You don’t have to search very far in the news to see stories of websites being hacked and customer details being stolen. Stories about incidents involving industrial control systems (ICSes) and operational technology (OT) environments aren’t so common. But they are prevalent. Just the other week, for example, an airline company sent out an email...

The Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act of 1996 (HIPAA) is a federal law that was established to transform the security landscape of the healthcare industry. Businesses that are found guilty of a breach or violation of HIPAA rules will have to face repercussions. Part of the HIPAA law includes the HIPAA Breach Notification Rule,...

The Australian Government is committed to protecting the essential services all Australians rely on by uplifting the security and resilience of critical infrastructure. Increasingly interconnected and interdependent critical infrastructure is delivering efficiencies and economic benefits to operations. However, connectivity without proper safeguards...

Loginizer, a popular plugin for protecting WordPress blogs from brute force attacks, has been found to contain its own severe vulnerabilities that could be exploited by hackers. The flaw, discovered by vulnerability researcher Slavco Mihajloski, opened up opportunities for cybercriminals to completely compromise WordPress sites. The flaw can be...

There are two significant trends occurring right now that shouldn’t be a surprise to anyone reading this post. First, businesses are gathering and leveraging more and more data to improve their core services. Second, more compliance and regulatory standards are popping up from governments and private organizations. As these businesses realize that...

As I had mentioned previously, this year, I’m going back to school. Not to take classes, but to teach a course at my alma mater, Fanshawe College. I did this about a decade ago and thought it was interesting, so I was excited to give it another go. Additionally, after a friend mentioned that their kid wanted to learn Python, I developed an Intro to...

A public transport agency operating in Montréal announced that a ransomware attack had affected its website and other systems. The Société de transport de Montréal (STM) disclosed the infection on a web page it created to keep customers updated about its services while its main site remains offline: Since the afternoon of October 19, the STM has...

It’s often said that humans are the weakest link in cybersecurity. Indeed, I’d have a hard time arguing that a computer that was sealed in a box, untouched by human hand, poses much of a security risk. But a computer that is unused has no purpose. It behooves security practitioners to get smarter about how we teach people to use those machines so...

A budding ransomware group donated part of the ransom demands that it had previously extorted from its victims to two charities. On October 13, the Darkside ransomware group announced the donations in a blog post on its dark web portal. As quoted by ZDNet: As we said in the first press release - we are targeting only large profitable corporations....

Cybersecurity is in the news again with the disclosure that Tesla, working in conjunction with the FBI, prevented a ransomware attack from being launched at its Gigafactory in Nevada. The cybercriminals targeted Tesla through one of its employees, whom they allegedly promised to pay $1 million in order to help them infect the company’s system with...

A few weeks, ago, technology news site The Verge reported on a new Ring security camera that is in fact a drone that flies around inside your house. Available beginning next year, the ‘Always Home Cam’ is supposed to give its owners a total view of their home without the need for multiple cameras. Those worried about break-ins or other kinds of...

By now, we have a good understanding of what secure remote access (SRA) is and why organizations might choose to enable it for their OT environments. We also know that securing IT-OT collaboration, leveraging guidance from best practice frameworks and using an automated solution can help organizations to implement this type of access. Even so, we...

A federal court in the United States issued a temporary restraining order against a tech support scheme that's alleged to have targeted U.S. consumers. On October 15, the U.S. District Court filed Southern District of Florida submitted a complaint against Michael Brian Cotter, 59, of Glendale,...

Security researchers discovered that an APT group known as "Silent Librarian" is actively targeting universities with spear phishing attacks. Malwarebytes learned in mid-September that Silent Librarian, also known as "TA407" and "COBALT DICKENS," had launched a new attack campaign. In its analysis of the operation, the security firm found that the...

American bookselling giant Barnes & Noble is contacting customers via email, warning them that its network was breached by hackers, and that sensitive information about shoppers may have been accessed. In the email to customers, Barnes & Noble says that it became aware that it had fallen victim to a cybersecurity attack on Saturday October 10th. ...

For years, the United Arab Emirates (UAE) has committed itself to adopting information technology (IT) and electronic communication. The UAE’s Telecommunications Regulatory Authority (TRA) noted that this policy has made the state’s government agencies and organizations more efficient as well as has improved the ability for individuals to...

Digital attackers created a Magento phishing page that used JavaScript to exfiltrate the login credentials of its victims. Sucuri came across a compromised website using the filename "wp-order.php" during an investigation. This phishing page hosted what appeared to be a legitimate Magento 1.x login portal at the time of discovery. In support of this...

Vulnerability Description Tripwire VERT has identified a stack-based buffer overflow in SonicWall Network Security Appliance (NSA). The flaw can be triggered by an unauthenticated HTTP request involving a custom protocol handler. The vulnerability exists within the HTTP/HTTPS service used for product management as well as SSL VPN remote access. ...

As I had mentioned previously, this year, I’m going back to school. Not to take classes but to teach a course at my alma mater, Fanshawe College. I did this about a decade ago and thought it was interesting, so I was excited to give it another go. Additionally, after a friend mentioned that their kid wanted to learn Python, I developed an Intro to...

Today’s VERT Alert addresses Microsoft’s October 2020 Security Updates. VERT is actively working on coverage for these vulnerabilities and expects to ship ASPL-909 on Wednesday, October 14th. In-The-Wild & Disclosed CVEs (October 2020 Patch Tuesday Analysis) CVE-2020-16938 This CVE describes an information disclosure in the Windows kernel that...