Recent Posts

Blurred Lines: Sophisticated Hacks Building On Commodity Crime Tools

The information security industry has long operated with the premise of two, very different kinds of threats: indiscriminate, cyber criminal activity aimed at making money quick and sophisticated, targeted attacks intended to provide long term competitive advantage to another company (or economy), disrupt the operation of the target or provide a (future) strategic advantage in some kind of cyber conflict. But new research from FireEye suggests that the lines between sophisticated and unsophisticated cyber operations are blurred, making it hard for organizations to know if a given infection is merely bad luck, or evidence of a larger and more dangerous operation. Writing about a new financially motivated hacking crew called Fin6, FireEye said that the group, which targeted point-of-sale systems made off with “millions of payment card numbers.” Still, FireEye said that it couldn’t figure out how the group compromised its victims. “In Mandiant’s investigations of FIN6, the group already […]

FBI Warns of Smart Farm Risk

In-brief:Farmers who are looking to make better use of technology need to start paying attention to security, or suffer the same fate as industries such as healthcare, the FBI warned in an industry note. 

Can Blockchain Save The Internet of Things?

In-brief: In this Security Ledger podcast, we speak with the guys from Chain of Things, a new consortium that is investigating applications of Block Chain and related technologies to solving identity and security problems for IoT deployments. 

Updated: Vulnerability on 3m Systems Could Spread Ransomware To Schools

In-brief: Researchers at Cisco Systems said that they had identified more than 3 million “at risk” application servers running a vulnerable component that has been linked to ransomware infections. More than 1,600 of those systems have already been compromised, including many school libraries. Updated to add comment from Follett Corp. PFR 4/18/2016

NHTSA Drafting Cyber Security Guidelines for Light Vehicles

In-brief: The National Highway Traffic and Safety Administration (NHTSA) is drafting cyber security guidelines for light vehicles, the agency’s first major initiative exclusively focused on the security of connected cars.