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Why Every Company Should Include Threat Intelligence in Their Cybersecurity Strategy

In the fast-evolving digital landscape, the prevalence of cyber threats has become a stark reality for businesses and individuals. While essential, conventional cybersecurity measures are often reactive and inadequate against sophisticated attacks. This is where Cyber Threat Intelligence (CTI) emerges as a proactive and complementary approach to cybersecurity. Utilising CTI helps organisations to protect their systems from potential hazards. It provides a way to cut through the noise and focus on threats relevant to that specific company and industry.

Protecting Your Software Supply Chain: Understanding Typosquatting and Dependency Confusion Attacks

Typosquatting and dependency confusion are two common tactics used by hackers to exploit open-source package repositories. Understand how these attacks work and discover preventive measures to secure your infrastructure.

Scattered Spiders and Black Cats: MGM and Caesars Hacked?

In this week's episode, Bill and Robin dive deep into the techniques and tricks used by the masterminds behind the recent attacks on MGM and the Caesars Entertainment group, Scattered Spider and ALPHV. Why was MGMs business down for 10 days? Why did Caesars pay an alleged $15M ransom? What is BlackCat? How can this have been prevented, and how would this map to something like the MITRE ATT&CK framework?

Amazon (AWS) S3 Bucket Take Over

Let’s try something a bit different and take a look at some of Trustwave SpiderLabs’ Open Source Intelligence (OSINT) research findings, and exploitation of vulnerable buckets and domains. I published this research internally on February 3, 2023, and here are my findings. Today, I will share with you how deleted S3 buckets could become a liability or threat to your organization and highlight the importance of cybersecurity in data and asset management.

Live DDoS Attack Simulation on Websites & APIs

DDoS attacks have increased by 75% in Q2 when compared to Q1, 2023 as per Indusface research – State of Application Security. Launching a 1-hour DDoS attack costs only a couple of bucks on the dark web. So, how does one fortify defenses to ensure app and API availability in case of an attack? In this live attack simulation, Karthik Krishnamoorthy (CTO - Indusface) demonstrates a wide variety of attacks and mitigation measures.

Fortifying your wireless network: A comprehensive guide to defend against wireless attacks

In our increasingly interconnected world, wireless networks have become the lifeblood of modern communication and productivity. However, this convenience comes with a price – the heightened risk of wireless attacks. In this in-depth blog, we will delve into the technical intricacies of safeguarding your network against wireless threats. Armed with this knowledge, you can confidently defend your wireless infrastructure against potential attackers.

Subdomain Hijacking: The Domain's Silent Danger

Just two months ago, researchers from Vienna conducted a study that revealed the abuse of dangling DNS records to hijack subdomains of numerous major organizations, highlighting the potential vulnerability of thousands of entities. The researchers targeted subdomains belonging to various government organizations, political parties, universities, media companies, and financial institutions. They managed to take control of these subdomains to demonstrate the risk associated with this vulnerability.

Defending against DDoS Attacks: What you need to know

Patience is one of those time-dependent, and often situational circumstances we experience. Few things define relativity better than patience. Think of the impatience of people who have to wait ten minutes in a line at a gas station, yet the thought of waiting ten minutes for a perfectly brewed cup of coffee seems entirely reasonable. It can’t be about the cost, since even the smallest cup of coffee is equal to, if not more expensive than a gallon of gasoline.

What Is an Account Takeover Attack?

An account takeover attack is a form of identity theft in which a cybercriminal takes over someone else’s online account. Cybercriminals steal a victim’s login credentials without them knowing through methods such as brute force attacks and phishing. Once the cybercriminal gains access to a victim’s account, they change the login credentials to prevent the victim from logging back in.

Mockbin and the Art of Deception: Tracing Adversaries, Going Headless and Mocking APIs

On September 4, 2023, CERT-UA revealed a meticulously planned cyberattack targeting Ukraine's critical energy infrastructure. The attack's modus operandi was distinct; it utilized deceptive emails containing bait links, luring victims into downloading a seemingly innocuous ZIP archive. This archive, however, harbored malicious files designed to hijack the victim's computer, redirecting data flows and exfiltrating sensitive information using services like mockbin.org and mocky.io.

Okta Environments Seeing Increased Targeted Threat Activity

In the last few weeks, Arctic Wolf Labs has noted an increase in threat activity targeting Okta as an attack vector. The relevant Techniques, Tools, and Procedures (TTPs) span across several different types of attacks. This bulletin will review several key aspects of these attacks.

The MGM Resorts Attack: Initial Analysis

The recent cyberattack on MGM Resorts International has raised serious concerns about the security of sensitive data and the vulnerabilities organizations face in today’s digital landscape. In this blog post, we will dive into the details of the attack based on the information currently available, analyze its root causes and discuss key takeaways to help organizations strengthen their security posture.

Understanding Malicious Package Attacks and Defense Strategies for Robust Cybersecurity

Malicious packages consist of software embedded with code that is capable of causing harm to an entire system or network. This is a rapidly growing threat affecting open-source software and the software supply chain. This attack method has seen a nearly 12,000% increase from 2022 to 2023, as reported by Synk. Some reasons include its technical feasibility, the potential for high returns, and the widespread distribution of open-source offerings, Common types of malicious packages encompass.

What is an Authenticated Security Scan, And Why Is It Important?

Many organizations today rely only on “unauthenticated” web application security scans, leaving their admin and user portals unchecked. While it is crucial to protect your system against external automated attacks, you shouldn’t ignore the possibility of a targeted attack from someone with valid logins. If your app lets anyone signup online, it could easily expose your business to attackers.

As MGM Struggles Amid Ransomware Fallout, Data Recovery Lessons Abound - Part 2

The latest MGM Resorts ransomware attack demonstrates why cyber insurance is critical as part of a multi-layered security strategy. In our last blog, we discussed the recent Las Vegas cyber incidents and how no organization is completely safe. The original cyber incident at MGM Resorts occurred on September 10, 2023 — nearly two weeks ago now – and the company and its valued customers are still feeling its effects.

Evolution of Real Time Attack Detection

Attack detection is critical for most security solutions, whether we are talking about a load balancer-based (NIDS, WAF), host-based or in-application solutions (HIDS, RASP). Interestingly, regardless of the differences in architecture and data flow, most solutions use similar detection principles and techniques. We will explore how the detection architecture evolved over time and how the new generation of detection logic, such as the architecture implemented by Wallarm, is principally different from that of the legacy solutions.

Non-Profit Save the Children Gets Hit By Ransomware Data Attack

Save The Children is an organization that specializes in helping children live healthy lives. The non-profit works in multiple countries, helping to provide for children's needs, especially in areas affected by war or tragedy. This organization was recently the target of a ransomware hacker group and suffered huge data losses as a result of that targeting.

How Social Engineering Took Down MGM and Caesars

Two major players in hospitality and gaming, MGM and Caesars, were victims of two, separate cyber attacks. While the details are still unknown, what is known is that Caesars paid the hackers a multi-million dollar ransom, and that both attacks began with social engineering.

Major Casinos Hacked Using Social Engineering Attacks

Two giants in the gaming and hospitality industry, Caesars Entertainment and MGM Resorts, recently announced that they were targeted by cybercriminals. But here’s the catch, both ransomware attacks appear to have started with the use of social engineering tactics against IT helpdesk personnel to gain access to systems.

Malicious Packages Special Report - Attacks Move Beyond Vulnerabilities

Threat actors are after our sensitive data. In 2023, the number of malicious packages published to Node Package Manager (npm) and RubyGems ballooned 315% compared to 2021, and 85% of malicious packages discovered in existing applications were capable of exfiltration – meaning they could cause an unauthorized transmission of information. Software packages containing malicious code are a growing threat, and they may have unknowingly infiltrated your applications.

Breach and Attack Simulation Helps Pipeline Operators Comply with New TSA Requirements

In July of this year, the Transportation Safety Administration (TSA) released Security Directive Pipeline-2021-02D (SD-02D) Pipeline Cybersecurity Mitigation Actions, Contingency Planning, and Testing. The directive—aimed at owners and operators of liquid and natural gas pipelines or facilities designated as critical infrastructure—outlines requirements for enhancing cyber resilience through the implementation of a TSA-approved cybersecurity implementation plan (CIP).

Caesars Entertainment Gets Hacked, Exposing Countless Gamblers

Caesars Entertainment is one of the largest casino companies in the United States and is well-known for its loyalty program. The company serves countless customers in Las Vegas and elsewhere throughout the world. The massive loyalty program takes in data from all of Caesars customers, and that program may have just backfired on the company, potentially hurting many of its customers in the process.

Cyber attackers hit the jackpot: learn why casinos aren't the only ones vulnerable

For many years, hackers and cybercriminals have used social engineering techniques to gain unauthorized access to confidential information. It is easy to predict that these attacks will continue to advance in sophistication and frequency. Whether they are using AI to create better lures or cyber criminals are just getting more adept at exploiting human nature, the success of these attacks proves the tactics are winning.

Gambling away your data: What we know about the Las Vegas cyberattacks

MGM Resorts has announced that it will be shutting down 12 of its hotels and casinos in and around Las Vegas. The reason—a ransomware attack of unknown magnitude on servers containing a goldmine of customer data. MGM reports that it managed to detect the breach at a fairly early stage and notify the authorities and law enforcement, but the damage incurred is yet to be evaluated.

As MGM Struggles Amid Ransomware Fallout, Data Recovery Lessons Abound

Picture this: Your IT infrastructure is breached by a nefarious actor, who then encrypts critical data and holds your organization hostage until a ransom is paid. Far from hypothetical, this is exactly what happened to multi-billion-dollar casino operator MGM Resorts International last week when hit with a ransomware attack – the latest in a string of large-scale, high-profile cyber security incidents.

The Top 7 Cyberattacks on U.S. Government

In a world where ones and zeros are the new battleground, these threats, cyberattacks have become a significant threat to governments worldwide. The United States, with its vast array of government agencies and critical infrastructure, is no exception. Cybersecurity threats that impact the public sector range from state-sponsored attacks to financially motivated hacking groups. In this blog post, we’ll delve into the top 7 cyberattacks on the U.S.

5 Types of Software Supply Chain Attacks Developers Should Know

What do ambulances in the UK, the Norwegian government, and a major Russian bank have in common? They were all victims of successful supply chain attacks in July 2023. Could you be next? It’s more likely than you think. Organizations entrust more sensitive data to vendors and third parties (like government agencies and critical infrastructure operators) than ever as part of their software development and operations.

Why Legacy AV Is an Easy Target for Attackers

If you still rely on legacy antivirus software to stop modern cyberattacks, this post is for you. Today’s adversaries are relentless. While many threat actors have adopted newer techniques such as data extortion, identity-based threats and in-memory attacks to achieve their goals, some continue to rely on tried-and-proven threats — and legacy software is no match for either.

Desorden Group - The Summer 2023 Update

The financially motivated Desorden (Disorder in Spanish) group, previously known as “chaoscc”, was first observed going by the new name Desorden in 2021 while acting against multiple Asian-based organizations in various sectors. The group mainly targets high-revenue enterprises and supply chains to amass as much profit as possible by extracting sensitive organizational data and demanding a ransom for it.

What is an API attack and how does it work

If you want to visualize how data flows across your connected applications, you can think back to that childhood game of Chutes and Ladders (also called Snakes and Ladders). As a kid, the board felt like a confusing grid that had the weirdest, seemingly arbitrary connections between blocks. In your modern digital environment, your Application Programming Interfaces (APIs) fulfill the same role that the ladders and chutes/snakes fulfilled, connecting disparate blocks across a larger whole.

How to avoid web cache poisoning attacks

Web cache poisoning is a cyber attack that wreaks havoc on unsuspecting websites. It exploits vulnerabilities by caching mechanisms that web servers, proxies, and content delivery networks (CDNs) use, compromising data integrity. Malicious actors can use cache poisoning to deliver malicious payloads, tamper with sensitive information, or redirect users to fraudulent websites. In this article, we’ll comprehensively explore web cache poisoning attacks and how they work.

Tackling the Surge: The Expanded Financial Attack Surface

The Attack Surface is Growing, and fast. What once was considered the attack surface is no longer. Instead organizations are faced with a sprawling attack surface, including not just domains, IPs and sub-domains, but also third parties, brand risks and more. Businesses in the finance sector face two additional challenges: This blog focuses on banks, FinTech companies and insurance providers, as they are among the largest types of entities in the financial sector.

SME Cyber Security Services | Protect Your Small Business from Cyberattacks

Small businesses are increasingly targeted by cyberattacks. In fact, a recent study found that small businesses are 44% more likely to be attacked than large businesses. If you're a small business owner, it's important to take steps to protect your business from cyberattacks. Watch this video to know that how Cyphere can help you protect your small business from cyber threats. Service quality underpins everything we do.

Why is it Important to Have Cybersecurity

In the era of the internet, cybersecurity has become an essential element. That is because the constant online presence has led to an increase in cyber crimes. However, taking the issue of cybercrimes such as spamming, phishing, etc. lightly won't cut it anymore. Most small businesses are unaware of the cybersecurity issues that exist in their environment because they believe that large companies are the only targets of cybercrime.

AT&T Cybersecurity serves as critical first responder during attack on municipality

Earlier this year, analysts in the AT&T Cybersecurity Managed Threat Detection and Response (MTDR) security operations center (SOC) were alerted to a potential ransomware attack on a large municipal customer. The attack, which was subsequently found to have been carried out by members of the Royal ransomware group, affected several departments and temporarily disrupted critical communications and IT systems.

The Top Cyber Attacks of August 2023

There was some good news on the cybersecurity front in August, starting with a joint effort by U.S. and European authorities that broke up a far-reaching network of compromised computers used in attacks on healthcare organizations around the world. The takedown also netted more than $8 million in illicit cryptocurrency from Russian-affiliated hacking groups.

Scarleteel 2.0 and the MITRE ATT&CK framework

In this blog post, we will take a comprehensive dive into a real-world cyber attack that reverberated across the digital realm – SCARLETEEL. Through an in-depth analysis of this notorious incident using the MITRE ATT&CK framework, we aim to unearth invaluable insights into the operational tactics of cyber adversaries.

The Stealthy Threat of AI Prompt Injection Attacks

Just last week the UK’s NCSC issued a warning, stating that it sees alarming potential for so-called prompt injection attacks, driven by the large language models that power AI. The NSCS stated “Amongst the understandable excitement around LLMs, the global tech community still doesn‘t yet fully understand LLM’s capabilities, weaknesses, and (crucially) vulnerabilities.

How AI is Helping Cybercriminals and What You Can Do for Your Protection

Artificial intelligence is an all-encompassing tool that leverages computer systems to mimic intelligent actions like solving problems and learning. Due to its general nature, AI can aid almost any endeavor. Sadly, this includes leveraging it for malicious purposes. How do cybercrooks use AI to aid their activities? Can you do anything about it? We explore answers to both!

Deciphering alphabet soup: IoCs and IoAs

Security Operations teams are the cornerstone of the fight against last-mile cybercrime in any organization. This is why they need the most advanced technologies possible.But the fight against cybercriminals isn’t simply a question of technology. Having a proactive attitude against possible cyberattacks is also key. This is where we see two essential concepts for all Security Operations teams: IoCs (indicators of compromise) and IoAs (indicators of attack). What is the difference?

What are Software Supply Chain Attacks?

Software supply chain attacks, or digital supply chain attacks, have become increasingly prevalent over the last couple of years. According to a study by KPMG, 73% of organizations have experienced at least one significant disruption from a third-party in the last three years. What’s the best way to protect against potential software supply chain attacks? To get the answer, let’s define what those attacks are, how they happen, and how you can defend against them.

CISO's Corner: Cybersecurity Best Practices: Securing Employee Smartphones

Arguably, the most used device by an organization’s employees is their smartphone. Ensuring that anyone, from the CEO to a newcomer being onboarded, knows how to keep this device safe should be paramount. Why? Globally, more than 2 million attacks on mobile devices are reported each month, according to Statista. While the number of attacks has dropped precipitously from its peak of 6.5 million in October 2020, it is still dangerously high and a favorite threat actor attack vector.

Nearly One-Quarter of Financial-Themed Spam Emails are Phishing Attacks

While spam tends to be dismissed as being more an annoyance, new research shows that there is a very real and ever-present threat in emails that are marked as “spam”. I’ve written plenty about phishing attacks that target bank customers. It’s nothing new. What’s interesting is a recent article by security researchers at BitDefender where banking-related phishing attacks are considered spam.