Bitcoin | Breaking Cybersecurity News | The Hacker News

The breaking news is that, another Bitcoin exchange  company gets hacked i.e. BIPS ( bips.me ), one of the largest European Danish Bitcoin payment processors. On Friday evening, a bunch of cyber criminals just broke into BIPs - Bitcoin payment processor servers and wiped out around 1,295 Bitcoin from people's wallets, currently worth $1 Million. More than 22,000 consumer wallets have been compromised and BIPS will be contacting the affected users. Initially on 15th November, Hackers launched Distributed Denial of Service (DDoS) attack on BIPS, originate from Russia and neighboring countries and then hackers attacked again on 17th November. This time somehow they got access to several online Bitcoin wallets, which allowed them to steal the 1,295 BTC. " As a consequence Bips will temporarily close down the wallet initiative to focus on real-time merchant processing business which does not include storing of Bitcoins. " company says. " All existing users will be aske

Two most important moments in the history of Bitcoin are : Its creation by Satoshi Nakamoto , and the burst of The Silk Road's Founder  Ross William Ulbricht . The silk Road's black market was a Bitcoin economy. According to a report published by two Israeli computer scientists,  Ross William Ulbricht , aka Dread Pirate Roberts , may be financially linked to Satoshi Nakamoto. Even if the Bitcoin buyers and sellers remained anonymous, but the transactions themselves are public, So the scientists were able to trace the interactions. The Scientists, Ron and Shamir were exploring the connection between the operator of Silk Road who was recently arrested by the FBI for running the Internet blackmarket Silk Road and the entity that invented the bitcoin. The bitcoin network was established in 2008 and it has been popularly believed that the first accounts in the early days of the bitcoin were of Satoshi Nakamoto , accumulated some 77,600 BTC as a result of 'mining' Bitcoins

It comes as no surprise that today's cyber threats are orders of magnitude more complex than those of the past. And the ever-evolving tactics that attackers use demand the adoption of better, more holistic and consolidated ways to meet this non-stop challenge. Security teams constantly look for ways to reduce risk while improving security posture, but many approaches offer piecemeal solutions – zeroing in on one particular element of the evolving threat landscape challenge – missing the forest for the trees.  In the last few years, Exposure Management has become known as a comprehensive way of reigning in the chaos, giving organizations a true fighting chance to reduce risk and improve posture. In this article I'll cover what Exposure Management is, how it stacks up against some alternative approaches and why building an Exposure Management program should be on  your 2024 to-do list. What is Exposure Management?  Exposure Management is the systematic identification, evaluation,

The  CryptoLocker Malware continues to spread, infected more than 12,000 U.S computers in one week and threatening millions of computers in the UK. Just last week, The UK National Crime Agency urge people afflicted by CryptoLocker not to pay ransom, not least because there is no guarantee that they will even receive an unlock key. Not even Police departments are immune to CryptoLocker. In November second week, Massachusetts' Swansea Police Department paid a 2 Bitcoin ($750 that time) ransom to decrypt images and Word documents encrypted by CryptoLocker ransomware . " It gave us 100 hours to pay and it was literally a timer, " said Police Department. " A big red screen comes up with a timer that says you have 100 hours to pay or your files will be encrypted forever. " Malware usually distributed through spam emails, encrypting the user's files on the infected machine and also the local network it is attached to. However, Police Depar

CryptoLocker is an especially insidious form of Ransomeware malware that was first detected in the wild in September 2013, restricts access to infected computers and requires victims to pay a ransom in order to regain full access. What makes CryptoLocker so bad is the way it encrypts the user data on your hard drive using a strong encryption method. This makes it literally impossible to access your own data without paying the ransom amount to the criminals between $100 and $300 or two  Bitcoins , even now more. Once affected you will be locked out of your computer and unless you pay the ransom amount in 72 hours , the virus will delete the decryption key to decrypt all the files on your PC . The malware lands on PCs the same way other malware does and a few sensible precautions will help minimize the chances of a CrytoLocker attack. Yesterday, we reported that - UK's National Crime Agency has given out an urgent national alert that a mass spamming event target

The UK's National Crime Agency has given out an urgent national alert that a mass spamming event targeting 10 million UK based email users with a piece of malware called CryptoLocker that encrypts your files and then demands a ransom money to restore access. The agency has said that the people who are majorly receiving targeted spam emails that appear to be from banks and other financial institutions. Each email comes with attachments that look like files such as a voicemail, fax, an invoice or details of a suspicious transaction, but is in fact Cryptolocker Ransomware malware that encrypts the user's computer. The public should be aware not to click on any such attachment. On Infected system, The Cryptolocker Malware screen will then display a countdown timer that demands the payment of 2 Bitcoins in ransom, worth around £536, for the decryption key. The NCCU is trying to trace that who is sending the emails. " We are working in cooperation wit

Another Bitcoin Exchange hacked!  Bitcash. CZ based out of the Czech Republic has been hacked and Money from 4000 Bitcoin wallets have been Stolen, value of over 2 million Czech Koruna i.e. Approx $100,000. Bitcash.cz  is currently down with a maintenance message that on the evening of November 11, their server was compromised by unknown Hackers and  bitcoins from its clients were stolen. Hackers appear to have sent emails from Bitcash.cz email accounts pretending to be members of staff. The emails claim the company had to use a US recovery company to get back the bitcoins that have been stolen and recipients are then apparently asked to send 2 BTC to a wallet address in order for their bitcoins to be returned. " We are trying to resolve the situation, but we want to warn our users about fraudulent emails and scams [claiming to be from Bitcash] " site said on their Facebook page. Meanwhile, GBL, the Chinese Bitcoin exchange mysteriously disappeared, t

There's an extraordinary malware making rock-n-roll over the Internet and if you are one of the unlucky folks to cross its path, then it could make your computer unusable and you have to pay a few hundred Dollars to retrieve your important data back. We have warned our readers in many  previous articles about a nasty piece of Ransomware malware called ' CryptoLocker ', which is targeting computers running the Microsoft Windows operating system. The CryptoLocker  Ransomware encrypts the files on a victim's computer and issues an ultimatum - Pay up or lose your data . Users who are getting infected with CryptoLocker can see a message informing them that their computer is locked up and their files encrypted. It then asks them to make a ransom payment, which typically ranges between $100 and $700 or 2 Bitcoins , to get their files back. Just yesterday I noticed on a forum that the criminals behind the CryptoLocker malware has recently launched a dedicated  Cry

When you're online, you expose your vulnerability to malicious virus that have been growing in virulence and ferocity over the last few years.  Among home PC users, you may think that you protected from malicious software by Installing an effective, trusted antivirus solution, but most if the Antivirus solutions still it merely finds and removes any known threats. But what if someday you turn on your system and you will find a pop up window with a warning that says " Your system is Locked and Important drives are encrypted and there is no way out unless you will not Pay fine ". This is what Ransomware malware does to your system. Ransomware is the most serious emerging threat in the virtual world of computing devices. Ransomware is a kind of malware which is designed to Block access to the computing system or can lock your system until an amount of money is paid through Internet banking. Ransomware is usually installed when you open a malicious atta

The TorRAT malware was first appeared in 2012 as spying tool only. But from August 2012, Bitcoin Mining feature was added and it became a powerful hacking tool that was commonly associated with attacks on Financial institutions. ab This year TorRat Malware targeted two out of three major Banks in the Netherlands and the  criminals stole over Million Dollars from user' Banking Accounts. The Dutch  police has arrested four men from Alkmaar, Haarlem, Woubrugge and Roden on last Monday, who are suspected of involvement in the large scale digital fraud and money laundering case using TorRat Malware. Using Spear Phishing techniques, gang  targeted the victims to access their computers and the Financial accounts. The gang used anonymous VPN services, Bitcoins, TorMail and the Tor network itself to remain anonymous. Malware is also capable of manipulating the information during online banking , can secretly add new payment orders and also able to modify existing

The world's favorite crypto-currency has made rounds in the headlines this week. The FBI had managed to seize 144,000 Bitcoins  worth some $28.5 million at current exchange rates from Silk Road's founder, that's the largest ever seizure of the cryptocurrency . Bitcoin is an open-source, decentralised, digital currency, whose production is designed to simulate the mining of a commodity, like gold. These Bitcoins belonged to Ross Ulbricht , the 29-year-old who allegedly created and managed the Silk Road , the popular anonymous drug-selling site. In March, 7000 of 10,000 items on Silk Road were drugs. Earlier this month Ulbricht was arrested and the website was taken offline by the Department of Justice and charged with engaging in a drug trafficking and money laundering conspiracy as well as computer hacking and attempted murder-for-hire. The Bitcoin address now known as DPR Seized Coins finished receiving the mass of cryptocurrency and Authorities are also

In March of this year, we saw the first ever 300 Gigabit DDoS attack , which was possible due to a DNS Reflection Amplification attack against Spamhaus . On 24 September World's 3rd Largest Bitcoin exchange BTC China , a platform where both Bitcoin and Chinese yuan are traded faced massive DDoS attack for continued nine hours, where no amplification techniques were used. Incapsula , Cloud-based security service provider helped the Chinese Bitcoin trader to protect them from such massive denial-of-service attack and successfully mitigated the threats. Incapsula tweeted  a graph of DDoS attack last month as shown, " Yesterday we prevented a ~100Gbps DDoS. The attack's load was distributed across our 350Gbps network. " Specialist at Incapsula shared the details of the attack with TheRegister , explained " The attack against BTC China took the form of a SYN flood rather than the DNS amplification-style attack ", " The attacker balanced the assault betwee

Authorities in Britain, Sweden, and the United States have arrested eight more people in the wake of the shutdown of the Silk Road , online illegal drug marketplace which helped dealers sell drugs under the cloak of anonymity. Millions of Dollars worth of Bitcoins (Electronic currency) had been seized and that other online drug dealer should expect a knock on their door by the National Crime Agency. The other suspects were arrested within hours after the FBI arrested 29-year-old Ross Ulbricht , the suspected creator of Silk Road also known as " Dread Pirate Roberts ". Although, he denies charges that he operated the website. Ulbricht is separately accused in a federal indictment in U.S. District Court in Baltimore with a similar count of narcotics trafficking conspiracy and additional charges of soliciting an $80,000 murder-for-hire of a former Silk Road employee. A federal judge on Wednesday ordered that Ulbricht charged with operating a notorious online drug marketplac

Ross Ulbricht , the recently arrested mastermind behind Silk Road , appeared in court yesterday where his lawyer begged for more time before the detention hearing. As the Protective Order states, The United States is further authorized to seize any and all Bitcoins contained in wallet files residing on silk road servers and can transfer the full account balance in each silk road wallet to a public Bitcoin address controlled by the United States. Right now the FBI must be feeling pretty good too, because a federally controlled Bitcoin account , renamed as " Silkroad Seized Coins " now contains over $3.5 million worth of the digital currency , seized from Silk Road over 26,000 Bitcoins. As of this writing, the FBI 's Bitcoin address has received 122 transactions, nearly 30 of which apparently come from pranksters and now the account holds 27,365.89919925 BTC. Forbes, Kashmir Hill asked FBI spokesperson that what the plan is for those seized Bitcoins. " W

Bitcoin Talk , the popular Bitcoin discussion forum, has been hacked and as it stands the site is currently unreachable. Bitcointalk has been down for nearly 6 hours. The forums have been allegedly hacked and Defaced by " The Hole Seekers " and selling 150,000 emails and hashed passwords stolen from Bitcointalk.org for 25 Bitcoins , where the passwords are hashed with sha256crypt. Hacker embedded the "1812 Overture" song in the background with a dazzling animated picture show. According to Bitcointalk admin Theymos, it's possible that the hackers gained access to the database. He says the website will not be restored until he figures out precisely what vulnerability the hackers leveraged. He's offering 50 Bitcoin to the first individual who can pinpoint the security hole. See the video below for the Hack-in-Action: " Hello friend, Bitcoin has been seized by the FBI for being illegal. Thanks, bye " reads one the message in the video. To be safe, it is reco

The FBI had seized a website called ' Silk Road ', that was considered one of the most popular Underground places on the Internet for buying drugs and other illicit goods and services. They arrested the site's alleged founder,  Ross William Ulbricht, known as " Dread Pirate Roberts ," in San Francisco, who reportedly had  26,000 Bitcoins worth $3.6 million. The FBI used information from Comcast in the investigation and collaborated with US Customs and Border Patrol, the Internal Revenue Service, the Drug Enforcement Administration, and the Department of Homeland Security. Ross Ulbricht Ross William Ulbricht, a 29-year-old graduate of the University of Pennsylvania School of Materials Science and Engineering  charged with one count each of narcotics trafficking conspiracy, computer hacking conspiracy and money laundering conspiracy, according to the filing. ' Silk Road '  website, which had operated since early 2011, also offered tut

It's been nearly three months since Edward Snowden started telling the world about the National Security Agency's mass surveillance of global communications. After the last week report that the National Security Agency has leveraged its cooperative relationships with specific industry partners to insert vulnerabilities into Internet security products. Bitcoin , a virtual currency, a peer-to-peer electronic cash system, which is generated on a logarithmic scale by dedicated miners who run software that generate the complex hash codes which make up a Bitcoin.  The integrity of Bitcoin depends on a hash function called SHA-256 , which was designed by the NSA and published by the National Institute for Standards and Technology (NIST). Is it hard to believe that could the intelligence community have a secret exploit for Bitcoin? While there is no evidence yet to support the speculation. " If you assume that the NSA did something to SHA-256, which no outside resea