The District of Columbia Board of Elections data breach claimed by a Russian ransomware gang leaked the entire voter roll, including personal information and voting records.
Cyber Security
Cyber criminals, state-sponsored hackers and even the occasional disgruntled employee are constantly looking to gain unauthorized access for a variety of purposes: theft of money, cyber espionage, personal information for sale or for use in scams, and damage to critical infrastructure for just a few of the most common.
So how does an organization mitigate an entire world full of continual cyber attacks? Just as buildings have a number of necessary elements of physical security: access control, cameras, alarms and so on; there are similar key elements of cyber security that are absolutely vital for just about any modern business.
It starts with identifying and closing the most common doors that attackers use. For example, phishing attacks on employees are far and away the most common initial point of entry. The breach of even a low-level employee account can quickly turn into an escalation in access privileges and the ability to reach sensitive information. This is also true of smart devices, which are generally more poorly secured than computers and phones.
The cyber crime group that locked up an Indonesian national data center last month, impacting hundreds of government services, has opted to provide the ransomware decryptor for free. This was accompanied by an apology, but also a donation link exhorting the Indonesian government and public to show gratitude for their supposed generosity.
FBI's annual internet crime report says cyber crime losses increased by almost two-thirds while ransomware attacks remain the greatest risk to critical infrastructure organizations.
A data breach on consumer lender TMX and its subsidiaries Titlemax, Titlebucks, and Instaloan leaked the personal information, including social security numbers, of 4.8 million customers.
In what is shaping up to be a major test case for the entire cyber insurance industry, Zurich Insurance is refusing to pay out a $100 million claim from Mondelez, saying that the ransomware attack was actually an act of “cyber war,” and therefore, is not covered by the policy.
As cyber crime groups grow and "corporatize," they find themselves under pressure to keep up with wages. Operating expenses are largely devoted to paying employees and contractors for their work, with 80% a typical number.
Hackers published a list of 50,000 Fortinet VPN credentials stolen from vulnerable devices. A second data leak dumped sslvpn_websession files for every IP initially compromised.
There is reason to be optimistic about the future of cyber security. In today’s world, there is always a “weak link” in the chain that hackers can exploit. In a blockchain world, there are no longer any weak links and every action taken on the blockchain is part of a completely verifiable and trackable digital ledger.
UK Police have arrested a 17-year-old suspected Scattered Spider member accused of the MGM hack that disrupted casinos and hotels in Las Vegas on September 12, 2023, costing over $100 million in recovery.
A massive credentials leak has compromised the login information of over 149 million accounts, stolen via an infostealer after a threat actor failed to secure a cloud database.










