Category Archives: Social Engineering

Backdoor in XZ Utils That Almost Happened

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Last week, the Internet dodged a major nation-state attack that would have had catastrophic cybersecurity repercussions worldwide. It’s a catastrophe that didn’t happen, so it won’t get much attention—but it should. There’s an important moral to the story of the attack and its discovery: The security of the global Internet depends on countless obscure pieces of software written and maintained by even more obscure unpaid, distractible, and sometimes vulnerable volunteers. It’s an untenable situation, and one that is being exploited by malicious actors. Yet precious little is being done to remedy it…

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XZ Utils Supply Chain Attack: A Threat Actor Spent Two Years to Implement a Linux Backdoor

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Read about a supply chain attack that involves XZ Utils, a data compressor widely used in Linux systems, and learn how to protect from this threat. Continue reading XZ Utils Supply Chain Attack: A Threat Actor Spent Two Years to Implement a Linux Backdoor→

XZ Utils Backdoor

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The cybersecurity world got really lucky last week. An intentionally placed backdoor in XZ Utils, an open-source compression utility, was pretty much accidentally discovered by a Microsoft engineer—weeks before it would have been incorporated into both Debian and Red Hat Linux. From ArsTehnica:

Malicious code added to XZ Utils versions 5.6.0 and 5.6.1 modified the way the software functions. The backdoor manipulated sshd, the executable file used to make remote SSH connections. Anyone in possession of a predetermined encryption key could stash any code of their choice in an SSH login certificate, upload it, and execute it on the backdoored device. No one has actually seen code uploaded, so it’s not known what code the attacker planned to run. In theory, the code could allow for just about anything, including stealing encryption keys or installing malware…

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US organizations targeted with emails delivering NetSupport RAT

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Employees at US-based organizations are being targeted with emails delivering NetSupport RAT malware via “nuanced” exploitation and by using an advanced detection evasion method. The malware campaign The campaign, dubbed PhantomBlu, takes t… Continue reading US organizations targeted with emails delivering NetSupport RAT→

Hacker Conversations: Stephanie ‘Snow’ Carruthers, Chief People Hacker at IBM X-Force Red

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The desire to be a hacker is usually innate, and commonly emerges in early life. This did not happen with Snow: she was a married freelance special effects makeup artist when it all began.
The post Hacker Conversations: Stephanie ‘Snow’ Carruthers, Chi… Continue reading Hacker Conversations: Stephanie ‘Snow’ Carruthers, Chief People Hacker at IBM X-Force Red→

95% believe LLMs making phishing detection more challenging

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More than 95% of responding IT and security professionals believe social engineering attacks have become more sophisticated in the last year, according to LastPass. Recent AI advancements, particularly generative AI, have empowered cybercriminals to co… Continue reading 95% believe LLMs making phishing detection more challenging→

Cybercriminals harness AI for new era of malware development

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The alliance between ransomware groups and initial access brokers (IABs) is still the powerful engine for cybercriminal industry, as evidenced by the 74% year-on-year increase in the number of companies that had their data uploaded on dedicated leak si… Continue reading Cybercriminals harness AI for new era of malware development→

Airbnb scammers pose as hosts, redirect users to fake Tripadvisor site

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Scammers on Airbnb are faking technical issues and citing higher fees to get users to a spoofed Tripadvisor website and steal their money. The Airbnb scam Malwarebytes researchers came across the Airbnb scam when trying to book an apartment through the… Continue reading Airbnb scammers pose as hosts, redirect users to fake Tripadvisor site→