US sanctions NSO Group, Israeli spyware company at centre of Pegasus Papers

The US is sanctioning an Israeli spyware company that it accused of supplying technology to foreign governments “to maliciously target government officials, journalists, businesspeople, activists, academics, and embassy workers”. NSO Group had been accused of assisting despotic regimes in targeting Read More …

Twitter Suspends Accounts Used to Snare Security Researchers

Twitter has shuttered two accounts – @lagal1990 and @shiftrows13 – specifically used to trick security researchers into downloading malware in a long-running cyber-espionage campaign attributed to North Korea. The campaign was first discovered by the Google Threat Analysis Group (TAG) Read More …

MysterySnail attacks IT companies, defence contractors and diplomatic entities with Windows zero-day

In late August and early September 2021, Kaspersky technologies detected attacks with the use of an elevation of privilege exploit on multiple Microsoft Windows servers. The exploit had numerous debug strings from an older, publicly known exploit for vulnerability CVE-2016-3309, Read More …

Iran-linked DEV-0343 targeting defense, GIS, and maritime sectors

DEV-0343 is a new activity cluster that the Microsoft Threat Intelligence Center (MSTIC) first observed and began tracking in late July 2021. MSTIC has observed DEV-0343 conducting extensive password spraying against more than 250 Office 365 tenants, with a focus Read More …

Microsoft: Russian state hackers behind 53% of attacks on US govt agencies

Microsoft says that Russian-sponsored hacking groups are increasingly targeting US government agencies, with roughly 58% of all nation-state attacks observed by Microsoft between July 2020 and June 2021 coming from Russia. “Russian nation-state actors are increasingly targeting government agencies for Read More …

BlackBerry ties malware campaign targeting victims in India to Chinese cyberespionage group

The BlackBerry Research & Intelligence team released a new report on Tuesday linking disparate malware campaigns to Chinese cyberespionage group APT41, noting that the group has been taking advantage of Cobalt Strike activity using a bespoke Malleable C2 Profile that Read More …

UK plans to invest £5 billion in retaliatory cyber-attacks

The United Kingdom has revealed plans to invest £5 billion in bolstering national cybersecurity that includes creating a “Cyber Force” unit to perform retaliatory attacks. Cyber-warfare is being embraced as the “fifth domain” of international conflict and is being incorporated Read More …

UK: Location Of New National Cyber Force Revealed

The UK Government’s new National Cyber Force (NCF) will be located in Samlesbury in the North West, Defence Secretary Ben Wallace has confirmed. Samlesbury is also home to a BAE Systems site. The NCF draws together personnel from intelligence, cyber Read More …