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An anonymous hacker with an online alias "SandboxEscaper" today released proof-of-concept (PoC) exploit code for a new zero-day vulnerability affecting Windows 10 operating system—that's his/her 5th publicly disclosed Windows zero-day exploit [ 1 , 2 , 3 ] in less than a year. Published on GitHub , the new Windows 10 zero-day vulnerability is a privilege escalation issue that could allow a local attacker or malware to gain and run code with administrative system privileges on the targeted machines, eventually allowing the attacker to gain full control of the machine. The vulnerability resides in Task Scheduler, a utility that enables Windows users to schedule the launch of programs or scripts at a predefined time or after specified time intervals. SandboxEscaper's exploit code makes use of SchRpcRegisterTask, a method in Task Scheduler to register tasks with the server, which doesn't properly check for permissions and can, therefore, be used to set an arb...

Elastic, the company behind the most widely used enterprise search engine ElasticSearch and the Elastic Stack, today announced that it has decided to make core security features of the Elastic Stack free and accessible to all users. ELK Stack or Elastic Stack is a collection of three powerful open source projects—Elasticsearch, Logstash, and Kibana—that many large and small companies are using to format, search, analyze, and visualize a large amount of data in real time. In recent months, we have seen how thousands of instances of insecure, poorly configured Elasticsearch and Kibana servers had left millions of users sensitive data exposed on the Internet. Since the free version of Elastic Stack by default does not have any authentication or authorization mechanism, many developers and administrators fail to properly implement important security features manually. The core security features—like encrypted communication, role-based access control, authentication realms—in p...

High-quality cybersecurity posture is typically regarded as the exclusive domain of the large and heavy resourced enterprises – those who can afford a multi-product security stack and a skilled security team to operate it. This implies a grave risk to all organizations who are not part of this group, since the modern threat landscape applies to all, regardless of size and vertical. What is less commonly known is that by following basic and well-defined practices and wise security product choices, any organization can level up its defenses to a much higher standard. "At the end of the day it comes down to strategic planning," says Eyal Gruner, CEO and co-founder of Cynet, "rather than thinking in term of specific product or need, zoom out and breakdown the challenge to its logical parts – what do you need to do proactively on an on-going basis, while you're under attack and when you manage a recovery process." From the various frameworks of security b...

SaaS Adoption is Skyrocketing, Resilience Hasn't Kept Pace SaaS platforms have revolutionized how businesses operate. They simplify collaboration, accelerate deployment, and reduce the overhead of managing infrastructure. But with their rise comes a subtle, dangerous assumption: that the convenience of SaaS extends to resilience. It doesn't. These platforms weren't built with full-scale data protection in mind . Most follow a shared responsibility model — wherein the provider ensures uptime and application security, but the data inside is your responsibility. In a world of hybrid architectures, global teams, and relentless cyber threats, that responsibility is harder than ever to manage. Modern organizations are being stretched across: Hybrid and multi-cloud environments with decentralized data sprawl Complex integration layers between IaaS, SaaS, and legacy systems Expanding regulatory pressure with steeper penalties for noncompliance Escalating ransomware threats and inside...

Google has reportedly suspended all businesses with the world's second-biggest smartphone maker, Huawei, and revoked its Android license effective immediately—a move that will have a drastic impact on Huawei devices across the globe. Revoking Android license means Huawei future smartphones will no longer have access to Android updates and apps like Gmail or the Play Store, as well as Google technical support beyond services that are publicly available via open source licensing, Reuters report. Why? That's because last week, U.S. President Donald Trump signed an executive order declaring a national emergency banning foreign companies—over surveillance fear—from doing telecommunication business in the United States without the government's approval. About the executive order, White House Press Secretary Sarah Sanders said in a statement that President Trump "has made it clear that this Administration will do what it takes to keep America safe and prosperous, an...

The German software company behind TeamViewer, one of the most popular software in the world that allows users to access and share their desktops remotely, was reportedly compromised in 2016, the German newspaper Der Spiegel revealed today. TeamViewer is popular remote-support software that allows you to securely share your desktop or take full control of other's PC over the Internet from anywhere in the world. With millions of users making use of its service, TeamViewer has always been a target of interest for attackers. According to the publication , the cyber attack was launched by hackers with Chinese origin who used Winnti trojan malware, activities of which have previously been found linked to the Chinese state intelligence system. Active since at least 2010, Winnti advanced persistent threat (APT) group has previously launched a series of financial attacks against software and gaming organizations primarily in the United States, Japan, and South Korea. The group i...

Note: We have updated this story to reflect new information after Stack Overflow changed its original announcement and shared more details on the security incident. Stack Overflow, one of the largest question and answer site for programmers, revealed today that unknown hackers managed to exploit a bug in its development tier and then almost a week after they gained unauthorized access to its production version. Founded by Jeff Atwood and Joel Spolsky in 2008, Stack Overflow is the flagship site of the Stack Exchange Network. With 10 million registered users and over 50 million unique visitors every month, Stack Overflow is very popular among professional and enthusiast programmers. In an older version of the announcement published by Mary Ferguson, VP of Engineering at Stack Overflow, the company confirmed the breach but said it did not find any evidence that hackers accessed customers' accounts or any user data. However, the updated announcement now says that after ...

In a joint effort by several law enforcement agencies from 6 different countries, officials have dismantled a major global organized cybercrime network behind GozNym banking malware . GozNym banking malware is responsible for stealing nearly $100 million from over 41,000 victims across the globe, primarily in the United States and Europe, for years. GozNym was created by combining two known powerful Trojans—Gozi ISFB malware, a banking Trojan that first appeared in 2012 and Nymaim, a Trojan downloader that can also function as ransomware. In a press conference held on Thursday, Europol said the operation was successfully conducted with the cooperation between Bulgaria, Germany, Georgia, Moldova, Ukraine, and the United States. The United States has charged ten members of the GozNym criminal network, 5 of which were arrested during several coordinated searches conducted in Bulgaria, Georgia, Moldova, and Ukraine. However, rest of the five defendants reside in Rus...

A team of security researchers at Microsoft discovered a potentially serious vulnerability in the Bluetooth-supported version of Google's Titan Security Keys that could not be patched with a software update. However, users do not need to worry as Google has announced to offer a free replacement for the affected Titan Security Key dongles. In a security advisory published Wednesday, Google said a "misconfiguration in the Titan Security Keys Bluetooth pairing protocols" could allow an attacker who is physically close to your Security Key (~within 30 feet) to communicate with it or the device to which your key is paired. Launched by Google in August last year, Titan Security Key is a tiny low-cost USB device that offers hardware-based two-factor authentication (2FA) for online accounts with the highest level of protection against phishing attacks. Titan Security Key, which sells for $50 in the Google Store, includes two keys—a USB-A security key with NFC, and a...

Academic researchers today disclosed details of the newest class of speculative execution side-channel vulnerabilities in Intel processors that impacts all modern chips, including the chips used in Apple devices. After the discovery of Spectre and Meltdown processor vulnerabilities earlier last year that put practically every computer in the world at risk, different classes of Spectre and Meltdown variations surfaced again and again. Now, a team of security researchers from multiple universities and security firms has discovered different but more dangerous speculative execution side-channel vulnerabilities in Intel CPUs. The newly discovered flaws could allow attackers to directly steal user-level, as well as system-level secrets from CPU buffers, including user keys, passwords, and disk encryption keys. Speculative execution is a core component of modern processors design that speculatively executes instructions based on assumptions that are considered likely to be true. ...

It's Patch Tuesday—the day when Microsoft releases monthly security updates for its software. Microsoft has software updates to address a total of 79 CVE-listed vulnerabilities in its Windows operating systems and other products, including a critical wormable flaw that can propagate malware from computer to computer without requiring users' interaction. Out of 79 vulnerabilities, 18 issues have been rated as critical and rest Important in severity. Two of the vulnerabilities addressed this month by the tech giant are listed as publicly known, of which one is listed as under active attack at the time of release. May 2019 security updates address flaws in Windows OS, Internet Explorer, Edge, Microsoft Office, and Microsoft Office Services and Web Apps, ChakraCore, .NET Framework, and ASP.NET, Skype for Android, Azure DevOps Server, and the NuGet Package Manager. Critical Wormable RDP Vulnerability The wormable vulnerability ( CVE-2019-0708 ) resides in Remote Desktop...

Adobe today released its monthly software updates to patch a total of 87 security vulnerabilities in its Adobe Acrobat and Reader, Flash Player and Media Encoder, most of which could lead to arbitrary code execution attacks or worse. None of the flaws patched this month in Adobe products has been found exploited in the wild. Out of 87 total flaws, a whopping number of vulnerabilities (i.e., 84 in total) affect Adobe Acrobat and Reader applications alone, where 42 of them are critical and rest 42 are important in severity. Upon successful exploitation, all critical vulnerabilities in Adobe Acrobat and Reader software lead to arbitrary code execution, allowing attackers to take complete control over targeted systems. Adobe has released updated versions of Acrobat and Reader software for Windows and macOS operating systems to address these security vulnerabilities. The update for Adobe Flash Player , which will receive security patch updates until the end of 2020, comes this...

Researchers have discovered a severe vulnerability in Cisco products that could allow attackers to implant persistent backdoor on wide range devices used in enterprises and government networks, including routers, switches, and firewalls. Dubbed Thrangrycat or 😾😾😾, the vulnerability, discovered by researchers from the security firm Red Balloon and identified as CVE-2019-1649, affects multiple Cisco products that support Trust Anchor module (TAm). Trust Anchor module (TAm) is a hardware-based Secure Boot functionality implemented in almost all of Cisco enterprise devices since 2013 that ensures the firmware running on hardware platforms is authentic and unmodified. However, researchers found a series of hardware design flaws that could allow an authenticated attacker to make the persistent modification to the Trust Anchor module via FPGA bitstream modification and load the malicious bootloader. "An attacker with root privileges on the device can modify the contents of...

Though once synonymous with underground networks and black hat hackers, bitcoin and other cryptocurrencies have gone mainstream over the past two years. In 2017, we saw the skyrocket of bitcoin to an all-time high of close to $20,000 followed by a significant decline the following year. But beyond the ups and downs in the market for the world's largest cryptocurrency is a much more sinister story revolving around cyber-attacks of the economy's newest asset class. In 2018, it estimated that as much as $1.7 billion worth of cryptocurrencies were swindled away from investors (likely more) through a variety of means. Whether accomplished through hacking, phishing, or other forms of scamming, it's clear that the crypto industry is facing a serious dilemma with security. For a technological movement based on decentralization and the advantages it offers for security, the number of breaches occurring is startling. Cryptocurrencies offer users a way to send money with...

Whatsapp has recently patched a severe vulnerability that was being exploited by attackers to remotely install surveillance malware on a few "selected" smartphones by simply calling the targeted phone numbers over Whatsapp audio call. Discovered, weaponized and then sold by the Israeli company NSO Group that produces the most advanced mobile spyware on the planet, the WhatsApp exploit installs Pegasus spyware on to Android and iOS devices. According to an advisory published by Facebook, a buffer overflow vulnerability in WhatsApp VOIP stack allows remote attackers to execute arbitrary code on target phones by sending a specially crafted series of SRTCP packets. Apparently, the vulnerability, identified as CVE-2019-3568 , can successfully be exploited to install the spyware and steal data from a targeted Android phone or iPhone by merely placing a WhatsApp call, even when the call is not answered. Also, the victim would not be able to find out about the intrusion af...

The U.S. Department of Justice today announced charges against nine individuals, 6 of which are members of a hacking group called "The Community" and other 3 are former employees of mobile phone providers who allegedly helped them steal roughly $2.5 million worth of the cryptocurrency using a method known as "SIM Swapping." According to the 15-count indictment unsealed today, five Americans and an Irishman related to The Community hacking group are charged with conspiracy to commit wire fraud, as well as wire fraud and aggravated identity theft. Another three Americans, who reportedly are the former employees of mobile phone providers, are charged in a criminal complaint with the wire fraud. SIM Swapping , or SIM Hijacking , is a type of identity theft that typically involves fraudulently porting of the same number to a new SIM card belonging to the attacker. In SIM swapping, attackers social engineer a victim's mobile phone provider by convincing it ...

The U.S. Department of Homeland Security (DHS) and the FBI have issued another joint alert about a new piece of malware that the prolific North Korean APT hacking group Hidden Cobra has actively been using in the wild. Hidden Cobra, also known as Lazarus Group and Guardians of Peace, is believed to be backed by North Korean government and known to launch cyber attacks against media organizations, aerospace, financial and critical infrastructure sectors across the world. The hacking group was the same associated with the 2017 WannaCry ransomware menace , the 2014 Sony Pictures hack , and the SWIFT Banking attack in 2016. Now, the DHS and the FBI have uncovered a new malware variant, dubbed ELECTRICFISH , that Hidden Cobra hackers have been using for secretly tunneling traffic out of compromised computer systems. The malware implements a custom protocol configured with a proxy server/port and proxy username and password, allowing hackers to bypass the compromised system'...

The United States Justice Department today announced charges against a Chinese hacker and his hacking team member for their alleged role in the 2015 massive data breach at health insurance giant Anthem and three other unnamed American companies. Fujie Wang (王 福 杰) and another hacker named John Doe with three different aliases—Deniel Jack, Kim Young, and Zhou Zhihong—are charged with four counts of conspiracy to commit fraud, wire fraud, and damage to a protected computer, according to an indictment [ pdf ] unsealed today in federal court in Indianapolis. In 2015, the hackers managed to breach Anthem, the country's second-largest health insurance company and stole personal information of over 80 Millions of its customers, including their Social Security Numbers, birthdates, email addresses, residential addresses, medical identification numbers, employment information, and income data. The incident marked as one of the worst data breaches in history, with the company paying...

Researchers from Chinese cybersecurity firm Qihoo 360's NetLab have revealed details of an ongoing credit card hacking campaign that is currently stealing payment card information of customers visiting more than 105 e-commerce websites. While monitoring a malicious domain, www.magento-analytics[.]com , for over last seven months, researchers found that the attackers have been injecting malicious JS scripts hosted on this domain into hundreds of online shopping websites. The JavaScript scripts in question include the digital credit card skimming code that when execute on a site, automatically steal payment card information, such as credit card owner name, credit card number, expiration time, CVV information, entered by its customers. In an email Interview, NetLab researcher told The Hacker News that they don't have enough data to determine how hackers infected affected websites on the first place or what vulnerabilities they exploited, but did confirm that all affected ...

A bug hunter has discovered and publicly disclosed details of an unpatched browser address bar spoofing vulnerability that affects popular Chinese UC Browser and UC Browser Mini apps for Android. Developed by Alibaba-owned UCWeb, UC Browser is one of the most popular mobile browsers, specifically in China and India, with a massive user base of more than half a billion users worldwide. According to the details security researcher Arif Khan shared with The Hacker News, the vulnerability resides in the way User Interface on both browsers handles a special built-in feature that was otherwise designed to improve users Google search experience. The vulnerability, which has yet not assigned any CVE identifier, could allow an attacker to control URL string displayed in the address bar, eventually letting a malicious website to pose as some legitimate site. The vulnerability affects the latest UC Browser version 12.11.2.1184 and UC Browser Mini version 12.10.1.1192—that is current...

At the company's I/O 2019 developer conference, Google has announced its plan to introduce two new privacy and security-oriented features in the upcoming versions of its Chrome web browser. In an attempt to allow users to block online tracking, Google has announced two new features—Improved SameSite Cookies and Fingerprinting Protection—that will be previewed by Google in the Chrome web browser later this year. Cookies, also referred to as HTTP cookies or browser cookies, are the small pieces of information that websites store on your computer, which play an important role in improving your online experience. Cookies are created by a web browser when a user loads a particular website, which helps the website to remember information about your visit, like your login information, preferred language, items in the shopping cart and other settings. However, cookies are also being widely used to identify users and track their activities not only on the site that issued a cooki...