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Mozilla has made it easy for you to share large files securely and privately with whomever you want, eliminating the need to depend upon less secure free third-party services or file upload tools that burn a hole in your pocket. Mozilla has finally launched its free, end-to-end encrypted file-transfer service, called Firefox Send , to the public, allowing users to securely share large files like video, audio or photo files that can be too big to fit into an email attachment. Firefox Send was initially rolled out by Mozilla to test users way back in August 2017 as part of the company's now-defunct "Test Pilot" experimental program. Firefox Send allows you to send files up to 1GB in size, but if you sign up for a free Firefox account, you can upload files as large as 2.5GB in size. The service uses a browser-based encryption technology that encrypts your files before uploading them to the Mozilla server, which can only be decrypted by the recipients. Unlike popul...

The Department of Justice announced Wednesday charges against two Iranian nationals for their involvement in creating and deploying the notorious SamSam ransomware. The alleged hackers, Faramarz Shahi Savandi, 34, and Mohammad Mehdi Shah, 27, have been charged on several counts of computer hacking and fraud charges, the indictment unsealed today at New Jersey court revealed. The duo used SamSam ransomware to extort over $6 million in ransom payments since 2015, and also caused more than $30 million in damages to over 200 victims, including hospitals , municipalities, and public institutions. According to the indictment, Savandi and Mansouri have been charged with a total of six counts, including one count of conspiracy to commit wire fraud, one count of conspiracy to commit fraud and related activity in connection with computers, two counts of intentional damage to a protected computer, and two counts of transmitting a demand in relation to damaging a protected computer. Si...

Vulnerability Management (VM) has long been a cornerstone of organizational cybersecurity. Nearly as old as the discipline of cybersecurity itself, it aims to help organizations identify and address potential security issues before they become serious problems. Yet, in recent years, the limitations of this approach have become increasingly evident.  At its core, Vulnerability Management processes remain essential for identifying and addressing weaknesses. But as time marches on and attack avenues evolve, this approach is beginning to show its age. In a recent report, How to Grow Vulnerability Management into Exposure Management (Gartner, How to Grow Vulnerability Management Into Exposure Management, 8 November 2024, Mitchell Schneider Et Al.), we believe Gartner® addresses this point precisely and demonstrates how organizations can – and must – shift from a vulnerability-centric strategy to a broader Exposure Management (EM) framework. We feel it's more than a worthwhile read an...

A security researcher has discovered a critical vulnerability in some of the world's most popular and widely used email encryption clients that use OpenPGP standard and rely on GnuPG for encrypting and digitally signing messages. The disclosure comes almost a month after researchers revealed a series of flaws, dubbed eFail , in PGP and S/Mime encryption tools that could allow attackers to reveal encrypted emails in plaintext , affecting a variety of email programs, including Thunderbird, Apple Mail, and Outlook. Software developer Marcus Brinkmann discovered that an input sanitization vulnerability, which he dubbed SigSpoof , makes it possible for attackers to fake digital signatures with someone's public key or key ID, without requiring any of the private or public keys involved. The vulnerability, tracked as CVE-2018-12020 , affects popular email applications including GnuPG, Enigmail, GPGTools and python-gnupg, and have now been patched in their latest available so...

Remember The Shadow Brokers ? They are back. A hackers group that previously claimed to have stolen a bunch of hacking tools (malware, zero-day exploits, and implants) created by the NSA and gained popularity last year for leaking a portion of those tools is back. Today, The Shadow Brokers group released more alleged hacking tools and exploits that, the group claims, belonged to " Equation Group " – an elite cyber attack unit linked to the NSA. Besides dumping some NSA's hacking tools back in August 2016, the Shadow Brokers also released an encrypted cache of files containing more NSA's hacking tools and exploits in an auction, asking for 1 Million Bitcoins (around $568 Million). However, after failed auction , the group put up those hacking tools and exploits for direct sale on an underground website, categorizing them into a type — like "exploits," "Trojans," and "implant" — each of which ranged from 1 to 100 Bitcoins (fr...

After TrueCrypt mysteriously discontinued its service, VeraCrypt became the most popular open source disk encryption software used by activists, journalists, as well as privacy conscious people. First of all, there is no such thing as a perfect, bug-free software. Even the most rigorously tested software, like the ones that operate SCADA Systems, medical devices, and aviation software, have flaws. Vulnerabilities are an unfortunate reality for every software product, but there is always space for improvements. Due to the enormous popularity of VeraCrypt, security researchers from the OSTIF (The Open Source Technology Improvement Fund) agreed to audit VeraCrypt independently and hired researchers from QuarksLab in August to lead the audit. And it seems like VeraCrypt is not exactly flawless either. Now after one month of the audit, researchers have discovered a number of security issues, including 8 critical, 3 medium, and 15 low-severity vulnerabilities in the popular...

Over the past few years, Internet users globally have grown increasingly aware of online privacy and security issues due to mass monitoring and surveillance by government agencies, making them adopt encryption software and services. But it turns out that hackers are taking advantage of this opportunity by creating and distributing fake versions of encryption tools in order to infect as many victims as possible. Kaspersky Lab has revealed an advanced persistent threat (APT) group, nicknamed StrongPity , which has put a lot of efforts in targeting users of software designed for encrypting data and communications. The StrongPity APT group has been using watering-hole attacks, infected installers, and malware for many years to target users of encryption software by compromising legitimate sites or setting up their own malicious copycat sites. Watering hole attacks are designed to lure specific groups of users to their interest-based sites that typically house malicious files or...

After TrueCrypt mysteriously discontinued itself, VeraCrypt became the most popular open source disk encryption software used by activists, journalists, and privacy conscious people. Due to the huge popularity of VeraCrypt, security researchers from the OSTIF ( The Open Source Technology Improvement Fund ) announced at the beginning of this month that it had agreed to audit VeraCrypt independently. Using funds donated by DuckDuckGo and VikingVPN, the OSTIC hired vulnerability researchers from QuarksLab to lead the audit, which would look for zero-day vulnerabilities and other security holes in VeraCrypt's code. Now, the most troubling part comes here: The OSTIF announced Saturday that its confidential PGP-encrypted communications with QuarkLabs about the security audit of VeraCrypt were mysteriously intercepted. "We have now had a total of four email messages disappear without a trace, stemming from multiple independent senders." the OSTIF said . "Not ...

Ransomware has risen dramatically since last few years and is currently one of the most popular threats on the Internet. The Ransomware infections have become so sophisticated with the time that victims end up paying ransom in order to get their critical and sensitive data back. But if you are infected with Petya Ransomware , there is good news for you. You can unlock your infected computer without paying the hefty ransom. Thanks to the Petya author who left a bug in the Ransomware code. What is Petya Ransomware? Petya is a nasty piece of ransomware that emerged two weeks ago and worked very differently from any other ransomware. The ransomware targets the victims by rebooting their Windows computers, encrypting the hard drive's master boot file, and rendering the master boot record inoperable. Also Read:  How to Decrypt CoinVault and Bitcryptor Ransomware A master boot record (MBR) is the information in the first sector of any hard disk that ide...

Have you been infected with the insidious CoinVault or Bitcryptor ransomware? If so, there is some potentially good news for you. You may now recover your encrypted files for FREE! – Thanks to the efforts of Dutch police and antivirus maker Kaspersky Lab. Security researchers from Kaspersky Lab and the Dutch Public Prosecution Service have obtained and published the last set of encryption keys from command-and-control (C&C) servers used by two related ransomware threats – CoinVault and Bitcryptor . Security researchers first observed CoinVault ransomware attacks in May 2014. Since then, CoinVault has made more than 1,500 victims in more than 108 countries. In April 2015, the Dutch police obtained ' Decryption keys ' database from a seized command and control server of CoinVault. Ransomware Decryption Tool Those decryption keys were then used by Kaspersky Lab to set up a Ransomware Decryptor Service , which included a set of around 750 decryp...

Encrypting your sensitive data is important. As you may know, CIA... C onfidentiality I ntegrity A vailability ...are the essential elements of Information Security. There are a number of tools and methods available out there, but not all encryption tools are same. We are now living in an era where everyone is watching everyone else, and now you need to pay extra attention before choosing any tool. VeraCrypt , a TrueCrypt alternative, is an open source file encryption software designed to protect your online privacy. VeraCrypt enters the market within months after TrueCrypt died , almost similar to it, but with enhancements to further secure your data. A week ago, latest version VeraCrypt 1.12 released with a new feature called PIM, which stands for " Personal Iterations Multiplier ". PIM (Personal Iterations Multiplier) is a new parameter introduced in VeraCrypt 1.12 to secure your data. PIM is basically a secret numerical value that...

The USB flash drives or memory sticks are an excellent way to store and carry data and applications for access on any system you come across. With storage spaces already reaching 256 gigabytes, nowadays USB drives are often larger than past's hard drives. Thanks to increased storage capacity and low prices, you can easily store all your personal data on a tiny, easy-to-carry, USB memory stick. The USB drive is a device that is used by almost everyone today. However, there's a downside… I think you'll agree with me when I say: USB sticks are easily lost or stolen. Aren't they? However, in today's post I am going to show you how to use your USB drives without fear of being misplaced. If you are not aware, the leading cause of data breaches for the past few years has been the loss or theft of laptops and USB storage devices. However, USB flash memory sticks are generally treated with far less care than laptops, and criminals seeking for corporate devices could cost your c...

Last week, I have to communicate with my friend overseas in China. We both were aware that our email communications were being monitored. So, we both were forced to install and use a fully-fledged encrypted email system. Although it appeared to be very secure, it was quite cumbersome to handle. If you are ever faced with the same situation, I am here to introduce you a very simple and easy-to-use approach to encrypt your files and send them to the person you want to communicate with. Here's the Kicker: You don't even need to install any software or sign up to any website in order to use the file encryption service. So, what do I have today in my box? " Otr.to " — an open-source peer-to-peer browser-based messaging application that offers secure communication by making use of "Off-the-Record" (OTR) Messaging, a cryptographic protocol for encrypting instant messaging applications. We first introduced you Otr.to two months ago. At that time,...

The Security audit of TrueCrypt disk-encryption software has been completed, with no evidence of any critical design vulnerabilities or deliberate backdoors in its code. TrueCrypt -- one of the world's most-used open source file encryption software used by Millions of privacy and security enthusiasts -- is being audited from past two years by a team of security researchers to assess if it could be easily exploited and cracked. Hopefully, it has cleared the second phase of the audit. TrueCrypt is a free, open-source and cross-platform encryption program available for Windows, OSX and Linux that can be used to encrypt individual folders or encrypt entire hard drive partitions including the system partition. NO NSA BACKDOORS Security Auditors and Cryptography Experts at NCC took an initiative to perform a public information security audit of TrueCrypt in response to the concerns that National Security Agency (NSA) may have tampered with it, according to a leaked cl...