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Spam Campaign Targeting German Users with Ordinypt Malware

A new spam campaign is attempting to infect German-speaking users with samples of the destructive Ordinypt malware family. According to Bleeping Computer, the campaign sent spam emails masquerading as a job application from someone named Eva Richter. These messages supported this claim by using the subject line "Bewerbung via Arbeitsagentur - Eva...
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COBALT DICKENS Launched New Phishing Operation against Universities

The COBALT DICKENS threat group stayed busy over the summer by launching a new global phishing operation targeting universities. In July and August 2019, Secureworks' Counter Threat Unit (CTU) researchers observed COBALT DICKENS using compromised university resources to send out library-themed phishing emails. These emails differed from those used...
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How to Foil the 6 Stages of a Network Intrusion

The cost of a breach is on the rise. A recent report from IBM revealed that the average cost of a data breach had risen 12 percent over the past five years to $3.92 million per incident on average. Additionally, this publication uncovered that data breaches originating from malicious digital attacks were both the most common and the most expensive...
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What to Do If You Receive a Legitimate 'Unusual Account Activity' Notice

Sadly, it’s all too common for consumers to receive notices of “unusual account activity” these days. Yes, service providers might send out these letters after learning of a data breach that affected a large portion of their customer base. But sprawling security incidents aren’t the only motivation here for issuing these types of notifications....
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Toyota Parts Supplier Loses $37 Million in Email Scam

Toyota Boshoku, a seating and interiors supplier for Toyota cars, has revealed that it was tricked into moving a large amount of money into a bank account controlled by scammers. In a statement published on its global website, Toyota Boshoku Corporation said that its European subsidiary was duped into transferring approximately four billion yen ...
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VERT Threat Alert: September 2019 Patch Tuesday Analysis

Today’s VERT Alert addresses Microsoft’s September 2019 Security Updates. VERT is actively working on coverage for these vulnerabilities and expects to ship ASPL-849 on Wednesday, September 11th. In-The-Wild & Disclosed CVEs CVE-2019-1214 An elevation of privilege vulnerability in the Windows Common Log File System (CLFS) driver can allow an...
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District in Rockford Public Schools Confirms Ransomware Attack

A district within the Rockford Public Schools (RPS) system has confirmed it suffered a ransomware attack that affected parts of its network. On 6 September, District 205 of RPS posted a statement on Facebook in which it noted that its Internet, phones and information systems used to track attendance...
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10 of the Most Significant Ransomware Attacks of All Time

For years, ransomware actors have developed new families and attack campaigns in increasing frequency and numbers. Such activity peaked in 2017 but then fell in tandem with cryptocurrency miners’ rise. This development was short-lived, however. Between Q4 2018 and Q1 2019, Malwarebytes observed a 195 percent increase in ransomware detections...
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Fake PayPal Website Distributes New Variant of Nemty Ransomware

Digital attackers created a fake PayPal website to distribute samples of a new variant of the Nemty crypto-ransomware family. Security researcher nao_sec uncovered the ransomware variant after they came across a fake PayPal website. This site promised users a return of 3-5 percent for making purchases through its payment system. But its primary...
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Don’t Trade Convenience for Security: Protect the Provenance of your Work

I recently volunteered as an AV tech at a science communication conference in Portland, OR. There, I handled the computers of a large number of presenters, all scientists and communicators who were passionate about their topic and occasionally laissez-faire about their system security. As exacting as they were with the science, I found many didn’t actually see a point to the security policies...
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Don’t Let Your Analysts Become the Latest Victims of Burnout!

Working as a cybersecurity analyst is incredibly challenging. It’s one of the only roles in IT that requires 24/7/365 availability. The constant stressors of the job can overload security analysts, which ultimately leads to burnout—affecting every factor of the job from performance to talent retention. Recently recognized by the World Health...
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Ransomware Attackers Demanded $5.3M from City of New Bedford

Digital criminals demanded $5.3 million in ransom from the City of New Bedford, Massachusetts following a ransomware attack. Jon Mitchell, Mayor of New Bedford, explained in a press briefing that the ransom demand came shortly after the City's Management Information Systems (MIS) staff detected a ransomware attack in the early morning hours of 5...
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Tripwire Patch Priority Index for August 2019

Tripwire's August 2019 Patch Priority Index (PPI) brings together important security vulnerabilities from Microsoft and Adobe. First on the Patch Priority Index are patches for Microsoft's Browser and Scripting Engine. These patches resolve 12 vulnerabilities including fixes for memory corruption, information disclosure and security feature bypass...
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Phishing Campaign Used SharePoint to Bypass Email Perimeter Tech

Security researchers spotted a phishing campaign that used SharePoint to bypass email gateway and other perimeter technologies. Cofense learned of the campaign after it analyzed an attack email sent from a compromised account @independentlegalassessors.co.uk. The email asked the recipient to review a proposed document by clicking on an embedded URL....