American and Dutch Teenagers Arrested on Criminal Charges for Allegedly Operating International Cyber-Attack-For-Hire Websites CHICAGO — Federal authorities in Chicago have charged two suspected computer hackers for allegedly operating cyber-attack-for-hire websites that launched attacks on companies and individuals around the world. ZACHARY BUCHTA, 19, of Fallston, Md., and BRADLEY JAN WILLEM VAN ROOY, 19, of…
Category: Of Note
Contracting in the Cloud: Who Pays for a Data Breach?
In a recent white paper I co-authored with Protenus, Inc., we noted the significant risks of a breach involving a vendor or business associate. In following up in a subsequent post, I also included a “pop quiz” for readers to use to test their understanding about the terms of any contract they have in terms of…
TalkTalk gets record £400,000 fine for failing to prevent October 2015 attack
From the Information Commissioner’s Office, this announcement about what is a record fine for them: Telecoms company TalkTalk has been issued with a record £400,000 fine by the ICO for security failings that allowed a cyber attacker to access customer data “with ease”. The ICO’s in-depth investigation found that an attack on the company last October could have been…
RedHack leaks reveal the rise of Turkey’s pro-government Twitter trolls
Efe Kerem Sozeri reports: Leaked emails from the Turkish government provide new details of how Turkey’s pro-government Twitter troll army targets the opposition and silences media criticism in the media. Last Friday, RedHack, a Marxist hacker group, claimed to have hacked personal email accounts of Turkey’s Energy Minister and President Erdoğan’s son-in-law, Berat Albayrak. They threatened to leak data if Turkey…
FTC denies LabMD’s application for a stay of Commission’s Final Order
In what is likely to infuriate those who believe that the Federal Trade Commission has already abused its authority in its relentless enforcement action against a small cancer-detecting laboratory, the FTC has denied LabMD’s application for a stay of their final order while LabMD appeals to a federal court. In explaining its denial, the Commission said it looked at four…
InfoArmor: Yahoo Data Breach Investigation
Well, it seems InfoArmor is calling b.s. on claims that Yahoo! was hacked by state actors. The overview from their report: Yahoo was compromised in 2014 by a group of professional blackhats who were hired to compromise customer databases from a variety of different targeted organizations. Some of their initial targets, which occurred in 2012…