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Memcached reflections that recently fueled two most largest amplification DDoS attacks in the history have also helped other cybercriminals launch nearly 15,000 cyber attacks against 7,131 unique targets in last ten days, a new report revealed. Chinese Qihoo 360's Netlab, whose global DDoS monitoring service ' DDosMon ' initially spotted the Memcached-based DDoS attacks, has published a blog post detailing some new statistics about the victims and sources of these attacks. The list of famous online services and websites which were hit by massive DDoS attacks since 24th February includes Google, Amazon, QQ.com, 360.com, PlayStation, OVH Hosting, VirusTotal, Comodo, GitHub ( 1.35 Tbps attack ), Royal Bank, Minecraft and RockStar games, Avast, Kaspersky, PornHub, Epoch Times newspaper, and Pinterest. Overall, the victims are mainly based in the United States, China, Hong Kong, South Korea, Brazil, France, Germany, the United Kingdom, Canada, and the Netherlands.

Microsoft has confirmed that the company is planning to convert Windows 10 S from a dedicated operating system to a special " S Mode " that will be available in all versions of Windows. Windows 10 S, a new operating system designed for simplicity, security, and speed, was released by Microsoft last year. It locks a computer down to run applications only downloaded from official Windows Store, but the slimmed-down and restricted flavor of Windows did not exactly turn out to be a success. Therefore, the company has now decided Windows 10 S be offered as an optional mode rather than a dedicated operating system. Windows 10 S was developed to simplify administration for school or business sysadmins that want the 'low-hassle' guaranteed performance version. It has been designed to deliver predictable performance and quality through Microsoft-verified apps via the Microsoft Store. However, in a blog post published Wednesday, the corporate VP of Microsoft's

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

Two days ago, Microsoft encountered a rapidly spreading cryptocurrency-mining malware that infected almost 500,000 computers within just 12 hours and successfully blocked it to a large extent. Dubbed Dofoil , aka Smoke Loader , the malware was found dropping a cryptocurrency miner program as payload on infected Windows computers that mines Electroneum coins, yet another cryptocurrency, for attackers using victims' CPUs. On March 6, Windows Defender suddenly detected more than 80,000 instances of several variants of Dofoil that raised the alarm at Microsoft Windows Defender research department, and within the next 12 hours, over 400,000 instances were recorded. The research team found that all these instances, rapidly spreading across Russia, Turkey, and Ukraine, were carrying a digital coin-mining payload, which masqueraded as a legitimate Windows binary to evade detection. However, Microsoft has not mentioned how these instances were delivered to such a massive audienc

A medium yet critical vulnerability has been discovered in Cisco Prime Collaboration Provisioning software that could allow a local attacker to elevate privileges to root and take full control of a system. Cisco Prime Collaboration Provisioning (PCP) application allows administrators to remotely control the installation and management of Cisco communication devices (integrated IP telephony, video, voicemail) deployed in the company and services for its subscribers. The vulnerability (CVE-2018-0141) is due to a hard-coded password for Secure Shell (SSH), which could be exploited by a local attacker to connect to the PCP's Linux operating system and gain low-level privileges. Cisco PCP Hard-Coded Password Flaw According to an advisory released by Cisco, with low-level privileges, an attacker could then elevate its privileges to root and take full control of the affected devices. Although this vulnerability has been given a Common Vulnerability Scoring System (CVSS) bas

Security researchers have discovered a "kill switch" that could help companies protect their websites under massive DDoS attack launched using vulnerable Memcached servers. Massive Memcached reflection DDoS attacks with an unprecedented amplification factor of 50,000 recently resulted in some of the largest DDoS attacks in history . To make matter even worse, someone released proof-of-concept (PoC) exploit code for Memcached amplification attack yesterday, making it easier for even script kiddies to launch massive cyber attacks. Despite multiple warnings, more than 12,000 vulnerable Memcached servers with UDP support enabled are still accessible on the Internet, which could fuel more cyber attacks soon. However, the good news is that researchers from Corero Network Security found a technique using which DDoS victims can send back a simple command, i.e., "shutdown\r\n", or "flush_all\r\n", in a loop to the attacking Memcached servers in order