Author Archives: Lucian Constantin

Security researchers have discovered a new malware threat that goes to great lengths to remain undetected while targeting energy companies.

The malware program, which researchers from security firm SentinelOne have dubbed Furtim’s Parent, is a so-called dropper — a program designed to download and install additional malware components and tools. The researchers believe it was released in May and was created by state-sponsored attackers.

The goal of droppers is to prepare the field for the installation of other malware components that can perform specialized tasks. Their priority is to remain undetected, gain privileged access, and disable existing protections. These are all tasks that Furtim’s Parent does well.

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Security researchers have discovered a new malware threat that goes to great lengths to remain undetected while targeting energy companies.

The malware program, which researchers from security firm SentinelOne have dubbed Furtim’s Parent, is a so-called dropper — a program designed to download and install additional malware components and tools. The researchers believe it was released in May and was created by state-sponsored attackers.

The goal of droppers is to prepare the field for the installation of other malware components that can perform specialized tasks. Their priority is to remain undetected, gain privileged access, and disable existing protections. These are all tasks that Furtim’s Parent does well.

To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here

If you’re running a WordPress website and you have the hugely popular All in One SEO Pack plug-in installed, it’s a good idea to update it as soon as possible. The latest version released Friday fixes a flaw that could be used to hijack the site’s admin account.

The vulnerability is in the plug-in’s Bot Blocker functionality and can be exploited remotely by sending HTTP requests with specifically crafted headers to the website.

The Bot Blocker feature is designed to detect and block spam bots based on their user agent and referer header values, according to security researcher David Vaartjes, who found and reported the issue.

If the Track Blocked Bots setting is enabled — it’s not by default — the plug-in will log all requests that were blocked and will display them on an HTML page inside the site’s admin panel.

To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here

If you’re running a WordPress website and you have the hugely popular All in One SEO Pack plug-in installed, it’s a good idea to update it as soon as possible. The latest version released Friday fixes a flaw that could be used to hijack the site’s admin account.

The vulnerability is in the plug-in’s Bot Blocker functionality and can be exploited remotely by sending HTTP requests with specifically crafted headers to the website.

The Bot Blocker feature is designed to detect and block spam bots based on their user agent and referer header values, according to security researcher David Vaartjes, who found and reported the issue.

If the Track Blocked Bots setting is enabled — it’s not by default — the plug-in will log all requests that were blocked and will display them on an HTML page inside the site’s admin panel.

To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here

Many computer users don’t realize it, but for most people their internet router is the most important electronic device in their home. It links most of their other devices together and to the world, so it has a highly privileged position that hackers can exploit.

Unfortunately many consumer and small-business routers come with insecure default configurations, have undocumented backdoor accounts, expose legacy services and have firmware that is riddled with basic flaws. Some of these problems can’t be fixed by users, but there are many actions that can be taken to at least protect these devices from large-scale, automated attacks.

Don’t let your router be a low-hanging fruit for hackers.

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