Su22 CYBR 332-51 Computer Security

 https://thehackernews.com/2022/07/north-korean-hackers-targeting-small.html A group of North Korean hackers are attacking small to midsize businesses with ransomware called "H0lyGh0st." They are most likely targeting small to midsize businesses because larger businesses will more often have better security measures in place that make a successful ransomware attack more unlikely. This type of ransomware is crypto-ransomware, which is the hardest to resolve. It encrypts all the files on the victim's computer and shows a sample of the unencrypted files, but to get all the unencrypted files back the ransom note demands 1.2-5 bitcoin. This is why sufficient backups of company data are important, having a recent backup would greatly minimize the losses from a ransomware attack since paying the ransom for the data would not even be a consideration.  Even if the company pays the ransom, it is not guaranteed that the data will be given back.

 https://www.csoonline.com/article/3666428/6-security-analyst-job-description-red-flags-that-make-hiring-harder.html I thought it would be a nice change of pace to share some challenges when it comes to getting cyber security jobs instead of a security threat since most people in this class will one day or already have been on the job hunt for these jobs. The article shares the top 6 red flags to look out for in security analyst positions: 1. No description of the actual responsibilities The job of security analyst could potentially have a vast number of responsibilities, it is not a good sign if the company is trying to hide the workload for the position. 2. Unrealistic experience requirements Security analysts are often the first job someone pursuing a cyber security career will get. If the company says you need many years of experience first, the company might not understand what a security analyst is. 3. Overemphasizing the tech—especially if it’s old Often job p...

 https://thehackernews.com/2022/07/experts-uncover-350-browser-extension.html Experts are finding many popular chrome/firefox/opera browser extensions have malicious duplicates that users may accidentally install instead of the real ones. Usually, these malicious extensions cause popups and gather personal information, but they can also inject JavaScript code into various websites the user visits such as YouTube or Facebook.

 https://www.csoonline.com/article/3043030/top-cloud-security-threats.html Cloud security is growing in popularity, and because of this, it is important to know what its common risks are. The article above has eleven cloud risks, however, I will only go over the top five in this blog post. 1. Insufficient identity, credential, access and key management Brute forcing is not nearly as popular as infiltrating cloud security by posing as a legitimate user. Identity management is important for any cloud security to minimize this threat. 2. Insecure interfaces and APIs Using interfaces and/or APIs can help alleviate some work for security specialists and software development, however, sometimes security flaws exist in these interfaces/APIs. It is important for organizations to know exactly what these APIs are doing and restructure them if a security vulnerability exists in them. 3. Misconfiguration and inadequate change control This results from a lack of system knowledge,...

https://www.csoonline.com/article/3664748/adversarial-machine-learning-explained-how-attackers-disrupt-ai-and-ml-systems.html In a previous post, I talked about AI as a defense and its potential. Yet, AI security is not perfect and there are many ways attackers can abuse AI and ML systems. Out of 7,500 global businesses, 35% are already using AI as a defense while 42% are experimenting with it. However, 20% say they have difficulties securing data with AI. This is not even to mention the difficulties companies will have integrating AI solutions into existing systems. Additionally, 90% of companies are not prepared for "adversarial machine learning" which are techniques used to attack machine learning systems. There are four types of adversarial machine learning attacks: - Poisoning: attacker manipulates training data. - Evasion: changing input in an already trained model. - Extraction: attacker obtains a copy of your AI system by seeing what the system outputs given inputs. -...

 https://thehackernews.com/2022/06/russian-hackers-exploiting-microsoft.html Russia and Ukraine are in the midst of a cyber war. Currently, Russia is taking advantage of a security flaw in Windows operating systems "Follina" which allows password-stealing software to be deployed on other computers. Follina is a security flaw that exists because it allows remote code execution for the Windows Support Diagnostic Tool. This malware has been used on Ukraine devices to gather data from users such as passwords and cookies.