Saudi Arabia's government agencies were hit with a cyberattack that security researchers are blaming on a worm-like malware that can wipe computer systems, destroying data.Several government bodies and vital installations suffered the attack, disrupting their servers, the country's Saudi Press Agency said on Thursday. The transportation sector was among the agencies hit by an actor from outside the country, the press agency said.Security firms say the attack involved malware called Shamoon or Disttrack that was previously found targeting a Saudi Arabian oil company four years ago. That attack disabled 30,000 computers. To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here
Saudi Arabia's government agencies were hit with a cyberattack that security researchers are blaming on a worm-like malware that can wipe computer systems, destroying data.Several government bodies and vital installations suffered the attack, disrupting their servers, the country's Saudi Press Agency said on Thursday. The transportation sector was among the agencies hit by an actor from outside the country, the press agency said.Security firms say the attack involved malware called Shamoon or Disttrack that was previously found targeting a Saudi Arabian oil company four years ago. That attack disabled 30,000 computers. To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here
A new Android malware has managed to steal access to more than 1 million Google accounts, and it continues to infect new devices, according to security firm Checkpoint.“We believe that it is the largest Google account breach to date,” the security firm said in Wednesday blog post.The malware, called Gooligan, has been preying on devices running older versions of Android, from 4.1 to 5.1, which are still used widely, especially in Asia.Gooligan masquerades as legitimate-looking Android apps. Checkpoint has found 86 titles, many of which are offered on third-party app stores, that contain the malicious coding.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here
A new Android malware has managed to steal access to more than 1 million Google accounts, and it continues to infect new devices, according to security firm Checkpoint.“We believe that it is the largest Google account breach to date,” the security firm said in Wednesday blog post.The malware, called Gooligan, has been preying on devices running older versions of Android, from 4.1 to 5.1, which are still used widely, especially in Asia.Gooligan masquerades as legitimate-looking Android apps. Checkpoint has found 86 titles, many of which are offered on third-party app stores, that contain the malicious coding.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here
The latest strain of Mirai, the malware that’s been infecting internet routers from Germany’s Deutsche Telekom, has spread to devices in at least 10 other countries, according to security firm Flashpoint.The company has detected the new Mirai strain infecting internet routers and modems across the globe, including in the U.K., Brazil, Iran and Thailand.It’s still unclear how many devices have been infected, but Flashpoint estimates that as many as five million devices are vulnerable. “If even a fraction of these vulnerable devices were compromised, they would add considerable power to an existing botnet,” Flashpoint said in a Tuesday blog post.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here
The latest strain of Mirai, the malware that’s been infecting internet routers from Germany’s Deutsche Telekom, has spread to devices in at least 10 other countries, according to security firm Flashpoint.The company has detected the new Mirai strain infecting internet routers and modems across the globe, including in the U.K., Brazil, Iran and Thailand.It’s still unclear how many devices have been infected, but Flashpoint estimates that as many as five million devices are vulnerable. “If even a fraction of these vulnerable devices were compromised, they would add considerable power to an existing botnet,” Flashpoint said in a Tuesday blog post.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here
A new version of Mirai -- a malware that’s been enslaving poorly secured IoT devices -- has found a new victim: vulnerable internet routers from Germany's Deutsche Telekom.The spread of the new strain of Mirai has caused internet connection problems for close to a million Deutsche Telekom customers, the company reported on Monday. Deutsche Telekom blamed the disruption on the notorious malware, which has already been found infecting more than 500,000 internet connected devices, including DVRs and surveillance cameras.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here
A new version of Mirai -- a malware that’s been enslaving poorly secured IoT devices -- has found a new victim: vulnerable internet routers from Germany's Deutsche Telekom.The spread of the new strain of Mirai has caused internet connection problems for close to a million Deutsche Telekom customers, the company reported on Monday. Deutsche Telekom blamed the disruption on the notorious malware, which has already been found infecting more than 500,000 internet connected devices, including DVRs and surveillance cameras.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here
It may take several years or even decades, but hackers won't necessarily always be human. Artificial intelligence -- a technology that also promises to revolutionize cybersecurity -- could one day become the go-to hacking tool. Organizers of the Cyber Grand Challenge, a contest sponsored by the U.S. defense agency DARPA, gave a glimpse of the power of AI during their August event. Seven supercomputers battled each other to show that machines can indeed find and patch software vulnerabilities.Theoretically, the technology can be used to perfect any coding, ridding it of exploitable flaws. But what if that power was used for malicious purposes? The future of cyberdefense might also pave the way for a new era of hacking.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here
It may take several years or even decades, but hackers won't necessarily always be human. Artificial intelligence -- a technology that also promises to revolutionize cybersecurity -- could one day become the go-to hacking tool.
Organizers of the Cyber Grand Challenge, a contest sponsored by the U.S. defense agency DARPA, gave a glimpse of the power of AI during their August event. Seven supercomputers battled each other to show that machines can indeed find and patch software vulnerabilities.
Theoretically, the technology can be used to perfect any coding, ridding it of exploitable flaws. But what if that power was used for malicious purposes? The future of cyberdefense might also pave the way for a new era of hacking.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here
Michael Flynn, the man President-elect Donald Trump plans to name as U.S. national security advisor, believes the government is falling behind on cybersecurity.
Trump named Flynn to his cabinet on Friday after the former military intelligence leader acted as the top military advisor to Trump's presidential campaign. Flynn previously was director of the Defense Intelligence Agency and has served in U.S. intelligence operations in Afghanistan and Iraq.
Flynn holds strong views on cybersecurity. He’s called U.S. cyber capabilities “underwhelming.”
“We have competitors out there that are rapidly catching up with us,” he said in a speech posted online last year. In 2014, after retiring as a general, he started a consulting firm called Flynn Intel Group that specializes in preventing cyber threats for clients.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here
Michael Flynn, the man President-elect Donald Trump plans to name as U.S. national security advisor, believes the government is falling behind on cybersecurity.
Trump named Flynn to his cabinet on Friday after the former military intelligence leader acted as the top military advisor to Trump's presidential campaign. Flynn previously was director of the Defense Intelligence Agency and has served in U.S. intelligence operations in Afghanistan and Iraq.
Flynn holds strong views on cybersecurity. He’s called U.S. cyber capabilities “underwhelming.”
“We have competitors out there that are rapidly catching up with us,” he said in a speech posted online last year. In 2014, after retiring as a general, he started a consulting firm called Flynn Intel Group that specializes in preventing cyber threats for clients.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here
Apple may have refused to help the FBI unlock an iPhone used by the San Bernardino shooter, but the tech industry is still better off working with the U.S. government on encryption issues than turning away, according to a former official with the Obama administration.
“The government can get very creative,” said Daniel Rosenthal, who served as the counterterrorism director in the White House until January this year. He fears that the U.S. government will choose to “go it alone” and take extreme approaches to circumventing encryption, especially if another terrorist attack occurs.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here
Apple may have refused to help the FBI unlock an iPhone used by the San Bernardino shooter, but the tech industry is still better off working with the U.S. government on encryption issues than turning away, according to a former official with the Obama administration.
“The government can get very creative,” said Daniel Rosenthal, who served as the counterterrorism director in the White House until January this year. He fears that the U.S. government will choose to “go it alone” and take extreme approaches to circumventing encryption, especially if another terrorist attack occurs.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here
A group of laid-off IT workers at the University of California, San Francisco may resort to filing a lawsuit against the school, accusing it of discrimination by outsourcing their jobs to an all Indian staff.
It's a legal tactic that U.S. IT workers are increasingly considering to try and block employers from allegedly replacing their jobs with foreign workers.
In the case of UCSF, the school is dismissing 49 permanent employees from its IT department and contracting the work to outside firms. But in doing so, the school is also getting rid of a diverse staff comprised of Americans from various ethnicities, and replacing them with Indian workers from one of the contractors, the laid-off workers said.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here
A group of laid-off IT workers at the University of California, San Francisco may resort to filing a lawsuit against the school, accusing it of discrimination by outsourcing their jobs to an all Indian staff.
It's a legal tactic that U.S. IT workers are increasingly considering to try and block employers from allegedly replacing their jobs with foreign workers.
In the case of UCSF, the school is dismissing 49 permanent employees from its IT department and contracting the work to outside firms. But in doing so, the school is also getting rid of a diverse staff comprised of Americans from various ethnicities, and replacing them with Indian workers from one of the contractors, the laid-off workers said.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here
Audrey Hatten-Milholin has worked at the University of California, San Francisco for 17 years. But come February, her job in the IT department as a system architect will be taken over by a worker from India.
Even worse, Hatten-Milholin has been asked to train her replacement.
“It’s horrible. Really horrible,” she said on Tuesday. “You want to treat people decently. But on the other hand, I’m pretty ticked off I have to do this.”
Hatten-Milholin was among about 80 laid-off IT workers who held a rally on Tuesday, calling for an end to the university's outsourcing program. The IT department workers, including permanent staff and contract employees, will be replaced by workers from an India-based IT services firm called HCL.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here
A consumer protection group in China is asking Apple to investigate problems with iPhone 6 and iPhone 6s units automatically shutting off.Recently, iPhone customers in the country have been complaining about the problem to the China Consumers Association, the group said in a statement on Tuesday. The shutdowns occur when the phone’s battery charge drops to between 60 and 50 percent.The problem will persist despite upgrading to the latest version of iOS. It will also occur in both cold environments and at room temperature. After the automatic shutdown, the phones will also fail to turn on without connecting to a power supply.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here
Hotel and restaurant chains, beware. A notorious cybercriminal gang is tricking businesses into installing malware by calling their customer services representatives and convincing them to open malicious email attachments.
The culprits in these hacks, which are designed to steal customers’ credit card numbers, appear to be the Carbanak gang, a group that was blamed last year for stealing as much as $1 billion from various banks.
On Monday, security firm Trustwave said that three of its clients in the past month had encountered malware built with coding found in previous Carbanak attacks.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here
Hotel and restaurant chains, beware. A notorious cybercriminal gang is tricking businesses into installing malware by calling their customer services representatives and convincing them to open malicious email attachments.
The culprits in these hacks, which are designed to steal customers’ credit card numbers, appear to be the Carbanak gang, a group that was blamed last year for stealing as much as $1 billion from various banks.
On Monday, security firm Trustwave said that three of its clients in the past month had encountered malware built with coding found in previous Carbanak attacks.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here
Michael Kan