Facial recognition technology: force for good or privacy threat?

All across the world, governments and corporations are looking to invest in or develop facial recognition technology. From law enforcement to marketing campaigns, facial recognition is poised to make a splashy entrance into the mainstream. Biometrics are big business, and third party contracts...

Malaysia Airlines Flight 17 investigation shows Russian disinformation campaigns have global reach

A little background: on July 17, 2014, Malaysia Airlines Flight 17 was shot from the sky on its way from Amsterdam to Kuala Lumpur above the Ukraine. The plane was hit by a surface-to-air missile, and as a result, all 298 people on board were killed. At that time, there was a revolt of pro-Russia...

Compromising vital infrastructure: water management

It’s probably unnecessary to explain why water management is considered part of our vital infrastructure, but it's a wider field than you might expect—and almost every one of its components can be integral to our survival. We all need clean water to drink. As much as I like my coffee, I can't mak...

Apple’s FaceTime privacy bug allowed possible spying

Social media caught fire yesterday as the news of a new Apple bug spread. It seemed that there was a flaw in FaceTime that allowed you to place a call to someone, but listen in on their microphone if they didn't pick up. Worse, as the news spread, it turned out that there was also a way to captur...

Web skimmers compete in Umbro Brasil hack

Umbro, the popular sportswear brand has had their Umbro Brasil website hacked and injected with not one but two web skimmers part of the Magecart group. Magecart has become a household name in recent months due to high profile attacks on various merchant websites. Criminals can seamlessly steal...

A month of giveaway spam on Twitter

We've observed a low level spam campaign working its way through Twitter, with just under 2,000 posts visible on public search since September 1. Click to enlarge The posts promote what appears to be CBD oil. For those who don't know And I was one of them—still not sure if this oil is supposed to...

The many faces of omnichannel fraud

The rise of new technologies, social networks, and other means of online communication have brought about compelling changes in industries across the board. For example, in retail, organizations use digital tools such as websites, email, and apps to reach out to their current and potential client...

Mac App Store apps are stealing user data

There is a concerning trend lately in the Mac App Store. Several security researchers have independently found different apps that are collecting sensitive user data and uploading it to servers controlled by the developer. This is referred to as exfiltrating the data. Some of this data is actuall...

Explained: regular expression (regex)

Regular expression, or "regex" for short, is a mathematical term for the theory used to describe regular languages. But in computing, regexes are used to search for patterns in files and databases, and their functionality is incorporated into many modern programming languages. Regex search patter...

A week in security (May 28 – June 3)

Last week on Labs, we talked about the significance of SEO poisoning in the world of search marketing, blackmail attempts against financial institutions in Canada, voice command flaws in smart assistants, survey and potential phishing scams on Instagram, and the latest changes in Office 365. We...

A week in security (April 30 – May 6)

Last week on Labs, we examined the Spartacus ransomware, reported about a new tactic used by the Necurs malspam campaign, informed you about the recommended Twitter password change, and discussed engaging students to start considering careers in cybersecurity. Other news NTML credentials can be...

A week in security (October 23 – October 29)

Welcome back to "A week in security." Last week, we took a look at how deleted files can be recovered, explored the BadRabbit ransomware plague attacking Eastern Europe including a deep dive into the code, and talked about what it takes to work in security. One of our researchers, who is a PhD...

Report: Second quarter dominated by ransomware outbreaks

The second quarter of 2017 brought ransomware to unprecedented levels with worldwide outbreaks that went almost out of control. In scenarios reminiscent of yesteryears worms, WannaCry created global panic as it used a critical vulnerability in the SMBv1 protocol to propagate like wildfire. Within...

Pirated PC games are delivering password-stealing malware

A new Windows malware campaign hides inside pirated PC games and modified installers for franchises like Far Cry, Need for Speed, FIFA, and Assassin’s Creed. Researchers estimate that more than 400,000 devices worldwide have been infected, with around 30,000 users in the US. The infection method ...

Patch now! VMWare escape flaws are so serious even end-of-life software gets a fix

VMWare has issued secuity fixes for its VMware ESXi, Workstation, Fusion, and Cloud Foundation products. It has even taken the unusual step of issuing updates for versions of the affected software that have reached thier end-of-life, meaning they would normally no longer be supported. This flaws...

Credit card skimming on the rise for the holiday shopping season

As we head into shopping season, customers arent the only ones getting excited. More online shopping means more opportunities for cybercriminals to grab their share using scams and data theft. One particular threat were following closely and expect to increase over the next several weeks is credi...

Citrix NetScalers backdoored in widespread exploitation campaign

Fox-IT has uncovered a large-scale exploitation campaign of Citrix NetScalers in a joint effort with the Dutch Institute of Vulnerability Disclosure DIVD. Over 1900 instances were found to have a backdoor in the form of a web shell. These backdoored NetScalers can be taken over at will by an...

Apple releases emergency updates for two known-to-be-exploited vulnerabilities

On Friday April 7, 2023, Apple released iOS 16.4.1, iPadOS 16.4.1, and macOS 13.3.1 for the iPhone, iPad, and Mac, respectively, and our advice is to install them as soon as possible because all three updates include important security fixes. The Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency...

5 facts about Vice Society, the ransomware group wreaking havoc on the education sector

Move over Lockbit, there's a new ransomware-as-a-service RaaS player in town attacking the education sector--and its name is Vice Society. Vice Society is believed to be a Russian-based intrusion, exfiltration, and extortion group. And their ideal prey? You guessed it: universities, colleges, and...

Update Chrome now! Google issues patch for zero day spotted in the wild

Google updated the Stable channel for Chrome to 104.0.5112.101 for Mac and Linux and 104.0.5112.102/101 for Windows which will roll out over the coming days/weeks. Extended stable channel has been updated to 104.0.5112.101 for Mac and 104.0.5112.102 for Windows , which will roll out over the comi...

NGINX zero-day vulnerability: Check if you’re affected

On April 9, hacking group BlueHornet tweeted about an experimental exploit for NGINX 1.18 and promised to warn companies affected by it. On April 10, BlueHornet claimed to have breached the China branch of UBS Securities using the NGINX vulnerability. All we learned on Twitter was that a new...

A bug is about to confuse a lot of computers by turning back time 20 years

For those of you that remember the fuss about the Y2K bug, this story may sound familiar. The Cybersecurity & Infrastructure Security Agency CISA has issued a warning to Critical Infrastructure CI owners and operators, and other users who get the time from GPS, about a GPS Daemon GPSD bug in GPSD...

DNS-over-HTTPS takes another small step towards global domination

Firefox recently announced that it will be rolling out DNS-over-HTTPS or DoH soon to one percent of its Canadian users as part of its partnership with CIRA the Canadian Internet Registration Authority, the Ontario-based organization responsible for managing the .ca top-level domain for Canada and...

A week in security (April 19 – 25)

Last week on Malwarebytes Labs, we interviewed Youssef Sammouda, a 21-year-old bug bounty hunter who is focused on finding vulnerabilities on Facebook. We looked into the CodeCov supply-chain attack, the vulnerabilities in Pulse Secure VPN that are being actively exploited by attackers, and the...

150,000 Verkada security cameras hacked—to make a point

Hackers were able to gain access to camera feeds from Verkada, a tech company that specializes in video security and physical access control, to demonstrate how prevalent surveillance is, reports say. Unfortunately, it also exposed the inner workings of hospitals, clinics, and mental health...

The mystery of the Silver Sparrow Mac malware

Cyber security company Red Canary published findings last week about a new piece of Mac malware called Silver Sparrow. This malware is notable in being one of the first to include native code for Apples new M1 chips, but what is unknown about this malware is actually more interesting than what is...

Malvertising campaign on PornHub and other top adult brands exposes users to tech support scams

Threat actors involved in tech support scams have been running a browser locker campaign from November 2020 until February 2021 on the worlds largest adult platforms including PornHub. The same group behind this campaign has been active for much longer and we believe is tied to previous schemes...

Flaw in Twitter form may have been abused by nation states

Twitter announced in a blog post on Monday that they discovered and addressed a security flaw on one of their support forms. The discovery was made on November 15 — more than a month ago — and was promptly fixed the next day. From the Twitter blog on this issue: We have become aware of an issue...

Compromising vital infrastructure: the power grid

Where were you when the lights went out? That line became famous after the 1977 blackout in New York City. This power outage was caused by lightning and lasted for up to two days, depending on which part of New York you lived in. While in this case the power grid failure was a freak incident due ...

Secret Sister scam returns in time for Christmas

The festive season may be imminent, but it’s a Facebook Secret Sister not Santa you have to steer clear of. Secret Sister has been a mainstay of Yuletide scams since at least 2015, and has come back around once more. But what is it? Your office probably has a Secret Santa scheme in place. You dra...

Official Cardi B website plagued by spammers

We come bearing tidings of proper website maintenance and general housekeeping for singer Cardi B or rather, for her web development team. At first glance, it appeared as though her website had been hacked a few days ago. But a look under the hood told a different story. We were surprised to see...

So you’ve been asked to start a threat intel program

Ever since the Mandiant APT1 report landed like a bomb in private sector security reporting, threat intelligence has been a hot buzzword many companies have been chasing over. But what is threat intelligence? What do you need to execute it well? And how many new tools do you need to buy? The...

Mac malware targets cryptomining users

Last week, a security researcher named Remco Verhoef announced the discovery of a new piece of Mac malware being distributed on cryptomining chat groups. This malware was later further analyzed by Patrick Wardle, who gave it the rather appropriate moniker OSX.Dummy. The malware was being...

Blast from the past: stowaway Virut delivered with Chinese DDoS bot

Recently, we described an unusual Chinese drive-by attack that was delivering a variant of the Avzhan DDoS bot. The attack also contained multiple components that were not-so-new. Among the exploits, the newest was from 2016. Avzhan is also not a recent malware—the compilation timestamp of the...

Stop telephoning me-eh-eh-eh-eh: robocalls explained

If you've ever answered a call from anyone outside your contact list only to hear a recorded message playing back at you, you have just been robocalled. Unfortunately for American consumers, this happens several times a day, seven days a week. Suffice to say, this is beyond annoying—and it's...

New Android Trojan malware discovered in Google Play

A new piece of mobile malware has been discovered in Google Play masquerading as multiple apps: an alarm clock app, a QR scanner app, a compass app, a photo editor app, an Internet speed test app, and a file explorer app. According to Google Play data, all were last updated between October and...

More trouble in Google Play land

This is not a good week for Google, it seems. After our mobile security experts repeatedly discovered adware on several apps on the Google Play store, our friends at Symantec have unearthed at least eight malicious apps that are found capable of adding affected mobile devices to a botnet. Accordi...

Release the KRACKen: flaw in Wi-Fi security leaves users vulnerable

A serious flaw in the wireless protocol that secures all modern protected Wi-Fi networks has been discovered. How serious? If your device supports Wi-Fi, it is most likely affected. This feasible attack, dubbed KRACK, could abuse design or implementation flaws in the Wi-Fi standard, not some...

Explained: False positives

What are false positives? False positive, which is sometimes written as f/p, is an expression commonly used in cybersecurity to denote that a file or setting has been flagged as malicious when it’s not. In statistics, false positives are called Type I errors, because they check for a particular...

Update now! Google Pixel vulnerability is under active exploitation

Google has notified Pixel users about an actively exploited vulnerability in their phones firmware. Firmware is the code or program which is embedded into hardware devices. Simply put, it is the software layer between the hardware and the applications on the device. About the vulnerability, Googl...

A first analysis of the i-Soon data leak

Data from a Chinese cybersecurity vendor that works for the Chinese government has exposed a range of hacking tools and services. Although the source is not entirely clear, it seems that a disgruntled staff member of the group leaked the information on purpose. The vendor, i-Soon aka Anxun is...

Discord.io confirms theft of 760,000 members' data

Discord.io was/is a third party service that enables owners of Discord servers to create customized, personal Discord invites. After a preview of Discord.io's users database was posted on BreachForums, the owners have decided to shut down all Discord.io services "for the foreseeable future."...

Compromised Barracuda appliances equipped with persistent backdoors by attackers

The Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency CISA has published three malware analysis reports based on malware variants associated with the exploitation of a known vulnerability in Barracuda ESG appliances. The Common Vulnerabilities and Exposures CVE database lists publicly disclosed...

Update now! Two zero-days fixed in 2022's last patch Tuesday

In numbers, the patch Tuesday of December 2022 is a relatively light one for Windows users. Microsoft patched 48 vulnerabilities with only six considered critical. But numbers are only half the story. Two of the updates are zero-days with one of them known to be actively exploited. Windows...

ProtonMail hands user’s IP address and device info to police, showing the limits of private email

They say there’s two sides to every story. Depending on your point of view, you may have heard a recent story thats either about overreaching law enforcement and protestors exposed by organisations happy to hand over revealing data despite saying they wont. Or: BREAKING: legitimate business...

10 best practices for MSPs to secure their clients and themselves from ransomware

Lock-downs and social distancing may be on, but when it comes to addressing the need for IT support—whether by current of potential clients—it’s business as usual for MSPs. And, boy, is it a struggle. On the one hand, they keep an eye on their remote workers to ensure they’re still doing their jo...

Switching from a “Just in Time” delivery system should include planning ahead

As it becomes clear that some things will never again be the same after the global coronavirus pandemic, it is time to prepare for the future. The cybersecurity implications of upcoming changes will be most noticeable in organizations that rely on security models like the software defined...

Criminals hack Tupperware website with credit card skimmer

Update 2: A spokesperson for Tupperware has given a public statement to Alex Scroxton, Security Editor at ComputerWeekly. You can read it here. Update: Following our blog post, we continued to monitor the Tupperware website. As of 03/25 at 1:45 PM PT, we noticed that the malicious PNG file had be...

Why all organizations must better protect sensitive data

About two weeks ago, National Cybersecurity Awareness Month NCSAM kicked off with a new message stressing personal responsibility for users keeping themselves safe online: “Own IT. Secure IT. Protect IT.” NCSAM asked users to consider best practices for both securing their own devices and...

A week in security (December 10 – 16)

Last week on Labs, we took a look at some new Mac malware, a collection of various scraped data dumps, the protection of power grids, and how bad actors are using SMB vulnerabilities. Other cybersecurity news Millions affected by Facebook photo API bug: An issue granted third-party apps more acce...