Data Protection | Breaking Cybersecurity News | The Hacker News

Most organizations believe they are prepared for ransomware, but they probably aren't. Sure, everything seems to be in place: backups and a plan for disaster recovery, plus recovery time objective (RTO) and recovery point objective (RPO) tracking.  But when a real attack happens, many fail to recover within acceptable timeframes, if at all.  Not because backups are missing but because they're not reliable or can't be retrieved quickly enough. Therein lies the gap between backup and true cyber resilience . Backup isn't worth much without fast and reliable recovery.  What actually happens when ransomware hits and recovery begins A realistic ransomware incident rarely looks like a sudden outage. It unfolds over time. Day 0 – Initial compromise Cybercriminals steal credentials through phishing or exposed services. Day 3 – Lateral movement Attackers move across endpoints and servers using legitimate tools. Day 7 – Privilege escalation Cyberattackers achieve domain a...

Higher education institutions operate some of the most complex identity environments of any industry. Universities often struggle to balance open access for learning and research with strong security controls to protect students, faculty, and sensitive institutional data. This contrast creates unique identity security and management challenges that require specialized strategies and tools. A Highly Complex Identity Ecosystem Unlike corporate businesses, the ecosystem that is common at universities requires them to manage a variable and highly diverse population of users. Churn is a constant challenge, with students, faculty, alumni, researchers, contractors, and affiliate colleges and labs, and other contributors enrolling, changing roles or status, tracks or departments, and leaving frequently.  This dynamic ecosystem results in an identity lifecycle that is far more fluid than most corporate environments. "Joiners", or new identities, are created continuously, while "movers a...

As identity-based attacks continue to rise, the most damaging breaches increasingly begin with valid credentials rather than vulnerability exploits. That's why identity resilience will define the maturity of your cybersecurity in 2026.  A unified identity defense layer, combining privileged access management (PAM) with identity threat detection and response (ITDR), is emerging as the foundation of that resilience. This article explores why integrating these capabilities into your security strategy is no longer optional and how, together, they form the backbone of modern organizational security. The shift to identity-centric security Traditional PAM solutions that allow you to safely authenticate users are no longer enough to protect your business against modern threats. Instead of breaking through technical barriers, threat actors are now using compromised credentials to sign in as legitimate users. According to IBM's X-Force 2025 Threat Intelligence Index, identity-driven intr...

Employees are increasingly using personal AI tools, AI-powered extensions, and emerging agentic browsers to accelerate their work. But unlike sanctioned AI platforms, these tools operate inside the browser runtime, where neither CASBs, SWGs, EDRs, nor DLP solutions have visibility. This has quietly turned the browser into an unmanaged AI execution environment, giving way to a new threat known as shadow AI. Shadow AI isn't just the latest buzzword; it's a serious risk that leaves organizations vulnerable to data loss, cyberattacks, compliance violations, and more.  What is Shadow AI? Shadow AI refers to GenAI-powered tools, browser extensions, and browsers that workers use on their own, without any company vetting or guidance. Different from shadow IT, where unsanctioned apps or devices slip through the cracks, shadow AI lives directly in the browser.  For example, employees might use their personal Claude accounts to work with sensitive company data or work on important pr...

In cybersecurity, the old adage "trust but verify" emphasizes that granting trust should always be accompanied by oversight. Yet, with software-as-a-service (SaaS), organizations often stop at the "trust" part and never get around to the "verify." SaaS environments in 2025 run on implicit trust. Once a user or app is authenticated and given access, it's largely trusted indefinitely. Tokens issued to third-party apps rarely expire, integrations often get more permissions than they truly need, and automations execute with minimal human oversight. We talk about Zero Trust principles, but in practice, many SaaS platforms grant one-time approval and then assume all is well thereafter. The result is a growing security gap, where credentials and connections are implicitly trusted far beyond what's safe, creating fertile ground for breaches and abuse. Implicit Trust in the SaaS Ecosystem Every SaaS integration or API token represents an implicit trust relationship between your organizatio...

AI SOC Agents are going through a hype cycle. If we're going by Gartner's Hype Cycle for Security Operations, 2025 , this technology is still an "Innovation Trigger", but it's at the cusp of "Peak of Inflated Expectations". Every vendor claims their solution will revolutionize security operations. Every conference features another keynote promising autonomous defense. And every CISO is being asked whether AI will replace their security team. At Redis, implementing AI in the SOC has been more of a measured journey. The model is more of a hybrid SOC, so there's a combination of external service providers as well as internal resources. In this case, Prophet Security is currently proving themselves alongside a more traditional MDR provider.  But let's take a step back.  The Tipping Point for AI Adoption within the SOC Considering an AI solution for Redis' SOC came down to the confluence of three drivers.  On an individual level, there was more value from AI tools an...

Artificial Intelligence (AI) has served as a great resource for cyber defenders by enabling real-time detection and response through advanced pattern recognition and predictive analysis that traditional methods weren't able to achieve. However, AI has recently become a dangerous and widely available enabler for attackers to leverage. CISOs now face adversaries who easily scale large-scale cyberattacks like spear-phishing and polymorphic malware at machine speed.  This article examines the rising AI-driven cyberthreat landscape and presents the browser, the enterprises' new endpoint, as the most strategic control plane for defense. By adopting a Secure Enterprise Browser (SEB) into the security stack, enterprises can reduce their attack surface, contain incidents at scale, and future-proof themselves against these advanced attacks.  Why Traditional Defenses Struggle Against AI  Most organizations have robust defense in place against cyberattacks, such as firewalls, EDR...

Salesforce Is Mission-Critical, but That Doesn't Mean It's Protected At the beating heart of customer operations, the scope of Salesforce goes well and beyond traditional customer relationship management (CRM) systems. As a system of records, a sales engine, a service dashboard, and a repository for years of business-critical insight, deals flow through it continuously. Strategies depend on it. Customer relationships live or die by what they contain.  Yet, despite this, a dangerous misconception persists: "It's in the cloud, so it must be safe." Unfortunately, this assumption is as costly as it is common.  Here's the reality. Salesforce operates under a shared responsibility model , meaning your cloud provider — in this case, Salesforce — is responsible for platform uptime, infrastructure integrity, and security of the cloud. But you, the customer, are responsible for its actual content (your data, your metadata, and your configurations). So, while Salesforce protects th...

Data Resilience is No Longer Optional Even in 2025, over half of all businesses suffer devastating data loss from ransomware attacks, configuration errors, or system crashes — yet only 15% of enterprises treat SaaS data backup as a strategic priority. While that number is projected to surge to 75% by 2028 , many organizations today overlook this critical component and risk falling dangerously behind or worse.  Data protection is more than an IT issue, and it takes more than your standard backup solution to reconcile this problem. As threats evolve rapidly, data protection is now an essential strategic priority. Businesses must respond by building resilient, cloud-native backup strategies that ensure data stays protected, available, and uncompromised, no matter the circumstances. Breaking Free from Legacy Constraints with SaaS-Driven Flexibility The modern enterprise landscape has transformed. Hybrid and multi-cloud environments have overcome their once-trendy labels, having b...