X-Industry

"There's a sucker born every minute" is a phrase closely associated with PT Barnum, an American showman of the mid-19th century, although there is no evidence that he said it.  Early examples of its use are among gamblers and confidence tricksters of the era.  A previously undetected cryptocurrency scam has leveraged over 1,000 fraudulent websites to ensnare users into a bogus rewards scheme since at least January 2021.

This massive campaign has likely resulted in thousands of people being scamm

Not every time there is a supply chain slowdown or stoppage, it is caused by criminal hackers.  The recent supply chain woes in Seattle and other maritime ports along the west coast of the US, is actually a worker’s slowdown.  The Port of Seattle shut its cargo operations on 10 June, adding to sporadic disruptions that have plagued West Coast ports for over a week.

The Pacific Maritime Association (PMA), which represents ocean carriers and terminal operators, blamed “coordinated and disruptive w

Researchers at FortiGuard Labs are aware of a critical zero-day SQL injection vulnerability in the MOVEit Secure Managed File Transfer software (CVE-2023-34362) allegedly exploited by the Cl0p ransomware threat actor.  High-profile government, finance, media, aviation, and healthcare organizations have reportedly been affected, with data exfiltrated and stolen.

Due to its severity, US CISA released an advisory for the vulnerability on 1 June 2023. They also updated the Known Exploited Vulnerabil

Ever since generative AI exploded into public consciousness with the launch of ChatGPT at the end of 2022, calls to regulate the technology to stop it from causing undue harm have risen to a fever pitch worldwide.  The stakes are high; technology leaders signed an open public letter saying that if government officials get it wrong, the consequence could be the extinction of the human race.

See:  https://redskyalliance.org/xindustry/the-future-is-here

While most consumers are just having fun test

Mark Twain once said, “It ain’t what you don’t know that gets you into trouble. It’s what you know for sure that just ain’t so.” Twain's quote provides two key lessons: first, why double negatives in a sentence are a terrible idea, and second, how assumptions can lead one into trouble. Assumptions affect all levels of decision-making; however, when national leaders make assumptions, trouble can rapidly escalate to chaos and turmoil.

Russian President Vladimir Putin and his military suffered fro

The Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency (CISA), National Security Agency (NSA), Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI), Multi-State Information Sharing & Analysis Center (MS-ISAC), and Israel National Cyber Directorate (INCD) published a “Guide to Securing Remote Access Software,” which provides an overview of common exploitations and associated tactics, techniques, and procedures (TTPs) used by cyber threat actors to exploit the legitimate, beneficial use of this software for easy b

Many people have wondered what the YKK labeled zipper on their jeans and jackets really meant.  Well, hackers sure knew what YKK stood for: lots of ransom money. Japanese zipper giant YKK confirmed that its US operations were targeted by hackers in recent weeks but said it was able to contain the threat before damage was caused.

The Tokyo-based corporation would not say if it was hit with ransomware, but a spokesperson reported that once YKK discovered that its US-based networks were targeted, t

Cyber threat actors associated with the Cyclops ransomware have been observed offering an information stealer malware designed to capture sensitive data from infected hosts.  The threat actor behind this Ransomware-as-a-Service (RaaS) promotes its offering on forums where it requests a share of profits from those engaging in malicious activities using its malware.

Cyclops ransomware is notable for targeting all major desktop operating systems, including Windows, macOS, and Linux.  It is also des

At a time when vessels and other critical maritime infrastructure are becoming increasingly connected to IT systems, less than half (40%) of maritime professionals think their organization is investing enough in cyber security, according to new research from DNV.[1]  While the maritime industry has focused on enhancing IT security over recent decades, said the class society, the security of operational technology (OT) – which manages, monitors, controls and automates physical assets – is ‘a more

A recent FBI report smishing attempts, which send text messages purporting to be from employees or company leadership to induce individuals to reveal personal information.  Actors conducting this scheme typically try to elicit financial information, personal identifiable information (PII), credentials, or details about a company and/or its employees.  The criminal threat actors in these instances are attempting to solicit and/or steal various types of information which could be used for financia

If you keep feeding the local stray cat, it will never go away.  Like malware, if you don’t stomp it out, it keeps harassing you.  The threat actors behind BlackCat ransomware have developed an improved variant that prioritizes speed and stealth to bypass security guardrails and achieve their ransom objectives.  The new version, Sphynx, and announced in February 2023 and includes updated capabilities that strengthen the group's efforts to evade detection.  The "product" update was first highligh

A tractor beam is a device with the ability to attract one object to another from a distance. The concept originates in fiction: The term was coined by E. E. Smith (an update of his earlier "attractor beam") in his novel Spacehounds of IPC (1931). Since the 1990s, technology and research has labored to make it a reality, and have had some success on a microscopic level. Less commonly, a similar beam that repels is called a pressor beam or repulsor beam. Gravity impulse and gravity propulsion bea

The human element is near and dear to my heart in the world of Cyber Security.  As cyberattacks intensify, more and more organizations recognize the need to have a strong security culture for all employees.  This cyber-aware workforce is a necessary addition to a skilled and knowledgeable security team and the use of advanced cybersecurity solutions.  Employees who know how to practice good cyber hygiene are increasingly seen as a crucial line of defense.

Bolstering cyber defenses will be import

According to industry experts, predictions about the BRICS countries as the fastest-growing economies have not happened. Instead, the alliance now offers a diplomatic forum and development financing outside the Western mainstream.  The acronym began as an optimistic term to describe countries with fast-growing economies at the time.  But now the BRICS nations, Brazil, Russia, India, China, and South Africa, are setting themselves up as an alternative to existing international financial and polit

ChatGPT is a large language model (LLM) falling under the broad definition of generative AI.  The sophisticated chatbot was developed by OpenAI using the Generative Pre-trained Transformer (GPT) model to understand and replicate natural language patterns with human-like accuracy.  The latest version, GPT-4, exhibits human-level performance on professional and academic benchmarks.  Without question, generative AI will create opportunities across all industries, particularly those that depend on l

British Airways; Boots, a British health/beauty retailer and pharmacy chain; and the BBC are investigating the potential theft of personal details of staff after the companies were hit by a cyber-attack attributed to a Russia-linked criminal gang.   British Airways (BA) confirmed it was one of the companies affected by the hack, which targeted software called MOVEit used by Zellis, a payroll provider.  “We have been informed that we are one of the companies impacted by Zellis’s cybersecurity inc

A vulnerability has been discovered in Progress Moveit Transfer, which could allow for potential unauthorized access to the environment, escalated privileges, and remote code execution.  MOVEit Transfer is a managed file transfer software that allows the enterprise to securely transfer files between business partners and customers using SFTP, SCP, and HTTP-based uploads.  Depending on the privileges associated with the user an attacker could then install programs; view, change, or delete data; o

US and South Korean intelligence agencies have issued a new alert warning of North Korean cyber actors' use of social engineering tactics to strike think tanks, academia, and news media sectors.  The "sustained information gathering efforts" have been attributed to a state-sponsored cluster called Kimsuky, which is also known by the names APT43, ARCHIPELAGO, Black Banshee, Emerald Sleet (previously Thallium), Nickel Kimball, and Velvet Chollima.  Active guys…..  "North Korea relies heavily on in

The Shadow Force group is a threat group that has been active since 2013, targeting corporations and organizations in South Korea.  Trend Micro revealed the first analysis report in September 2015, where it stated that a Korean media-related company had been attacked.  In March 2020, AhnLab published an analysis report on Operation Shadow Force.  It was introduced as a single campaign a there was the possibility of it being activies of an existing threat group.  However, no relevant threat group

The United States and international cybersecurity authorities are issuing this joint  Cybersecurity Advisory (CSA) to highlight a recently discovered cluster of activity of interest associated with a People’s Republic of China (PRC) state-sponsored cyber actor, also known as Volt Typhoon.  Private sector partners have identified that this activity affects networks across US critical infrastructure sectors, and the authoring agencies believe the actor could apply the same techniques against these