do not have a software asset management capability, so knowing where the components of a running program originated from is uncertain.

            Figure 1: The Supply Chain for Industrial Robot Programming

            All is not lost – not quite. In the short term, Trend Micro Research has developed a static code analysis tool called OTRazor, which examines robotic code for unsafe code patterns. This was demonstrated during our session at Black Hat.

            Over time, vendors will have to introduce basic security checks, such as authentication, authorization, data integrity, and data confidentiality. The vendors will also have to introduce architectural restrictions – for instance, an application should be able to read the clock but not change it.. Applications should not be able to modify system files, programs, or data, nor should they be able to modify other applications. These changes will take years to arrive in the market, however. Until then, CISOs should audit industrial robot programs for vulnerabilities, and segment networks including industrial robots, and apply baseline security programs, as they do now, for both internally developed and procured software.

            Protocol Gateway Vulnerabilities

            Presented at Black Hat, Wednesday, August 5, https://www.blackhat.com/us-20/briefings/schedule/index.html#industrial-protocol-gateways-under-analysis-20632, with the corresponding research paper available here: https://www.trendmicro.com/vinfo/us/security/news/internet-of-things/lost-in-translation-when-industrial-protocol-translation-goes-wrong.

            Industry 4.0 leverages the power of automation alongside the rich layer of software process control tools, particularly Enterprise Resource Planning (ERP), and its bigger cousin, Supply Chain Management (SCM). By bringing together dynamic industrial process control with hyper-efficient “just-in-time” resource scheduling, manufacturers can achieve minimum cost, minimum delay, and optimal production. But these integration projects require that IIoT devices speak with other technology, including IIoT from other manufacturers and legacy equipment. Since each equipment or device may have their own communication protocol, Industry 4.0 relies heavily on protocol converters.

            Protocol converters are simple, highly efficient, low-cost devices that translate one protocol into another. Protocol converters are ubiquitous, but they lack any basic security capabilities – authentication, authorization, data integrity or data confidentiality – and they sit right in the middle of the OT network. Attackers can subvert protocol converters to hijack the communication or change configuration. An attacker can disable a safety thresholds, generate a denial of service attack, and misdirect an attached piece of equipment.

            In the course of this research, we found nine vulnerabilities and are working with vendors to remediate the issues. Through our TXOne subsidiary, we are developing rules and intelligence specifically for IIoT message traffic, which are then embedded in our current network security offerings, providing administrators with better visibility and the ability to enforce security policies in their OT networks.

            Protocol converters present a broad attack surface, as they have limited native information security capabilities. They don’t validate senders or receivers, nor do they scan or verify message contents. Due to their crucial position in the middle of the OT network, they are an exceptionally appealing target for malicious actors. Organizations using protocol converters – especially those on the way to Industry 4.0 – must address these weak but critical components of their evolving infrastructure.

            What do you think? Let me know in the comments below or @WilliamMalikTM

            The post Black Hat Trip Report – Trend Micro appeared first on .

            Positive Drift - ASW #118

            This week, we welcome back Cesar Rodriguez, Head of Developer Advocacy at Accurics, to discuss Immutable Security For Immutable Infrastructure! In the Application Security News, Microsoft Bug Bounty Programs Year in Review: $13.7M in Rewards, In-band key negotiation issue in AWS S3 Crypto SDK for golang, Re VoL TE attack can decrypt 4G (LTE) calls to eavesdrop on conversations, Hardware Security Is Hard: How Hardware Boundaries Define Platform Security, How to make your security team more business savvy, and more!

             

            Show Notes: https://wiki.securityweekly.com/asw118

            Visit https://securityweekly.com/accurics to learn more about them!

             

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            Tyler's Dieting Tips - PSW #662

            This week, we welcome back Mike Nichols, Head of Product at Elastic Security, to discuss Why Elastic Is Making Endpoint Security 'Free And Open'! In our second segment, it's the Security News! We'll be talking about how Amazon Alexa One-Click Attack Can Divulge Personal Data, Researcher Publishes Patch Bypass for vBulletin 0-Day, Threat actors managed to control 23% of Tor Exit nodes, a Half a Million IoT Passwords were Leaked, Hackers Are Exploiting a 5-Alarm Bug in Networking Equipment, and a Zoom zero-day flaw allows code execution on victim's Windows machine! In our final segment, we air a pre recorded interview with Michael Assraf, CEO and Co-Founder at Vicarius, to talk about Vulnerability Rich - Contextually Blind!

             

            Show Notes: https://wiki.securityweekly.com/psw662

            Visit https://securityweekly.com/vicarius to learn more about them!

            Visit https://securityweekly.com/elastic to learn more about them!

             

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            ReVoLTE, Tor Exit Nodes, & Drovorub Malware - Wrap Up - SWN #56

            This week, Dr. Doug wraps up Fancy Bear, Alexa flaws, 747's fly with 3.5 inch floppies, Drovorub, Volte/Revolte LTE hacks, and how Cybersecurity Earnings are up!

             

            Show Notes: https://wiki.securityweekly.com/swn56

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            This Week in Security News: Microsoft Patches 120 Vulnerabilities, Including Two Zero-Days and Trend Micro Brings DevOps Agility and Automation to Security Operations Through Integration with AWS Solutions

            week in security

            Welcome to our weekly roundup, where we share what you need to know about the cybersecurity news and events that happened over the past few days. This week, read about one of Microsoft’s largest Patch Tuesday updates ever, including fixes for 120 vulnerabilities and two zero-days. Also, learn about Trend Micro’s new integrations with Amazon Web Services (AWS).

             

            Read on:

             

            Microsoft Patches 120 Vulnerabilities, Two Zero-Days

            This week Microsoft released fixes for 120 vulnerabilities, including two zero-days, in 13 products and services as part of its monthly Patch Tuesday rollout. The August release marks its third-largest Patch Tuesday update, bringing the total number of security fixes for 2020 to 862. “If they maintain this pace, it’s quite possible for them to ship more than 1,300 patches this year,” says Dustin Childs of Trend Micro’s Zero-Day Initiative (ZDI).

             

            XCSSET Mac Malware: Infects Xcode Projects, Performs UXSS Attack on Safari, Other Browsers, Leverages Zero-day Exploits

            Trend Micro has discovered an unusual infection related to Xcode developer projects. Upon further investigation, it was discovered that a developer’s Xcode project at large contained the source malware, which leads to a rabbit hole of malicious payloads. Most notable in our investigation is the discovery of two zero-day exploits: one is used to steal cookies via a flaw in the behavior of Data Vaults, another is used to abuse the development version of Safari.

             

            Top Tips for Home Cybersecurity and Privacy in a Coronavirus-Impacted World: Part 1

            We’re all now living in a post-COVID-19 world characterized by uncertainty, mass home working and remote learning. To help you adapt to these new conditions while protecting what matters most, Trend Micro has developed a two-part blog series on ‘the new normal’. Part one identifies the scope and specific cyber-threats of the new normal. 

             

            Trend Micro Brings DevOps Agility and Automation to Security Operations Through Integration with AWS Solutions

            Trend Micro enhances agility and automation in cloud security through integrations with Amazon Web Services (AWS). Through this collaboration, Trend Micro Cloud One offers the broadest platform support and API integration to protect AWS infrastructure whether building with Amazon Elastic Compute Cloud (Amazon EC2) instances, AWS Lambda, AWS Fargate, containers, Amazon Simple Storage Service (Amazon S3), or Amazon Virtual Private Cloud (Amazon VPC) networking.

             

            Shedding Light on Security Considerations in Serverless Cloud Architectures

            The big shift to serverless computing is imminent. According to a 2019 survey, 21% of enterprises have already adopted serverless technology, while 39% are considering it. Trend Micro’s new research on serverless computing aims to shed light on the security considerations in serverless environments and help adopters in keeping their serverless deployments as secure as possible.

             

            In One Click: Amazon Alexa Could be Exploited for Theft of Voice History, PII, Skill Tampering

            Amazon’s Alexa voice assistant could be exploited to hand over user data due to security vulnerabilities in the service’s subdomains. The smart assistant, which is found in devices such as the Amazon Echo and Echo Dot — with over 200 million shipments worldwide — was vulnerable to attackers seeking user personally identifiable information (PII) and voice recordings.

             

            New Attack Lets Hackers Decrypt VoLTE Encryption to Spy on Phone Calls

            A team of academic researchers presented a new attack called ‘ReVoLTE,’ that could let remote attackers break the encryption used by VoLTE voice calls and spy on targeted phone calls. The attack doesn’t exploit any flaw in the Voice over LTE (VoLTE) protocol; instead, it leverages weak implementation of the LTE mobile network by most telecommunication providers in practice, allowing an attacker to eavesdrop on the encrypted phone calls made by targeted victims.

             

            An Advanced Group Specializing in Corporate Espionage is on a Hacking Spree

            A Russian-speaking hacking group specializing in corporate espionage has carried out 26 campaigns since 2018 in attempts to steal vast amounts of data from the private sector, according to new findings. The hacking group, dubbed RedCurl, stole confidential corporate documents including contracts, financial documents, employee records and legal records, according to research published this week by the security firm Group-IB.

             

            Walgreens Discloses Data Breach Impacting Personal Health Information of More Than 72,000 Customers

            The second-largest pharmacy chain in the U.S. recently disclosed a data breach that may have compromised the personal health information (PHI) of more than 72,000 individuals across the United States. According to Walgreens spokesman Jim Cohn, prescription information of customers was stolen during May protests, when around 180 of the company’s 9,277 locations were looted.

             

            Top Tips for Home Cybersecurity and Privacy in a Coronavirus-Impacted World: Part 2

            The past few months have seen radical changes to our work and home life under the Coronavirus threat, upending norms and confining millions of American families within just four walls. In this context, it’s not surprising that more of us are spending an increasing portion of our lives online. In the final blog of this two-part series, Trend Micro discusses what you can do to protect your family, your data, and access to your corporate accounts.

             

            What are your thoughts on Trend Micro’s tips to make your home cybersecurity and privacy stronger in the COVID-19-impacted world? Share your thoughts in the comments below or follow me on Twitter to continue the conversation: @JonLClay.

            The post This Week in Security News: Microsoft Patches 120 Vulnerabilities, Including Two Zero-Days and Trend Micro Brings DevOps Agility and Automation to Security Operations Through Integration with AWS Solutions appeared first on .

            The Only Player - ESW #194

            This week, first we talk Enterprise News, discussing how Attivo Networks Announces New Integration with IBM Security Resilient, GreatHorn improves email security with better visibility and intelligent protection, Elite Intelligence Ascends to the Cloud With Recorded Future and Microsoft Azure, Thycotic Releases Privileged Access Management Capabilities for the New Reality of Cloud and Remote Work, Datadog has acquired Undefined Labs, a testing and observability company for developer workflows, and more! In our second segment, we air two pre-recorded interviews from Security Weekly Virtual Hacker Summer Camp with Chris Wysopal from Veracode and Mario Vuksan from ReversingLabs! In our final segment, we air two more pre-recorded interviews from Virtual Hacker Summer Camp with Danny Jenkins from ThreatLocker and Stephen Boyer from BitSight!

             

            Show Notes: https://securityweekly.com/esw194

             

            To learn more about BitSight, visit: https://securityweekly.com/bitsight

            To learn more about ThreatLocker, visit: https://www.securityweekly.com/threatlocker

            To learn more about ReversingLabs, visit: https://www.reversinglabs.com/

            To learn more about Veracode, visit: https://www.veracode.com/

             

            Visit https://www.securityweekly.com/esw for all the latest episodes!

            Follow us on Twitter: https://www.twitter.com/securityweekly

            Like us on Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/secweekly

            Jeff's PCI Disciples - SCW #38

            This week, we welcome Jeanette Manfra, Global Director, Security and Compliance at Google Cloud! Government agencies are running in antiquated, fortress-based government clouds under the guise this is the only option for superior security and compliance. However, security and compliance don t have to be a blocker to innovation; they can be part of the transformation. Jeanette will discuss how Google Cloud is enabling this transformation with Assured Workloads for Government by simplifying the compliance configuration process and providing seamless platform compatibility between government and commercial cloud environments.

             

            Show Notes: https://wiki.securityweekly.com/scw38

            Visit https://www.securityweekly.com/scw for all the latest episodes!

             

            Follow us on Twitter: https://www.twitter.com/securityweekly

            Like us on Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/secweekly

            Banning TikTok, Kr00k Vuln, & Mercedes-Benz Vulns - SWN #55

            This week, Dr. Doug White talks TikTok, Microsoft 0-Days, Google Bug Bounties, Mercedes bugs, Kr00k redux, Tor nodes, and is 5G Dead? Jason Wood joins us for Expert Commentary on how the Cybersecurity Skills Gap Worsens, Fueled by Lack of Career Development!

             

            Show Notes: https://wiki.securityweekly.com/swn55

            Visit https://www.securityweekly.com/swn for all the latest episodes!

             

            Follow us on Twitter: https://www.twitter.com/securityweekly

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            SecurityWeek Extends ICS Cyber Security Conference Call for Presentations to August 31, 2020

            The official Call for Presentations (speakers) for SecurityWeek’s 2020 Industrial Control Systems (ICS) Cyber Security Conference, being held October 19 – 22, 2020 in SecurityWeek’s Virtual Conference Center, has been extended to August 31st.

            As the premier ICS/SCADA cyber security conference, the event was originally scheduled to take place at the InterContinental Atlanta, but will now take place in a virtual environment due to COVID-19.

            “Due to the impact of COVID-19 and transition to a fully virtual event, we have extended the deadline for submissions to allow more time for speakers to put together their ideas under the new format,” said Mike Lennon, Managing Director at SecurityWeek. “Given SecurityWeek’s global reach and scale, we expect this to be the largest security-focused gathering of its kind serving the industrial and critical infrastructure sectors.” 

            ICS Cyber Security ConferenceThe 2020 Conference is expected to attract thousands of attendees from around the world, including large critical infrastructure and industrial organizations, military and state and Federal Government. 

            SecurityWeek has developed a fully immersive virtual conference center on a cutting- edge platform that provides attendees with the opportunity to network and interact from anywhere in the world.

            As the original ICS/SCADA cyber security conference, the event is the longest-running cyber security-focused event series for the industrial control systems sector. 

            With an 18-year history, the conference has proven to bring value to attendees through the robust exchange of technical information, actual incidents, insights, and best practices to help protect critical infrastructures from cyber-attacks.

            Produced by SecurityWeek, the conference addresses ICS/SCADA topics including protection for SCADA systems, plant control systems, engineering workstations, substation equipment, programmable logic controllers (PLCs), and other field control system devices.

            Through the Call for Speakers, a conference committee will accept speaker submissions for possible inclusion in the program at the 2020 ICS Cyber Security Conference.

            The conference committee encourages proposals for both main track, panel discussions, and “In Focus” sessions. Most sessions will be mixed between 30 and 45 minutes in length including time for Q&A.

            Submissions will be reviewed on an ongoing basis so early submission is highly encouraged. Submissions must include proposed presentation title, an informative session abstract, including learning objectives for attendees if relevant; and contact information and bio for the proposed speaker.

            All speakers must adhere to the 100% vendor neutral / no commercial policy of the conference. If speakers cannot respect this policy, they should not submit a proposal.

            To be considered, interested speakers should submit proposals by email to events(at)securityweek.com with the subject line “ICS2020 CFP” by August 31, 2020.

            Plan on Attending the 2020 ICS Cyber Security Conference? Online registration is open, with discounts available for early registration.

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