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After more than 20 years in the making, now it's official: APIs are everywhere. In a 2021 survey,  73% of enterprises reported that they already publish more than 50 APIs , and this number is constantly growing. APIs have crucial roles to play in virtually every industry today, and their importance is increasing steadily, as they move to the forefront of business strategies. This comes as no surprise: APIs seamlessly connect disparate apps and devices, bringing business synergies and efficiencies never witnessed before.  However, APIs have vulnerabilities just like any other component of the software. Adding to that, if they aren't rigorously tested from a security standpoint, they can also introduce a whole new array of attack surfaces and expose you to unprecedented risks. If you wait until production to discover API vulnerabilities, you can incur substantial delays. APIs are attractive to attackers, not just businesses Keep in mind that APIs do more than simply connect

Law enforcement authorities in the Netherlands have  arrested  two alleged individuals belonging to a Dutch cybercriminal collective who were involved in developing, selling, and renting sophisticated phishing frameworks to other threat actors in what's known as a "Fraud-as-a-Service" operation. The apprehended suspects, a 24-year-old software engineer and a 15-year-old boy, are said to have been the main developer and seller of the phishing frameworks that were employed to collect login data from bank customers. The attacks primarily singled out users in the Netherlands and Belgium. The 15-year-old suspect has since been released from custody "pending further investigation," Dutch police said. Believed to be active since at least 2020, the cybercriminal syndicate has been codenamed " Fraud Family " by cybersecurity firm Group-IB. The frameworks come with phishing kits, tools designed to steal information, and web panels, which allow the fraudsters

Nearly three weeks after Florida-based software vendor Kaseya was hit by a  widespread supply-chain ransomware attack , the company on Thursday said it obtained a universal decryptor to unlock systems and help customers recover their data. "On July 21, Kaseya obtained a decryptor for victims of the REvil ransomware attack, and we're working to remediate customers impacted by the incident," the company  said  in a statement. "Kaseya obtained the tool from a third-party and have teams actively helping customers affected by the ransomware to restore their environments, with no reports of any problem or issues associated with the decryptor." It's not immediately unclear if Kaseya paid any ransom. It's worth noting that REvil affiliates had  demanded a ransom of $70 million  — an amount that was subsequently lowered to $50 million — but soon after, the ransomware gang mysteriously  went off the grid , shutting down their payment sites and data leak portal

There's a natural human desire to avoid threatening scenarios. The irony, of course, is if you hope to attain any semblance of security, you've got to remain prepared to confront those very same threats. As a decision-maker for your organization, you know this well. But no matter how many experts or trusted cybersecurity tools your organization has a standing guard, you're only as secure as your weakest link. There's still one group that can inadvertently open the gates to unwanted threat actors—your own people. Security must be second nature for your first line of defense For your organization to thrive, you need capable employees. After all, they're your source for great ideas, innovation, and ingenuity. However, they're also human. And humans are fallible. Hackers understand no one is perfect, and that's precisely what they seek to exploit. This is why your people must become your first line of defense against cyber threats. But to do so, they need to learn how to defend thems

An advanced persistent threat (APT) actor has been tracked in a new campaign deploying Android malware via the Syrian e-Government Web Portal, indicating an upgraded arsenal designed to compromise victims. "To the best of our knowledge, this is the first time that the group has been publicly observed using malicious Android applications as part of its attacks," Trend Micro researchers Zhengyu Dong, Fyodor Yarochkin, and Steven Du  said  in a technical write-up published Wednesday. StrongPity , also codenamed  Promethium  by Microsoft, is believed to have been active since 2012 and has typically focused on targets across Turkey and Syria. In June 2020, the espionage threat actor was  connected  to a wave of activities that banked on watering hole attacks and tampered installers, which abuse the popularity of legitimate applications, to infect targets with malware. "Promethium has been resilient over the years," Cisco Talos  disclosed  last year. "Its campai

Organizations today must give attention to their cybersecurity posture, including policies, procedures, and technical solutions for cybersecurity challenges.  This often results in a greater burden on the IT service desk staff as end-users encounter issues related to security software, policies, and password restrictions.  One of the most common areas where security may cause challenges for end-users is password policies and password changes. What are these issues? How can organizations reduce end-user password change frustration? First, let's consider the standard password policy, its role, and general settings affecting end-users. What are password policies? Most organizations today have a password policy in place. So, what is a password policy? Password policies define the types and content of passwords allowed or required of end-users in an identity and access management system. Various aspects of the password that businesses control may include the password's required

Oracle on Tuesday released its quarterly  Critical Patch Update for July 2021  with 342 fixes spanning across multiple products, some of which could be exploited by a remote attacker to take control of an affected system. Chief among them is  CVE-2019-2729 , a critical deserialization vulnerability via XMLDecoder in Oracle WebLogic Server Web Services that's remotely exploitable without authentication. It's worth noting that the weakness was originally addressed as part of an  out-of-band security update  in June 2019. Oracle WebLogic Server is an application server that functions as a platform for developing, deploying, and running enterprise Java-based applications. The flaw, which is rated 9.8 out of a maximum of 10 on the CVSS severity scale, affects WebLogic Server versions 11.1.2.4 and 11.2.5.0 and exists within the Oracle Hyperion Infrastructure Technology. Also fixed in WebLogic Server are six other flaws, three of which have been assigned a CVSS score of 9.8 out

A U.K. citizen has been arrested in the Spanish town of Estepona over his alleged involvement in the July 2020 hack of Twitter, resulting in the compromise of 130 high-profile accounts. Joseph O'Connor , 22, has been  charged  with intentionally accessing a computer without authorization and obtaining information from a protected computer, as well as for making extortive communications. The Spanish National Police made the arrest pursuant to a U.S. warrant. Besides his role in the Twitter hack, O'Connor is also charged with computer intrusions related to takeovers of TikTok and Snapchat user accounts and cyberstalking an unnamed juvenile victim. The  great Twitter hack  of July 15, 2020, emerged as one of the biggest security lapses in the social media platform's history after O'Connor, along with  Mason Sheppard, Nima Fazeli, and Graham Ivan Clark , managed to gain access to Twitter's internal tools, abusing it to breach the accounts of politicians, celebritie