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Even with the growing awareness about cybersecurity, many myths about it are prevalent. These misconceptions can be a barrier to effective security.  The first step to ensure the security of your business is to separate the false information, myths, and rumors from the truth. Here, we're busting some common cybersecurity myths. Read on to find out which of the following you thought were true. Cybersecurity Myths vs. Truths Myth #1 — Too much security diminishes productivity There is a common idea that increased security makes it difficult for even employees to access what they need, not just hackers. Strict security policies such as regular monitoring and access control are believed to hinder productivity at work. However, doing away with security may have far-reaching consequences for your business. A successful attack like a  DDoS attack or ransomware can bring your business to a standstill. Employees might not be able to access important files, networks, and info...

Multiple backdoors have been discovered during a penetration test in the firmware of a widely used voice over Internet Protocol (VoIP) appliance from Auerswald, a German telecommunications hardware manufacturer, that could be abused to gain full administrative access to the devices. "Two backdoor passwords were found in the firmware of the  COMpact 5500R PBX ," researchers from RedTeam Pentesting said in a  technical   analysis  published Monday. "One backdoor password is for the secret user ' Schandelah ', the other can be used for the highest-privileged user ' admin .' No way was discovered to disable these backdoors." The vulnerability has been assigned the identifier  CVE-2021-40859  and carries a critical severity rating of 9.8. Following responsible disclosure on September 10, Auerswald addressed the problem in a firmware update (version 8.2B) released in November 2021. "Firmware Update 8.2B contains important security updates that you...

Facebook's parent company Meta Platforms on Monday said it has filed a federal lawsuit in the U.S. state of California against bad actors who operated more than 39,000 phishing websites that impersonated its digital properties to mislead unsuspecting users into divulging their login credentials. The social engineering scheme involved the creation of rogue webpages that masqueraded as the login pages of Facebook, Messenger, Instagram, and WhatsApp, on which victims were prompted to enter their usernames and passwords that were then harvested by the defendants. The tech giant is also seeking $500,000 from the anonymous actors. The attacks were carried out using a relay service, Ngrok , that redirected internet traffic to the phishing websites in a manner that concealed the true location of the fraudulent infrastructure. Meta said the volume of these phishing attacks ramped up in volume since March 2021 and that it worked with the relay service to suspend thousands of URLs to the...

Researchers have disclosed security vulnerabilities in handover, a fundamental mechanism that undergirds modern cellular networks, which could be exploited by adversaries to launch denial-of-service (DoS) and man-in-the-middle (MitM) attacks using low-cost equipment. The "vulnerabilities in the handover procedure are not limited to one handover case only but they impact all different handover cases and scenarios that are based on unverified measurement reports and signal strength thresholds," researchers Evangelos Bitsikas and Christina Pöpper from the New York University Abu Dhabi said in a  new paper . "The problem affects all generations since 2G (GSM), remaining unsolved so far." Handover , also known as handoff, is a process in telecommunications in which a phone call or a data session is transferred from one  cell site  (aka base station) to another cell tower without losing connectivity during the transmission. This method is crucial to establishing cellul...

The last several years have seen an ever-increasing number of cyber-attacks, and while the frequency of such attacks has increased, so too has the resulting damage. One needs only to look at  CISA's list of significant cyber incidents  to appreciate the magnitude of the problem. In May of 2021, for example, a ransomware attack brought down the Colonial Pipeline, causing a serious fuel disruption for much of the United States. Just last month, a hacking group gained access to call logs and text messages from telecommunications carriers all over the world. These are just two of dozens of cyber-attacks occurring this year. Because of these and other cyber security incidents, the Department of Homeland Security issues a  compulsory directive  to federal agencies to better protect federal information systems and the data that they contain against cyber-attack. This directive is based around  CISA's catalog of vulnerabilities  that are known to pose a signific...

A U.S. federal government commission associated with international rights has been targeted by a backdoor that reportedly compromised its internal network in what the researchers described as a "classic APT-type operation."  "This attack could have given total visibility of the network and complete control of a system and thus could be used as the first step in a multi-stage attack to penetrate this, or other networks more deeply," Czech security company Avast  said  in a report published last week. The name of the federal entity was not disclosed, but reports from  Ars Technica  and  The Record  tied it to the U.S. Commission on International Religious Freedom ( USCIRF ). Avast said it was making its findings public after unsuccessful attempts to directly notify the agency about the intrusion and through other channels put in place by the U.S. government. At this stage, only "parts of the attack puzzle" have been uncovered, leaving the door open ...

A malicious Android app with more than 500,000 downloads from the Google Play app store has been found hosting malware that stealthily exfiltrates users' contact lists to an attacker-controlled server and signs up users to unwanted paid premium subscriptions without their knowledge. The latest Joker malware was found in a messaging-focused app named  Color Message  ("com.guo.smscolor.amessage"), which has since been removed from the official app marketplace. In addition, it has been observed simulating clicks in order to generate revenue from malicious ads and connecting to servers located in Russia. Color Message "accesses users' contact list and exfiltrates it over the network [and] automatically subscribes to unwanted paid services," mobile security firm Pradeo  noted . "To make it difficult to be removed, the application has the capability to hides it icon once installed." "We is [sic] committed to ensuring that the app is as useful ...