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Security researchers have discovered a series of new vulnerabilities in EOS blockchain platform, one of which could allow remote hackers to take complete control over the node servers running the critical blockchain-based applications. EOS is an open source smart contract platform, known as 'Blockchain 3.0,' that allows developers to build decentralized applications over blockchain infrastructure, just like Ethereum. Discovered by Chinese security researchers at Qihoo 360 —Yuki Chen of Vulcan team and Zhiniang Peng of Core security team—the vulnerability is a buffer out-of-bounds write issue which resides in the function used by nodes server to parse contracts. To achieve remote code execution on a targeted node, all an attacker needs to do is upload a maliciously crafted WASM file (a smart contract) written in WebAssembly to the server. As soon as the vulnerable process parser reads the WASM file, the malicious payload gets executed on the node, which could then al

German security researchers claim to have found a new practical attack against virtual machines (VMs) protected using AMD's Secure Encrypted Virtualization (SEV) technology that could allow attackers to recover plaintext memory data from guest VMs. AMD's Secure Encrypted Virtualization (SEV) technology, which comes with EPYC line of processors, is a hardware feature that encrypts the memory of each VM in a way that only the guest itself can access the data, protecting it from other VMs/containers and even from an untrusted hypervisor. Discovered by researchers from the Fraunhofer Institute for Applied and Integrated Security in Munich, the page-fault side channel attack, dubbed SEVered, takes advantage of lack in the integrity protection of the page-wise encryption of the main memory, allowing a malicious hypervisor to extract the full content of the main memory in plaintext from SEV-encrypted VMs. Here's the outline of the SEVered attack, as briefed in the paper :

Imagine a world where the software that powers your favorite apps, secures your online transactions, and keeps your digital life could be outsmarted and taken over by a cleverly disguised piece of code. This isn't a plot from the latest cyber-thriller; it's actually been a reality for years now. How this will change – in a positive or negative direction – as artificial intelligence (AI) takes on a larger role in software development is one of the big uncertainties related to this brave new world. In an era where AI promises to revolutionize how we live and work, the conversation about its security implications cannot be sidelined. As we increasingly rely on AI for tasks ranging from mundane to mission-critical, the question is no longer just, "Can AI  boost cybersecurity ?" (sure!), but also "Can AI  be hacked? " (yes!), "Can one use AI  to hack? " (of course!), and "Will AI  produce secure software ?" (well…). This thought leadership article is about the latter. Cydrill  (a

Researchers have found that even after having an advanced encryption scheme in place, more than 100 million Internet-of-Things (IoT) devices from thousands of vendors are vulnerable to a downgrade attack that could allow attackers to gain unauthorized access to your devices. The issue resides in the implementation of Z-Wave protocol —a wireless, radio frequency (RF) based communications technology that is primarily being used by home automation devices to communicate with each other. Z-Wave protocol has been designed to offer an easy process to set up pairing and remotely control appliances—such as lighting control, security systems, thermostats, windows, locks, swimming pools and garage door openers—over a distance of up to 100 meters (330 feet). The latest security standard for Z-Wave, called S2 security framework, uses an advanced key exchange mechanism, i.e., Elliptic-Curve Diffie-Hellman (ECDH) anonymous key agreement protocol, to share unique network keys between the con

More than half a million routers and storage devices in dozens of countries have been infected with a piece of highly sophisticated IoT botnet malware, likely designed by Russia-baked state-sponsored group. Cisco's Talos cyber intelligence unit have discovered an advanced piece of IoT botnet malware, dubbed VPNFilter , that has been designed with versatile capabilities to gather intelligence, interfere with internet communications, as well as conduct destructive cyber attack operations. The malware has already infected over 500,000 devices in at least 54 countries, most of which are small and home offices routers and internet-connected storage devices from Linksys, MikroTik, NETGEAR, and TP-Link. Some network-attached storage (NAS) devices known to have been targeted as well. VPNFilter is a multi-stage, modular malware that can steal website credentials and monitor industrial controls or SCADA systems, such as those used in electric grids, other infrastructure and factori

Even after being aware of various active cyber attacks against the GPON Wi-Fi routers, if you haven't yet taken them off the Internet, then be careful—because a new botnet has joined the GPON party, which is exploiting an undisclosed zero-day vulnerability in the wild. Security researchers from Qihoo 360 Netlab have warned of at least one botnet operator exploiting a new zero-day vulnerability in the Gigabit-capable Passive Optical Network (GPON) routers, manufactured by South Korea-based DASAN Zhone Solutions. The botnet, dubbed TheMoon, which was first seen in 2014 and has added at least 6 IoT device exploits to its successor versions since 2017, now exploits a newly undisclosed zero-day flaw for Dasan GPON routers. Netlab researchers successfully tested the new attack payload on two different versions of GPON home router, though they didn't disclose details of the payload or release any further details of the new zero-day vulnerability to prevent more attacks. Th

Chinese security researchers have discovered more than a dozen vulnerabilities in the onboard compute units of BMW cars, some of which can be exploited remotely to compromise a vehicle. The security flaws have been discovered during a year-long security audit conducted by researchers from Keen Security Lab, a cybersecurity research unit of Chinese firm Tencent, between January 2017 and February 2018. In March 2018, the team responsibly disclosed 14 different vulnerabilities directly to the BMW Group, which affects its vehicles since at least 2012. These are the same group of researchers who have previously found multiple vulnerabilities in various in-car modules used by Tesla , that could have been exploited to achieve remote controls on a target car. Now that BMW started rolling out patches for the vulnerabilities to car owners, the researchers have gone public with a 26-page technical report [ PDF ] describing their findings, though they avoided publishing some important t

Widespread routers' DNS hijacking malware that recently found targeting Android devices has now been upgraded its capabilities to target iOS devices as well as desktop users. Dubbed Roaming Mantis , the malware was initially found hijacking Internet routers last month to distribute Android banking malware designed to steal users' login credentials and the secret code for two-factor authentication. According to security researchers at Kaspersky Lab s, the criminal group behind the Roaming Mantis campaign has broadened their targets by adding phishing attacks for iOS devices, and cryptocurrency mining script for PC users. Moreover, while the initial attacks were designed to target users from South East Asia–including South Korea, China Bangladesh, and Japan–the new campaign now support 27 languages to expand its operations to infect people across Europe and the Middle East. How the Roaming Mantis Malware Works Similar to the previous version, the new Roaming Mantis

Last week, we reported about the first network-based remote Rowhammer attack, dubbed Throwhammer , which involves the exploitation a known vulnerability in DRAM through network cards using remote direct memory access (RDMA) channels. However, a separate team of security researchers has now demonstrated a second network-based remote Rowhammer technique that can be used to attack systems using uncached memory or flush instruction while processing the network requests. The research was carried out by researchers who discovered Meltdown and Spectre CPU vulnerabilities, which is independent of the Amsterdam researchers who presented a series of Rowhammer attacks, including Throwhammer published last week. If you are unaware, Rowhammer is a critical issue with recent generation dynamic random access memory (DRAM) chips in which repeatedly accessing a row of memory can cause "bit flipping" in an adjacent row, allowing attackers to change the contents of the memory. The

For the second time in less than a week, users of the popular end-to-end encrypted Signal messaging app have to update their desktop applications once again to patch another severe code injection vulnerability. Discovered Monday by the same team of security researchers, the newly discovered vulnerability poses the same threat as the previous one, allowing remote attackers to inject malicious code on the recipients' Signal desktop app just by sending them a message—without requiring any user interaction. To understand more about the first code injection vulnerability ( CVE-2018-10994 ), you can read our previous article covering how researchers find the Signal flaw and how it works. The only difference between the two is that the previous flaw resides in the function that handles links shared in the chat, whereas the new vulnerability (CVE-2018-11101) exists in a different function that handles the validation of quoted messages, i.e., quoting a previous message in a reply

A Google security researcher has discovered a critical remote command injection vulnerability in the DHCP client implementation of Red Hat Linux and its derivatives like Fedora operating system. The vulnerability, tracked as CVE-2018-1111 , could allow attackers to execute arbitrary commands with root privileges on targeted systems. Whenever your system joins a network, it's the DHCP client application which allows your system to automatically receive network configuration parameters, such as an IP address and DNS servers, from the DHCP (Dynamic Host Control Protocol) server. The vulnerability resides in the NetworkManager integration script included in the DHCP client packages which is configured to obtain network configuration using the DHCP protocol. Felix Wilhelm from the Google security team found that attackers with a malicious DHCP server, or connected to the same network as the victim, can exploit this flaw by spoofing DHCP responses, eventually allowing them to run

Adobe has just released new versions of its Acrobat DC, Reader and Photoshop CC for Windows and macOS users that patch 48 vulnerabilities in its software. A total of 47 vulnerabilities affect Adobe Acrobat and Reader applications, and one critical remote code execution flaw has been patched in Adobe Photoshop CC. Out of 47, Adobe Acrobat and Reader affect with 24 critical vulnerabilities —categorized as Double Free, Heap Overflow, Use-after-free, Out-of-bounds write, Type Confusion, and Untrusted pointer dereference—which if exploited, could allow arbitrary code execution in the context of the targeted user. Rest of the 23 flaws, including Security Bypass, Out-of-bounds read, Memory Corruption, NTLM SSO hash theft, and HTTP POST newline injection via XFA submission, are marked as important and can lead to information disclosure or security bypass. The above-listed vulnerabilities impact the Windows and macOS versions of Acrobat DC (Consumer and Classic 2015), Acrobat Rea

With a heavy heart, security researchers have early released the details of a set of vulnerabilities discovered in email clients for two widely used email encryption standards—PGP and S/MIME—after someone leaked their paper on the Internet, which was actually scheduled for tomorrow. PGP and S/MIME are popular end-to-end encryption standards used to encrypt emails in a way that no one, not even the company, government, or cyber criminals, can spy on your communication. Before explaining how the vulnerability works, it should be noted that the flaw doesn't reside in the email encryption standards itself; instead, it affects a few email clients/plugins that incorrectly implemented the technologies. Dubbed eFail by the researchers, the vulnerabilities, as described in our previous early-warning article , could allow potential attackers to decrypt the content of your end-to-end encrypted emails in plaintext, even for messages sent in the past. According to the paper released

A critical remote code execution vulnerability has been discovered in the popular Electron web application framework that could allow attackers to execute malicious code on victims' computers. Electron is an open source app development framework that powers thousands of widely-used desktop applications including WhatsApp, Skype, Signal, Wordpress, Slack, GitHub Desktop, Atom, Visual Studio Code, and Discord. Besides its own modules, Electron framework also allows developers to create hybrid desktop applications by integrating Chromium and Node.js framework through APIs. Since Node.js is a robust framework for server-side applications, having access to its APIs indirectly gives Electron-based apps more control over the operating system installed on the server. To prevent unauthorised or unnecessary access to Node.js APIs, Electron framework by default sets the value of "webviewTag" to false in its "webPreferences" configuration file, which then sets &

Note— the technical details of the vulnerabilities introduced in this article has now been released, so you should also read our latest article to learn how the eFail attack works and what users can do to prevent themselves. An important warning for people using widely used email encryption tools—PGP and S/MIME—for sensitive communication. A team of European security researchers has released a warning about a set of critical vulnerabilities discovered in PGP and S/Mime encryption tools that could reveal your encrypted emails in plaintext. What's worse? The vulnerabilities also impact encrypted emails you sent in the past. PGP, or Pretty Good Privacy, is an open source end-to-end encryption standard used to encrypt emails in a way that no one, not even the company, government, or cyber criminals, can spy on your communication. S/MIME, Secure/Multipurpose Internet Mail Extensions, is an asymmetric cryptography-based technology that allows users to send digitally signed

Security researchers have discovered a severe vulnerability in the popular end-to-end encrypted Signal messaging app for Windows and Linux desktops which could allow remote attackers to execute malicious code on recipients system just by sending a message—without requiring any user interaction. Discovered by Alfredo Ortega, a software security consultant from Argentina, the vulnerability was announced on Twitter just a few hours ago with a proof-of-concept video, demonstrating how a javascript payload sent over Signal for desktop app successfully got executed on the recipient's system. Although technical details of the vulnerability have not been revealed as of now, the issue appears to be a remote code execution vulnerability in Signal or at least something very close to persistent cross-site scripting (XSS) which eventually could allow attackers to inject malicious code onto targeted Windows and Linux systems. "For the time being, we can only confirm the execution

Luring users on social media to visit lookalike version of popular websites that pop-up a legitimate-looking Chrome extension installation window is one of the most common modus operandi of cybercriminals to spread malware. Security researchers are again warning users of a new malware campaign that has been active since at least March this year and has already infected more than 100,000 users worldwide. Dubbed Nigelthorn, the malware is rapidly spreading through socially engineered links on Facebook and infecting victims' systems with malicious browser extensions that steal their social media credentials, install cryptocurrency miners, and engage them in click fraud. The malware was pushed through at least seven different Chrome browser extensions—all were hosted on Google's official Chrome Web Store. These malicious Chrome browser extensions were first discovered by researchers at cybersecurity firm Radware, after a "well-protected network" of one of its custo

Exploitation of Rowhammer attack just got easier. Dubbed ' Throwhammer ,' the newly discovered technique could allow attackers to launch Rowhammer attack on the targeted systems just by sending specially crafted packets to the vulnerable network cards over the local area network. Known since 2012, Rowhammer is a severe issue with recent generation dynamic random access memory (DRAM) chips in which repeatedly accessing a row of memory can cause "bit flipping" in an adjacent row, allowing anyone to change the contents of computer memory. The issue has since been exploited in a number of ways to achieve remote code execution on the vulnerable computers and servers. Just last week, security researchers detailed a proof-of-concept Rowhammer attack technique, dubbed GLitch , that leverages embedded graphics processing units (GPUs) to carry out Rowhammer attacks against Android devices. However, all previously known Rowhammer attack techniques required privilege escal

Well, that did not take long. Within just 10 days of the disclosure of two critical vulnerabilities in GPON router at least 5 botnet families have been found exploiting the flaws to build an army of million devices. Security researchers from Chinese-based cybersecurity firm Qihoo 360 Netlab have spotted 5 botnet families, including Mettle, Muhstik, Mirai, Hajime, and Satori, making use of the GPON exploit in the wild. As detailed in our previous post, Gigabit-capable Passive Optical Network (GPON) routers manufacturer by South Korea-based DASAN Zhone Solutions have been found vulnerable to an authentication bypass ( CVE-2018-10561 ) and a root-RCE ( CVE-2018-10562 ) flaws that eventually allow remote attackers to take full control of the device. Shortly after the details of the vulnerabilities went public, 360 Netlab researchers warned of threat actors exploiting both the flaws to hijack and add the vulnerable routers into their botnet malware networks. Now, the researche