In 2019, high level executives of national cybersecurity authorities, the European Commission and ENISA, the EU Agency for Cybersecurity participated in the table-top Blueprint Operational Level Exercise (Blue OLEx) 2019, which underlined the need to implement an intermediate level between the technical and the political ones in the EU cyber crisis management framework.
On 9 August, QuoIntelligence disseminated a Warning to its government customers about a new APT28 (aka Sofacy, Sednit, Fancy Bear, STRONTIUM, etc.) campaign targeting government bodies of NATO members (or countries cooperating with NATO). In particular, we found a malicious file uploaded to VirusTotal, which ultimately drops a Zebrocy malware and communicates with a C2 in France. After our discovery, we reported the malicious C2 to the French law enforcement as part of our responsible disclosure process.
Zebrocy is a malware used by APT28 (also known as Sofacy), which was reported by multiple security firms[1][2][3][4][5][6] in the last two years.
Finally, our investigation concluded that the attack started on 5 August and targeted at least a government entity located in the Middle East. However, it is highly likely that NATO members also observed the same attack.
The U.S. government on Thursday imposed sweeping sanctions against an Iranian threat actor backed by the country’s Ministry of Intelligence and Security (MOIS) for carrying out malware campaigns targeting Iranian dissidents, journalists, and international companies in the telecom and travel sectors.
According to the U.S. Treasury and the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI), the sanctions target Rana Intelligence Computing Company (or Rana), which the agencies said operated as a front for the threat group APT39 (aka Chafer or Remix Kitten), Iranian cyber espionage hacking collective active since 2014 known for its attacks on companies in the U.S. and the Middle East with an aim to pilfer personal information and advance Iran’s national security objectives. Read more »
The U.S. Department of Justice announced today charges against five Chinese nationals fort cyberattacks on more than 100 companies, some of them being attributed to state-backed hacking group APT41.
APT41 is one of the oldest threat groups, known primarily for cyber-espionage operations against a variety of entities, including software developers, gaming companies, hardware manufacturers, think tanks, telcos, social, universities, or foreign governments.
Kaspersky has been tracking this group since 2012 as Winnti – the name Symantec gave the malware used in attacks. APT41 has been active for more than a decade and is also known as Barium, Wicked Panda/Spider.
Zoom has announced that starting today it has added two-factor authentication (2FA) support to all user accounts to make it simpler to secure them against security breaches and identity theft.
With 2FA, Zoom users will have an extra layer added to the authentication process, blocking attackers from take control of their account by guessing their password or using compromised credentials.
This is because, Zoom accounts secured using 2FA will require you to enter a one-time code from a mobile authenticator app or received via SMS or phone call, in addition to the account’s password, before allowing you to sign in to the Zoom web portal, desktop client, mobile app, or Zoom Room. Read more »
