Cybersecurity & Espionage Articles
Original article at ASISOnline.org
There are significant opportunities for stopping insider attacks. Generally, these incidents are not impulsive in nature. The insider takes considerable time before acting, regardless of the motivation, and slow progression from idea to action means that they almost always expose themselves to some degree through observable changes in attitude and behavior.
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Original article at Fox News
For decades, China has waged an espionage war with the United States, exploiting America's comparatively open society and free-market economy to steal critical information, trade secrets and technology tools. But as the coronavirus, officially termed COVID-19, continues to assault the globe – Beijing is upping its spy game on U.S. soil with a focus on manipulating the narrative, officials and experts say. The primary focus now, according to several current and former intelligence officials interviewed by Fox News, is attempting to control the disease narrative inside the U.S. and cast the blame game anywhere but Beijing. Original article at NextGov.com
Whether you use Zoom, Skype or Microsoft Teams, the webcam on your home PC or laptop device has probably never been as active as it is during this pandemic. Most of us have a camera built into our phone, tablet, laptop, or a desktop webcam we use for work, study or virtual socialising. Unfortunately, this privilege can leave us vulnerable to an online attack known as camfecting. This is when hackers take control of your webcam remotely. They do this by disabling the “on” light which usually indicates the camera is active – so victims are none the wiser. Original article at Yahoo News
Hacking activity against corporations in the United States and other countries more than doubled by some measures last month as digital thieves took advantage of security weakened by pandemic work-from-home policies, researchers said. Corporate security teams have a harder time protecting data when it is dispersed on home computers with widely varying setups and on company machines connecting remotely, experts said. Even those remote workers using virtual private networks (VPNs), which establish secure tunnels for digital traffic, are adding to the problem, officials and researchers said. Original article at TechRadar.com
But as its usage boomed, cybersecurity experts warned of serious issues with the security protocols in both both Zoom and Google Hangouts compared to the other enterprise-grade applications like Microsoft Teams, Webex and Bluejeans. Zoom has been particularly vulnerable to attacks from hackers who have managed to barge into others' video chats and slip in lewd, vulgar messages and racial slurs. As the usage of Zoom has picked up among schools and colleges, such attacks from interlopers have sent waves of concerns among the users, with schools in the US and Singapore blocking the platform. Original article at Stars and Stripes
The Pentagon maintains it is being as transparent as possible about the outbreak, and provides daily updates on total cases across the department. It draws the line, however, at providing specific figures at the unit, installation or even the large combatant command level, citing the need for “operational security” — Pentagon speak for not letting the enemy know your plans or weak points. Pentagon bans Zoom over ‘security concerns’ after reports of app routing data through China4/13/2020 Original article at American Military News
“During a test of a Zoom meeting with two users, one in the United States and one in Canada, we found that the AES-128 key for conference encryption and decryption was sent to one of the participants over TLS from a Zoom server apparently located in Beijing, 52.81.151.250,” the University of Toronto researchers wrote in their findings. “A company primarily catering to North American clients that sometimes distributes encryption keys through servers in China is potentially concerning, given that Zoom may be legally obligated to disclose these keys to authorities in China.” Original article at CBS Boston.
It may be tempting to join your Facebook friends in taking the latest online personality test or quiz popping up in your social media feed. But at a time when doing so might be a welcome distraction during the coronavirus pandemic, police are cautioning that you risk exposing your personal information. Original article at TheHill.com
Have you heard about Weiyun “Kelly” Huang? She came to the United States from China on a student visa in 2009 and was accused of enabling a spy. The U.S. government approves thousands of such visas each year, allowing foreign nationals to come to the United States to fill certain high-tech jobs. India and China have accounted for the majority of these visas. Major tech corporations typically employ these foreign nationals, claiming they cannot fill some jobs with Americans. Critics allege that the tech giants use the visas to bring in workers who will work for less money than their American counterparts. The companies gain skilled workers and, according to their critics, a reduced wage bill. The visa workers get three to six years’ experience working for the world’s most technically advanced companies. The American consumer presumably gets lower prices. But has anyone thought about Original article at Yahoo News
These are precisely the kind of tools that Beijing values. The Chinese Communist Party (CCP) pursues a decades-long grand strategy to develop and capture global networks and platforms – with them to define global standards. Original article at Quartz Africa
Nigerian internet fraudsters, best known for romance scams and infamous business propositions from “Nigerian princes,” are now operating with a lot more sophistication. Original document at the U.S. Army Cyber Institute at West Point
Science Fiction Prototypes are science fiction stories based on future trends, technologies, economics, and cultural change. The story you are about to read is based on threatcasting research from the Army Cyber Institute at West Point and Arizona State University’s Threatcasting Lab. Our story does not shy away from a dystopian vision of tomorrow. Exploring these dark regions inspires us to build a better, stronger, and more secure future for our Armed Forces. Original article at Politico
The leadership of the Justice Department has put a bull’s-eye on the Chinese government, pushing prosecutors across the country to focus on investigations of Chinese state-backed efforts to steal intellectual property. The work involves investigations into American academics and work with U.S. universities, and department officials say their nationwide undertaking isn’t slowing it down. The department’s targets range from Chinese military officers to American college professors — evidence, its leadership says, that the Chinese government is targeting every sector of American public life. The Chinese government has denied allegations of state-sponsored theft, according to media reports, and its embassy in Washington did not respond to POLITICO’s requests for comment on this story. Download report at Stratfor.com
Candace Claiborne, an Office Management Specialist with the U.S. Department of State (DOS), was accused of lying to U.S. officials about passing information to Chinese intelligence officers. Claiborne apparently passed most of the benefits of her work on to her son, and her concern for his well-being -- rather than selfish indulgences -- appears to have been her primary motive to engage in espionage. Threat Lens assessed the industrial espionage threat from China as “critical” -- the highest ranking -- described the industrial espionage as a top strategic priority due to a tight connection between state security services and commercial interests seeking to expand global competitiveness. |
Cyber-CyI find interesting articles on the web that are simple, down-to-earth, easy to understand, and (hopefully) informative for non-technical readers. Archives
November 2022
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