Advance Auto Parts customer data posted for sale

A cybercriminal using the handle Sp1d3r is offering to sell 3 TB of data taken from Advance Auto Parts, Inc. Advance Auto Parts is a US automotive aftermarket parts provider that serves both professional installers and do it yourself customers. Allegedly the customer data includes: Names Email...

Kaiser health insurance leaked patient data to advertisers

Health insurance giant Kaiser has announced it will notify millions of patients about a data breach after sharing patients’ data with advertisers. Kaiser said that an investigation led to the discovery that “certain online technologies, previously installed on its websites and mobile applications...

Mental health company Cerebral failed to protect sensitive personal data, must pay $7 million

The Federal Trade Commission FTC has reached a settlement with online mental health services company Cerebral after the company was charged with failing to secure and protect sensitive health data. Cerebral has agreed to an order that will restrict how the company can use or disclose sensitive...

Cannabis investment scam JuicyFields ends in 9 arrests

Europol and its associates have arrested 9 people in conjunction with a cannabis investment scam known as "JuicyFields". The suspects used social media to lure investors to their website. There they found information about a “golden opportunity” to invest in the cultivation, harvesting and...

3 important lessons from a devastating ransomware attack

In October 2023, The British Library was attacked by the Rhysida ransomware gang in a devastating cyberattack. The library, a vast repository of over 170 million items, is still deep in the recovery process, but recently released an eighteen page cyber incident review describing the attack, its...

Ransomware’s appetite for US healthcare sees known attacks double in a year

Following the February 21 attack on Change Healthcare, scores of people in the US have been living with the brutal, real-world effects of ransomware. Described by the American Hospital Association AHA President and CEO Rick Pollack as “the most significant and consequential incident of its kind...

New Facebook photo rule hoax spreads

Some hoaxes on Facebook are years old, but like a cat with nine lives they keep coming back again and again. This is certainly the case with this most recent hoax. Fact-checking site Snopes is reporting on a hoax that concerns Metas use of our photos, messages and other posts on Facebook. Users a...

Data brokers admit they’re selling information on precise location, kids, and reproductive healthcare

Information newly made available under California law has shed light on data broker practices, including exactly what categories of information they trade in. Any business that meets the definition of data broker must register with the California Privacy Protection Agency CPPA annually. The CPPA...

A week in security (March 4 – March 10)

Last week on Malwarebytes Labs: Patch now! VMWare escape flaws are so serious even end-of-life software gets a fix Update now! JetBrains TeamCity vulnerability abused at scale PetSmart warns customers of credential stuffing attack Predator spyware vendor banned in US ALPHV ransomware gang fakes o...

Why ransomware gangs love using RMM tools—and how to stop them

One of the most alarming trends our ThreatDown Intelligence team has noticed lately is the increased exploitation of legitimate Remote Monitoring and Management RMM tools by ransomware gangs in their attacks. RMM software, such as AnyDesk, Atera, and Splashtop, are essential for IT administrators...

Nitrogen shelling malware from hacked sites

Nitrogen is the name given to a campaign and associated malware that have been distributed via malicious search ads. Its signature move is using Python and DLL side-loading to connect to the attackers command and control server. In this blog post, we look at a recent Nitrogen campaign and...

In conversation: Bruce Schneier on AI-powered mass spying

For decades, governments and companies have surveilled the conversations, movements, and behavior of the public. And then the internet came along and made that a whole lot easier. Today, search engines collect our queries, browsers collect our device information, smartphones collect out locations...

AI used to fake voices of loved ones in “I’ve been in an accident” scam

The San Francisco Chronicle tells a story about a family that almost got scammed when they heard their sons voice telling them hed been in a car accident and hurt a pregnant woman. Sadly, this is becoming more common. Scammers want to spread panic among their victims, and to do this, they feign a...

Fidelity National Financial acknowledges data breach affecting 1.3 million customers

In November 2023, real estate services company Fidelity National Financial FNF got its systems knocked offline for a week after a cyberincident. As is often the case these days, it turns out that the cyberincident was very likely a ransomware attack that included a data breach. Ransomware operato...

Malvertisers zoom in on cryptocurrencies and initial access

During the past month, we have observed an increase in the number of malicious ads on Google searches for "Zoom", the popular piece of video conferencing software. Threat actors have been alternating between different keywords for software downloads such as "Advanced IP Scanner" or "WinSCP"...

Patch…later? Safari iLeakage bug not fixed

Apple has released updates for its phones, Macs, iPads, watches, and TV streaming devices, fixing a bunch of security problems. But amid all that activity, one fix is notably absent—there is nothing to address the vulnerability dubbed iLeakage. iLeakage is a side-channel attack that can force the...

MGM attack is too late a wake-up call for businesses, says James Fair: Lock and Code S04E22

This week on the Lock and Code podcast… In September, the Las Vegas casino and hotel operator MGM Resorts became a trending topic on social media… but for all the wrong reasons. A TikTok user posted a video taken from inside the casino floor of the MGM Grand—the companys flagship hotel complex ne...

Explained: Quishing

Quishing is phishing using QR Quick Response codes. QR codes are basically two-dimensional barcodes that hold encoded data, and they can be used to work as a link. Point your phone's camera at a QR code and it will ask you if you want to visit the link. The use of QR codes in malicious campaigns ...

What does a car need to know about your sex life? Lock and Code S04E20

This week on the Lock and Code podcast... When you think of the modern tools that most invade your privacy, what do you picture? There's the obvious answers, like social media platforms including Facebook and Instagram. There's email and "everything" platforms like Google that can track your...

X wants your biometric data

Users of X formerly Twitter paying for a checkmark under what used to be called Twitter Blue now X Premium have some biometric related decisions to make. The BBC reports that Elon Musk, having dismantled the old checkmark system to replace it with the all new Premium, is reintroducing identity...

Malwarebytes acquires Cyrus Security

Today, I am absolutely thrilled to share some exciting news: Malwarebytes is officially welcoming Cyrus Security into our family. This acquisition signifies an exciting chapter in our journey, and I wanted to share why this development is so special, and what it means for the millions who trust...

YouTube makes sweeping changes to tackle spam on Shorts videos

YouTube is rolling out unclickable links. Video portals like YouTube have had to deal with spam comments and bogus links for many years. With new additions to a platform come new places for scammers to go about their business. YouTube is now cracking down on links posted to the comments section o...

"Free" Evil Dead Rise movie scam lurks in Amazon listings

Scammers are using a novel technique with Amazon listings to trick fans of Evil Dead into downloads they may not want, and expensive rolling payments they have no interest in. Evil Dead Rise, the breakout horror film of 2023, started with big cinema numbers and has moved on to a victory lap in...

Update now! MOVEit Transfer vulnerability actively exploited

On May 31, 2023, Progress Software released a security bulletin about a critical vulnerability in MOVEit Transfer. The security bulletin states: "a SQL injection vulnerability has been found in the MOVEit Transfer web application that could allow an un-authenticated attacker to gain unauthorized...

Removing the human: When should AI be used in emotional crisis? Lock and Code S03E09

In January, a mental health nonprofit admitted that it had used Artificial Intelligence to help talk to people in distress. Prompted first by a user's longing for personal improvement--and the difficulties involved in that journey--the AI tool generated a reply, which, with human intervention,...

A whirlwind adventure: Malwarebytes' 15-year journey in business cybersecurity

As we raise a glass to toast Malwarebytes' 15th anniversary of boldly venturing into the realm of business cybersecurity, we're feeling nostalgic. It's time to buckle up and embark on a whimsical journey through the twists and turns of Malwarebytes' evolution. From modest beginnings to becoming a...

ChatGPT helps both criminals and law enforcement, says Europol report

In a report, Europol says that ChatGPT and other large language models LLMs can help criminals with little technical knowledge to perpetrate criminal activities, but it can also assist law enforcement with investigating and anticipating criminal activities. The report aims to provide an overview ...

Ransomware attack hits ANOTHER school

In what is likely Vice Society's handiwork, the UK's largest state boarding school Wymondham College has announced it has become the victim of a "sophisticated cyberattack". The school didn't provide additional information, but Jonathan Taylor, chief of the school's parent company Sapientia...

Ryuk ransomware laundering leads to guilty plea

Ryuk, a mainstay of the ransomware scene for some years until it transformed into Conti and then split off into other groups after that, is back in the news again... though not in the way you might have imagined. Its not a compromise, or a surprise comeback. What we have is a guilty plea, as a...

T-Mobile reports data theft of 37 million customers in the US

T-Mobile has announced that an attacker has accessed "limited types of information" on customers. It says it is informing impacted customers. According to the press release, no passwords, payment card information, social security numbers, government ID numbers or other financial account informati...

Google sponsored ads lead to rogue imitation sites

Theres a big push in rogue advert land at the moment, with multiple forms of bogus websites being used as bait to rob people of their logins and funds. This story first came to light a few days ago, with news of a well known cryptocurrency fan "NFT God" being caught out by a bogus video recording...

The Guardian hit by "ransomware attack"

On Tuesday December 20, 2022 British newspaper The Guardian experienced a major IT security incident that crippled a part of its IT infrastructure. The suspected cause is ransomware. In an online article the newspaper published an internal statement from the chief executive and the editor-in-chie...

Eufy "no cloud" security cameras streaming data to the cloud

Eufy home security cameras are currently in a spot of trouble as a result of door camera footage. This is because it turns out that data which should not have been going to the cloud was doing so anyway in certain conditions. Securing your home: a complicated proposition Insecure cameras,...

Maintenance Mode aims to keep phone data private during repairs

One of the biggest data related headaches youll face with a mobile device is what do to in the event of a repair. When you have to send your phone in for a fix, what happens to your data? In many cases, the repair technicians will simply scrub the phone by default unless you ask them not to. In...

Ransomware attack freezes newspaper printing system

Several German newspapers were left unable to release printed versions of their papers after a ransomware attack affected their printing systems. Speaking to BleepingComputer, Uwe Ralf Heer, editor-in-chief of Heilbronn Stimme, said the attack hit the entire Stimme Mediengruppe media group, which...

Romance scammer deepfakes Mark Ruffalo to con elderly artist

Deepfakes have settled into a groove, as most scam techniques do. It seems most deepfakers have decided to make as much cash as possible from unsuspecting victims instead of doing anything particularly earth-shattering with their technology. One curious twist we may not have seen coming is the...

Why (almost) everything we told you about passwords was wrong

I have an embarrassing confession to make: I reuse passwords. I am not proud of it, but honestly its a relief to finally get it off my chest. I am not a heavy re-user, nothing crazy, I use a password manager to handle most of my credentials but I still reuse the odd password from time to time. It...

Fast Company hacked to send obscene and racist messages

Yesterday, Apple News announced it had disabled the channel of Fast Company, a US-based business magazine, after surprised Twitter users reported it was tweeting offensive comments. An incredibly offensive alert was sent by Fast Company, which has been hacked. Apple News has disabled their channe...

Welcome to high tech hacking in 2022: Annoying users until they say "yes"

Last week we learned that ride-sharing giant Uber's defences had been unpicked by an attacker with a novel take on social engineering: Fatigue. Fatigue attacks play on the often repetitive nature of certain security procedures and failsafes. Do you hate having to punch in a password on your login...

Twitter security under scrutiny after former executive turns whistleblower

A former Twitter executive has acted as a whistleblower and alleged some serious problems. Provided these accusations are true, the disclosure shows a side of Twitter that poses a threat to its own users' personal information, to company shareholders, to national security, and to democracy...

Reddit users crowdsourcing explicit images and identities

The BBC is warned of a large photograph trading ring which operated on popular group forum site Reddit. These warnings are in relation to stolen nude photographs and other content shared without permission. In this case, even non-explicit photos are being posted alongside frequently degrading and...

Cryptojackers growing in numbers and sophistication

With rising energy costs and increased volatility in the value of cryptocurrencies, we were bound to see a rise in malicious cryptomining, aka cryptojacking. If you dont know whether you will ever see a return on your investments in mining equipment, one will look for other opportunities. But if...

Simplifying the fight against ransomware: An expert explains

Fighting against ransomware can be difficult—especially if your organization has limited IT resources to begin with. But Adam Kujawa, security evangelist and director of Malwarebytes Labs, has a few tips for overburdened IT folks looking to simplify their fight against ransomware. In this post,...

Fake streamed cricket matches knocks victims for six

An incredible scam which resembles hidden camera prank shows has been shut down by police. Four men were arrested last week in connection with the con-job involving fake cricket and online betting. It begins in Russia, takes a trip to India, and ends up back in Russia. Heres how it unfolded:...

North Korean APT targets US healthcare sector with Maui ransomware

State-sponsored North Korean threat actors have been targeting the US Healthcare and Public Health HPH sector for the past year using the Maui ransomware, according to a joint cybersecurity advisory CSA from the FBI, Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency CISA, and the Department of the...

Criminals are applying for remote work using deepfake and stolen identities, says FBI

The FBI has warned businesses of an uptick in reports of criminals applying for remote work using deepfake and stolen PII personally identifiable information. A deepfake is essentially created or modified media image, video, or audio, often with the help of artificial intelligence AI and machine...

A week in security (June 20 – June 26)

Last week on Malwarebytes Labs: LinkedIn scams are a "significant threat", warns FBI DDoS-for-hire service provider jailed Internet Safety Month: 7 tips for staying safe online while on vacation Client-side Magecart attacks still around, but more covert Security vulnerabilities: 5 times that...

Client-side Magecart attacks still around, but more covert

This blog post was authored by Jérôme Segura We have seen and heard less buzz about Magecart during the past several months. While some marketing playbooks continue to rehash the same breaches of yesteryear, we have been wondering if some changes took place in the threat landscape. One thing we...

Facebook users targeted in massive phishing campaign

Facebook is once again the launchpad for a large-scale phishing campaign, according to researchers at PIXM. The campaign, which first shows signs of life back in September 2021, has generated millions of page views and ad referral revenue "estimated to be millions of USD at this scale of...

A week in security (May 16 – 22)

Last week on Malwarebytes Labs: Fake reCAPTCHA forms dupe users via compromised WordPress sites How COVID-19 fuelled a surge in malware Why MRG-Effitas matters to SMBs “Look what I found here” phish targets Facebook users AirTag stalking: What is it, and how can I avoid it? Long lost @ symbol get...