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Cyber Criminals Brought to Justice – The DoD Hacker

Earlier this month, Tripwire published its final installment of 10 Notorious Cyber Criminals Brought to Justice, a series that sought to demonstrate how law enforcement frequently catches up with individuals who use cyberspace for malicious purposes. Although our series has concluded, we as information security professionals realize that law...
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Cyber Insurance: Managing the Risk

Cyber insurance is a hot topic of many debates today. It is believed to be the long-awaited cure for high-impact security risks, especially in light of constantly evolving privacy legislation and disclosure obligations – but what actually is it? Simply put, cyber insurance is a tool intended to mitigate the loss from information security incidents....
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Why Companies Have Little Incentive to Invest in Information Security

According to a fellow at Columbia University, companies are not investing significantly more in information security partly because of the influence of moral hazards, or the act of one entity taking risks because others bear the burden of those actions. Benjamin Dean, a staff associate and fellow in cyber-security and internet governance at the...
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All Versions of Windows Vulnerable to FREAK Attack, Confirms Microsoft

There's bad news for any Windows users who were thinking that the recently-announced FREAK vulnerability wasn't something they had to particularly worry about. When first announced, it was thought that the newly-discovered flaw in SSL/TLS was limited to Apple's Safari and Google's Android web browsers, opening the possibility of hackers and...
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Who is Responsible for Secure Software Development?

An interesting dialogue came up in my security circles that I believe outlines a fundamental disconnect within organizations developing software products. We have all heard that communication is key, but are the conversations happening at the proper levels to expose a product’s security requirements? The conversation went something like this: ...
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‘CSI: Cyber’ Riddled with Misperceptions, Lacks ‘Cyber’ Substance

On March 4, the series premiere for the new crime drama CSI: Cyber aired on CBS. The show stars Patricia Arquette, who recently won an Oscar for Best Supporting Actress in a Supporting Role, as Avery Ryan, a behavioral analyst who solves crimes under the FBI Cyber Division. Peter MacNiol, Charley Koontz, Hayley Kiyoko, James Van Der Beek,and Shad...
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Understanding U.S. NSS 2015 Using the International Strategy for Cyberspace

Last week, we used the United States’ 2015 National Security Strategy (NSS) as a reference point to analyze “A Strong Britain in an Age of Uncertainty: The National Security Strategy,” the United Kingdom’s 2010 National Security Strategy. Though limited in scope, this comparative analysis revealed a number of important findings, including the UK’s...
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RBAC is Dead – Now What?

Historically, access control has been based on the identity of a user requesting execution of a capability to perform an operation (e.g., read) on an object (e.g., a file). This was done directly either as in Discretionary Access Control or Mandatory Access Control or through predefined attribute types, such as roles or groups assigned to that user...
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The ‘ABC’ of the ‘APT’

The term APT (Advanced Persistent Threat), like many other acronyms in the world of IT/Information/Cyber Security entered our vocabulary some years ago, along with other partnering phrases, such as Advanced Evasion Techniques (AET), which at the time took the headlines as something new. Whilst these new outlined logical dangers do serve up a very...
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Look How Easy TAXII Is

Tripwire has been getting more involved in connecting its products to threat intelligence services lately. I described the reasons why we care about threat intelligence, particularly STIX and TAXII, in my article last month: Why We Should Care About STIX & TAXII. My colleagues also talked in more specifics about some of the partners Tripwire is...
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‘Gazon’ Malware Spreads Via SMS Using Fake Amazon Gift Card Offers

A security firm has identified a new type of malware that spams a mobile device’s contact list with SMS text messages touting fake Amazon gift card offers. According to an article posted on its blog, AdaptiveMobile states that the malware, dubbed ‘Gazon,’ is quickly becoming “one of the ‘spammiest’ mobile malware outbreaks seen yet.” Gazon employs a...
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Hillary Clinton's Private Email Account Hacked? The Perils of Shadow IT

It was revealed this evening that Hillary Clinton was using a personal email account while serving as the secretary of state. This has raised a number of issues with regards to both compliance and security. Apparently, Clinton chose not to use a government-issued email address despite the Federal Records Act, which only applies to official email...
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The Malicious Insider

Financial gain or fraud was the primary driver of the 11,698 instances of insider privilege abuse – defined as any unapproved or malicious use of organization resources – in last year's Verizon Data Breach Investigations Report. Source: 2014 VDBIR A malicious insider can be detected in a number of...
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Phishing Campaign Targets UK Netflix Users

A new phishing campaign has been targeting European users of the popular video streaming service Netflix. According to security researcher Jovi Umawing from Malwarebytes, the fake website – with the domain nefixx.co.uk – is nearly identical to that of netflix.co.uk, and even offers potential customers a "free trial." The malicious campaign prompts...
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10 Notorious Cyber Criminals Brought to Justice – No. 1

In the fall of 2014, Tripwire published a series on the 10 Most Wanted Hackers by the FBI. Each of those articles revealed the extent to which cyber crime has become more sophisticated and threatens online users’ information now more than ever. Given this growing threat, it is understandable that some might feel disheartened by the challenges...
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Is It Time to Trust The Cloud?

Outsourcing critical aspects of our lives is nothing new. We trust banks to safeguard our money, even though many of us do not trust bankers. We trust taxi cab drivers with our lives, even if we do not know their first name. We do this not out of ignorance but because we trust the overall system that these components work within. With the...
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Scammers Target TalkTalk Customers Following Data Breach

Cyber criminals are phishing for customers’ sensitive information following a data breach at TalkTalk, a UK Internet service provider. In an email sent to its four million customers, TalkTalk confirmed that “in a small number of cases,” scammers might have compromised customers’ information. “We have now become aware that some limited, non...
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Is Compliance Bad for Security?

Companies like mine, and consultants like me, have long been instructed and expected to pass on the mantra that the solution to security is compliance with standards and that being in compliance means you are secure. Having worked in the industry for more than a decade, I know that this is demonstrably not true. My hypothesis is that compliance and...