Security News
German authorities said Thursday that what appears to have been a misdirected hacker attack caused the failure of IT systems at a major hospital in Duesseldorf, and a woman who needed urgent admission died after she had to be taken to another city for treatment. As a consequence, systems gradually crashed and the hospital wasn't able to access data; emergency patients were taken elsewhere and operations postponed.
German authorities have reportedly seized a server hosting the massive BlueLeaks data dump, which was released earlier in June and exposed thousands of sensitive police department and law enforcement files. "We have received official confirmation that #DDoSecrets' primary public download server was seized by German authorities," said Emma Best, founder of DDoSecrets, in a Tuesday Twitter post.
A top German court on Tuesday ordered Facebook to stop merging data collected through its Whatsapp and Instagram subsidiaries or other websites unless users explicitly agree, in a legal victory for competition authorities. Germany's Federal Cartel Office had told Facebook to rein in the data collecting in a landmark decision in 2019, but the social media giant appealed the order.
Researchers are warning of an ongoing phishing attack that's targeting the credentials of more than 100 high-profile executives at a German multinational corporation that's tasked with procuring coronavirus medical gear for Germany. The company, left unnamed by researchers, is part of a task force created March 30 by the German government and the private sector to procure personal protective equipment for healthcare workers on the front lines of COVID-19, such as face masks and medical equipment.
One of the several multinational corporations enlisted by the German government to help it obtain personal protective equipment for the care of COVID-19 patients has been targeted in an ongoing phishing campaign, IBM reported on Monday. According to IBM, a threat actor has targeted more than 100 high-ranking people within this company, which is part of Germany's Task Force Personal Protective Equipment, whose members leverage their contact networks, particularly in China, to secure PPE. The attackers have targeted executives within the organization, as well as its supply chain partners, and IBM believes the same group likely also targeted other members of the task force.
The Russian Foreign Ministry on Thursday angrily rejected Germany's allegations over Russian intelligence involvement in a cyberattack against the German parliament. The ministry's spokeswoman, Maria Zakharova, said the claim concerning a 2015 hacking attack on the German parliament was "Absurd" and "Unfounded."
German prosecutors said Tuesday they had brought charges against a 22-year-old hacker who released personal data of dozens of politicians, journalists and other public figures online, embarrassing national authorities. The German man - arrested in January last year - is accused of multiple computer crimes, as well as making false reports to the police and attempted blackmail.
Germany's foreign intelligence service violated the constitution by spying on internet data from foreigners abroad, the nation's top court ruled Tuesday in a victory for overseas journalists who brought the case. The BND agency's surveillance violates "The fundamental right to privacy of telecommunications" and freedom of the press, judges at the Constitutional Court in Karlsruhe said in their verdict.
Earlier this year, Prevailion's security researchers identified a TA505 campaign targeting German companies with fake job application emails, but the attacks appear to have started in June 2019, or even the month before. Through the use of legitimate tools that are unlikely to be removed by traditional security software, the attackers can perform a broad range of activities, such as stealing files, capturing screens, and even recording audio.
Swiss authorities said Tuesday they have opened an investigation into allegations a Zug, Switzerland-based maker of encryption devices was a front operated by the CIA and West German intelligence that enabled them to break the codes of the countries that used their products. A joint investigation published Tuesday by Germany's ZDF public broadcaster and The Washington Post based on documents from the CIA and Germany's BND foreign intelligence agency revealed that Crypto AG made millions of dollars for the two agencies, while providing them with access to the encrypted communications of more than 120 countries for decades.