Security News
Non-executable files containing malware were rarely shared, and could easily and automatically be identified if you tried to share one by mistake because they lacked the tell-tale starting bytes of a typical program file. Firstly, numerous malware families sneakily store at least some of their own needed data as added information in the personal part of such files, so that trying to bowdlerise, redact or rewrite the sensitive, "Unsharable" parts of the file causes the malware to stop working, or to behave differently.
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Two execs and a multinational payment processing company must pay $650k to the US government, says the FTC, which accuses them of knowingly processing credit card payments for Microsoft-themed support scammers. The Justice Department and the Feds claim [PDF] Nexway, along with a web of related companies based in France, Switzerland, Germany, and the US, violated the FTC Act and the Telemarketing Sales Rule by processing payments for India-based Tech Live Connect and "Other foreign clients" that commit telemarketing fraud via tech support scams all over the world, although the agency and the department are regulating the United States side of things.
The ClamAV command-line virus scanner used on many Linux boxes has attained an important-looking milestone release: version 1.0.0. It's not really the first finished version, of course.
Mobile malware is on the rise: Know how to protect yourself from a virus or stolen data. Loïc Guézo, senior director, Cybersecurity Strategy at Proofpoint, said, "Scams, smishing and mobile malware have been increasing exponentially for the past few years. This is a trend that began pre-pandemic and continues. Trust in mobile messaging communications makes it a very attractive platform for commercial and marketing activity; it also makes the mobile channel ripe for fraud and identity theft for cybercriminals."
The United Kingdom's data watchdog is calling on organisations to review their "Bulk email practices" after a BCC blunder by HIV Scotland incurred a £10,000 fine for breaking data protection regulations. The case pertains to an email that was sent to 105 individuals on the Community Advisory Network list, which is made up of patient-advocates "From across Scotland to represent the full diversity of people living with HIV".
An amalgam of multiple state-sponsored threat groups from China may have been behind a string of targeted attacks against Russian federal executive authorities in 2020. The latest research, published by Singapore-headquartered company Group-IB, delves into a piece of computer virus called "Webdav-O" that was detected in the intrusions, with the cybersecurity firm observing similarities between the tool and that of popular Trojan called "BlueTraveller," that's known to be connected to a Chinese threat group called TaskMasters and deployed in malicious activities with the aim of espionage and plundering confidential documents.
Colombian authorities on Wednesday said they have arrested a Romanian hacker who is wanted in the U.S. for distributing a virus that infected more than a million computers from 2007 to 2012. Paunescu was previously charged by the U.S. Department of Justice in January 2013 for operating a bulletproof hosting service that "Enabled cyber criminals to distribute the Gozi Virus, the Zeus Trojan and other notorious malware, and conduct other sophisticated cyber crimes." He was arrested in Romania in December 2012 but managed to avoid extradition to the U.S. "Through this service, Paunescu, like other bulletproof hosts, knowingly provided critical online infrastructure to cyber criminals that allowed them to commit online criminal activity with little fear of detection by law enforcement," the DoJ said in an unsealed indictment.
Colombian officials say they have arrested a Romanian hacker who is wanted in the U.S. for distributing a virus that infected more than a million computers from 2007 to 2012. Mihai Ionut Paunescu faces computer intrusion and banking fraud charges in New York, where prosecutors say he was part of a ring of criminals that developed and spread the "Gozi" virus and other forms of malware that were used to steal money from bank accounts.
A previously undocumented Windows malware has infected over 222,000 systems worldwide since at least June 2018, yielding its developer no less than 9,000 Moneros in illegal profits. Dubbed "Crackonosh," the malware is distributed via illegal, cracked copies of popular software, only to disable antivirus programs installed in the machine and install a coin miner package called XMRig for stealthily exploiting the infected host's resources to mine Monero.