French President Emmanuel Macron (Photo: Jacques Paquier via Flickr/CC)

Pegasus Spyware: World Leaders Demand Israeli Probe

Mathew J. Schwartz • July 27, 2021

Calls are growing for an investigation into how commercial Pegasus spyware developed by Israel's NSO Group gets sold to autocratic governments and used to target journalists, lawyers, human rights advocates and others, with some lawmakers saying "the hacking-for-hire industry must be brought under control."

Business Continuity Management / Disaster Recovery

World Leaders Included on Alleged Spyware Targeting List

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Governance & Risk Management

M&A Update: Deloitte and Sophos Make Acquisitions

Doug Olenick • July 27, 2021

Brisk M&A activity in the cybersecurity sector continues. Among the latest moves: Deloitte and Sophos each have announced two acquisitions.

COVID-19

SASE: Building a Migration Strategy

Geetha Nandikotkur • July 27, 2021

Security experts offer an analysis of Gartner's new strategic road map for SASE adoption that emphasizes the need for a detailed migration plan and offer tips for a successful rollout.

Business Continuity Management / Disaster Recovery

Kaseya Says It Paid No Ransom to Obtain Universal Decryptor

Doug Olenick • July 26, 2021

Remote management software company Kaseya says it obtained the ability to decrypt all victims of a massive REvil - aka Sodinokibi - attack via its software, without paying a ransom to attackers. But Kaseya has still not revealed how it obtained the decryption key, except to say it was supplied by a third party.

Cybercrime

Attackers Rely on 'Exotic' Languages for Malware Creation

Rashmi Ramesh • July 26, 2021

Malware developers increasingly are relying on "exotic" programming languages - such as Go, Rust, DLang and Nim - to create malicious code that can avoid detection by security tools and add a layer of obfuscation to an attack, according to a report released Monday by BlackBerry.

Governance & Risk Management

Australia Says Uber 'Interfered' With Users' Privacy

Jeremy Kirk • July 26, 2021

Australia's data regulator has found that Uber interfered with the privacy of 1.2 million of its customers as a result of a 2016 global data breach. Uber says it's made improvements to its systems and its internal security policies.

Cryptocurrency Fraud

Hackers Target Kubernetes Using Misconfigured Argo Workflows

Akshaya Asokan • July 26, 2021

A hacking campaign is targeting Kubernetes environments using misconfigured Argo Workflows to deploy cryptominers, a report by security firm Intezer finds.

Business Continuity Management / Disaster Recovery

IoT Security Dangers Loom as Office Workers Return

Doug Olenick • July 24, 2021

With corporate America beginning to ask employees to come back to their offices in the fall, cybersecurity teams have the huge task of ensuring that the work environment is safe. This is particularly true of IoT devices, as many have been left unprotected for months.

Cyberwarfare / Nation-State Attacks

ISMG Editors’ Panel: Examining the Pegasus Project

Anna Delaney • July 23, 2021

In the latest weekly update, four editors at Information Security Media Group discuss important cybersecurity issues, including the use of commercially available spyware and security risk management in the telecom sector.

Business Continuity Management / Disaster Recovery

Resiliency Is Key to Surviving a CDN Outage

Doug Olenick • July 23, 2021

A short-lived outage at the content delivery network supplier Akamai on Thursday which briefly knocked offline many corporate websites, is another indicator that companies need resiliency built into their systems. That means they should avoid relying on just one CDN provider, security experts say.

Application Security

Analysis: Implications of the Pegasus Spyware Investigation

Anna Delaney • July 23, 2021

This edition of the ISMG Security Report features an analysis of ongoing investigations into the use of NSO Group's Pegasus spyware to spy on dissidents, journalists, political rivals, business leaders and even heads of state - and discussion of whether the commercial spyware business model should be banned.

Fraud Management & Cybercrime

Saudi Aramco Traces Data Leak to Attack on Supplier

Scott Ferguson • July 22, 2021

Saudi Aramco, one of the world's largest oil and natural gas firms, has confirmed that company data was leaked after one of its suppliers was breached. Extortionists are reportedly demanding a $50 million ransom - payable in monero cryptocurrency - for a promise to delete the stolen data.

Governance & Risk Management

Patch Roundup: Windows, Linux, Oracle, Juniper

Prajeet Nair • July 22, 2021

A patch is forthcoming for a privilege escalation vulnerability in the Windows operating system that can allow hackers to gain a foothold. Meanwhile, Linux OS users also need to adopt system upgrades to fix a flaw, and Oracle and Juniper have announced product patches.