Malware

Is 2014 The Year Uncle Sam Takes On Connected Device Security?

The Consumer Electronics Show – or CES- kicked off last week in Las Vegas. In the last decade, CES has become one of the premiere venues for consumer device makers to launch new products and to show off prototypes of technology they hope to introduce to the public. Home entertainment megafauna dominate the coverage of CES — there was Samsung’s 85-inch LED LCD model with 4K resolution that can transform from flat-screen to curved display. But this year’s show is also a showcase for the next wave of connected devices, including wearable technology, smart appliances and connected vehicles. All these new platforms raise important questions about security, privacy and reliability. I sat down to talk about some of those issues with Mark Stanislav, the lead security evangelist at the firm Duo Security. Mark is a frequent contributor to The Security Ledger who last joined us to provide an end of year […]

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Update: Retail Breaches Spread. Point of Sale Malware A Suspect.

Reuters is reporting on Monday that the recently disclosed hack of box store retailer Target Inc. was just one of a series of attacks against U.S. retailers, including Target, the luxury department store Neiman Marcus and other, as-yet-unnamed companies.* The story adds to other, recent revelations, including the breach at Neiman Marcus, which was first disclosed by the security blog Krebsonsecurity.com on Friday. Also on Monday, Target CEO Gregg Steinhafel confirmed that his company was the victim of malicious software installed on point of sale (PoS) systems at the store. According to the Reuters report, Target Corp and Neiman Marcus are just two retailers whose networks were breached over the holiday shopping season. The story cites unnamed sources “familiar with attacks,” which have yet to be publicly disclosed. Breaches of “at least three other well-known U.S. retailers took place and were conducted using similar techniques as the one on Target,” according […]

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Week In Security: More Target Woes and CES

It was another eventful week in security, with another big revelation in the story of a hack of box retailer Target Inc. That update – which accompanied Target’s fourth quarter earnings guidance – nearly doubled the number of known victims of that attack. It also revealed that credit card data was not the only information stolen by hackers, who also made off with customer names, mailing addresses and emails. In this latest installment of Security Ledger’s Security Week in Review, we spoke with Jody Brazil, the President of the security firm FireMon about the week’s events. Jody is a seasoned security professional who works day-in-day-out with companies that are trying to manage their risk. He said that even large companies like Target can fall victim to sophisticated attacks, but the IT security may be too quick to give up on traditional defensive technologies. Jody and I had an interesting chat about […]

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Target: Hack Exposed Data On 70 Million

Target provided some guidance on its fourth quarter earnings on Friday and, not incidentally, dropped another bombshell in the long-running story about the November data breach that exposed credit card information on some 40 million customers. It turns out that the credit card numbers were just the tip of a much larger iceberg. The box store retailer now claims that its investigation of that incident revealed that data on around 70 million customers was exposed, including e-mail addresses, phone numbers, mailing addresses and more. In a statement, Target said that much of the stolen data was “partial in nature,” but that it will reach out to customers whose e-mail addresses were stolen to warn them about potential fraud, including “phishing” e-mails that purport to come from Target. “I know that it is frustrating for our guests to learn that this information was taken and we are truly sorry they are […]

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IoT Hackers Await Their Killer App

The next year will see the continued blurring of lines between the worlds of IT security and what we’ve come to think of as the ‘rest of our lives.’ But those who expect to see a large shift in malicious activity to the Internet of Things in 2014 will be disappointed.   That, according to a report from the security firm Trend Micro, which argues that Internet of Things malware and attacks are still a ways off – as cyber criminals await a “killer app” that will boost adoption and provide a common platform to attack. The prediction is part of “Blurring Boundaries,” a 2014 outlook report from Trend that argues IoT threats are mostly future-tech. “While we certainly think that attacks on IoT devices and the underlying architecture will be a major area of attack in the future, that future will not be until 2015 and beyond” writes Robert McArdle, […]

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