Jessica Lyons Hardcastle reports: With mandated spyware downloads to tens of thousands of surveillance cameras equipped with facial-recognition technology, the World Cup in Qatar next month is looking more like a data security and privacy nightmare than a celebration of the beautiful game. Football fans and others visiting Qatar must download two apps: Ehteraz, a Covid-19…
Category: Commentaries and Analyses
Ransomware gangs shift tactics, making crimes harder to track
Jack Gillum reports: Ransomware gangs increasingly use their own or stolen computer code, moving away from a leasing model that made their activities easier to monitor, new research shows. Numerous prominent hacking groups in recent years have functioned by leasing their malicious software and computing infrastructure to other bad actors, in what’s known as ransomware-as-a-service….
Scammers Are Extorting Parents With Their Dead Children’s Nude Images, FBI Says
Thomas Brewster reports: Sextortion scammers have become increasingly ruthless, targeting families of teenage victims who took their own lives after sending nude images to highly organized cybercriminal gangs, the FBI has warned. The gangs have demanded that parents or siblings pay to ensure that the sexualized photos of their deceased relatives are not publicly released,…
HC3: Analyst Note: Venus Ransomware Targets Publicly Exposed Remote Desktop Services
November 9, 2022 TLP: Clear Report: 202211091400 Executive Summary HC3 is aware of at least one healthcare entity in the United States falling victim to Venus ransomware recently. The threat actors behind Venus ransomware operations are known to target publicly exposed Remote Desktop Services to encrypt Windows devices. This report provides additional information, indicators of…
Canadian police arrest suspected LockBit ransomware operator (updated)
Is the end of LockBit near? First an irate developer leaked the builder code for LockBit 3.0 code on GitHub in September. And now one of their big operators has been arrested in Canada. Howard Solomon reports: Canadian police have arrested a Russian citizen who they say is one of the world’s most prolific ransomware…
State hit by largest sustained Election Day cyberattack warns ‘it’s only going to get worse’
Mark Albert reports: The longest sustained cyberattack against election websites in America on Election Day did not affect any votes but caused disruptions to voters’ efforts to determine their polling locations and access other information, Michael Watson, Mississippi’s secretary of state, said in his first interview about the attack. Watson, the state’s top election administrator,…