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Hundreds of millions of devices, especially Android smartphones and tablets, using Qualcomm chipsets, are vulnerable to a new set of potentially serious vulnerabilities. According to a report cybersecurity firm CheckPoint shared with The Hacker News, the flaws could allow attackers to steal sensitive data stored in a secure area that is otherwise supposed to be the most protected part of a mobile device. The vulnerabilities reside in Qualcomm's Secure Execution Environment (QSEE), an implementation of Trusted Execution Environment (TEE) based on ARM TrustZone technology. Also known as Qualcomm's Secure World, QSEE is a hardware-isolated secure area on the main processor that aims to protect sensitive information and provides a separate secure environment (REE) for executing Trusted Applications. Along with other personal information, QSEE usually contains private encryption keys, passwords, credit, and debit card credentials. Since it is based on the principle of l

What could be even worse than getting hacked? It's the "failure to detect intrusions" that always results in huge losses to the organizations. Utah-based technology company InfoTrax Systems is the latest example of such a security blunder, as the company was breached more than 20 times from May 2014 until March 2016. What's ironic is that the company detected the breach only after it received an alert that its servers had reached maximum storage capacity due to a data archive file that the hacker created. InfoTrax Systems is an American company based in Utah that provides backend operations systems to multi-level marketers, which also includes an extensive amount of sensitive data on their users' compensation, inventory, orders, and accounting. The breach reportedly occurred in May 2014 when the hacker exploited vulnerabilities in InfoTrax's server and its client's website to gain remote control over its server, allowing him to gain access t

In today's digital world, where connectivity is rules all, endpoints serve as the gateway to a business's digital kingdom. And because of this, endpoints are one of hackers' favorite targets.  According to the IDC,  70% of successful breaches start at the endpoint . Unprotected endpoints provide vulnerable entry points to launch devastating cyberattacks. With IT teams needing to protect more endpoints—and more kinds of endpoints—than ever before, that perimeter has become more challenging to defend. You need to improve your endpoint security, but where do you start? That's where this guide comes in.  We've curated the top 10 must-know endpoint security tips that every IT and security professional should have in their arsenal. From identifying entry points to implementing EDR solutions, we'll dive into the insights you need to defend your endpoints with confidence.  1. Know Thy Endpoints: Identifying and Understanding Your Entry Points Understanding your network's

Cyberattacks on small and midsized companies in 2019 cost $200,000 per company on average, mercilessly putting many of them out of business, says CNBC in its analysis of a recent Accenture report. In light of the global cybersecurity skills shortage, the number is set to soar in 2020. Solely in the UK, over 50,000 British SMEs could collapse next year following a cyberattack. This article brings a list of free tools that are already being used to combat these alarming challenges and enabling SMEs to arm themselves against a wide range of cyber offenders. Website Security Test with GDPR and PCI DSS Compliance Scan The problem: It would be hard to come across an SME without a website, or at least a web page on the Internet. Such websites are habitually poorly protected, becoming low-hanging fruit for cybercriminals. Even if the website does not store or handle any payment transactions or otherwise sensitive information, once breached, access to it can be sold in Dark Web mark

Zombieload is back. This time a new variant (v2) of the data-leaking side-channel vulnerability also affects the most recent Intel CPUs, including the latest Cascade Lake, which are otherwise resistant against attacks like Meltdown , Foreshadow and other MDS variants (RIDL and Fallout). Initially discovered in May this year, ZombieLoad is one of the three novel types of microarchitectural data sampling (MDS) speculative execution vulnerabilities that affect Intel processor generations released from 2011 onwards. The first variant of ZombieLoad is a Meltdown-type attack that targets the fill-buffer logic allowing attackers to steal sensitive data not only from other applications and the operating system but also from virtual machines running in the cloud with common hardware. ZombieLoad v2 Affects Latest Intel CPUs Now, the same group of researchers has disclosed details of a second variant of the vulnerability, dubbed ZombieLoad v2 and tracked as CVE-2019-11135 , that r

A team of cybersecurity researchers today disclosed details of two new potentially serious CPU vulnerabilities that could allow attackers to retrieve cryptographic keys protected inside TPM chips manufactured by STMicroelectronics or firmware-based Intel TPMs. Trusted Platform Module (TPM) is a specialized hardware or firmware-based security solution that has been designed to store and protect sensitive information from attackers even when your operating system gets compromised. TMP technology is being used widely by billion of desktops, laptops, servers, smartphones, and even by Internet-of-Things (IoT) devices to protect encryption keys, passwords, and digital certificates. Collectively dubbed as TPM-Fail , both newly found vulnerabilities, as listed below, leverage a timing-based side-channel attack to recover cryptographic keys that are otherwise supposed to remain safely inside the chips. CVE-2019-11090 : Intel fTPM vulnerabilities CVE-2019-16863 : STMicroelectronics

Complying with cyber regulations forms a significant portion of the CISO's responsibility. Compliance is, in fact, one of the major drivers in the purchase and implementation of new security products. But regulations come in multiple different colors and shapes – some are tailored to a specific vertical, while others are industry-agnostic. Some bare explicit consequences for failing to comply, while others have a more guidance-like nature. The Comprehensive Security Guide (download here) , for the first time, provides security executives with a single document that gathers standardized and easy to use templates of all main compliance frameworks: PCI-DSS, HIPAA, NIST Cyber Security Framework and GDPR. Employing an independent auditor is the common practice to ensure one complies with the desired regulation. However, before having an external auditor excavating through the organizations' security stack internals, it makes sense for the security stakeholders to independ

It appears that Facebook at the center of yet another issue involving privacy. Reportedly, multiple iPhone users have come forward on social media complaining that the Facebook app secretly activates their smartphone's camera in the background while they scroll through their Facebook feeds or looking at the photos on the social network. As shown in the Twitter videos below, when users click on an image or video on the social media to full screen and then return it back to normal, an issue with the Facebook app for iOS slightly shifts the app to the right. It opens a space on the left from where users can see the iPhone's camera activated in the background. However, at this moment, it's not clear if it's just an UI bug where Facebook app incorrectly but only accesses the camera interface, or if it also records or uploads something, which, if proven right, would be the most disastrous moment in Facebook's history. Found a @facebook #security & #pri

ZoneAlarm, an internet security software company owned by Israeli cybersecurity firm Check Point Technologies, has suffered a data breach exposing data of its discussion forum users, the company confirmed The Hacker News. With nearly 100 million downloads, ZoneAlarm offers antivirus software, firewall, and additional virus protection solutions to home PC users, small businesses, and mobile phones worldwide. Though neither ZoneAlarm or its parent company Check Point has yet publicly disclosed the security incident, the company quietly sent an alert via email to all affected users over this weekend, The Hacker News learned. The email-based breach notification advised ZoneAlarm forum users to immediately change their forum account passwords, informing them hackers have unauthorizedly gained access to their names, email addresses, hashed passwords, and date of births. Moreover, the company has also clarified that the security incident only affects users registered with the "