From the good folks at EPIC.org: In a report released today, the House Committee on Oversight declared that the Equifax breach, which affected 148 million U.S. consumers, was “entirely preventable.” The breach, one of the largest in U.S. history, compromised the authenticating details, including dates of birth and social security numbers, of more than half of American consumers….
Category: Of Note
NJ Fines Health Insurance Provider $100K For Personal Information Breach
Kimberly Bosco reports: New York-based health insurance provider EmblemHealth, Inc. is paying the state of New Jersey a hefty fine for disclosing confidential personal information of over 6,000 New Jersey customers. Attorney General Gurbir S. Grewal and the Division of Consumer Affairs announced on Dec. 10 that EmblemHealth will pay NJ a $100,000 civil penalty….
New Zealand Privacy Commissioner releases annual report
Stuff reports on a case in New Zealand that was cited in a newly-released annual report by the Privacy Commissioner. Disturbingly, the unnamed government agency not only did not set a great example for data protection, but they demonstrated less than admirable response to the incident of insider-wrongdoing that harmed a member of the public….
North Korea-linked Hackers Target Academic Institutions
Ionut Arghire reports: A threat group possibly originating from North Korea has been targeting academic institutions since at least May of this year, NetScout’s security researchers reveal. The attackers use spear-phishing emails that link to a website where a lure document attempts to trick users into installing a malicious Google Chrome extension. Following initial compromise,…
Those annoying sextortion scams are redirecting users to GandCrab ransomware now
Okay, I tend to laugh at the sextortion emails and have tweeted or posted some of them at times, usually after I check the referenced BTC wallet to see if anyone actually fell for the scam and paid. But Catalin Cimpanu reports on a new – and important – development: This past week, users in…
U.S. Readies Charges Against Chinese Hackers
Dustin Volz reports: Federal prosecutors are expected to unseal criminal charges as soon as next week against hackers linked to the Chinese government who have allegedly engaged in a sophisticated multiyear scheme to break into U.S. technology service providers in order to compromise the networks of their clients, according to people familiar with the matter….