Cyber Defense Advisors

Year: 2024

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  • April 17, 2024

Smashing Security podcast #368: Gary Barlow, and a scam turns deadly

Take That’s Gary Barlow chats up a pizza-slinging granny from Essex via Facebook, or does he? And a scam takes a sinister turn – for both the person being scammed and an innocent participant – in Ohio. All this and more is discussed in the latest edition of the “Smashing Security” podcast by cybersecurity veterans […]

Cyber News
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  • April 17, 2024

Russian APT Deploys New ‘Kapeka’ Backdoor in Eastern European Attacks

A previously undocumented “flexible” backdoor called Kapeka has been “sporadically” observed in cyber attacks targeting Eastern Europe, including Estonia and Ukraine, since at least mid-2022. The findings come from Finnish cybersecurity firm WithSecure, which attributed the malware to the Russia-linked advanced persistent threat (APT) group tracked as Sandworm (aka APT44 or Seashell Blizzard). Microsoft is […]

Cyber News
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  • April 17, 2024

Using AI-Generated Legislative Amendments as a Delaying Technique

Canadian legislators proposed 19,600 amendments—almost certainly AI-generated—to a bill in an attempt to delay its adoption. I wrote about many different legislative delaying tactics in A Hacker’s Mind, but this is a new one.  

Cyber News
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  • April 17, 2024

GenAI: A New Headache for SaaS Security Teams

The introduction of Open AI’s ChatGPT was a defining moment for the software industry, touching off a GenAI race with its November 2022 release. SaaS vendors are now rushing to upgrade tools with enhanced productivity capabilities that are driven by generative AI. Among a wide range of uses, GenAI tools make it easier for developers […]

Cyber News
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  • April 17, 2024

Critical Atlassian Flaw Exploited to Deploy Linux Variant of Cerber Ransomware

Threat actors are exploiting unpatched Atlassian servers to deploy a Linux variant of Cerber (aka C3RB3R) ransomware. The attacks leverage CVE-2023-22518 (CVSS score: 9.1), a critical security vulnerability impacting the Atlassian Confluence Data Center and Server that allows an unauthenticated attacker to reset Confluence and create an administrator account. Armed with this access, a threat […]

Cyber News
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  • April 17, 2024

Hackers Exploit Fortinet Flaw, Deploy ScreenConnect, Metasploit in New Campaign

Cybersecurity researchers have discovered a new campaign that’s exploiting a recently disclosed security flaw in Fortinet FortiClient EMS devices to deliver ScreenConnect and Metasploit Powerfun payloads. The activity entails the exploitation of CVE-2023-48788 (CVSS score: 9.3), a critical SQL injection flaw that could permit an unauthenticated attacker to execute unauthorized code or commands via specifically […]

Cyber News
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  • April 17, 2024

Cisco Warns of Global Surge in Brute-Force Attacks Targeting VPN and SSH Services

Cisco is warning about a global surge in brute-force attacks targeting various devices, including Virtual Private Network (VPN) services, web application authentication interfaces, and SSH services, since at least March 18, 2024. “These attacks all appear to be originating from TOR exit nodes and a range of other anonymizing tunnels and proxies,” Cisco Talos said. […]

Cyber News
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  • April 16, 2024

OpenJS Foundation Targeted in Potential JavaScript Project Takeover Attempt

Security researchers have uncovered a “credible” takeover attempt targeting the OpenJS Foundation in a manner that evokes similarities to the recently uncovered incident aimed at the open-source XZ Utils project. “The OpenJS Foundation Cross Project Council received a suspicious series of emails with similar messages, bearing different names and overlapping GitHub-associated emails,” OpenJS Foundation and […]

Cyber News
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  • April 16, 2024

TA558 Hackers Weaponize Images for Wide-Scale Malware Attacks

The threat actor tracked as TA558 has been observed leveraging steganography as an obfuscation technique to deliver a wide range of malware such as Agent Tesla, FormBook, Remcos RAT, LokiBot, GuLoader, Snake Keylogger, and XWorm, among others. “The group made extensive use of steganography by sending VBSs, PowerShell code, as well as RTF documents with […]

Cyber News