Cyber Defense Advisors

Cyber News

Friday Squid Blogging: NGC 1068 Is the “Squid Galaxy”

I hadn’t known that the NGC 1068 galaxy is nicknamed the “Squid Galaxy.” It is, and it’s spewing neutrinos without the usual accompanying gamma rays. As usual, you can also use this squid post to talk about the security stories in the news that I haven’t covered.  

Cyber News

Cybercriminals Target AI Users with Malware-Loaded Installers Posing as Popular Tools

Fake installers for popular artificial intelligence (AI) tools like OpenAI ChatGPT and InVideo AI are being used as lures to propagate various threats, such as the CyberLock and Lucky_Gh0$t ransomware families, and a new malware dubbed Numero. “CyberLock ransomware, developed using PowerShell, primarily focuses on encrypting specific files on the victim’s system,” Cisco Talos researcher […]

Cyber News

New Windows RAT Evades Detection for Weeks Using Corrupted DOS and PE Headers

Cybersecurity researchers have taken the wraps off an unusual cyber attack that leveraged malware with corrupted DOS and PE headers, according to new findings from Fortinet. The DOS (Disk Operating System) and PE (Portable Executable) headers are essential parts of a Windows PE file, providing information about the executable. While the DOS header makes the […]

Cyber News

Surveillance Via Smart Toothbrush

The only links are from The Daily Mail and The Mirror, but a marital affair was discovered because the cheater was recorded using his smart toothbrush at home when he was supposed to be at work.  

Cyber News

DragonForce Exploits SimpleHelp Flaws to Deploy Ransomware Across Customer Endpoints

The threat actors behind the DragonForce ransomware gained access to an unnamed Managed Service Provider’s (MSP) SimpleHelp remote monitoring and management (RMM) tool, and then leveraged it to exfiltrate data and drop the locker on multiple endpoints. It’s believed that the attackers exploited a trio of security flaws in SimpleHelp (CVE-2024-57727, CVE-2024-57728, and CVE-2024-57726) that […]

Cyber News

Chinese APT41 Exploits Google Calendar for Malware Command-and-Control Operations

Google on Wednesday disclosed that the Chinese state-sponsored threat actor known as APT41 leveraged a malware called TOUGHPROGRESS that uses Google Calendar for command-and-control (C2). The tech giant, which discovered the activity in late October 2024, said the malware was hosted on a compromised government website and was used to target multiple other government entities. […]

Cyber News

Over 100,000 WordPress Sites at Risk from Critical CVSS 10.0 Vulnerability in Wishlist Plugin

Cybersecurity researchers have disclosed a critical unpatched security flaw impacting TI WooCommerce Wishlist plugin for WordPress that could be exploited by unauthenticated attackers to upload arbitrary files. TI WooCommerce Wishlist, which has over 100,000 active installations, is a tool to allow e-commerce site customers to save their favorite products for later and share the lists […]

Cyber News

Smashing Security podcast #419: Star Wars, the CIA, and a WhatsApp malware mirage

Why is a cute Star Wars fan website now redirecting to the CIA? How come Cambodia has become the world’s hotspot for scam call centres? And can a WhatsApp image really drain your bank account with a single download, or is it just a load of hacker hokum? All this and much more is discussed […]

Cyber News

Pakistan Arrests 21 in ‘Heartsender’ Malware Service

Authorities in Pakistan have arrested 21 individuals accused of operating “Heartsender,” a once popular spam and malware dissemination service that operated for more than a decade. The main clientele for HeartSender were organized crime groups that tried to trick victim companies into making payments to a third party, and its alleged proprietors were publicly identified […]

Cyber News