Bite Sized Cyber Crime

A couple months ago security education company KnowBe4 accidentally hired a North Korean threat actor who tried to install malware on their machine. Turns out this may not be as uncommon as you'd think. Recently a network of North Korean threat actors applying for jobs, and US citizens helping them, has been uncovered. Sources: https://pastebin.com/1npHD8cA

The Internet Archive is a website vital in the preservation of digital information, and recently it was attacked on two separate occasions. Here's what went down. Sources: https://pastebin.com/nbhNFAv5

Ever receive a weird wrong number text or match with someone on a dating site who starts talking about crypto? It may be part of a long term scam meant to drain you of as much money as you're willing to part with to make a big investment. Once it seems too good to be true and you go to withdraw your earnings, suddenly you realize you've lost it all.

Cars are just big computers now, and that means they are vulnerable to exploits that could allow a concerning amount of control over them. Security researchers discovered a vulnerability in the Kia dealer portal that could allow a hacker remote control over millions of cars made after 2013. Sources: https://pastebin.com/tsJGg8jq

The Tor network allows for anonymous connections to unindexed search engines, including to online criminal services. Recently though, German authorities claimed to have de-anonymized a user using Tor and made an arrest. Has Tor finally been cracked, or is this a scare tactic to instill fear in threat actors? Sources: https://pastebin.com/Hfrrbdag

YubiKeys are physical authentication devices that have a lot of flexibility and are compatible with just about every service, but as it turns out if you know a lot about math and electronics you can uncover the private keys and clone the device! Sources: https://pastebin.com/WacbUmA1

The city of Columbus, Ohio had a data breach occur in July. According to the mayor, the information leaked was nothing important to hackers. A security researcher proved that this was not the case, that the data was incredibly sensitive. In response, the city sued him. Sources: https://pastebin.com/C632hthD

Using native Windows tools rather than custom malware is becoming a better technique of pulling off attacks while remaining under the radar. Qilin was caught doing just this to steal credentials right from the Chrome web browser. Sources: https://pastebin.com/Ccvhs7Pd

Antimalware solutions like EDR are meant to keep a careful watch on our systems to ensure they are protected from even sneaky threats. But what happens when malware can take out an EDR solution before it is spotted? Sources: https://pastebin.com/6uRVy4Yd

Often times we can reduce our risk to cyber crime by being careful about the websites we sign up for, but what if someone has our data that we never consented to giving them and ends up being breached? Just that happened, with a company you've probably never heard of. Sources: https://pastebin.com/Yms285F5

Ransomware threat actors are one of the biggest modern threats, and things will only ramp up when threat actors see just how much an organization is willing to pay to have their data back. Recently it was uncovered that a covert ransomware group quietly received the largest payout ever recorded in ransomware history. Sources: https://pastebin.com/uLQ9sFh0

KnowBe4 has employed hacker Kevin Mitnick as a spokesperson in their security training materials. But what happens when you employ a hacker by accident and they immediately try loading malware on the company provided laptop? Sources: https://pastebin.com/XrMa4bsS

The biggest IT outage across the world just happened. Planes were grounded, hospitals and 911 dispatch centers were down, people couldn't turn their computers on, all on a massive global scale never seen before. So what is CrowdStrike, and how did this happen? Sources: https://pastebin.com/vxfyMcd4

Ticketmaster, AT&T, Neiman Marcus, Advanced Auto Parts. These organizations may not seem like they have anything in common, but they all were customers of Snowflake that had a data breach within the past couple months. With conflicting reports from Snowflake, the victims, the threat actors, and different security firms, who is really at fault here? Sources: https://pastebin.com/E1H5rgkd

Authy is an app that allows for multifactor authentication, recently the phone numbers of 33 million Authy customers were leaked due to an unsecured API, which could lead to attacks on those users. Sources: https://pastebin.com/qLsuL1Qb

After Lockbit was taken down in a multinational effort, they appear to still be a major threat after hacking the US Federal Reserve. Or did they? And why lie about such a major attack? Sources: https://pastebin.com/y8aYFSZv

Geopolitical tensions are a major factor in cyber crime as our lives become more and more online, due to concerns about Kaspersky antivirus being based in Russia, the US government has banned sales of the product, any new business agreements with Kaspersky and US orgs, and has barred them from sending software updates to Kaspersky AV users. But why ban an antivirus product at all? Sources: https://pastebin.com/DHzqYVhB

Have you ever wondered what the first malware ever was? It was more like an experiment rather than a malicious tool of destruction that malware has become today. Although Creeper didn't do much damage it's interesting to reflect on how far malware has come. Sources: https://pastebin.com/68f9yTu1

Microsoft introduced an upcoming AI tool that is able to remember everything you did on your PC and fetch results if you need to go back in time and remember. However with this tool came a mountain of distrust and security concerns. These are the concerns and how Microsoft addressed them. Sources: https://pastebin.com/QGdtx4Np

If you go to concerts or live shows sometimes like I do you've likely used Ticketmaster, as it has a strangehold over the industry. The morning after I saw a concert I woke up, checked Twitter, and saw that Ticketmaster had a massive data breach. This is what happened. Sources https://pastebin.com/8dSztCJg

After COVID-19 hit, telehealth businesses started booming and BetterHelp became especially prominent via YouTube and podcast sponsorships. However BetterHelp has been criticized for their data sharing practices, and the gray area they are in when it comes to regulations. Sources: https://pastebin.com/8fxw3sQy

Ethereum is a popular cryptocurrency, and some have started using bots to frontrun. Two brothers learned how they could exploit a vulnerability in these bots and make themselves $25 million richer. Sources: https://pastebin.com/xuQZ1ard

Dell is a massive provider of technology for organizations and home users alike, and although on first glance their data breach seems not to contain sensitive data it has likely opened the floodgates for scams and phishing opportunities. Sources: https://pastebin.com/6jSYQM4P

With online shopping being so popular, getting delivery updates is not so uncommon, but this has led to the rise of a prolific scam that is much bigger than you may think. Sources: https://pastebin.com/mW6kWtWx

The cloud is ever expanding and allowing people to easily scale up at rates previously impossible. However one thing that must be considered is that security becomes complicated. You have to really trust your cloud provider to hold up their end, and even trusted providers can have oversights. Sources: https://pastebin.com/2LJPjrVx