The Game Changing Role of Performance Testing (Part 1)

In two previous blogs, VMware Carbon Black software engineers discussed how important it was to maintain a balance of latency, scale, and cost as they built out and enhanced the company’s reputation services. They also provided some insights into the challenges they encountered with various...

Taking Reputation to Scale: An Iterative Journey with an Agile Approach (Part 2)

In Part 1 of this blog, we shared with you the challenges we had in balancing latency, scalability, and cost for our reputation services. In this blog, we’ll give you some insights into each major iteration along that journey, from the beginning to where we are now. 100 requests per second. Befor...

Iron Mind: Defending Against Propaganda & Counter Victimization

Thomas Jefferson had it right. Propaganda is the greatest threat to any democracy. Or did you just believe a quote that I made up with a picture of him to add credence to this blog? Iron Palm or Iron Hand is a body of training techniques in various martial arts. It is originally one of the 72 art...

Excerpts From “Why Companies Are Replacing AV with Advanced Endpoint Security”

Is legacy antivirus failing to keep your endpoints secure? In Carbon Black's recent webinar, Fulcanelli Chavez, Sr. Security Operations Analyst at D.A. Davidson, shared how switching from McAfee to Cb Defense has improved protection and simplified operations for his team. Below are excerpts from...

Partner Perspectives: VMRay + Carbon Black Bridge the Gap Between Threat Hunting & Incident Response

In 2016, Carbon Black and VMRay introduced an out-of-the-box integration combining the capabilities of two industry-best platforms: Cb Response and the VMRay Analyzer. Leveraging the threat hunting and incident response capabilities of Cb Response, alongside the malware analysis and detection...

Cb Customer Spotlight Series: How Purdue Federal Credit Union Achieves Critical System Lockdown

Featuring Dee Lucas, Sr. Network Administrator at Purdue Federal Credit Union Leading financial institution, Purdue Federal Credit Union, serves over 71,000 members nationwide. This makes security of the utmost importance for Sr. Network Administrator Dee Lucas who supports Purdue Federal’s SOC...

10 Endpoint Security Problems Solved by the Cloud – Securing Remote Workers

In last week’s post, we talked about how the cloud solves the problem of managing multiple agents. In this week’s blog, we’re going to look at a security challenge that almost every company faces: Securing Remote Workers. Remote Workers Are A Security Risk Advances in technology are creating...

Excerpts from Modern Bank Heists – Nation State Threats

Carbon Black recently published a report on the latest non-malware attack methods, and how to counteract them. For more information about how Cb Defense, Carbon Black's NGAV + EDR solution, helps enterprises address their endpoint security challenges, check out our weekly Cb Defense Live Demo,...

Suppressing the Adversary via Threat Hunt Teams

What a brave new world. Global cyber insurgencies continue unabated. Decreasing dwell time is imperative in 2018. In order to achieve this goal, we must embrace the hunt. Every organization should stand up a threat hunt team. The team must be multidisciplinary with experience in e-forensics and...

Carbon Black Solutions Currently Compatible With Major OS Vendor Patches on Meltdown & Spectre

Recently, researchers have released details on two classes of vulnerabilities in modern CPU hardware. These vulnerabilities affect unprecedented numbers of systems and are some of the more difficult issues to address in recent history. These vulnerabilities, dubbed Meltdown and Spectre, may be...

September 19, 2017 – Morning Cyber Coffee Headlines – “Space Jam” Edition

Good morning! Sit with Carbon Black this morning over a cup of coffee or tea and browse a few industry headlines to get the day started. We’ve got just enough information below to get you through that first cup…enjoy! September 19, 2017 - Headlines State, Federal Authorities Proposing New Rules o...

August 30, 2017 – Morning Cyber Coffee Headlines – “Eiffel Tower” Edition

Good morning! Sit with Carbon Black this morning over a cup of coffee or tea and browse a few industry headlines to get the day started. We’ve got just enough information below to get you through that first cup…enjoy! August 30, 2017 - Headlines Carbon Black in the News: Carbon Black names Marco...

Attacking Critical Infrastructure: The Evolution Of Kinetic Warfare

I said earlier in 2017 I believed it was quite possible that during the year a major cyberattack will occur in either the United States, the United Kingdom, or another friendly country that will require a response equivalent to a kinetic attack. In other words, a cyberattack will occur that will ...

August 14, 2017 – Morning Cyber Coffee Headlines – “Creamsicle” Edition

Good morning! Sit with Carbon Black this morning over a cup of coffee or tea and browse a few industry headlines to get the day started. We’ve got just enough information below to get you through that first cup…enjoy! August 14, 2017 - Headlines Carbon Black in the News: NSA tools used to hack...

July 5, 2017 – Morning Cyber Coffee Headlines – “Isaac Newton” Edition

Good morning! Sit with Carbon Black this morning over a cup of coffee or tea and browse a few industry headlines to get the day started. We’ve got just enough information below to get you through that first cup…enjoy! July 5, 2017 - Headlines Carbon Black in the News: Carbon Black’s Cb Defense...

TAU Threat Analysis: Bundlore (macOS) mm-install-macos

The mm-install-macos variant of the Bundlore family of macOS adware has been around for many years in many variations and delivery methods. Recently, a variant with a novel installation method was discovered. Although most of the installation details were the same or similar to the samples analyz...

TAU Technical Report: New Attack Combines TinyPOS With Living-off-the-Land Techniques for Scraping Credit Card Data

In April of 2020 VMware Carbon Black Threat Analysis Unit TAU researchers worked with an Incident Response IR partner on a piece of malware that was discovered during an ongoing PCI investigation. The combined analysis showed that attackers who previously leveraged a malware family called TinyPOS...

Invoke-APT29: Adversarial Threat Emulation

MITRE recently conducted its second ATT&CK exercise in their ongoing annual series of Endpoint Security Efficacy testing and evaluation. This test focuses on assessing the behavioral capabilities of multiple endpoint security vendors against a simulated adversary, based closely around...

Gray Day: My Undercover Mission To Expose America’s First Cyber Spy

Who is Eric O’Neill? Eric O’Neill serves as Carbon Black’s national security strategist where he is a thought leader on a wide range of issues including counterterrorism and national security matters. Prior to this, he was as an operative for the FBI, where he conducted national security field...

October 16, 2018 – Morning Cyber Coffee Headlines – “Yale” Edition

Good morning! Sit with Carbon Black this morning over a cup of coffee or tea and browse a few industry headlines to get the day started. We’ve got just enough information below to get you through that first cup…enjoy! October 16, 2018 - Headlines U.K. Cyber Security Center Says Most Attacks Are...

In the New “Wild West” Even “Small” Cryptocurrency Theft is Costing Billions

Over the weekend, another cryptocurrency exchange was breached. This time it was “only” $40 million” in cryptocurrency. However, as a result cryptocurrencies overall lost more than $40 billion in value following the attack. That’s not a typo - a $40 million heist cost the market more than $40...

Essays from 7 Experts on Moving to a Cloud-Based Endpoint Security Platform

Carbon Black recently published a series of essays about the experiences of experts in the field on information security as they moved their endpoint security program to the cloud; this is one of those essays. To read the full series check out 7 Experts on Moving to a Cloud-Based Endpoint Securit...

The Perfect Storm:  Cyberspace Requires Defense in the Cloud

Cyberspace is a free-fire zone. Corporations are regularly under siege from multiple threat actors. The cyber-arms bazaar that flourishes around the world has allowed criminals and nations to wage long-term campaigns against corporations and government agencies. These attackers stalk businesses a...

VIDEO: Unfiltered Endpoint Data – Building Better Detection

BUILDING BETTER DETECTION In our previous post, Carbon Black’s Founder and CTO Mike Viscuso talked about how we can tilt the advantage back to the defenders with a “surveillance camera” for endpoints. By collecting endpoint activity and continuously storing it in a centralized location — without...

Australia’s “Essential Eight” is Critical to Meet 2018 Cybersecurity Mandates & Privacy Laws

Christopher Strand, Carbon Black’s security risk and compliance officer recently wrote a blog discussing how the new mandatory data breach notification rule in the Privacy Amendment Notifiable Data Breaches Bill 2016, helps bring attention to cybersecurity solutions and focus on the practices...

August 22, 2017 – Morning Cyber Coffee Headlines – “Hamilton” Edition

Good morning! Sit with Carbon Black this morning over a cup of coffee or tea and browse a few industry headlines to get the day started. We’ve got just enough information below to get you through that first cup…enjoy! August 22, 2017 - Headlines The Intelligence Community’s Top 3 Cybersecurity...

“The 101” – Episode 6 – Why is Malware Still Successful?

We’re back with another episode of The 101! This weekly security series aims to define endpoint security one question at a time. Tune in each week as we tackle a new term, concept, or comparison in our ongoing effort to provide clear definitions. In the past few episodes we’ve spoken about the...

Common Sense Clarity on GDPR

Having recently returned from the first phase of Carbon Black’s official General Data Protection Regulation GDPR Data Security and Privacy tour, where I participated in the data privacy and security enablement of numerous European global businesses, I’ve collected many valuable insights on the...

July 7, 2017 – Morning Cyber Coffee Headlines – “Spiderman” Edition

Good morning! Sit with Carbon Black this morning over a cup of coffee or tea and browse a few industry headlines to get the day started. We’ve got just enough information below to get you through that first cup…enjoy! July 7, 2017 - Headlines Carbon Black in the News: Residents of these states ar...

July 6, 2017 – Morning Cyber Coffee Headlines – “Dalai Lama” Edition

Good morning! Sit with Carbon Black this morning over a cup of coffee or tea and browse a few industry headlines to get the day started. We’ve got just enough information below to get you through that first cup…enjoy! July 6, 2017 - Headlines UN finds cybersecurity is a struggle worldwide - CNET...

Linux Distribution Coverage Extended Across the VMware Carbon Black Cloud

In 2020, a record 56 new Linux malware families were discovered. We are now seeing this trend continue into the new year with the latest discovery of RedXOR, believed to be formulated by Chinese nation-state actors targeting RedHat Enterprise Linux RHEL. With organizations hyper-accelerating thei...

Cybersecurity Awareness Checklist

Cybersecurity Awareness Month CAM 2020,, in its 17th year, is an annual campaign in October that raises awareness on the importance of cybersecurity. This year’s theme is “Do Your Part. BeCyberSmart” along with the key message “If you connect it, protect it.” 2020 has been an unprecedented year...

Threat Analysis Unit (TAU) Threat Intelligence Notification: SatanCryptor Ransomware

In early January 2020, a new ransomware named ‘SatanCryptor’ was discovered. After it performs file encryption, it will drop a ransom note named “ SATAN CRYPTOR .hta” and append ‘.satan’ as a file extension to the encrypted files. In addition, SatanCryptor will delete itself after the execution t...

If You Don’t Have 2, You Don’t Have 1

If You Don’t Have 2, You Don’t Have 1 “If you don’t have 2, you don’t have 1” is something you hear often in our engineering group. This is our team’s way of stressing the importance of persistence in data engineering. If a stream goes down, you lose it. You have to get confirmation that data is...

Cybersecurity Awareness Month: Bridging the Cybersecurity Skills Gap

Pumpkins, football, and cooler weather are three big indicators that it’s officially October. But, the most near and dear benchmark to my heart is that it’s National Cybersecurity Awareness Month NCSAM 2018. In its 15th year, NCASM is as an annual initiative to raise awareness about the importanc...

How Live Query Will Change The Way You Do Vulnerability Management

It’s no secret that, without the right set of tools, vulnerability management can be tedious and exhausting. With slow, manual processes it can take weeks to identify and remediate issues. And the work itself is often dull, sifting and searching without yielding real results. Live Query...

10 Endpoint Security Problems Solved by the Cloud – Responding Quickly To Threats

In this week’s installment of 10 endpoint security problems solved by the cloud, we’re going to step away from last week’s topic, identifying problems, and examine how the cloud helps organizations respond quickly to threats. Speed is Critical Attackers move quickly, and your ability to respond...

10 Endpoint Security Problems Solved by the Cloud – Slowing Down Endpoints

This week we will continue our investigation into the top 10 endpoint security problems the cloud solves. Our blog today moves on from the last dilemma we discussed, securing remote workers, and examines the issue of slowing down endpoints. Legacy AV Slows Down Endpoints Traditional AV is as...

10 Endpoint Security Problems Solved by the Cloud – An Introduction

Question: Where do 70% of successful breaches begin? Answer: The endpoint. The State of Endpoint Security Traditional defensive security solutions are fighting a losing battle against hackers and malware. With each day, new attacks and viruses appear and keeping systems safe is like bailing out a...

Modern Bank Heists: Cybersecurity Threats Facing the Financial Sector

Despite investing heavily in security, financial institutions continue to experience cyber attacks at a rapid pace. Conducted primarily for the purpose of yielding illicit financial gain, cyber attacks against the financial services industry are increasing in sophistication and are often...

In Cybersecurity, the Fastest Decision Maker Wins Most Often

During the Korean War, John Boyd, an Air Force pilot and military strategist, studied why the F-86 Sabre was so successful in shooting down the Russian MiG-15 of that generation. Boyd discovered that the U.S. planes, while inferior to the Russian MiG in terms of speed, range, and altitude, were...

Introducing Cb ThreatSight: Managed Threat Hunting and Triage

As the global threat landscape accelerates, security teams are always worried something will slip through. Many companies lack the security professionals needed to investigate and respond to the flood of cybersecurity incidents they face. Others don’t even understand the threats they face — thoug...

Cb Defense October 2017 Release Speeds Up Your Response

During a response scenario, every minute counts. The faster you can complete your investigation, the faster you can start taking corrective action. That’s why this week we’re happy to announce the October 2017 update of Cb Defense, which improves search functionality within the Cb Defense console...

Ransomware Roundup: Alternative Techniques featuring CTB-Faker

Ransomware is innovating to spread faster, hit harder and increase its payout potential. New unknown variants pop up daily, and many leverage non-malware techniques to evade traditional defenses. CTB-Faker is a perfect example of how modern ransomware is leveraging these new techniques to easily...

“The 101” – Episode 9 – What Makes a Rootkit So Dangerous?

We’re back with another episode of The 101! This weekly security series aims to define endpoint security one question at a time. Tune in each week as we tackle a new term, concept, or comparison in our ongoing effort to provide clear definitions. In this week’s episode, we learn more about a...

September 5, 2017 – Morning Cyber Coffee Headlines – “The Office” Edition

Good morning! Sit with Carbon Black this morning over a cup of coffee or tea and browse a few industry headlines to get the day started. We’ve got just enough information below to get you through that first cup…enjoy! September 5, 2017 - Headlines Carbon Black in the News: Carbon Black’s Cb Defen...

“The 101” – Episode 7 – Why is Ransomware on the Rise?

We’re back with another episode of The 101! This weekly security series aims to define endpoint security one question at a time. Tune in each week as we tackle a new term, concept, or comparison in our ongoing effort to provide clear definitions. Much like viruses and adware were top of mind in t...

VMware Carbon Black Cloud™ Awarded Cyber Catalyst Designation

VMware Carbon Black Cloud has been awarded a Cyber CatalystSM designation for its cloud native endpoint and workload protection platforms, which helps more than 20,000 organizations worldwide detect and stop emerging attacks. The designation is part of the annual Cyber Catalyst by Marsh℠ program,...

Broad, Ongoing Cyberattacks Targeting Australia Underscore Need for Behavioral-Based Cybersecurity

On Friday the Australian Federal Government detailed sustained ‘copy-paste’ threats on government and business throughout the country. According to the Government: “‘Copy-paste compromises’ is derived from … heavy use of proof-of-concept exploit code, web shells and other tools copied almost...

TAU Threat Analysis: Medusa Locker Ransomware

In recent weeks Carbon Black’s Threat Analysis Unit TAU has seen an increase in the number of infections attributed to the Medusa Locker ransomware family. There were notable traits exhibited by Medusa Locker in these attacks that warranted further investigation to determine behavioral tactics th...