[From the desk of Paul Davis – his opinions and no-one else’s]
Apart from the reporter’s opinions 😉
So onto the news:
Facebook Now Warns Targets of State-Sponsored Hackers
When their accounts are compromised by state-sponsored actors, Facebook users will now be prompted to turn on “Login Approvals.” The feature requires the user to enter a special code whenever they are trying to log onto Facebook from an unrecognized device or browser.
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Mac OS X Malware hits record high
Infosec specialist Swift on Security has raised awareness on Friday over new adware software named “eFast Browser”.
Malwarebytes detailed in a report the modus operandi of the nefarious software.
What happens is that eFast attempts to erase Chrome and sets itself in its place, which allows it to hijack file associations and links with ease.
For the unsuspecting user, eFast shows a striking design resemblance with icons and window from Chrome.
What is more, eFast is built on the open source Chromium project to begin with, so it functions in a very similar fashion to the Google-created browser.
What the analysis showed them was that the figure for the first 9 months of 2015 was 5 times greater than the sum of the years 2010-2014.
Let’s be clear, this is not five times greater than any one year but 5 times greater than all the malware seen over the previous five years and this only takes us through the first 9 months of 2015.
Bit9 + Carbon Black is not the only company to warn of an increase in Mac OS X malware.
Earlier this year Kaspersky revealed details of the Darwin Nuke attack which affected both iOS and Mac OS X.
It said then that the number of attacks against Apple and its operating systems were on the rise and this was expected to continue.
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Banks Should Use Darknet For Better Security According To Ex MI5 Chief Lord Evans
In response to the IBTimes UK’s question, Lord Evans made a statement at the Good Exchange Cybersecurity Summit on 14 October:
“Certainly giving yourself that forward awareness so that you’re not waiting to see what arrives, you are out there trying to find out what might arrive, I think is quite a game changer.
But it does require quite a lot of maturity in your systems in order to do that and it can be quite difficult for some companies to do that.”
Several cybersecurity managers have shown their support to the former MI5 Chief’s statements.
In an emailed comment to IBTimes UK, Richard Beck, head of cybersecurity at QA, made this statement: “The dark web is increasingly at the forefront of criminal innovation.
Tapping into this hidden part of the Internet is the next chapter in the cat and mouse game of cybercrime being played out by the hackers and the IT security teams who continually try to catch them.
Having an understanding of how the dark web works is the first step in being able to combat the illegal activities that go on there.”
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Drowning in security data? Here’s how to make threat intel work for you
How does a company operationalize its risk and security programs.
More specifically, with all of the talk about big data, how does a company operationalize its threat intelligence process?
The reality is, security teams looking to analyze logs are at the mercy of the developers who decide what to log and from which systems.
These details are often built into (or more accurately, excluded from) systems when they are developed.
As Smith at Tripwire recommends, absolutely capture your log data but also look to move beyond logs and “organize some of your own internal network feeds.
You should also tie sessions together to capture packet strings and ultimately perform a full packet capture.”
When taking on this challenge, you will most likely need to identify and collaborate with a security expert trained in big data and security analytics.
Similarly, be sure to identify solution providers and security vendors that can provide expertise in both internal and third-party vendor risk management as well as security incident response.
It’s critical to thwart as many attacks as you possibly can up and down the supply chain, but when attacks succeed, it’s just as important to limit the damage and immediately return your network infrastructure to normal operations and to a fully secure state.
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‘Whale’ finance fraud hits businesses
Experts have dubbed this “whaling” fraud because it targets “one big fish” as opposed to phishing, which tends to be aimed at lots of smaller fry.
This week, the UK’s NCC Group said it too was targeted by “whaling” fraud.
In a blogpost the company said emails had been sent from a gang that had registered the nccgrrouptrust.com domain that is close to the firm’s actual domain.
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Failing To Protect ‘Internet Of Things’ Data Is Biggest Threat To Tech, Says Symantec, Cisco, RSA Security
That’s according to top information officers from companies like Symantec, Cisco, RSA Security and others who gathered at the NASDAQ Monday for an event hosted by the National Cybersecurity Alliance.
“If you don’t have confidence in the company you’re doing business with, you probably won’t do business with them,” said Tim Fitzgerald, chief security officer at Symantec. “That’s going to help raise the bar when it comes to customers’ expectations about what companies need to do.”
“We have an opportunity now to get ahead of this,” said Sven Schrecker, chief architect of IoT security solutions at Intel. “There’s no reason to wait until it’s too late this time.
We have the lessons of history.”
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Two-thirds of enterprises fail to meet best practice standards for data control
In IDC’s survey of senior executives at 429 mid-to-large scale enterprises, two-thirds of respondents were failing to meet best practice standards for data control, and few were likely to be consistent across the full spectrum of data security policies.
More than three quarters (77%) of those surveyed also failed to mask sensitive data during the test-development phase, which significantly increases the threat of a data breach.
Government was the best-performing sector at implementing data control policies, while education was the weakest.
Meanwhile, it was found that a typical organisation holds 375 data copies, with each copy carrying sensitive information and therefore an increased risk of attack.
And the CIO was cited as central to the implementation of data control and security policies, which were only found to be applied on an ad-hoc basis 34% of the time.
By 2018, IDC estimates copy data will be cost IT organisations $50.63 billion and currently consumes up to 60% of the IT storage hardware and infrastructure budget.
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Merchant Advisory Group Launches CyberRisk Mitigation Tool During Cybersecurity Awareness Month
The MAG CyberRisk Hub® is a private, mobile-friendly website that provides tools and resources to help MAG members understand their exposures, establish a response plan and minimize the effects of a breach on their organizations.
Tools include access to a Breach Coach, incident roadmap, risk management tools and up to date news.
The CyberRisk Hub® also serves as a Crisis Center, providing members with the information and technical resources they need to respond quickly and effectively to a potential data breach, alleged privacy violation or other cyber incident.
The portal is powered and maintained by NetDiligence®, a leading cyber risk assessment and data breach services company.
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