In-brief: The Internet of Things will make “datakinesis” – the impact of data attacks on the physical world – common, says Cisco’s Marc Blackmer.
Tag: vulnerabilities
Threats in 2014: Bears and Pandas and Malware – Oh My!
In-brief: a report from the firm CrowdStrike finds sophisticated nation-backed hacking groups were very active in 2014, with attacks on governments, pro-democracy advocates as well as banks and retailers.
New Ransomware, FessLeak, Taps Adobe Flash Flaws
In-brief: A new and sophisticated ransomware family dubbed “Fessleak” is spreading in malicious advertising (or “malvertising”) campaigns by exploiting newly disclosed flaws in Adobe’s Flash technology.
Ghost Vulnerability Replays Third Party Code Woes
In-brief: The security firm Qualys is warning of a serious and remotely exploitable vulnerability in a function of the GNU C Library (glibc) known as gethostbyname. The security hole raises more questions about dangers lurking in legacy, open source software.
The Enduring Terribleness of Home Router Security Matters to IoT
Last week, home broadband router maker ASUS was the latest vendor to issue an emergency patch for a critical vulnerability in its products. This, after proof-of-concept exploit code was released for the so-called “Inforsvr” vulnerability that affects several ASUS home routers. That vulnerability -if left unpatched – would allow anyone with access to a home- or small business network that used an ASUS broadband router to, essentially, commandeer the device. The “infosvr” feature is typically used for device discovery by the ASUS Wireless Router Device Discovery Utility, but the service also allowed unauthenticated users to execute commands through it using the “root” permissions, according to researcher Friedrich Postelstorfer, who created a proof of concept exploit for the security hole and released it on January 4. The exploit code finally prompted a patch from ASUS on January 13. The company had spent months analyzing the issue and working on a fix. Patch aside, it has been a worrying month for the […]
