A week in security (January 14 – 20)

Last week on the Malwarebytes Labs blog, we took a look at how the government shutdown is influencing cybersecurity jobs, Advanced Persistent Threats group APT10, the comeback of Fallout EK, the hosting of malicious sites on legitimate servers, and the Collection 1 data breach. Other cybersecurit...

Wallarm to Sponsor AppSec Cali

If you are a SecOps or DevOps professional on the west coast you can not miss the premier California application security event: AppSec California, January 22–25th in Santa Monica. Here are testimonials from the previous AppSec Cali events: “I'm looking forward to AppSecCali next week. Last year...

VOIPO Database Exposes Millions of Texts, Call Logs

UPDATE An improperly secured database owned by a California voice-over-internet provider left millions of customer call logs, SMS message logs and credentials in plain text open for months for the taking. The database belongs to VOIPO, which provides mobile services for consumers and commercial...

Unprotected VOIP Server Exposed Millions of SMS Messages, Call Logs

A California-based Voice-Over-IP VoIP services provider VOIPO has accidentally left tens of gigabytes of its customer data, containing millions of call logs, SMS/MMS messages, and plaintext internal system credentials, publicly accessible to anyone without authentication. VOIPo is one of a leadin...

School hackers steal personal data of half a million students & staff

By Waqas A school district in the United States has suffered a cyber attack in which unknown hackers managed to steal a trove of personal data belonging to over 500,000 staff and students. The targeted school was San Diego Unified School District in California whose database was accessed by hacke...

San Diego School District Data Breach Hits 500k Students

A phishing attack against California’s San Diego Unified School District has led to hackers scooping up Social Security numbers and addresses of more than 500,000 students and staff. The district became aware of the breach Oct. 2018. The actual breach occurred between January 2001 and November...

“Fire Danger Rating” on “High” in Security Climate

November was a scary month in California. After four years of drought, the forests and towns in the northern part of the state exploded into wildfires, displacing thousands of residents and destroying millions of dollars of property. The foul air in San Francisco and the surrounding areas was a...

californiaoutdoorproperties.com XSS vulnerability

Open Bug Bounty ID: OBB-702506 Description| Value ---|--- Affected Website:| californiaoutdoorproperties.com Open Bug Bounty Program:| Create your bounty program now. It's open and free. Vulnerable Application:| Custom Code Vulnerability Type:| XSS Cross Site Scripting / CWE-79 CVSSv3 Score:| 6.1...

Calif. Man Pleads Guilty in Fatal Swatting Case, Faces 20+ Years in Prison

A California man who pleaded guilty Tuesday to causing dozens of swatting attacks -- including a deadly incident in Kansas last year -- now faces 20 or more years in prison. Tyler Raj Barriss, in an undated selfie. Tyler Barriss, 25, went by the nickname SWAuTistic on Twitter, and reveled in...

SMS Phishing + Cardless ATM = Profit

Thieves are combining SMS-based phishing attacks with new "cardless" ATMs to rapidly convert phished bank account credentials into cash. Recent arrests in Ohio shed light on how this scam works. A number of financial institutions are now offering cardless ATM transactions that allow customers to...

Girl Scouts Issues Data Breach Warning to 2,800 Members

The Orange County, Calif. branch of the Girl Scouts of America has been hacked, potentially exposing personal information for thousands of members. Rest assured though: The cookies are safe, even those of the computing type. According to a letter to members filed with the state PDF, an...

Privacy Regulation Could Be a Test for States’ Rights

When the California Consumer Privacy Act CCPA passed in June, security experts applauded the state legislation as a win for consumers. The ruling gave residents certain rights around how their personal data can be stored, accessed, sold and deleted. But months later in September, the U.S. Chamber...

Calif. Law Takes Aim at Weak IoT Passwords

In a first of its kind law, California Governor Jerry Brown signed a bill that bans the use of default “admin” passwords on internet-connected devices sold in the state and requires manufacturers use strong passwords instead. California has been taking aggressive legislative action in 2018 to...

‘Secure by Design’ & SB-327. Standards for a secure IoT?

The ‘Secure by Design’ guidance for consumer IoT security from the UK's Department for Digital, Culture, Media and Sport DCMS is coming shortly. In the meantime we’ve seen SB-327 from California legislators, mandating some basic security standards for consumer smart tech. Both are big steps...

California, U.S. Government Battle Over Net Neutrality State Law

The U.S. government and the state of California are butting heads over a newly-passed state law that enforces net neutrality regulations on internet service providers ISPs. And experts say that the outcome of the feud between federal and state law has long-standing implications for the future of...

Major Tech Companies Finally Endorse Federal Privacy Regulation

The major tech companies, scared that states like California might impose actual privacy regulations, have now decided that they can better lobby the federal government for much weaker national legislation that will preempt any stricter state measures. I'm sure they'll still do all they can to...

John Deere Just Cost Farmers Their Right to Repair

The California Farm Bureau has given away the right of farmers to fix their equipment without going through a dealer...

California man may get 6 months in prison for uploading Deadpool on Facebook

By Carolina It is quite unlikely that somebody would be naïve enough to upload a copy of a newly released movie on his Facebook page with his real name since this would lead the law enforcement straight to the person, that too, in no time. However, it seems that there is one such person and his...

Experts Bemoan Shortcomings with IoT Security Bill

An internet of things IoT bill that would mandate unique passwords for connected devices has been approved by the California state legislature. It will be the first potential connected device regulation to come into effect in the United States if California Gov. Jerry Brown decides to sign it —...

Google Faces Legal Turmoil After Location Tracking Debacle

Google is under fire from both legal teams and activists after reports emerged that the technology giant tracked customers’ movements, even when they opt out. The company has been slapped by a lawsuit, filed in the federal court last week out of California, alleging that Google is violating both...