Apple’s passkeys attempt to solve the password problem

The recent Apple Worldwide Developers Conference WWDC revealed another teasing of what has been referred to as "the end of passwords forever". Passkeys are a "new biometric sign-in standard". Biometrics in security circles are used for things like identity cards, building access, and so on. This...

Hospitals taken offline after cyberattack

The GHT Coeur Grand Est has become a victim of a cyberattack on the hospital centers of Vitry-le-François and Saint-Dizier. The hospital’s administration has warned French that data have been exfiltrated and might be used for phishing in the future. As a consequence, the GHT Cœur Grand Est has cu...

Watch out for Ukraine donation scammers in Twitter replies

The invasion of Ukraine has been a money making opportunity for scammers since the moment it began: Fake donation sites, bogus Red Cross portals, phishing pages, the works. These scams can also be found on social media. Faking donations on Twitter Some users of social media have become very...

5 ways to spring clean your security

It is now officailly spring in the Northern Hemisphere, and with spring and the longer days comes the inescapable urge to shake off the lethargy of Winter and embrace the need to go through your stuff, throw a bunch of it out, and give the rest of it a shiny new lustre. And in our increasingly...

Globant suffers network breach due to LAPSUS$ compromise

Globant, an IT and software development firm with offices all around the globe, admitted in a press statement Wednesday that it has suffered a breach in its network. Affected data includes but may not be limited to some source code and certain project documentation of clients. "We have recently...

Fake Royal Mail chatbot offers up…a new iPhone?

Royal Mail scams are always popular techniques for people up to no good. We’ve covered them several times over the last year or so. A quick reminder: Your parcel is waiting for delivery This is the go-to tactic for fake Royal Mail phishing attacks. You receive a text claiming there’s a parcel in...

Google takes on Docs notification spammers

Cloud-based document suites have always been a hot target for scammers. When it’s easy to dip in and out for collaboration purposes, or just share things generally, then its likely that bad people will want in on the action. In 2019, Google calendar users were wading through endless spam...

Cyclops Blink malware: US and UK authorities issue alert

According to a joint security advisory published yesterday by US and UK cybersecurity and law enforcement agencies, a new malware called Cyclops Blink has surfaced to replace the VPNFilter malware attributed to the Sandworm group, which has always been seen as a Russian state-sponsored group...

FIFA 22 phishers tackle customer support with social engineering

Players of smash hit gaming title FIFA 22 have become the target of a wave of attacks focused on account compromise. Up to 50 “high profile” accounts were hijacked by what may have been the same group. FIFA games are, traditionally, a big draw for scammers and phishers. Many sports titles offer...

A week in security (Dec 13 – 19)

Last week on Malwarebytes Labs: Spear phish, whale phish, regular phish: What’s the difference? Kronos crippled by ransomware, service may be out for weeks 5 security lessons from 18 months of working from home What SMBs can do to protect against Log4Shell attacks After Log4j, December’s Patch...

CronRAT targets Linux servers with e-commerce attacks

There’s an interesting find over at the Sansec blog, wrapping time and date manipulation up with a very smart RAT attack. The file, named CronRAT, isn’t an e-commerce attack compromising payment terminals in physical stores. Rather, it looks to swipe payment details by going after vulnerable web...

Instagram’s memorialize feature abused to memorialize…Instagram’s boss

The mechanisms for memorialising the social network accounts of people who’ve died haven’t really suffered a lot of scrutiny up until now. I’ve done a fair amount of research on the processes and perils we face in the digitally deceased age. Traditionally, the biggest issues in this space tended ...

Inside Apple: How Apple’s attitude impacts security

Last week saw the fourth occurrence of the Objective by the Sea OBTS security conference, which is the only security conference to focus exclusively on Apples ecosystem. As such, it draws many of the top minds in the field. This year, those minds, having been starved of a good security conference...

What are SSL certificates?

Secure Sockets Layer SSL certificates are what cause your browser to display a padlock icon, indicating that your connection to a websites is secure. Although the padlock may soon be hidden from view, certificates arent going anywhere. Lets start with some definitions and explain some of the...

NAME:WRECK, a potential IoT trainwreck

A set of vulnerabilities has been found in the way a number of popular TCP/IP stacks handle DNS requests. Potentially this could impact hundreds of millions of servers, smart devices, and industrial equipment. The researchers that discovered the vulnerabilities have named them NAME:WRECK. Plural...

Surviving college distance learning during the pandemic: a cybersecurity guide

Social distancing, the wearing of face masks, practicing hand hygiene, and disinfecting often-touched surfaces have become human necessities during the pandemic era. For schools, theyve also had to adapt quickly to incorporate distance learning methods that let students continue their studies. Bu...

VideoBytes: Twitter gets hacked!

Hello dear readers, and welcome to the latest and greatest from VideoBytes: a brand new, video feature that we announced just yesterday. On our debut post today, were talking to you about the Twitter hack, in which hackers accessed the Twitter accounts of 130 high profile figures, like Barack...

New Android P includes several security improvements

According to the Android developer Program Overview, the next major version of Android, Android 9.0 or P, is set to arrive soon. Their plans show a final release within the next three months Q3 2018. The end of the Android P beta program is approaching, with the first release candidate built and...

Tech support scammers find new way to jam Google Chrome (updated)

Update 1 2018-02-07: This issue with Google Chrome was reported here and merged here. Update 2 2018-02-07: Firefox and Brave seem to be affected by this bug as well both vendors were informed. During the past quarter we have noted an increase in fake browser alerts pushing tech support scams. Mos...

A week in security (December 04 – December 10)

Last week on the blog, we looked at a RIG EK malware campaign, explored how children are being tangled up in money mule antics, took a walk through the world of Blockchain, and gave a rundown of what's involved when securing web applications. We also laid out the trials and tribulations of the...

Explained: the cloud

Even if you are reading this post because you have no idea what the cloud is, you might be using it more often than you realize. Twitter, LinkedIn, Dropbox, Google Drive, and Microsoft Office 365 are some of the most well-known cloud apps. Let’s start with a definition of the cloud to get a grip ...

Phishes, pseudophishes, and bad email

Everyone knows about phishing. We’ve all heard that the solution to phishing is to educate the user as, after all, it must be the user’s fault for stupidly clicking on the thing. But what about when perverse incentives make clicking the phish seem logical? What about the enterprise pseudophish—wh...

The real problem with ransomware

Ransomware – a specialized form of malware that encrypts files and renders them inaccessible until the victim pays a ransom – is an extremely serious problem and it’s quickly getting worse. The FBI estimated that ransomware payments were $1 billion in 2016, up from “just” $24 million a year...

Please stop posting your X-rays to social media

Social media is fun. Posting pictures and sharing them with friends is a great technology. But please, we beg you, stop posting your medical imaging results to Instagram, Twitter, and Facebook. Why? What if you get a gnarly fracture from a really awesome snowboarding stunt and you want to share...

Revolut phishing texts appear days after data breach

Only days after Revolut acknowledged that it disclosed sensitive customer records to an unauthorized party, affected customers are receiving phishing texts. However, we don't know yet if the phishing texts are linked to the breach. The company had accepted fraudulent information requests sent fro...

Google’s new search redirects make links harder to check before you click

Google is changing how some links in its search results work. Instead of linking directly to the destination, Google has started routing some search result links through opaque google.com/goto?url=... redirects. The url parameter does not show a readable version of the destination but uses a...

Grindr settles HIV status data-sharing lawsuit for $35 million

Grindr has reportedly agreed to pay £26 million around $35 million to settle a UK privacy lawsuit alleging that it shared sensitive user data, including some users' HIV status, with advertisers. The claim was brought by London law firm Austen Hays on behalf of roughly 12,000 UK Grindr users. It...

Update Chrome now: Two critical vulnerabilities fixed

Chrome is rolling out an update for its desktop versions. The update includes 15 security fixes, two of which address critical buffer overflow vulnerabilities. The stable channel has been updated to 151.0.7922.169/.170 for Windows and Mac, and 151.0.7922.169 for Linux. How to update Chrome If you...

Why Facebook’s war on ad blockers could help scammers

Reports that uBlock Origin is stepping back from the never-ending effort to filter Facebook ads are a reminder that ad blocking is no longer only an argument about inconvenience, publishers, and lost advertising revenue. It is also an issue of security. For years, ad blockers have occupied an...

Fake popular sites offer a free app, instead take over PCs

A website built to look almost exactly like CNN’s homepage is telling visitors to download "the new CNN app." But it's not CNN’s app, and has nothing to do with the news company. The campaign doesn’t stop at CNN. It also uses fake Stremio and Avast installers hosted on similarly convincing...

Google’s synchronized passkeys can be stolen in ‘Pass‑ta‑key’ attacks

Passkeys were supposed to make stolen passwords a thing of the past. No password to phish, no secret to reuse, and no string of characters sitting in a database waiting to be leaked. Over time, it's thought that passkeys will replace passwords entirely. But what happens when malware steals the...

Warning: Scammers are using FaceTime to empty bank accounts

Apple is urging users to treat any suspicious FaceTime call or message as untrusted, especially if it involves payments, refunds, password resets, or requests for personal information. This warning appears in a broader Apple support article about scams that target iPhone and iPad users through...

The inside job that cost ransomware victims millions

When a ransomware crew locks up your servers, the outside negotiator you hire has to know everything about you so that they can negotiate a smaller ransom payment. You tell them what your cyber-insurance covers and what your board is willing to pay. You have to. That's the whole reason you hire...

Your next car could be watching your face

To reduce traffic incidents, all new cars sold in the EU must now include driver-monitoring technology, including Driver Drowsiness and Attention Warning DDAW systems and, on newer vehicles, Advanced Driver Distraction Warning ADDW systems. Similar requirements are expected in the US, where the...

NetNut botnet takes a hit. Don’t be part of the next one.

In a joint operation, Google, the FBI, and other partners have dealt a significant blow to the residential proxy ecosystem by disrupting the NetNut also tracked as Popa botnet. NetNut is a malicious service built on millions of hijacked consumer devices. NetNut marketed itself as a high-quality...

Chrome needs another whopper update to fix 382 security bugs

If there was ever a time when it dawned on users how full of holes the software they’ve been using is, it’s now. Last month Microsoft pushed out its biggest patch Tuesday update ever. And yesterday, on the last day of June, Google published an update which included a whopping 382 security fixes...

Catch spyware in the act with Windows Webcam Monitoring

You’re working hard late at night, replying to emails and planning the week ahead. Then suddenly, a PDF file requests access to your camera. Why would a PDF need camera access? Cybercriminals often disguise spyware inside seemingly harmless files and programs. An unexpected request for access to...

A week in security (May 4 – May 10)

Last week on Malwarebytes Labs: Microsoft says Edge’s plaintext password behavior is "by design" ShinyHunters escalates Canvas attacks with school login defacements Massive AI investment scam network spans 15,500 domains If a fake moustache can fool age checks, is the Online Safety Act working?...

Your extensions leak clues about you, so we made sure Browser Guard doesn’t

Did you know you can be profiled based on the browser extensions you use? Advertisers can detect which extensions are installed and use that to build a picture of the kind of user you are. For instance, do you pride yourself on being a good online shopper who never pays full price? Maybe you use ...

A week in security (March 16 – March 22)

Last week on Malwarebytes Labs: Could your face change what you pay? NYC wants limits on biometric tracking That "job brief" on Google Forms could infect your device A DarkSword hangs over unpatched iPhones Your tax forms sell for $20 on the dark web Researchers found font-rendering trick to hide...

March 2026 Patch Tuesday fixes two zero-day vulnerabilities

Microsoft releases important security updates on the second Tuesday of every month, known as Patch Tuesday. This month’s update fixes 79 Microsoft CVEs including two zero-day vulnerabilities. Microsoft defines a zero-day as “a flaw in software for which no official patch or security update is...

Hackers may have breached FBI wiretap network via supply chain

Investigators are worried that a recent attack on a critical FBI system was more than just a random hit, and that another nation-state might have been involved. On February 17, the FBI flagged irregular network activity that led straight to its Digital Collection System Network. That system...

Refund scam impersonates Avast to harvest credit card details

A fraudulent website dressed in Avast’s brand is tricking French-speaking users into handing over their full credit card details—card number, expiry date, and three-digit security code—under the cover story of processing a €499.99 refund that was never owed to them. The operation combines live ch...

Criminals are using AI website builders to clone major brands

AI tool Vercel was abused by cybercriminals to create a Malwarebytes lookalike website. Cybercriminals no longer need design or coding skills to create a convincing fake brand site. All they need is a domain name and an AI website builder. In minutes, they can clone a site's look and feel, plug i...

Clawdbot’s rename to Moltbot sparks impersonation campaign

After the viral AI assistant Clawdbot was forced to rename to Moltbot due to a trademark dispute, opportunists moved quickly. Within days, typosquat domains and a cloned GitHub repository appeared—impersonating the project’s creator and positioning infrastructure for a potential supply-chain...

Phishing scammers are posting fake “account restricted” comments on LinkedIn

Recently, fake LinkedIn profiles have started posting comment replies claiming that a user has " engaged in activities that are not in compliance" with LinkedIn's policies and that their account has been " temporarily restricted" until they submit an appeal through a specified link in the comment...

In 2025, age checks started locking people out of the internet

If 2024 was the year lawmakers talked about online age verification, 2025 was the year they actually flipped the switch.​ In 2025, across parts of Europe and the US, age checks for certain websites especially pornography turned long‑running child‑protection debates into real‑world access controls...

A week in security (December 1 – December 7)

Last week on Malwarebytes Labs: Leaks show Intellexa burning zero-days to keep Predator spyware running How scammers use fake insurance texts to steal your identity Canadian police trialing facial recognition bodycams Update Chrome now: Google fixes 13 security issues affecting billions Attackers...

How scammers use fake insurance texts to steal your identity

Sometimes it’s hard to understand how some scams work or why criminals would even try them on you. In this case it may have been a matter of timing. One of my co-workers received this one: “Insurance estimates for certain age ranges: 20-30 200 – 300/mo 31-40 270 – 450/mo 41-64 350 – 500/mo Please...

Update Chrome now: Google fixes 13 security issues affecting billions

Google has released an update for its Chrome browser that includes 13 security fixes, four of which are classified as high severity. One of these was found in Chrome’s Digital Credentials feature–a tool that lets you share verified information from your digital wallet with websites so you can pro...