Raccoon Stealer Malware Scurries Past Microsoft Messaging Gateways

Criminals behind malware dubbed Raccoon Stealer have adopted a simple and effective technique to circumvent Microsoft and Symantec anti-spam messaging gateways. The technique has been used in a recent campaign targeting financial institutions via business email compromise BEC attacks. According t...

Cybercriminals Adding Sophistication to BEC Threats

Cybercriminals are boosting their game and employing new tactics to move up the chain of command with more sophisticated business email compromise BEC threats that pose a greater threat to organizations, according to a new report. Advanced BEC attacks–including impersonation attacks and CEO...

Newly-Identified BEC Cybergang Targets U.S. Enterprise Victims

LONDON, U.K. – Researchers have identified a highly-sophisticated Nigerian business email compromise gang targeting U.S enterprises and government institutions. The cybercrime group, dubbed Scattered Canary, has evolved over the past 10 years from a one-man shop working Craigslist scams into a...

This Week in Security News: BEC Attacks and Botnet Malware

Welcome to our weekly roundup, where we share what you need to know about the cybersecurity news and events that happened over the past few days. This week, learn about the prevalence and impact of BEC attacks. Also, find out how botnet malware can perform remote code execution, DDoS attacks and...

RSA Conference 2019: BEC Scammer Gang Takes Aim at Boy Scouts, Other Nonprofts

SAN FRANCISCO – A Nigeria-based scammer gang dubbed “Scarlet Widow” has been launching email fraud attacks against thousands of targets – including universities, the Salvation Army, and Boy Scouts of America. Researchers with Agari detailed the attack during an RSA Conference session on Tuesday...

Using Gmail "Dot Addresses" to Commit Fraud

In Gmail addresses, the dots don't matter. The account "[email protected]" maps to the exact same address as "[email protected]" and "[email protected]" -- and so on. Note: I own none of those addresses, if they are actually valid. This fact can be used to commit fraud:...

BEC Will Reach Two Levels Deeper

In our predictions report for 2019, “Mapping the Future: Dealing with Pervasive and Persistent Threats,” we foresaw an increase in the rate of BEC business email compromise attacks: “Business email compromise will go two levels down in the org chart.” From the report: | “Business email compromise...

ThreatList: 60% of BEC Attacks Fly Under the Radar

Up to 60 percent of business email compromise BEC attacks don’t involve a malicious link, making it more difficult for employees and email security systems to spot that something is amiss, a recent report found. Researchers at Barracuda, in a new study of 3,000 BEC attacks, found that most of the...

BEC is Big Business for Hackers: What makes these attacks so hard to prevent?

For years, one of the most lucrative ways for hackers to generate profits was through ransomware attacks. These instances involve the use of strong encryption to lock victims out of their files and data - attackers then sell the decryption key in exchange for an untraceable Bitcoin ransom payment...

How attackers are abusing high-profile users and executives

Email is the prime communication channel for businesses and their employees worldwide. In fact, last year saw more than 269 billion emails sent per day, and Radicati Group researchers predict that by 2021, this number will rise to more than 319 billion. With so much critical and sensitive...

TippingPoint Threat Intelligence and Zero-Day Coverage – Week of April 16, 2018

It was a crazy week at this year’s RSA Conference in San Francisco. I always try to get a quick view of the floor to see companies old and new exhibit their wares. Unfortunately, work never sleeps when you attend a conference, and the shortage of seating at this year’s event left many, including...

Gold Galleon Hacking Group Plunders Shipping Industry

SAN FRANCISCO – Researchers have identified the hacking group behind several widescale business email compromise BEC attacks gouging the maritime shipping industry millions of dollars since last year. Attackers are taking advantage of the industry’s lax security and the use of outdated computers,...

Arm your users with knowledge to spot phishing attacks – for free!

Attendees to the Black Hat 2017 security conference said their No. 1 security concern and most time-consuming activity was phishing and social engineering attacks. That’s no surprise with the increase in Business Email Compromise BEC attacks and with most ransomware being delivered by email. But...

Threat Landscape for Industrial Automation Systems in H1 2017

Kaspersky Lab Industrial Control Systems Cyber Emergency Response Team Kaspersky Lab ICS CERT publishes the results of its research on the threat landscape for industrial automation systems for the first six months of 2017. All statistical data used in this report was collected using the Kaspersk...

Grading our Predictions: See how we fared in 1H 2017

In December of last year, we released eight predictions as to what we thought the 2017 cybersecurity landscape would hold. Although we’ve definitely observed new trends and attacks that we didn’t foresee, we’ve also seen several of our predictions play out as anticipated. With only three and a ha...

Nigerian BEC Scams Hit 500 Companies in 50 Countries

Nigerian cybercriminals targeting industrial firms have stolen a slew of sensitive technical drawings, network diagrams, cost estimates, and project plans already this year. The data, exfiltrated by a cocktail of different spyware programs, wasn’t stolen from just executives, but also operators,...