Hacking Humans

Joe has a story about fake websites with advanced profiling tools and malicious software by OceanLotus, Dave's story is about sites that ask if it's ok to send you notifications, The Catch of the Day comes from a listener named William who received a phishing email from the boss, and later in the show, Dave's conversation with Mike Slaugh from USAA on his predictions for 2021 and best practices for organizations to protect themselves and consumers, including creating better means of identity verification. Links to stories: OceanLotus: Extending Cyber Espionage Operations Through Fake Websites Be Very Sparing in Allowing Site Notifications Have a Catch of the Day you'd like to share? Email it to us at [email protected] or hit us up on Twitter.

A reflection or amplification distributed denial-of-service attack in which hackers query Internet network time protocol servers, NTP servers for short, for the correct time, but spoof the destination address of their target victims.

From the intrusion kill-chain model, the delivery of a “lure” via a text message to a potential victim by pretending to be some trustworthy person or organization in order to trick the victim into revealing sensitive information. Smishing is a portmanteau word made of two other words, the acronym “SMS” and the cyber coinage “Phishing“. It’s a text-message-centric variation of the email-based phishing scams that have been around since the 1990s. The term “Smishing” arose in the late 2000s.

Joe shares his Classic Cons Part 3, Dave has an Apple device scam story, The Catch of the Day is your assassination heads-up, and later in the show our interview with Jonna Mendez, retired CIA intelligence officer and former Chief of Disguise. Link to story: Twitter Have a Catch of the Day you'd like to share? Email it to us at [email protected] or hit us up on Twitter.

A network switch configuration setting that forwards a copy of each incoming and outgoing packet to a third switch port. Also known as SPAN or Switched Port Analyzer, RAP or Roving Analysis Port, and TAP or Test Access Point. When network managers and security investigators want to capture packets for analysis, they need some sort of generic TAP or Test Access Point. You can buy specialized equipment for this operation but most modern switches have this capability built in.

Dave has a story about the security risks of your outbound email, Joe's story is about a fake company, Ecapitalloans, using fake BBB affiliation, The Catch of the Day comes from a listener named Max with a new work phone with curious activity from previous number owner, and later in the show, Dave's conversation with Bill Coletti, crisis communications and reputation management expert at Kith, and author of the book Critical Moments: A New Mindset for Reputation Management. Links to stories: The 2020 Outbound Email Data Breach Report Finds growing email volumes and stressed employees are causing rising breach risk BBB Warning: Ecapitalloans steals personal information and money from loan applicants Ecapitalloans.co Have a Catch of the Day you'd like to share? Email it to us at [email protected] or hit us up on Twitter.

Technology, software and hardware deployed without explicit organizational approval. In the early days of the computer era from the 1980s through the 2000s security and information system practitioners considered shadow IT as completely negative. Those unauthorized systems were nothing more than a hindrance that created more technical debt in organizations that were already swimming in it with the known and authorized systems.

NDR tools provide anomaly detection and potential attack prevention by collecting telemetry across the entire intrusion kill chain on transactions across the network, between servers, hosts, and cloud-workloads, and running machine learning algorithms against this compiled and very large data set. NDR is an extension of the EDR, or endpoint detection and response idea that emerged in 2013.

Joe has a story about how Emotet is being used in phishing emails through thread hijacking, Dave's story is a two-fer: one is about bad guys using image manipulation and the other has Elon Musk giving away Bitcoin again taking advantage of the US election, The Catch of the Day is from a listener named John about an email-based vishing attack, and later in the show, we welcome back Kurtis Minder of GroupSense on the burgeoning ransomware negotiation industry. Links to stories: Spike in Emotet activity could mean big payday for ransomware gangs Sneaky Office 365 phishing inverts images to evade detection Have a Catch of the Day you'd like to share? Email it to us at [email protected] or hit us up on Twitter.

From the intrusion kill chain model, a program that provides command and control services for an attack campaign. While the first ever deployed RAT is unknown, one early example is Back Orifice made famous by the notorious hacktivist group called “The Cult of the Dead Cow,” or cDc, Back Orifice was written by the hacker, Sir Dystic AKA Josh Bookbinder and released to the public at DEFCON in 1998.

Dave has a story about a fake Facebook copyright violation scam trying to trick you out of your TFA to get into your account, Joe story about the largest elder fraud scam in US history, The Catch of the Day is about a scam using a Google code for verification and includes Hacking Humans in the response, and later in the show, Dave's conversation with Mallory Sofastaii from WMAR Baltimore returns with her reporting on a fake website luring victims through social media ads. . Links to stories and Catch of the Day: Facebook “copyright violation” tries to get past 2FA – don’t fall for it! Feds Bust Massive Magazine-Subscription Scam Targeting Older Consumers Feds in Minnesota charge 60 in $335M magazine fraud that defrauded seniors nationwide Have a Catch of the Day you'd like to share? Email it to us at [email protected] or hit us up on Twitter.

A social engineering scam where fraudsters spoof an email message from a trusted company officer that directs a staff member to transfer funds to an account controlled by the criminal.

On this Special Edition, our extended conversation with author and New York Times national security correspondent David E. Sanger. The Perfect Weapon explores the rise of cyber conflict as the primary way nations now compete with and sabotage one another. ‌

Joe has a story about a woman who called a fake customer service number and got scammed, Dave's story talks about how phishing kits are not that. hard to find, just check YouTube, The Catch of the Day is an opportunity for a listener remove their name from the BLACKLIST, and later in the show, Dave's conversation with John Pescatore from SANS on Thinking Through the Unthinkable: Should You Pay Off a Ransomware Demand. Links to stories and Catch of the Day: Local Doctor Scammed After Calling Fake Customer Service Number Phishing kits as far as the eye can see Sawyer Dickey: " Your name is in the US.BLACKLIST which makes it impossible for you to send money" Have a Catch of the Day you'd like to share? Email it to us at [email protected] or hit us up on Twitter.

A word, phrase, or sentence formed from another by rearranging its letters. For example, cracking a columnar transposition cipher by hand involves looking for anagrams.

Dave's story is about some cybercriminal gangs that have stolen $22 million from users of the Electrum wallet app, Joe's story talks about a business email compromise scam cost a US company $15 million, The Catch of the Day is a gift card scam that includes references to National Treasure movie, and later in the show, Dave's conversation with Bill Harrod, Federal CTO of MobileIron on election disinformation campaigns. Links to stories and Catch of the Day: Bitcoin wallet update trick has netted criminals more than $22 million The anatomy of a $15 million cyber heist on a US company Uno reverses, 50000 credits worth of nitrous oxide, Have a Catch of the Day you'd like to share? Email it to us at [email protected] or hit us up on Twitter.

1. A wireless access point installed by employees in an office or data center environment as a convenience to connectivity without the consent or the knowledge of the network manager. 2. A wireless access point, sometimes called an Evil Twin, installed by a cyber adversary in or near an office or data center environment designed to bypass security controls, gain access, and/or surveil the network traffic of the victim’s network. Both kinds, the employee installed and the adversary installed rogue access points, increase the attack surface of the organization. The employee installed device, because of its electronic footprint range, might make it easier for hackers and mischief makers outside of the organization’s network to bypass the corporate security controls and gain access without permission. The adversary installed device is designed specifically to bypass the security controls of the target network.

Starting with some listener follow-up on password managers, Joe's story has an angel investor bilking people out of due diligence fees, Dave's story comes from Graham Cluley on a malware campaign talking about details on Donald Trump's COVID-19 status, The Catch of the Day is an animal vaccine phishing scam, and later in the show, we’ve got a special treat for you: David Spark from the The CISO/Security Vendor Relationship Series podcast joins us to play the Best Worst Idea game. Links to stories: Promising Infusions of Cash, Fake Investor John Bernard Walked Away With $30M Hackers disguise malware attack as new details on Donald Trump’s COVID-19 illness Have a Catch of the Day you'd like to share? Email it to us at [email protected] or hit us up on Twitter.

A subset of the internet where communications between two parties or client-server transactions are obscured from search engines and surveillance systems by layers of encryption. The U.S. Navy designed the original Darknet by developing The Onion Router network, or TOR, back in the 1990s. Roger Dingledine and Nick Mathewson deployed the first alpha implementation in 2002 with some initial funding by the Electronic Frontier Foundation (EFF.) The TOR Project became a non-profit in 2006 and is funded by the U.S, Sweden, different NGOs, and individual sponsors.

Dave's story is about how some adware took a turn for the worse (and how his dad has fallen adware in the past), Joe's story talks about how someone is trying to phish AT&T employees and others, The Catch of the Day is an OfferUp scam on an rtx 3080 (you gamers know what that is), and later in the show, Dave's conversation with Caleb Barlow from Cynergistek reacting to the recent story of the tragic death of a woman due to hospital ransomware. Links to stories: Linkury adware caught distributing full-blown malware Phishing Page Targets AT&T’s Employee Multi-Factor Authentication Have a Catch of the Day you'd like to share? Email it to us at [email protected] or hit us up on Twitter.

From the intrusion kill chain model, the delivery of a “lure” to a potential victim by pretending to be some trustworthy person or organization in order to trick the victim into revealing sensitive information. According to Knowbe4, the word “phishing” first appeared in a Usenet newsgroup called AOHell in 1996 and some of the very first phishing attacks used AOL Instant Messenger to deliver fake messages purportedly from AOL employees in the early 2000s. The word is part of l33tspeak that started in the early days of the internet (1980s) as a shorthand to let readers know the author was part of the hacker community. In this case, the letters “ph” replace the letter “f” in the word fishing, as in “I fish, with an ‘f,’ for bass in the lake.” In hacking, “I Phish, with a ‘ph,’ for login credentials from key employees at my target’s organization.

In addition to his regular story Dave shares a situation where his mom almost took the bait, Dave's story is about an SMS phishing (smishing) Apple scam in UK (ps, there's never a free iPhone & Joe is still not an Apple fan), Joe's story talks about why you don't trust anything political on a social network, The Catch of the Day is from a Reddit user invited to join the Illuminati game, and later in the show, Dave's conversation with Alex Mosher from MobileIron on MobileIron's Phishing with Cookies Campaign. Links to stories and Catch of the Day: SMS phishing scam pretends to be Apple “chatbot” – don’t fall for it! Chinese propaganda network on Facebook used AI-generated faces Catch of the Day on Reddit Have a Catch of the Day you'd like to share? Email it to us at [email protected] or hit us up on Twitter.

From the intrusion kill chain model, the first part of an exploitation technique where the hacker tricks their victims into revealing their login credentials. In the second part of the technique, hackers legitimately log into the targeted system and gain access to the underlying network with the same permissions as the victim. Hackers use this method 80% of the time compared to other ways to gain access to a system like developing zero day exploits for known software packages. The most common way hackers steal credentials is with some version of a phishing attack.

Dave and Joe have some follow-up from a listener on OG accounts, Joe's story talks about a new phishing campaign inspired by Twitter from earlier this summer, Dave shares a story about using security awareness training as phishing lures, The Catch of the Day is a SunTrust phishing scam, and later in the show, Dave's conversation with Tim Sadler from Tessian on the Psychology of Human Error report. Links to stories and Catch of the Day: New Twitter phishing scam inspired from Twitter’s latest security response This security awareness training email is actually a phishing scam Catch of the Day on Twitter Have a Catch of the Day you'd like to share? Email it to us at [email protected] or hit us up on Twitter.

An electro-mechanical device used to break Enigma-enciphered messages about enemy military operations during the Second World War. The first bombe–named Victory and designed by Alan Turning and Gordon Welchman– started code-breaking at Bletchley Park on 14 March 1940, a year after WWII began. By the end of the war, five years later, almost 2000, mostly women, sailors and airmen operated 211 bombe machines in the effort. The allies essentially knew what the German forces were going to do before the German commanders in the field knew. Historians speculate that the effort at Bletchley Park shortened the war by years and estimate the number of lives saved to be between 14 and 21 million.

Dave and Joe have some follow-up on mobile banking apps, Dave talks about the website bitcoinabuse.com, Joe's story Brian Krebs did on old Gmail emails and people using them either errantly or maliciously to create accounts, The Catch of the Day is about a Netflix-themed campaign that's currently running, and later in the show, Dave's conversation with Shai Cohen from TransUnion on identity fraud at center of many digital COVID-19 scams. Links to stories: Bitcoin Abuse Database The Joys of Owning an ‘OG’ Email Account Have a Catch of the Day you'd like to share? Email it to us at [email protected] or hit us up on Twitter.

From the intrusion kill chain model, a malicious code delivery technique that allows hackers to send code of their choosing to their victim’s browser. XSS takes advantage of the fact that roughly 90% of web developers use the JavaScript scripting language to create dynamic content on their websites. Through various methods, hackers store their own malicious javascript code on unprotected websites. When the victim browses the site, the web server delivers that malicious code to the victim’s computer and the victim’s browser runs the code.

Joe shares a story on the ability to make a scam work through storytelling skills, Dave's story is about a guy duping a convenience store clerk into taking over her shift and later robbing the place, The Catch of the Day is about an email from a fake landlord, and later in the show, Dave's conversation with Mallory Sofastaii a reporter and anchor at WMAR2 on Impostor uses Maryland man's identity to steal unemployment insurance benefits. Links to stories and Catch of the Day: The Age-Old Secrets of Modern Scams Twitter: @findmyscammer Have a Catch of the Day you'd like to share? Email it to us at [email protected] or hit us up on Twitter.

The process of evaluating the security of a system or network by simulating an attack on it. Sometimes called "ethical hacking" or white hat hacking. The phrase started to appear in U.S. military circles in the mid 1960s as time sharing computers became more necessary for daily operations. Computer security experts from Rand Corporation began describing computer compromises as “penetrations.” By the early 1970s, government leaders formed tiger teams of penetration testers to probe for weaknesses in various government systems.

Dave & Joe have a tip as some follow-up on cloning social media accounts, Dave's story is about turning the tables on hackers in the UK, Joe talks about Kaspersky's Spam and phishing report, The Catch of the Day is is from a listener, Bob, who received an email from Eddy looking for the love of a woman (but, Bob is not a woman), and later in the show, Dave's conversation with Max Heinemeyer from Darktrace on threats that he and his team have tracked throughout the onset and spread of COVID. Links to stories: Boomer outsmarts hackers: “Kiss your cash goodbye” Spam and phishing in Q2 2020 Have a Catch of the Day you'd like to share? Email it to us at [email protected] or hit us up on Twitter.

The art of convincing a person or persons to take an action that may or may not be in their best interests. Social engineering in some form or the other has been around since the beginning of time. The biblical story of Esau and Jacob might be considered one of the earliest written social engineering stories. As applied to cybersecurity, it usually involves hackers obtaining information illegitimately by deceiving or manipulating people who have legitimate access to that information. Common tactics involve phishing attacks and watering hole attacks.

Joe's story is about the effectiveness of social media account cloning, Dave talks about toll fraud, The Catch of the Day is a Bitcoin scam with some scam baiting on the side, and later in the show, Dave's conversation with Ben Rothke from Tapad on Medium piece: A conversation with an iTunes card scammer. Links to stories: Attack of the Instagram clones A Game of Phones: Fighting Phone Phreaks in the 21st Century Have a Catch of the Day you'd like to share? Email it to us at [email protected] or hit us up on Twitter.

A physical security access control device consisting of an enclosed hallway with interlocking doors on each end where both doors can’t be open at the same time. A person presents credentials to the entry doorway. If authorized, the entry door opens and the person walks into the mantrap. The man trap exit door will not open until the entry door closes. The person presents credentials to the exit door. If authorized, the exit door will open. If not, the person is captured in the man trap until security arrives to handle the situation. Physical security leadership installs man traps to separate unrestricted areas from restricted areas, to prevent tailgating by uncleared personnel, and to impede access by unauthorized persons.

Dave's story is about robocalls to a telephony honeypot, Joe talks about postcards impersonating HIPAA communications (you have one? please let Joe know), The Catch of the Day is an email that our editor, Tom, received from the FBI about his COVID-19 death,, and later in the show, Dave's conversation with Rachel Tobac from SocialProof with her insights on the Twitter hack. Links to stories: A simple telephony honeypot received 1.5 million robocalls across 11 months Fraudulent HIPAA Communications: An Alert from the Office for Civil Rights Have a Catch of the Day you'd like to share? Email it to us at [email protected] or hit us up on Twitter.

A class of software-security-weakness-issues where independent researchers discover a software flaw before the owners of the code discover it. Zero-day, or 0-day in hacker slang, refers to the moment the race starts, on day zero, between network defenders who are trying to fix the flaw before hackers leverage it to cause damage. It is a race because on day zero, there is no known fix to the issue.

Dave's story is about a forgotten scam, Joe talks about the recent Twitter hack, The Catch of the Day is a pretty standard phishing email for you to be on the lookout for, and later in the show, Dave's conversation with Carolyn Crandall from Attivo Networks on why human-controlled ransomware, Ransomware 2.0, is so threatening to today’s remote businesses. Links to stories: Question Quiz - The Forgotten Scam The Teenager Allegedly Behind the Twitter Hack and How He Did It Catch of the Day: Fake email notice for business owners on Bluehost. Have a Catch of the Day you'd like to share? Email it to us at [email protected] or hit us up on Twitter.

A network mapping tool that pings IP addresses looking for a response and can discover host names, open communications ports, operating system names and versions. Written and maintained by Gordon Lyon, a.k.a. Fyodor, it is a free and open source software application used by both system admins and hackers alike and has been a staple in the security community for well over two decades.

Dave shares an horrific cyberstalking story from the local area, Joe's story is about a phishing campaign impersonating voicemail alerts, The Catch of the Day is an HR front for a check floating scam, and later in the show, Dave's conversation with Johnathan Hunt of GitLab on his perspective of dealing with bad actors: ignore them. Links to stories: Anne Arundel man sentenced for ‘cyberstalking’ ex-girlfriend by hacking her accounts and getting her arrested New Voicemail-Themed Phishing Attacks Use Evasion Techniques and Steal Credentials Catch of the Day: I was just super bored. But now I have something to do. Have a Catch of the Day you'd like to share? Email it to us at [email protected] or hit us up on Twitter.

Dave talks about a deepfake recording impersonating a CEO, Joe's story is about a new phishing campaign, The Catch of the Day is a very persistent cash app scammer, and later in the show, Dave's conversation with Bruce Esposito from One Identity on digital identities and what they could mean for privacy. Links to stories: Listen to This Deepfake Audio Impersonating a CEO in Brazen Fraud Attempt New phishing campaign abuses a trio of enterprise cloud services Catch of the Day: Monica played dumb with a cash app scammer for 3 days. Have a Catch of the Day you'd like to share? Email it to us at [email protected] or hit us up on Twitter.

Dave talks about gift card scams associated with YouTube live streams, Joe's story is about a scam impersonating Canadian hospital staff, The Catch of the Day is phish impersonating a small game developer going after podcasters, and later in the show, Dave's conversation with Richard Torres from Syntax on phishing attacks increasing 350% during COVID-19. Links to stories: PSN / XBOX / STEAM CODES GIVEAWAY | V BUCKS GIVEAWAY Scam impersonating hospital staff, phishing for personal information: VCH Catch of the Day: Cellar Door Games impersonation Have a Catch of the Day you'd like to share? Email it to us at [email protected] or hit us up on Twitter.

We have some listener follow-up sharing dnstwister.report site, Dave has a story of consent phishing, Joe talks about calendar invite phishing, The Catch of the Day is a lazy money multiplying scam, and later in the show, Dave's conversation with Don MacLennan from Barracuda Networks on brand impersonation. Links to stories: Microsoft warns of Office 365 phishing via malicious OAuth apps Abnormal Attack Stories: Calendar Invite Phishing Have a Catch of the Day you'd like to share? Email it to us at [email protected] or hit us up on Twitter.

We have some follow-up, and this time, Joe was not right, Dave's story is about poison-selling scam, Joe about an impersonation site, The Catch of the Day claims to be notice of a United Nations payment, and later in the show, Dave's conversation with Satnam Narang from Tenable on the increase of scams on Venmo, PayPal and Cash App on giveaways due to the opportunity provided by the economic fallout of COVID-19. Links to stories: How to Passcode-Lock Any App on Your Phone Privnotes.com Is Phishing Bitcoin from Users of Private Messaging Service Privnote.com Catch of the Day: 7 Spam Email Examples that Will Make You LOL Have a Catch of the Day you'd like to share? Email it to us at [email protected] or hit us up on Twitter.

Dave's story shows Macs are not immune, Joe talks about a dark place in his soul (aka survey scams), some listener follow-up saying Joe was right!, The Catch of the Day an advanced fee scam from the US government, and later in the show, Dave's conversation with Aviv Grafi from Votiro on a multistage attack using a zero day exploit to deliver a trojan relating to COVID-19 Stay at Home orders. Links to stories: New Shlayer Mac malware spreads via poisoned search engine results Anatomy of a survey scam – how innocent questions can rip you off Have a Catch of the Day you'd like to share? Email it to us at [email protected] or hit us up on Twitter.

Joe shares a different spin on ransom attacks, Dave has a story on phone number reuse, The Catch of the Day is a notice from British Gas (accent included), and later in the show, Dave's conversation with Stan Holland from Atlantic Bay Mortgage on their experience adapting to COVID-19. Links to stories: Extortionists threaten to destroy sites in fake ransom attacks How I Accidentally Hijacked Someone's WhatsApp Have a Catch of the Day you'd like to share? Email it to us at [email protected] or hit us up on Twitter.

Dave shares a story of an attempt on his father's Verizon account, Joe has the story of an Amazon gift card phishing attempt, The Catch of the Day is a funny phishing email, and later in the show, Joe checks in with Kurtis Minder from GroupSense. They dig a little deeper into some of the topics Kurtis discussed in his previous appearance on our show. Link to story: Multifactor Authentication Hacking is Getting Real Have a Catch of the Day you'd like to share? Email it to us at [email protected] or hit us up on Twitter.

Joe talks about HROs (High Reliability Organizations), Dave has a scam on Upwork gigs, The Catch of the Day talks about giving a scammer the runaround, and later in the show our interview with Sanjay Gupta from Mitek on how cybercriminals are capitalizing on the recently-deceased and creating synthetic identities. Link to stories: The Unaddressed Gap in Cybersecurity: Human Performance People who turned to Upwork to find freelance gigs say they've lost thousands of dollars to scams Catch of the Day: Person Tests Scammer’s Patience By Pretending To Be Not The Sharpest Tool In The Shed Have a Catch of the Day you'd like to share? Email it to us at [email protected] or hit us up on Twitter.

Dave has a ransomware story from inside a virtual machine, Joe talks phishing with Google firebase storage URLs, some listener follow-up, The Catch of the Day comes from Joe's daughter and "Apple", and later in the show our interview with Paige Schaffer from Generali Global Assistance on the digital habits of seniors and millennials and the latest scams. Link to stories: The ransomware that attacks you from inside a virtual machine Phishing in a Bucket: Utilizing Google Firebase Storage Have a Catch of the Day you'd like to share? Email it to us at [email protected] or hit us up on Twitter.

Joe shares his Classic Cons Part 3, Dave has an Apple device scam story, The Catch of the Day is your assassination heads-up, and later in the show our interview with Jonna Mendez, retired CIA intelligence officer and former Chief of Disguise. Link to story: Twitter Have a Catch of the Day you'd like to share? Email it to us at [email protected] or hit us up on Twitter.

We'd like to thank you, our dear listeners, for sticking with us and our podcast through thick and thin, bad accents and even worse ones, with this - a collection of some of our favorite Catch of the Day segments. From Australia to Brazil, Italy to the Oval Office, they're all here. Here's to another 100 episodes. Have a Catch of the Day you'd like to share? Email it to us at [email protected] or hit us up on Twitter.