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6th August 2018

TSMC shut down by WannaCry variant | Avast

Questions still surround the TSMC (Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Company) computer virus incident which shut down operations for the world’s largest semiconductor foundry last Friday, August 3. While the company maintains this was not due to a cyberattack, it also reports that the virus was a variant of WannaCry, the ransomware that terrorized the world last year.

6th August 2018

A week in security (July 30 – August 5)

Last week, we posted a roundup of spam that may have landed in your mailbox, talked about what makes us susceptible to social engineering tactics, and took a deep dive into big data. Other news: Facebook claimed to have removed accounts that display behavior consistent with possible Russian actors engaged in misinformation. (Source: The Wall Street Journal) Yale University disclosed that they were breached at least a decade ago. (Source: NBC – Connecticut) High school students, be on the lookout! If you receive email or snail mail from organizations with impressive-sounding names, consider that it may just be a carefully packaged marketing scheme. (Source: Sophos’s Naked Security Blog) A researcher from Amnesty International revealed that hackers have targeted them with malware from an Israeli vendor. (Source: Motherboard) Certain e-commerce providers in the UK were affected by a data breach and exposed potentially more than a million user data. (Source: Graham Cluley’s blog) A game o..

3rd August 2018

A game that cryptojacks, a town under seige, and more data breaches | Avast

Steam game found to be secretly cryptomining “Malicious cryptomining has become so popular among cybercriminals that it has earned its own name: cryptojacking,” states Avast security evangelist Luis Corrons. “It is one of the most popular ways to make easy money nowadays, and we have seen in the last months how thousands of vulnerable websites have been hacked to make their visitors cryptomine, or using ads to push cryptomining JavaScript.”

3rd August 2018

SamSam ransomware can shut your city down | Avast

SamSam ransomware was first spotted in the digital wild back in 2015. Since then, its purveyors have racked up approximately $6M in extorted ransom money, experts surmise, and its diabolical reign shows no sign of slowing. The malware continues to be improved upon to make it sneakier, with its newest version encrypting files late at night, hoping to infect the system when the user is away from the screen. Additionally, the SamSam attacks all seem strategic and deliberate, as opposed to automated outbreaks, making them some of the most feared and destructive cyberattacks active today.

2nd August 2018

SMS intercept creates data breach at Reddit | Avast

Social website Reddit announced this week that they suffered a data breach in June. In its official statement, the company calls the breach a “security incident” and provides a detailed account of how it happened.