web security | Breaking Cybersecurity News | The Hacker News

Lovable , a generative artificial intelligence (AI) powered platform that allows for creating full-stack web applications using text-based prompts, has been found to be the most susceptible to jailbreak attacks, allowing novice and aspiring cybercrooks to set up lookalike credential harvesting pages. "As a purpose-built tool for creating and deploying web apps, its capabilities line up perfectly with every scammer's wishlist," Guardio Labs' Nati Tal said in a report shared with The Hacker News. "From pixel-perfect scam pages to live hosting, evasion techniques, and even admin dashboards to track stolen data – Lovable didn't just participate, it performed. No guardrails, no hesitation." The technique has been codenamed VibeScamming – a play on the term vibe coding, which refers to an AI-dependent programming technique to produce software by describing the problem statement in a few sentences as a prompt to a large language model (LLM) tuned for codin...

When assessing an organization's external attack surface, encryption-related issues (especially SSL misconfigurations) receive special attention . Why? Their widespread use, configuration complexity, and visibility to attackers as well as users make them more likely to be exploited.  This highlights how important your SSL configurations are in maintaining your web application security and minimizing your attack surface. However, research shows that most (53.5%) websites have  inadequate security and that  weak SSL/TLS configuration is amongst the most common application vulnerabilities. Get your SSL configuration right, and you'll enhance your cyber resilience and keep your apps and data safe. Get it wrong, however, and you can increase your organization's attack surface, exposing your business to more cyberattacks. We'll explore the impacts of SSL misconfigurations and explain why they present such a significant attack surface risk. Then, we'll show you how a s...

Everybody knows browser extensions are embedded into nearly every user's daily workflow, from spell checkers to GenAI tools. What most IT and security people don't know is that browser extensions' excessive permissions are a growing risk to organizations. LayerX today announced the release of the Enterprise Browser Extension Security Report 2025 , This report is the first and only report to merge public extension marketplace statistics with real-world enterprise usage telemetry. By doing so, it sheds light on one of the most underestimated threat surfaces in modern cybersecurity: browser extensions. The report reveals several findings that IT and security leaders will find interesting, as they build their plans for H2 2025. This includes information and analysis on how many extensions have risky permissions, which kinds of permissions are given, if extension developers are to be trusted, and more. Below, we bring key statistics from the report. Highlights from the Enterprise Browse...

Explore how relying on CSRF tokens as a security measure against CSRF attacks is a recommended best practice, but in some cases, they are simply not enough. Introduction As per the Open Web Application Security Project (OWASP), CSRF vulnerabilities are recognized as a significant threat and are historically part of their top risks. The implications of CSRF attacks are far-reaching and could lead to critical security implications, such as: Unauthorized actions : Attackers can trick users into executing unwanted actions on websites where they're authenticated. For example, changing account settings, making purchases, or transferring funds. Identity exploitation : The attack works by exploiting the victim's authenticated session, making the application unable to distinguish between legitimate user requests and forged ones. Silent execution : CSRF attacks often happen without the victim's knowledge as they can be hidden in seemingly innocent links, images, or embedded c...

A critical security flaw has been disclosed in the Next.js React framework that could be potentially exploited to bypass authorization checks under certain conditions. The vulnerability, tracked as CVE-2025-29927 , carries a CVSS score of 9.1 out of 10.0. "Next.js uses an internal header x-middleware-subrequest to prevent recursive requests from triggering infinite loops," Next.js said in an advisory.  "It was possible to skip running middleware , which could allow requests to skip critical checks—such as authorization cookie validation—before reaching routes." It's worth noting that CVE-2025-29927 impacts only self-hosted versions that use "next start" with "output: standalone." Next.js apps hosted on Vercel and Netlify, or deployed as static exports, are not affected. The shortcoming has been addressed in versions 12.3.5, 13.5.9, 14.2.25, and 15.2.3. If patching is not an option, it's recommended that users prevent external user ...

The threat actors behind the ClearFake campaign are using fake reCAPTCHA or Cloudflare Turnstile verifications as lures to trick users into downloading malware such as Lumma Stealer and Vidar Stealer. ClearFake , first highlighted in July 2023, is the name given to a threat activity cluster that employs fake web browser update baits on compromised WordPress as a malware distribution vector. The campaign is also known for relying on another technique known as EtherHiding to fetch the next-stage payload by utilizing Binance's Smart Chain (BSC) contracts as a way to make the attack chain more resilient. The end goal of these infection chains is to deliver information-stealing malware capable of targeting both Windows and macOS systems. As of May 2024, ClearFake attacks have adopted what has by now come to be known as ClickFix , a social engineering ploy that involves deceiving users into running malicious PowerShell code under the guise of addressing a non-existent technical i...

A recently disclosed security flaw impacting Apache Tomcat has come under active exploitation in the wild following the release  of a public proof-of-concept (PoC) a mere 30 hours after public disclosure. The vulnerability, tracked as CVE-2025-24813 , affects the below versions - Apache Tomcat 11.0.0-M1 to 11.0.2 Apache Tomcat 10.1.0-M1 to 10.1.34 Apache Tomcat 9.0.0-M1 to 9.0.98 It concerns a case of remote code execution or information disclosure when specific conditions are met - Writes enabled for the default servlet (disabled by default) Support for partial PUT (enabled by default) A target URL for security sensitive uploads that is a sub-directory of a target URL for public uploads Attacker knowledge of the names of security sensitive files being uploaded The security sensitive files are also being uploaded via partial PUT Successful exploitation could permit a malicious user to view security sensitive files or inject arbitrary content into those files by mea...

Malicious actors are exploiting Cascading Style Sheets (CSS), which are used to style and format the layout of web pages, to bypass spam filters and track users' actions. That's according to new findings from Cisco Talos, which said such malicious activities can compromise a victim's security and privacy. "The features available in CSS allow attackers and spammers to track users' actions and preferences, even though several features related to dynamic content (e.g., JavaScript) are restricted in email clients compared to web browsers," Talos researcher Omid Mirzaei said in a report published last week. The insights build upon previous findings from the cybersecurity company about a spike in email threats leveraging hidden text salting in the second half of 2024 with an aim to get around email spam filters and security gateways. This technique particularly entails using legitimate features of the Hypertext Markup Language (HTML) and CSS to include commen...

Cybersecurity researchers have demonstrated a novel technique that allows a malicious web browser extension to impersonate any installed add-on. "The polymorphic extensions create a pixel perfect replica of the target's icon, HTML popup, workflows and even temporarily disables the legitimate extension, making it extremely convincing for victims to believe that they are providing credentials to the real extension," SquareX said in a report published last week. The harvested credentials could then be abused by the threat actors to hijack online accounts and gain unauthorized access to sensitive personal and financial information. The attack affects all Chromium-based web browsers, including Google Chrome, Microsoft Edge, Brave, Opera, and others. The approach banks on the fact that users commonly pin extensions to the browser's toolbar. In a hypothetical attack scenario, threat actors could publish a polymorphic extension to the Chrome Web Store (or any extension m...

A cross-site scripting (XSS) vulnerability in a virtual tour framework has been weaponized by malicious actors to inject malicious scripts across hundreds of websites with the goal of manipulating search results and fueling a spam ads campaign at scale. Security researcher Oleg Zaytsev, in a report shared with The Hacker News, said the campaign – dubbed 360XSS – affected over 350 websites, including government portals, U.S. state government sites, American universities, major hotel chains, news outlets, car dealerships, and several Fortune 500 companies. "This wasn't just a spam operation," the researcher said . "It was an industrial-scale abuse of trusted domains." All these websites have one thing in common: A popular framework called Krpano that's used to embed 360° images and videos to facilitate interactive virtual tours and VR experiences.  Zaytsev said he stumbled upon the campaign after coming across a pornography-related ad listed on Google ...

A high-severity security flaw impacting the Craft content management system (CMS) has been added by the U.S. Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency (CISA) to its Known Exploited Vulnerabilities ( KEV ) catalog, based on evidence of active exploitation. The vulnerability in question is CVE-2025-23209 (CVSS score: 8.1), which impacts Craft CMS versions 4 and 5. It was addressed by the project maintainers in late December 2024 in versions 4.13.8 and 5.5.8. "Craft CMS contains a code injection vulnerability that allows for remote code execution as vulnerable versions have compromised user security keys," the agency said. The vulnerability affects the following version of the software - >= 5.0.0-RC1, < 5.5.5 >= 4.0.0-RC1, < 4.13.8 In an advisory released on GitHub, Craft CMS noted that all unpatched versions of Craft with a compromised security key are impacted by the security defect. "If you can't update to a patched version, then rota...

Cybersecurity researchers are alerting to a new campaign that leverages web injects to deliver a new Apple macOS malware known as FrigidStealer . The activity has been attributed to a previously undocumented threat actor known as TA2727, with the information stealers for other platforms such as Windows ( Lumma Stealer or DeerStealer ) and Android ( Marcher ). TA2727 is a "threat actor that uses fake update themed lures to distribute a variety of malware payloads," the Proofpoint Threat Research Team said in a report shared with The Hacker News.  It's one of the newly identified threat activity clusters alongside TA2726, which is assessed to be a malicious traffic distribution system (TDS) operator that facilitates traffic distribution for other threat actors to deliver malware. The financially motivated threat actor is believed to be active since at least September 2022. TA2726, per the enterprise security firm, acts as a TDS for TA2727 and another threat actor ca...

A widespread phishing campaign has been observed leveraging bogus PDF documents hosted on the Webflow content delivery network (CDN) with an aim to steal credit card information and commit financial fraud. "The attacker targets victims searching for documents on search engines, resulting in access to malicious PDF that contains a CAPTCHA image embedded with a phishing link, leading them to provide sensitive information," Netskope Threat Labs researcher Jan Michael Alcantara said . The activity, ongoing since the second half of 2024, entails users looking for book titles, documents, and charts on search engines like Google to redirect users to PDF files hosted on Webflow CDN. These PDF files come embedded with an image that mimics a CAPTCHA challenge, causing users who click on it to be taken to a phishing page that, this time, hosts a real Cloudflare Turnstile CAPTCHA. In doing so, the attackers aim to lend the process a veneer of legitimacy, fooling victims into think...

Threat actors have been observed leveraging Google Tag Manager (GTM) to deliver credit card skimmer malware targeting Magento-based e-commerce websites. Website security company Sucuri said the code, while appearing to be a typical GTM and Google Analytics script used for website analytics and advertising purposes, contains an obfuscated backdoor capable of providing attackers with persistent access. As of writing, as many as three sites have been found to be infected with the GTM identifier (GTM-MLHK2N68) in question, down from six reported by Sucuri. GTM identifier refers to a container that includes the various tracking codes (e.g., Google Analytics, Facebook Pixel) and rules to be triggered when certain conditions are met. Further analysis has revealed that the malware is being loaded from the Magento database table "cms_block.content," with the GTM tag containing an encoded JavaScript payload that acts as a credit card skimmer. "This script was designed to ...

Threat actors have been observed targeting Internet Information Services (IIS) servers in Asia as part of a search engine optimization (SEO) manipulation campaign designed to install BadIIS malware. "It is likely that the campaign is financially motivated since redirecting users to illegal gambling websites shows that attackers deploy BadIIS for profit," Trend Micro researchers Ted Lee and Lenart Bermejo said in an analysis published last week, Targets of the campaign include IIS servers located in India, Thailand, Vietnam, Philippines, Singapore, Taiwan, South Korea, Japan, and Brazil. These servers are associated with government, universities, technology companies, and telecommunications sectors. Requests to the compromised servers can then be served altered content from attackers, ranging from redirections to gambling sites to connecting to rogue servers that host malware or credential harvesting pages. It's suspected that the activity is the work of a Chinese-s...

Microsoft is warning of an insecure practice wherein software developers are incorporating publicly disclosed ASP.NET machine keys from publicly accessible resources, thereby putting their applications in attackers' pathway. The tech giant's threat intelligence team said it observed limited activity in December 2024 that involved an unknown threat actor using a publicly available, static ASP.NET machine key to inject malicious code and deliver the Godzilla post-exploitation framework. It also noted that it has identified over 3,000 publicly disclosed keys that could be used for these types of attacks, which it's calling ViewState code injection attacks . "Whereas many previously known ViewState code injection attacks used compromised or stolen keys that are often sold on dark web forums, these publicly disclosed keys could pose a higher risk because they are available in multiple code repositories and could have been pushed into development code without modificat...

Three security flaws have been disclosed in the open-source PHP package Voyager that could be exploited by an attacker to achieve one-click remote code execution on affected instances. "When an authenticated Voyager user clicks on a malicious link, attackers can execute arbitrary code on the server," Sonar researcher Yaniv Nizry said in a write-up published earlier this week. The identified issues, which remain unpatched to date despite responsible disclosure on September 11, 2024, are listed below - CVE-2024-55417 - An arbitrary file write vulnerability in the "/admin/media/upload" endpoint CVE-2024-55416 - A reflected cross-site scripting (XSS) vulnerability in the "/admin/compass" endpoint CVE-2024-55415 - An arbitrary file leak and deletion vulnerability  A malicious attacker could leverage Voyager's media upload feature to upload a malicious file in a manner that bypasses MIME type verification, and make use of a polyglot file that ap...

Cybersecurity researchers have exposed a new campaign that targets web servers running PHP-based applications to promote gambling platforms in Indonesia. "Over the past two months, a significant volume of attacks from Python-based bots has been observed, suggesting a coordinated effort to exploit thousands of web apps," Imperva researcher Daniel Johnston said in an analysis. "These attacks appear tied to the proliferation of gambling-related sites, potentially as a response to the heightened government scrutiny ." The Thales-owned company said it has detected millions of requests originating from a Python client that includes a command to install GSocket (aka Global Socket), an open-source tool that can be used to establish a communication channel between two machines regardless of the network perimeter. It's worth noting that GSocket has been put to use in many a cryptojacking operation in recent months, not to mention even exploiting the access provi...