Leveraging Knowledge to Manage Your Data Risks
On August 25, 2021, the FBI issued a Flash Alert to warn companies, especially in the health care industry, about the proliferation of attacks by threat actors using Hive ransomware.
According to the Flash Alert, Hive was first observed in June 2021: “Hive ransomware uses multiple mechanisms to compromise business networks, including phishing emails with…
On July 28, 2021, the Cybersecurity & Infrastructure Security Agency (CISA) issued a cybersecurity alert entitled “Top Routinely Exploited Vulnerabilities” in collaboration with the Australian Cyber Security Centre, the United Kingdom’s National Cyber Security Centre, and the FBI.
The Alert concludes that cyber criminals are exploiting vulnerabilities in unpatched systems, but that many of the…
On July 19, 2021, the Federal Bureau of Investigations issued a Private Industry Notification to service providers and “entities associated with the Tokyo 2020 Summer Olympics that cyber actors who wish to disrupt the event could use distributed denial of service (DDoS) attacks, ransomware, social engineering, phishing campaigns, or insider threats to block or disrupt…
I love seeing another win for law enforcement in the cyber context.
Servers and web domains owned by DoubleVPN, a virtual private network, were seized recently following a collaborative law enforcement effort involving the Dutch National Police, the FBI, Europol, and the U.K.’s National Crime Agency.
DoubleVPN is a security tool that has been used…
People always ask me if law enforcement is having any luck in combatting cyber criminals. Let me be clear: it is a very tough job to take down cyber criminals located in other countries or sponsored by foreign nations. Our government is focusing on cyber criminals more than I have ever seen before, and the…
The FBI recently issued a Flash Alert to Fortinet Fortigate users that Advanced Persistent Threat (APT) groups are continuing to exploit devices that have not been patched. Although Fortinet issued patches for these vulnerabilities in 2018, 2019, and 2020, many organizations have not applied the patches.
The exploitations are random, not against specific industries or…
Colonial Pipeline paid hackers a ransom of $4.4 million in bitcoin soon after discovering a cybersecurity hack on its systems that began on May 6. The company’s acknowledgement comes after days of speculation about whether a ransom was paid to the hackers. The company’s CEO defended the “difficult” decision to pay the ransom, maintaining he…
Colonial Pipeline, a company that transports more than 100 million gallons of gasoline and other fuel daily across 14 states from Houston to New York Harbor, shut down the pipeline last Friday after discovering ransomware on its computer systems. The FBI has blamed the attack on a ransomware group called DarkSide.
The hack reportedly began…
Ransomware attacks are so frequent that they seem like old news. There is a new interest in ransomware attacks following the attack against Colonial Pipeline [view related posts]. The Colonial Pipeline attack crippled the gas transporter for five days and could affect gas availability and prices for at least the next two weeks.
The…
The FBI recently issued a Flash Alert warning higher education institutions, K-12 schools, and seminaries about increasing numbers of ransomware attacks affecting the education industry. According to the warning, “Since March 2020, the FBI has become aware of PYSA ransomware attacks against US and foreign government entities, educational institutions, private companies, and the healthcare sector…
