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Black Arrow Cyber Threat Briefing 27 May 2022
Black Arrow Cyber Threat Briefing 27 May 2022
-How Confident Are Companies in Managing Their Current Threat Exposure?
-'There's No Ceiling': Ransomware's Alarming Growth Signals a New Era, Verizon DBIR Finds
-Paying Ransom Doesn’t Guarantee Data Recovery
-Report: Frequency of Cyber Attacks in 2022 Has Increased by Almost 3M
-New Zoom Flaws Could Let Attackers Hack Victims Just by Sending them a Message
-VMware, Airline Targeted as Ransomware Chaos Reigns
-Crypto Hacks Aren't a Niche Concern; They Impact Wider Society
-State of Cyber Security Report 2022 Names Ransomware and Nation-State Attacks as Biggest Threats
-Vishing (Voice Phishing) Cases Reach All Time High
-DeFi (Decentralised Finance) Is Getting Pummelled by Cyber Criminals
Welcome to this week’s Black Arrow Cyber Threat Briefing – a weekly digest, collated and curated by our cyber experts to provide senior and middle management with an easy to digest round up of the most notable threats, vulnerabilities, and cyber related news from the last week.
Top Cyber Stories of the Last Week
How Confident Are Companies In Managing Their Current Threat Exposure?
Crossword Cybersecurity has released a report based on the findings of a survey of over 200 CISOs and senior UK cyber security professionals. The paper reveals companies are more concerned and exposed to cyber threats than ever before, with 61 percent describing themselves as at best only “fairly confident” at managing their current cyber security threat exposure, which should raise some eyebrows around the boardroom.
Respondents also feared their cyber strategy would not keep pace with the rate of tech innovation and changes in the threat landscape. 40 percent of organisations believe their existing cyber strategy will be outdated in two years, and a further 37 percent within three years. Additional investment is needed to address longer term planning, with 44 percent saying they only have sufficient resources in their organisation to focus on the immediate and mid-term cyber threats and tech trends.
https://www.helpnetsecurity.com/2022/05/26/organizations-cyber-strategy/
'There's No Ceiling': Ransomware's Alarming Growth Signals A New Era, Verizon DBIR Finds
Ransomware has become so efficient, and the underground economy so professional, that traditional monetisation of stolen data may be on its way out.
The past year has seen a staggering acceleration in ransomware incidents, with 25% of all breaches containing a ransomware component.
That's the top-line finding in the 2022 Verizon Data Breach Investigations Report (DBIR), which found that ransomware events in conjunction with breaches ballooned 13% in the past year — last year's report found that just 12% of incidents were ransomware-related. That translates into a rate of increase that's more than the previous five years of growth combined.
The 15th annual DBIR analysed 23,896 security incidents, of which 5,212 were confirmed breaches. About four in five of those were the handiwork of external cyber criminal gangs and threat groups, according to Verizon. And according to Alex Pinto, manager of the Verizon Security Research team, these nefarious types are finding it easier and easier to earn an ill-gotten living with ransomware, making other types of breaches increasingly obsolete.
"Everything in cyber crime has become so commoditised, so much like a business now, and it's just too darn efficient of a methodology for monetising their activity," he tells Dark Reading, noting that with the emergence of ransomware as-a-service (RaaS) and initial-access brokers, it takes very little skill or effort to get into the extortion game.
"Before, you had to get in somehow, look around, and find something worth stealing that would have a reseller on the other end," he explains. "In 2008 when we started the DBIR, it was by and large payment-card data that was stolen. Now, that has fallen precipitously because they can just pay for access someone else established and install rented ransomware, and it's so much simpler to reach the same goal of getting money."
https://www.darkreading.com/attacks-breaches/ransomware-alarming-growth-verizon-dbir
Paying Ransom Doesn’t Guarantee Data Recovery
A Veeam report has found that 72% of organisations had partial or complete attacks on their backup repositories, dramatically impacting the ability to recover data without paying the ransom.
Additionally, 76% of organisations admitted to paying the ransom. But while 52% paid the ransom and were able to recover data, 24% paid the ransom but were still not able to recover data.
https://www.helpnetsecurity.com/2022/05/24/paying-ransom-recover-data-video/
Report: Frequency Of Cyber Attacks in 2022 Has Increased By Almost 3M
Kaspersky has released a new report revealing a growing number of cyber attacks on small businesses in 2022 so far. Researchers compared the period between January and April 2022 to the same period in 2021, finding increases in the numbers of Trojan-PSW detections, internet attacks and attacks on Remote Desktop Protocol.
In 2022, the number of Trojan-PSW (Password Stealing Ware) detections increased globally by almost a quarter compared to the same period in 2021 一 4,003,323 to 3,029,903. Trojan-PSW is a malware that steals passwords, along with other account information, which then allows attackers to gain access to the company network and steal sensitive information.
Internet attacks grew from 32,500,000 globally in the analysed period of 2021 to almost 35,400,000 in 2022. These can include web pages with redirects to exploits, sites containing exploits and other malicious programs, botnet command & control centres and more.
The number of attacks on Remote Desktop Protocol grew in the U.S. (while dropping slightly globally), going from 47.5 million attacks in the first trimester of 2021 to 51 million in the same period of 2022. With the widespread shift toward remote work, many companies have introduced Remote Desktop Protocol (RDP), a technology that enables computers on the same corporate network to be linked together and accessed remotely, even when the employees are at home.
With small business owners typically handling numerous responsibilities at the same time, cyber security is often an afterthought. However, this disregard for IT security is being exploited by cyber criminals. The Kaspersky study sought to assess the threats that pose an increasing danger to entrepreneurs.
New Zoom Flaws Could Let Attackers Hack Victims Just By Sending Them A Message
Popular video conferencing service Zoom has resolved as many as four security vulnerabilities, which could be exploited to compromise another user over chat by sending specially crafted Extensible Messaging and Presence Protocol (XMPP) messages and execute malicious code.
With Zoom's chat functionality built on top of the XMPP standard, successful exploitation of the issues could enable an attacker to force a vulnerable client to masquerade a Zoom user, connect to a malicious server, and even download a rogue update, resulting in arbitrary code execution stemming from a downgrade attack.
https://thehackernews.com/2022/05/new-zoom-flaws-could-let-attackers-hack.html
VMware, Airline Targeted As Ransomware Chaos Reigns
Global ransomware incidents target everything from enterprise servers to grounding an airline, with one India-based group even taking a Robin Hood approach to extortion with the "GoodWill" strain.
Ransomware incidents are on the rise and this week proved no exception, with the discovery of a Linux-based ransomware family called Cheerscrypt targeting VMware ESXi servers and an attack on SpiceJet, India’s second largest airline.
Meanwhile, an oddball "GoodWill" variant purports to help the needy.
The Cheerscrypt ransomware variant was uncovered by Trend Micro and relies on the double-extortion scheme to coerce victims to pay the ransom – i.e., stealing data as well and threatening to leak it if victims don’t pay up.
Because of the popularity of ESXi servers for creating and running multiple virtual machines (VMs) in enterprise settings, the Cheerscrypt ransomware could be appealing to malicious actors looking to rapidly distribute ransomware across many devices.
Meanwhile, low-cost carrier SpiceJet faced a ransomware attack this week, causing flight delays of between two and five hours as well as rendering unavailable online booking systems and customer service portals.
While the company’s IT team announced on Twitter that it had successfully prevented the attempted attack before it was able to fully breach all internal systems and take them over, customers and employees are still experiencing the ramifications.
https://www.darkreading.com/attacks-breaches/vmware-airline-targeted-as-ransomware-chaos-reigns
Crypto Hacks Aren't A Niche Concern; They Impact Wider Society
Million-dollar crypto heists are becoming more common as the currency starts to go mainstream; prevention and enforcement haven't kept pace.
The attack against the Ronin Network in March was quickly speculated to be one of the largest cryptocurrency hacks of all time. Approximately $540 million was stolen from the cryptocurrency and NFT games company in a combination of USDC and Etherium, with $400 million of the stolen funds owned by customers playing the game Axie Infinity.
This attack was the latest in a string of thefts perpetrated against crypto and should be a jolt to both the digital asset and cyber security communities to bring the security of cryptocurrencies into line.
The current vogue of large-scale crypto heists goes as far back as the 2014 Mt. Gox hack (another cryptocurrency exchange built around a game, Magic: The Gathering), which went into bankruptcy after losing $460 million of assets.
However, the trend has been gathering pace. In the months leading up to the Ronin Network attack, cyber criminals stole nearly $200 million worth of cryptocurrency from the crypto trading platform BitMart, attacked 400 Crypto.com users, and orchestrated NFT-related scams, to name but a few incidents.
There is often an uncomfortable tendency to see these attacks as something that takes place in isolation in a remote part of the Internet when they actually have a huge impact on thousands of people.
State Of Cyber Security Report 2022 Names Ransomware And Nation-State Attacks As Biggest Threats
Ransomware is the biggest concern for cyber security professionals, according to results of the Infosecurity Group’s 2022 State of Cybersecurity Report, produced by Infosecurity Europe and Infosecurity Magazine.
Cyber Security Professionals' Number One Concern: Ransomware.
This attack vector was voted as the biggest cyber security trend (28%) by the survey respondents (including CISOs, CTOs, CIOs and academics), marking a significant change from the previous report in 2020, where ransomware did not break the top three. This follows surging ransomware incidents in 2021, with ransom demands and payments growing significantly last year. A number of these attacks have also impacted critical industries, for example, taking down the US’ largest fuel pipeline.
The survey respondents also highlighted the evolving tactics and capabilities of ransomware attackers. This includes threat actors becoming more sophisticated as they evolve into loosely coupled service-based operations.
A number of cyber security professionals believe that cyber-criminal groups will become more guarded in their approach due to new initiatives by governments and law enforcement to tackle these activities.
Cyber Security Professionals' Number Two Concern: Nation-State Attacks.
The second biggest concern for survey respondents was geopolitics/nation-state attacks (24%), particularly the shifting hostilities from the Russia-Ukraine conflict into cyberspace. Russia already had a reputation for conducting offensive cyber operations prior to the conflict, and the Ukrainian government and critical services have experienced numerous attacks both before and since the war began.
https://www.infosecurity-magazine.com/news/2022-state-industry-report/
Vishing (Voice Phishing) Cases Reach All Time High
Vishing (voice phishing) cases have increased almost 550 percent over the last twelve months (Q1 2021 to Q1 2022), according to the latest Quarterly Threat Trends & Intelligence Report from Agari and PhishLabs.
In Q1 2022, Agari and PhishLabs detected and mitigated hundreds of thousands of phishing, social media, email, and dark web threats targeting a broad range of enterprises and brands. The report provides an analysis of the latest findings and insights into key trends shaping the threat landscape.
According to the findings, vishing attacks have overtaken business email compromise (BEC) as the second most reported response-based email threat since Q3 2021. By the end of the year, more than one in four of every reported response-based threat was a vishing attack, and this makeup continued through Q1 2022.
https://www.helpnetsecurity.com/2022/05/24/vishing-cases-increased/
DeFi (Decentralised Finance) Is Getting Pummelled By Cyber Criminals
Decentralised finance lost $1.8 billion to cyber attacks last year — and 80% of those events were the result of vulnerable code, analysts say.
Decentralised finance (DeFi) platforms — which connect various cryptocurrency blockchains to create a decentralised infrastructure for borrowing, trading, and other transactions — promise to replace banks as a secure and convenient way to invest in and spend cryptocurrency. But in addition to attracting hordes of new users with dreams of digital fortune, cyber criminals have discovered them to be an easy target, wiping out wallets to zero balances in a moment, tanking whole markets while profiting, and more, according to a new report.
Analysts with Bishop Fox found that DeFi platforms lost $1.8 billion to cyber attacks in 2021 alone. With a total of 65 events observed, 90% of the losses came from unsophisticated attacks, according to the report, which points to the lax cyber security practices of the sector.
DeFi averaged five attacks per week last year, with most of them (51%) coming from the exploitation of "smart contracts" bugs, the analysts found. Smart contracts are essentially records of transactions, stored on the blockchain.
Other top DeFi attack vectors include cryptowallets, protocol design flaws, and so-called "rug-pull" scams (where investors are lured to a new cryptocurrency project that is then abandoned, leaving targets with a worthless currency). But taken together, 80% of all events were caused by the use (and re-use) of buggy code, according to the report.
https://www.darkreading.com/attacks-breaches/defi-pummeled-by-cybercriminals
Threats
Ransomware
Ransomware Attacks Increasing at “Alarming” Rate - Infosecurity Magazine
VMware, Airline Targeted as Ransomware Chaos Reigns (darkreading.com)
Clop ransomware gang is back, hits 21 victims in a single month (bleepingcomputer.com)
Link Found Connecting Chaos, Onyx and Yashma Ransomware | Threatpost
Ransomware demands three good demands to restore files • The Register
Ransomware Cheerscrypt targets VMware ESXi systems • The Register
New Chaos Malware Variant Ditches Wiper for Encryption (darkreading.com)
Industrial Spy data extortion market gets into the ransomware game (bleepingcomputer.com)
BlackCat/ALPHV ransomware asks $5 million to unlock Austrian state (bleepingcomputer.com)
Conti Ransomware Operation Shut Down After Splitting into Smaller Groups (thehackernews.com)
Suspected phishing email crime boss arrested in Nigeria • The Register
BEC – Business Email Compromise
Interpol arrests alleged leader of the SilverTerrier BEC gang (bleepingcomputer.com)
Cyber security breach at the city of Portland led to fraudulent $1.4M transaction | KATU
Phishing & Email Based Attacks
Intuit warns of QuickBooks phishing threatening to suspend accounts (bleepingcomputer.com)
Suspected phishing email crime boss arrested in Nigeria • The Register
Other Social Engineering
Malware
BPFDoor malware uses Solaris vulnerability to get root privileges (bleepingcomputer.com)
New Windows Subsystem for Linux malware steals browser auth cookies (bleepingcomputer.com)
This Windows malware uses PowerShell to subvert Chrome • The Register
Hackers have found a new way to smuggle malware onto your device | TechRadar
Cyber Security Community Warned of Fake PoC Exploits Delivering Malware | SecurityWeek.Com
Popular Python and PHP libraries hijacked to steal AWS keys (bleepingcomputer.com)
New Attack Shows Weaponized PDF Files Remain a Threat (darkreading.com)
Mobile
Microsoft finds severe bugs in Android apps from large mobile providers (bleepingcomputer.com)
Google warns Android smartphones targeted by dangerous Predator spyware | TechRadar
New ERMAC 2.0 Android malware steals accounts, wallets from 467 apps (bleepingcomputer.com)
BYOD
Data Breaches/Leaks
GM Discloses Data Breach of Cars' Locations, Mileage, Service (gizmodo.com)
MGM Resorts' customer data now leaked on Telegram for free • The Register
Organised Crime & Criminal Actors
REvil prosecutions reach a 'dead end,' Russian media reports - CyberScoop
Scammer Behind $568M International Cyber Crime Syndicate Gets 4 Years (darkreading.com)
Multi-Continental Operation Leads to Arrest of Cyber Crime Gang Leader - Infosecurity Magazine
Cryptocurrency/Cryptomining/Cryptojacking/NFTs
Insider Risk and Insider Threats
68% of Legal Sector Data Breaches Caused by Insider Threats - Infosecurity Magazine
Verizon Report: Ransomware, Human Error Among Top Security Risks | Threatpost
Dark Web
Military cyber weapons could become available on dark web: Interpol (cnbc.com)
Darknet market Versus shuts down after hacker leaks security flaw (bleepingcomputer.com)
Supply Chain and Third Parties
Denial of Service DoS/DDoS
Cybergang Claims REvil is Back, Executes DDoS Attacks | Threatpost
DDoS Extortion Attack Flagged as Possible REvil Resurgence (darkreading.com)
Anatomy of a DDoS amplification attack - Microsoft Security Blog
Cloud/SaaS
Attack Surface Management
Open Source
Privacy
Passwords & Credential Stuffing
Strong Password Policy Isn't Enough, Study Shows (darkreading.com)
Verizon DBIR: Stolen credentials led to nearly 50% of attacks (techtarget.com)
Regulations, Fines and Legislation
GDPR Anniversary, Expert Insight On What Lead To GDPR Fines – Information Security Buzz
Indian stock markets given ten day deadline to file reports • The Register
Spyware, Espionage & Cyber Warfare, including Russian Invasion of Ukraine
Network of hyperlocal Russian Telegram channels spew disinformation in occupied Ukraine - CyberScoop
Predator spyware uses in Chrome, Android zero-day exploits • The Register
Unknown APT group is targeting Russian government entities - Security Affairs
Hackers target Russian govt with fake Windows updates pushing RATs (bleepingcomputer.com)
Remote bricking of Ukrainian tractors raises agriculture security concerns | CSO Online
Anonymous Declares Cyber-War On Pro-Russian Hacker Gang Killnet – Information Security Buzz
Ex-spymaster and fellow Brexiteers' emails stolen, leaked • The Register
Nation State Actors
Nation State Actors – Russia
Russian Hackers Believed to Be Behind Leak of Hard Brexit Plans - Infosecurity Magazine
Russian Gamaredon APT could fuel a new round of DDoS attacks - Security Affairs
Putin aimed cyber attack at me, says former MI6 chief Sir Richard Dearlove | News | The Times
Nation State Actors – China
Trend Micro Patches Vulnerability Exploited by Chinese Cyber Spies | SecurityWeek.Com
Chinese "Twisted Panda" Hackers Caught Spying on Russian Defense Institutes (thehackernews.com)
Nation State Actors – Iran
Vulnerabilities
CISA ‘Strongly Urges’ You To Patch 75 Actively Exploited Security Bugs (forbes.com)
CISA adds 41 vulnerabilities to list of bugs used in cyber attacks (bleepingcomputer.com)
Exploit released for critical VMware auth bypass bug, patch now (bleepingcomputer.com)
Zyxel addresses four flaws affecting APs, AP controllers, and firewalls - Security Affairs
Critical New Google Chrome Security Warning For All Users, Update Now (forbes.com)
Patching the latest Active Directory vulnerabilities is not enough | CSO Online
Microsoft Elevation-of-Privilege Vulnerabilities Spiked Again in 2021 (darkreading.com)
Sector Specific
SMBs – Small and Medium Businesses
Legal
Health/Medical/Pharma Sector
teiss - News - American healthcare tech giant Omnicell suffers a major ransomware attack
Web app attacks on the rise in healthcare as insider challenges remain (scmagazine.com)
Retail/eCommerce
Microsoft: Credit card stealers are getting much stealthier (bleepingcomputer.com)
Microsoft warns of new highly evasive web skimming campaigns - Security Affairs
Transport and Aviation
Hundreds Stranded After Ransomware Attack on Indian Airline | SecurityWeek.Com
SpiceJet airline passengers stranded after ransomware attack (bleepingcomputer.com)
CNI, OT, ICS, IIoT and SCADA
Taking the Danger Out of IT/OT Convergence (darkreading.com)
Critical Flaws in Popular ICS Platform Can Trigger RCE | Threatpost
Energy & Utilities
Oil, Gas and Mining
Education and Academia
Other News
IP and cyber security disputes are top legal concerns for tech companies | TechCrunch
Verizon DBIR: Stolen credentials led to nearly 50% of attacks (techtarget.com)
Managed Detection and Response (MDR): Who's Responsible for the R? - MSSP Alert
Survey Evidences Leaders Lack Confidence in Cyber-Risk Management - Infosecurity Magazine
Flaw in PayPal can allow attackers to steal money from users' account - Security Affairs
Most organisations do not follow data backup best practices - Help Net Security
Why are current cyber security incident response efforts failing? - Help Net Security
Nation-state malware will be a commodity on dark web soon, Interpol warns - Security Affairs
As usual, contact us to help assess where your risks lie and to ensure you are doing all you can do to keep you and your business secure.
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Black Arrow Cyber Threat Briefing 29 April 2022
Black Arrow Cyber Threat Briefing 29 April 2022
-Ransomware Attacks Surged to New Highs in 2021
-NCSC and Allies Publish Advisory on The Most Commonly Exploited Vulnerabilities In 2021
-Network Attacks Increased to a 3-Year High
-World War Three Is Far More Likely Than Anyone Is Prepared to Admit
-The Ransomware Crisis Deepens, While Data Recovery Stalls
-Ransoms Only Make Up 15% of Ransomware Costs
-Defending Your Business Against Russian Cyber Warfare
-5-Year Vulnerability Trends Are Both Surprising and Sadly Predictable
-Cisco Talos Observes 'Novel Increase' in APT Activity in Q1
-Deepfakes Set to Be Used in Organised Crime
-Smart Contract Developers Not Really Focused on Security. Who Knew?
-Tractor-Trailer Brake Controllers Vulnerable to Remote Hacker Attacks
Welcome to this week’s Black Arrow Cyber Threat Briefing – a weekly digest, collated and curated by our cyber experts to provide senior and middle management with an easy to digest round up of the most notable threats, vulnerabilities, and cyber related news from the last week.
Top Cyber Stories of the Last Week
Ransomware Attacks Surged to New Highs in 2021
Ransomware attacks are getting more frequent, more successful and more expensive.
Sixty-six percent of the organisations surveyed by Sophos for its annual State of Ransomware report admitted that they were hit with a ransomware attack last year, up from 37% in 2020. And 65 percent of those attacks were successful in encrypting their victims' data, up from 54 percent the year before.
On top of that, the average ransom paid by organisations for their most significant ransomware attack grew by nearly five times, to just over $800,000, while the number of organisations that paid ransoms of $1 million or more tripled to 11%, the UK-based cybersecurity company said. For its annual report, Sophos surveyed 5,600 organisations from 31 countries. A total of 965 of those polled shared details of their ransomware attacks.
The numbers aren't a huge surprise after a year of epic ransomware attacks that shut down everything from a major oil pipeline to one of the largest meat processors in the US. While both Colonial Pipeline and JBS US Holdings paid millions in ransom, the attacks paused their operations long enough to spark panic buying and drive prices up for consumers.
NCSC and Allies Publish Advisory on The Most Commonly Exploited Vulnerabilities In 2021
The UK and international partners have published an advisory for public and private sector organisations on the 15 most commonly exploited vulnerabilities in 2021.
The National Cyber Security Centre (NCSC), a part of GCHQ, has jointly published an advisory with agencies in the US, Australia, Canada and New Zealand, showing that malicious cyber actors aggressively targeted newly disclosed critical software vulnerabilities across the public and private sectors worldwide.
Threat actors often geared their efforts towards targeting internet-facing systems, such as email and virtual private network (VPN) servers.
It also indicates that, to a lesser extent, actors continue to exploit publicly known – and often dated – vulnerabilities, some of which were routinely exploited in 2020 or earlier.
The advisory directs organisations to follow specific mitigation advice to protect against exploitation, which includes applying timely patches, using a centralised patch management system and replacing any software no longer supported by the vendor.
Network Attacks Increased to a 3-Year High
WatchGuard Technologies’ Internet Security Report for Q4 2021 revealed all threats were up, whether they’re network attacks or malware.
When the pandemic started, their research team saw a big drop in malware being detected by network security devices. In this period, tech based jobs moved to remote work, which meant a lot of users were no longer browsing the internet and encountering bad things through the network security control at the office. That’s probably why network detection for malware dropped quite a bit at the beginning of the pandemic.
Meanwhile, network attacks continued to rise even through the pandemic, since the servers still lived at the offices and the cloud, and network security still protected those.
The big takeaway in Q4 2021 is that malware rose significantly, returning to normal levels. The reason might be the holiday season, but it’s most probably the fact that, at the end of last year, a lot of tech-based offices started reopening and offering employees to come back in, and thus there’s a bigger chance for network security controls to catch malware.
https://www.helpnetsecurity.com/2022/04/25/network-attacks-q4-2021-video/
World War Three Is Far More Likely Than Anyone Is Prepared to Admit
A Telegraph article looks at the Russia-Ukraine conflict and considers risks posed by new weapons and how the West’s failure to understand our enemies are raising the chances of a horrific conflict.
The fact is the world is becoming more, rather than less, dangerous: there are plenty of other wannabe Putins, and they are better equipped to sow death and destruction. Not only traditional and nuclear threats but bioterrorism is a growing worry and a major cyber attack or assault on transatlantic cables could be so devastating to an internet-based economy as to be seen as a declaration of war.
https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2022/04/27/world-war-three-far-likely-anyone-prepared-admit/
The Ransomware Crisis Deepens, While Data Recovery Stalls
Higher probabilities of attack, soaring ransoms, and less chance of getting data back — the ransomware plague gets worse, and cyber insurance fails to be a panacea.
When it comes to ransomware, more companies are seeing attacks and have had data encrypted, according to research out this week. And even though more companies are backing up or paying ransom demands, less data was recovered in 2021 compared with the previous year.
For instance, in its "State of Ransomware 2022" report, cybersecurity firm Sophos found that 66% of surveyed companies had encountered ransomware in 2021, with two-thirds of those firms — or 43% overall — suffering from an actual attack that encrypted data. In its previous report covering 2020, the frequency of successful attacks was much smaller, with about 20% overall resulting in encryption.
The deteriorating cyberthreat landscape is largely due to the evolution of ransomware groups and their techniques, says Sean Gallagher, senior threat researcher with Sophos.
"Over the past couple of years, there has been a massive transition from ransomware to ransomware-as-a-service," he says. "There are very well-established [groups] that are doing these attacks, and as a result, the number of attacks companies are seeing has gone up."
Ransomware continues to plague companies with business-disrupting attacks and defy efforts by cybersecurity experts to rein in the operators behind the criminals’ campaigns. Not only did the portion of companies affected by ransomware more than double last year, but the mean ransomware payment more than quadrupled to $812,000, according to the Sophos report.
https://www.darkreading.com/attacks-breaches/ransomware-crisis-deepens-data-recovery-stalls
Ransoms Only Make Up 15% of Ransomware Costs
New research suggests that paying ransoms is only the tip of the cost iceberg when it comes to ransomware attacks.
Researchers at Check Point have revealed that the collateral damage of ransomware attacks make up costs roughly seven times higher than the ransom demanded by threat actors.
The costs include financial implications caused by incident response efforts, system restoration, legal fees, monitoring costs and the overall impact of business disruption.
Ransomware attacks are an increasingly popular attack method, typically involving stealing data from the victim, encrypting data and forcing them to pay for decryption and avoiding a data leak.
Check Point said in the report:
“Most other losses, including response and restoration costs, legal fees, monitoring costs, etc., are applied whether the extortion demand was paid or not. The year 2020 showed that the average total cost of a ransomware attack was more than seven times higher than the average ransom paid.”
https://www.itsecurityguru.org/2022/04/28/ransoms-only-make-up-15-of-ransomware-costs/
Defending Your Business Against Russian Cyber Warfare
We are likely to see Russian state sponsored attacks escalate as the West continues to increase sanctions and support Ukraine.
The eyes of the world are focused on the war in Ukraine. As expected, Russia has targeted Ukraine with cyber attacks first, and much of the West is wondering when Russia will also retaliate against countries supporting Ukraine. Most agree that some attacks are already in progress, and the attacks against western entities are sure to escalate as the war continues and more sanctions are put in place.
The first wave of companies targeted by the Russian state, and threat actors it supports, will be those that suspend Russian operations or take direct action to support Ukraine. Information operations and subversion against these companies will likely ensue. In the event of Russian cyberwarfare, reviewing the industries, styles, and objectives of their attacks can help organisations to prepare and implement more robust defences. These defences include actions both inside and outside an enterprise's perimeter.
https://www.securityweek.com/defending-your-business-against-russian-cyberwarfare
5-Year Vulnerability Trends Are Both Surprising and Sadly Predictable
What 5,800+ pentests show us: Companies have been struggling with the same known and preventable security bugs year over year. Bandwidth stands at the heart of the problem.
Cyber crime can cause major disruption when it comes to the sustainability and long-term success of companies. Teams want to have robust security but often struggle to meet that objective. It's crucial for security professionals to leverage insights into emerging trends in cybersecurity to pinpoint which vulnerabilities put organisations at the greatest risk, and Cobalt's "State of Pentesting" reports explore how to achieve efficiency to strengthen security.
The "State of Pentesting 2022" surveyed 602 cybersecurity and software development professionals and analysed data from 2,380 pentests conducted over the course of 2021 to pull key insights that are relevant to security and development teams when it comes to fixing vulnerabilities.
As a result of the data collected, the top five most common vulnerability categories outlined in this year's "State of Pentesting" report include:
· Server Security Misconfigurations
· Cross-Site Scripting (XSS)
· Broken Access Control
· Sensitive Data Exposure
· Authentication and Sessions
Surprisingly — yet predictably — these vulnerability categories have stayed at the top of the list for at least the last five years in a row. They're also recognisable to those who are familiar with OWASP Top 10 list for Web Application Security Risks.
The majority of these findings are connected to missing configurations, outdated software, and a lack of access management controls — all common and easily preventable security flaws. So, what's holding companies back from preventing well-known security flaws? Why does this come as a surprise?
Cisco Talos Observes 'Novel Increase' in APT Activity in Q1
Advanced persistent threat actors have been busy over the past few months, according to Cisco Talos.
The security vendor released its Quarterly Trends report, which examined incident response trends from engagements in the first quarter of 2022. While ransomware remained the top threat, as it has for the past two years now, Cisco observed a new trend of increased APT activity. The Cisco Talos Incident Response (CTIR) team attributed some of the increase to groups like Iranian state-sponsored Muddywater and China-based Mustang Panda.
One suspected Chinese APT, dubbed "Deep Panda," was connected to exploitation of the Log4j flaw that was discovered last year in the widely used Java logging tool. Log4j exploitation was the second most common threat for Q1 behind ransomware, indicating the bug is a growing threat despite a patch being available.
Deepfakes Set to Be Used in Organised Crime
New research from Europol suggests that deepfakes will be used extensively in organised crime operations.
Europol has warned of a projected rise in the use of deepfake technology by organised crime organisations.
Deepfakes involve the use of artificial intelligence to create realistic audio and audio-visual content “that convincingly shows people saying or doing things they never did, or create personas that never existed in the first place.”
Law enforcement and the challenge of deepfakes is the first published analysis of the Europol Innovation Lab’s Observatory function, warning that law enforcement agencies must rapidly improve skills and technologies utilised by officers in order to keep up with criminal deepfake use.
The analysis report highlighted how deepfakes are used primarily in disinformation, non-consensual pornography and document fraud campaigns, which will grow more realistic in years to come.
https://www.itsecurityguru.org/2022/04/29/deepfakes-set-to-be-used-in-organised-crime/
Smart Contract Developers Not Really Focused on Security. Who Knew?
"Smart contracts," which consist of self-executing code on a blockchain, are not nearly as smart as the label suggests.
They are at least as error-prone as any other software, where historically the error rate has been about one bug per hundred lines of code.
And they may be shoddier still due to disinterest in security among smart contract developers, and perhaps inadequate technical resources.
Multi-million dollar losses attributed to smart contract bugs – around $31m stolen from MonoX via smart contract exploit and ~$34m locked into a contract forever due to bad increment math, to name a few – illustrate the consequences.
https://www.theregister.com/2022/04/26/smart_contract_losses/
Tractor-Trailer Brake Controllers Vulnerable to Remote Hacker Attacks
We’ve been predicting this for a while now and the move to more and more connected systems, autonomous and semi-autonomous vehicles, how long until someone is subject to threats to disconnect a vehicle’s brakes as they are driving along a motorway? Who wouldn’t pay the ransom demand in that scenario?
A report this week is related to articulated lorries but this is something that will be affecting all vehicles unless safeguards are put in place.
Researchers have analysed the cyber security of heavy vehicles and discovered that the brake controllers found on many tractor-trailers in North America are susceptible to remote hacker attacks.
The research was conducted by the US National Motor Freight Traffic Association (NMFTA), which is a non-profit organisation that represents roughly 500 motor freight carriers, in collaboration with Assured Information Security, Inc.
NMFTA has been analysing the cyber security of heavy vehicles since 2015 and it has periodically disclosed its findings. The latest report from the organisation came in early March, when the US Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency (CISA) also issued an advisory to describe two vulnerabilities affecting trailer brake controllers.
The flaws described in the CISA advisory are related to the power line communications (PLC) between tractors and trailers, specifically the PLC4TRUCKS technology, which uses a standard named J2497 for bidirectional communications between the tractor and trailer without adding new wires.
https://www.securityweek.com/tractor-trailer-brake-controllers-vulnerable-remote-hacker-attacks
Threats
Ransomware
Prevent HEAT Attacks to Foil Ransomware Incidents - Help Net Security
Conti Ransomware Operations Surge Despite Recent Leak - Security Affairs
Beware: Onyx Ransomware Destroys Files Instead of Encrypting Them (bleepingcomputer.com)
FBI says BlackCat Rust-Based Ransomware Scratched 60+ Orgs • The Register
REvil Ransomware Attacks Resume, But Operators Are Unknown (techtarget.com)
Fake Windows 10 Updates Infect You with Magniber Ransomware (bleepingcomputer.com)
New Black Basta Ransomware Springs into Action with A Dozen Breaches (bleepingcomputer.com)
Companies Can't Get Enough of Good Ol' Tape Storage For Ransomware Resistance | PC Gamer
Phishing & Email Based Attacks
Phishing Goes KISS: Don’t Let Plain and Simple Messages Catch You Out! – Naked Security (sophos.com)
Phishing Attacks Benefiting from Shady SEO Practices (techtarget.com)
Malware
Emotet Malware Now Installs Via Powershell in Windows Shortcut Files (bleepingcomputer.com)
New RIG Exploit Kit Campaign Infecting Victims' PCs with RedLine Stealer (thehackernews.com)
Emotet Tests New Attack Techniques: Sign of Things to Come? | CSO Online
Cyber Criminals Using New Malware Loader 'Bumblebee' in the Wild (thehackernews.com)
New Powerful Prynt Stealer Malware Sells for Just $100 Per Month (bleepingcomputer.com)
Mobile
Organised Crime & Criminal Actors
Cryptocurrency/Cryptomining/Cryptojacking/NFTs
Scammers Are Copying News Sites To Push Elon Musk-themed Crypto Scams - Information Security Buzz
Why Did Hackers Target DeFi L1, L2 Solutions for a $1.2 Billion Theft in 2022? (watcher.guru)
Intuit Sued Over Phishing Attack Targeting Trezor Crypto Wallet Users - Decrypt
Crypto Trading Fund Partners Accused of Fraud - Infosecurity Magazine
LemonDuck Botnet Evades Detection in Cryptomining Attacks (techtarget.com)
Bored Ape Yacht Club Instagram Hacked, NFTs Worth Millions Stolen (vice.com)
Insider Risk and Insider Threats
AML/CFT
Two More Indicted Over North Korean Sanctions Evasion Plot - Infosecurity Magazine
FCA: Challenger Banks Failing to Spot Money Launderers - Infosecurity Magazine
Denial of Service DoS/DDoS
Cloudflare Stomps On 15.3 Million Requests Per Second DDoS • The Register
How a New Generation of IoT Botnets Is Amplifying DDoS Attacks | CSO Online
DDoS Attacks Target Healthcare, Education Markets, Research Finds - MSSP Alert
Cloud
Is Cloud Critical Infrastructure? Prep Now for Provider Outages (techtarget.com)
Shadow IT Is A Top Concern Related To SaaS Adoption - Help Net Security
Travel
Parental Controls and Child Safety
Spyware, Espionage & Cyber Warfare, including Russian Invasion of Ukraine
Data-Wiper Malware Strains Surge Amid Ukraine Invasion • The Register
Chinese Hackers Targeting Russian Military Personnel with Updated PlugX Malware (thehackernews.com)
Cyber Attacks Rage in Ukraine, Support Military Operations | Threatpost
Ongoing DDoS Attacks from Compromised Sites Hit Ukraine - Security Affairs
Anonymous Hacked Russian PSCB Commercial Bank and Energy Firms - Security Affairs
Russia-Linked Threat Actors Launched Hundreds of Cyber Attacks on Ukraine - Security Affairs
Russian Hacktivists Launch DDoS Attacks on Romanian Govt Sites (bleepingcomputer.com)
Cyber Espionage APT Now Identified as Three Separate Actors | Threatpost
Nation State Actors
Nation State Actors – Russia
Microsoft Documents Over 200 Cyber Attacks by Russia Against Ukraine (thehackernews.com)
Russian Govt Impersonators Target Telcos in Phishing Attacks (bleepingcomputer.com)
The Subject of Trusting ‘Russian’ Applications - Information Security Buzz
Nation State Actors – North Korea
Nation State Actors – Iran
Nation State Actors – Misc
Vulnerabilities
CISA Adds 7 Vulnerabilities to List Of Bugs Exploited In Attacks (bleepingcomputer.com)
Cisco Patches 11 High-Severity Vulnerabilities in Security Products | SecurityWeek.Com
Update Now! Critical Patches for Chrome and Edge | Malwarebytes Labs
Microsoft Patches Pair of Dangerous Vulnerabilities in Azure PostgreSQL (darkreading.com)
Microsoft Discovers New Privilege Escalation Flaws in Linux Operating System (thehackernews.com)
Millions of Java Apps Remain Vulnerable to Log4Shell | Threatpost
Organisations Warned of Attacks Exploiting WSO2 Vulnerability | SecurityWeek.Com
Vulnerability Found in WordPress Anti-Malware Firewall (searchenginejournal.com)
Sector Specific
Financial Services Sector
Government
Governments Under Attack Must Think Defensively - Help Net Security
Data Breach Disrupts UK Army Recruitment - Infosecurity Magazine
Health/Medical/Pharma Sector
French Hospital Group Disconnects Internet After Hackers Steal Data (bleepingcomputer.com)
Medical Software Firm Fined €1.5M for Leaking Data of 490k Patients (bleepingcomputer.com)
DDoS Attacks Target Healthcare, Education Markets, Research Finds - MSSP Alert
Smile Brands Breach Impacts 2.5 Million Individuals - Infosecurity Magazine
CNI, OT, ICS, IIoT and SCADA
Education and Academia
Gaming/Gambling
Other News
SolarWinds Breach Lawsuits: 6 Takeaways for CISOs | CSO Online
41% Of Businesses Had an API Security Incident Last Year - Help Net Security
Security Leaders Relying More Heavily on MSPs Amid Talent Crunch - Help Net Security
2022 Security Priorities: Staffing and Remote Work (darkreading.com)
GitHub: How Stolen OAuth Tokens Helped Breach Dozens of Orgs (bleepingcomputer.com)
Why Companies Should Focus on Preventing Privilege Escalation (techtarget.com)
German Wind Turbine Firm Hit by 'Targeted, Professional Cyber Attack' | SecurityWeek.Com
308,000 Exposed Databases Discovered, Proper Management Is Key - Help Net Security
Lapsus$ targeting SharePoint, VPNs and virtual machines (techtarget.com)
Top Five Post-Pandemic Priorities for Cyber Security Leaders - Help Net Security
Security Spending Set to Hit $198bn by 2025 - Infosecurity Magazine
Companies Poorly Prepared to Meet CCPA, CPRA and GDPR Compliance Requirements - Help Net Security
As usual, contact us to help assess where your risks lie and to ensure you are doing all you can do to keep you and your business secure.
Look out for our ‘Cyber Tip Tuesday’ video blog and on our YouTube channel.
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