Plus: More Pegasus spyware controversy, a major BIOS controversy, and more of the week’s top security news.

The fallout from CrowdStrike’s deleterious software update came into full view this week as system administrators and IT staffers scrambled to get digital systems back online and return operations to normal. Elsewhere, the Olympics began this week, and Paris is ready with a controversial new surveillance system that hints at a future of ubiquitous CCTV camera coverage. And researchers revealed new findings this week about the innovative malware Russia used in January to sabotage a heating utility in Lviv and cut heat to 600 Ukrainian buildings at the coldest point in the year.

The US Department of Defense has a $141 billion idea to modernize US intercontinental ballistic missiles and their silos around the country. Meanwhile, the European Commission is allocating €7.3 billion for defense research—from drones and tanks to battleships and space intelligence—over the next seven years. And hackers have established a “ghost” network to quietly spread malware on the Microsoft-owned developer platform GitHub.

In more encouraging news, a former Google engineer has built a prototype search engine, dubbed webXray, meant to allow users to find specific privacy violations online, determine which sites are tracking you, and see where all that data goes.

And there’s more. Each week, we round up the security news we didn’t cover in depth ourselves. Click the headlines to read the full stories, and stay safe out there.

**Israel Reportedly Worked to Keep Info on Pegasus Spyware Out of US Courts**

Leaked files obtained by The Guardian reveal that the Israeli government took extraordinary measures to prevent information about the Pegasus spyware system from falling into the hands of US courts, including seizing files directly from the company to prevent legal disclosure. The spyware is the product of the Israel-based NSO Group. It allows users to infect smartphones, extract messages and photos, record calls, and secretly activate microphones. NSO Group faces legal action in the US brought by WhatsApp, which claims the company engineered Pegasus to target users of its messaging software. According to WhatsApp, more than 1,400 of its users were targeted. NSO, whose software has been allegedly tied to the harassment and murder of journalist Jamal Khashoggi, has denied any wrongdoing.

**Massive Screwup Leaves BIOS on 200+ Computer Models Vulnerable**

In an effort to thwart BIOS-based threats, prompted in part by the rollout of a powerful rootkit designed by a Chinese researcher in 2007, Secure Boot became a widely adopted tool. Unfortunately, researchers at the security firm Binarly have revealed that Secure Boot is now “completely compromised” on more than 200 device models, affecting major hardware manufacturers like Dell, Acer, and Intel. The incident was the result of a weak cryptographic key used to establish trust between hardware and firmware systems. AMI, the key's owner, says it was meant to be used for testing and should never have made its way into production.

**Musk’s AI system, Grok, Is Now Feeding on All Your Tweets**

Following in Meta's footsteps, Elon Musk's X quietly adjusted its settings this week to give the company's AI system—known as Grok—access to all of its users' posts. There is a way to prevent Grok from ingesting your posts; however, you cannot perform this action from the mobile app. You'll need to access X's **Settings** using a desktop computer; select **Privacy and Safety**, then select **Grok**, and then uncheck the box. Or just head straight here to go directly to the right settings page. (You can also delete your conversation history with Grok, if you have one, by clicking **Delete conversation history**.)

Stop X’s Grok AI From Training on Your Tweets

Digital literacy and protective measures will be key to detecting disinformation and deepfakes as AI is used to shape public opinion and erode trust in the democratic processes, as well as identify nefarious content.

Source: Enrico01 via Alamy Stock Photo

COMMENTARY

Disinformation — information created and shared to mislead opinion or understanding — isn't a new phenomenon. However, digital media and the proliferation of open source generative artificial intelligence (GenAI) tools like ChatGPT, DALL-E, and DeepSwap, coupled with mass dissemination capabilities of social media, are exacerbating challenges associated with preventing the spread of potentially harmful fake content. 

Although in their infancy, these tools have begun shaping how we create digital content, requiring little in the way of skill or budget to produce convincing photo and video imitations of individuals or generate believable conspiratorial narratives. In fact, the World Economic Forum places disinformation amplified by AI as one of the most severe global risks over the next few years, including the possibilities for exploitation amid heightened global political and social tensions, and during critical junctures such as elections. 

In 2024, as more than 2 billion voters across 50 countries have already headed to the polls or await upcoming elections, disinformation has driven concerns over its ability to shape public opinion and erode trust in the media and democratic processes. But while AI-generated content can be leveraged to manipulate a narrative, there is also potential for these tools to improve our capabilities to identify and protect against these threats. 

**Addressing AI-Generated Disinformation**

Governments and regulatory authorities have introduced various guidelines and legislation to protect the public from AI-generated disinformation. In November 2023, 18 countries — including the US and UK — entered into a nonbinding AI Safety agreement, while in the European Union, an AI Act approved in mid-March limits various AI applications. The Indian government drafted legislation in response to a proliferation of deepfakes during elections cycle that compels social media companies to remove reported deepfakes or lose their protection from liability for third-party content. 

Nevertheless, authorities have struggled to adapt to the shifting AI landscape, which often outpaces their ability to develop relevant expertise and reach consensus across multiple (and often opposing) stakeholders from government, civil, and commercial spheres. 

Social media companies have also implemented guardrails to protect users, including increased scanning and removal of fake accounts, and steering users toward reliable sources of information, particularly around elections. Amid financial challenges, many platforms have downsized teams dedicated to AI ethics and online safety, creating uncertainty as to the impact this will have on platforms' abilities and appetite to effectively stem false content in the coming years. 

Meanwhile, technical challenges persist around identifying and containing misleading content. The sheer volume and rate at which information spreads through social media platforms — often where individuals first encounter falsified content — seriously complicates detection efforts; harmful posts can "go viral" within hours as platforms prioritize engagement over accuracy. Automated moderation has improved capabilities to an extent, but such solutions have been unable to keep up. For instance, significant gaps remain in automated attempts to detect certain hashtags, keywords, misspellings and non-English words.  

Disinformation can be exacerbated when it is unknowingly disseminated by mainstream media or influencers who have not sufficiently verified its authenticity. In May 2023, the Irish Times apologized after gaps in its editing and publication process resulted in the publication of an AI-generated article. In the same month, while an AI-generated image on Twitter of an explosion at the Pentagon was quickly debunked by US law enforcement, it nonetheless prompted a 0.26% drop in the stock market. 

**What Can Be Done?**

Not all applications of AI are malicious. Indeed, leaning into AI may help circumvent some limitations of human content moderation, decreasing reliance on human moderators to improve efficiency and reduce costs. But there are limitations. Content moderation using large language models (LLMs) is often overly sensitive in the absence of sufficient human oversight to interpret context and sentiment, blurring the line between preventing the spread of harmful content and suppressing alternative views. Continued challenges with biased training data and algorithms and AI hallucinations (occurring most commonly in image recognition tasks) have also contributed to difficulties in employing AI technology as a protective measure. 

A further potential solution, already in use in China, involves "watermarking" AI-generated content to help identification. Though the differences between AI and human-generated content are often imperceptible to us, deep-learning models and algorithms within existing solutions can easily detect these variations. The dynamic nature of AI-generated content poses a unique challenge for digital forensic investigators, who need to develop increasingly sophisticated methods to counter adaptive techniques from malicious actors leveraging these technologies. While existing watermark technology is a step in the right direction, diversifying solutions will ensure continued innovation which can outpace, or at least keep up with, adversarial uses. 

**Boosting Digital Literacy**

Combating disinformation also requires addressing users' ability to critically engage with AI-generated content, particularly during election cycles. This requires improved vigilance in identifying and reporting misleading or harmful content. However, research shows that our understanding of what AI can do and our ability to spot fake content remains limited. Although skepticism is often taught from an early age in the consumption of written content, technological innovations now necessitate the extension of this practice to audio and visual media to develop a more discerning audience. 

**Testing Ground**

As adversarial actors adapt and evolve their use of AI to create and spread disinformation, 2024 and its multitude of elections will be a testing ground for how effectively companies, governments, and consumers are able to combat this threat. Not only will authorities need to double down on ensuring sufficient protective measures to guard people, institutions, and political processes against AI-driven disinformation, but it will also become increasingly critical to ensure that communities are equipped with the digital literacy and vigilance needed to protect themselves where other measures may fail.

**About the Author(s)**

Associate, Strategic Intelligence, S-RM

Erin Drake is an associate in S-RM’s Strategic Intelligence team, where she leads on case management of regular and bespoke consulting projects. She joined the firm in 2017 and has worked on a variety of projects ranging from threat assessments to security risk assessments across several markets. This often entails the development of client-specific approach and methodological framework for high-level and detailed bespoke projects, to support clients in understanding and monitoring the security, political, regulatory, reputational, geopolitical, and macroeconomic threats present in their operating environment. Erin’s expertise includes global maritime security issues, political stability concerns in the commercial sector, and conflict analysis. Erin holds a master's degree in international relations with a focus on global security issues like nuclear proliferation and multilateral diplomacy.

Global Cyber Threat Intelligence Lead, S-RM

Melissa DeOrio is Global Cyber Threat Intelligence Lead at S-RM, supporting clients on a variety of proactive cyber and cyber-threat intelligence services. Before joining S-RM, Melissa worked on US Federal Law Enforcement cyber investigations as a cyber targeter. In this role, Melissa utilized numerous cyber-investigative techniques and methodologies to investigate cyber threat actors and groups including open source intelligence techniques, cryptocurrency asset tracing as well as identifying and mapping threat actor tactics, techniques, and procedures (TTPs) to provide tactical and strategic intelligence reports. Melissa began her career in corporate intelligence, where she specialized in Turkish regional investigations, managed a global team of researchers, and played a role in the development and implementation of a new compliance program at a leading management consulting firm.

AI Remains a Wild Card in the War Against Disinformation

As the travel industry rebounds post-pandemic, it is increasingly targeted by automated threats, with the sector experiencing nearly 21% of all bot attack requests last year. That’s according to research from Imperva, a Thales company. In their 2024 Bad Bot Report, Imperva finds that bad bots accounted for 44.5% of the industry’s web traffic in 2023—a significant jump from 37.4% in 2022.

As the travel industry rebounds post-pandemic, it is increasingly targeted by automated threats, with the sector experiencing nearly 21% of all bot attack requests last year. That's according to research from Imperva, a Thales company. In their 2024 Bad Bot Report, Imperva finds that bad bots accounted for 44.5% of the industry's web traffic in 2023—a significant jump from 37.4% in 2022.

The summer travel season and major European sporting events are expected to drive increased consumer demand for flights, accommodation, and other travel-related services. As a result, Imperva warns that the industry could see a surge in bot activity. These bots target the industry through unauthorized scraping, seat spinning, account takeover, and fraud.

****From Scraping to Fraud****

Bots are software applications that run automated tasks across the internet. Many of these tasks, from indexing websites for search engines to monitoring website performance, are legitimate, but a growing number are not.

Bad bots engage in various malicious activities, from denial-of-service attacks to transaction fraud. These automated threats can consume bandwidth, slow down servers, and disrupt business operations even when not directly stealing sensitive data or conducting fraudulent transactions.

The travel industry has long grappled with complex bot issues, as malicious actors can exploit the various ways in which business logic is utilized in travel applications. These are some of the most common ways travel-related applications are targeted daily:

*   **Fare Scraping:** The use of bots to aggregate pricing information, inventories, discounted fares, and more. Airlines are particularly targeted by scraping, as bots operated by Online Travel Agencies (OTAs), aggregators, and competitors often harvest data without permission. As a result, the high volume of bots scraping information can skew critical business metrics like look-to-book ratios and inflate API costs. For example, one airline incurred $500,000 per month in API request fees due to a surge in bad bot traffic scraping its search API.
*   **Seat Spinning:** The use of bots to repeatedly book and cancel airline seats or hotel rooms, creating a temporary hold on inventory without making an actual purchase. This activity falsely creates scarcity, making it seem like fewer seats or rooms are available. As a result, it misleads customers and potentially drives up prices due to perceived high demand. This artificial shortage can lead to inventory mismanagement, making it difficult for legitimate customers to find and book available seats or rooms. Consequently, travel companies may suffer revenue losses as real customers are deterred by unavailability or inflated prices caused by the fake demand. Seat spinning also disrupts the normal operations of airlines and hotels, leading to inefficiencies and increased operational costs associated with managing and monitoring such fraudulent activities. This deterioration in customer experience can lead to frustration as genuine customers face difficulties in finding and booking seats or rooms.
*   **Account Takeover:** The travel industry experienced the second-highest volume of account takeover (ATO) attempts in 2023, with 11% of all ATO attacks targeting the industry and 17% of all login requests associated with ATO. Cybercriminals target this industry due to the valuable personal information, stored payment methods, and loyalty points within user accounts, making them lucrative for identity theft and fraud. Time-sensitive, high-value travel transactions enable quick monetization, often before fraud is detected, resulting in financial losses, damaged customer trust, and harm to the company's reputation. Moreover, addressing ATO demands substantial resources for customer support, reimbursements, and security enhancements. The industry's interconnected systems and numerous entry points further exacerbate its vulnerability.

****Not All Bots Are Created Equal****

Imperva categorizes malicious bot activity into three categories: simple, moderate, and advanced. Connecting from a single, ISP-assigned IP address, simple bad bots connect to sites or applications using automated scripts without self-reporting as a browser. Moderate bad bots use "headless browser" software that simulates browser technology, including the ability to execute JavaScript. Advanced bad bots mimic human user behavior, such as mouse movements and clicks, to spoof bot detection. They also use browser automation software or malware installed within real browsers to connect to sites.

Simple bad bots often perform basic web scraping activity, while advanced bad bots may be needed for more sophisticated fraud and account takeover attempts. The travel industry is particularly plagued by advanced bad bot activity, which accounted for 61% of bad bot activity last year. Advanced bad bot traffic poses a significant risk, as these bots can achieve their goals with fewer requests than simple bad bots and are much more persistent.

Sophisticated bot operators often employ techniques shared between moderate and advanced bad bots to evade detection. These evasive bots use complex tactics like cycling through random IPs, entering via anonymous proxies, defeating CAPTCHA challenges, and more to circumvent bot management solutions.

****Layering up Defenses****

Bots accounted for nearly half of all traffic within the travel industry in 2023. That situation could worsen as consumer demand for travel grows and bot operators target loyalty rewards programs, carry out account takeover attacks, or commit fraud. To mitigate these threats, Imperva recommends several strategies for IT security teams.

First, organizations must identify risks through advanced traffic analysis and real-time bot detection. Understanding exposure, particularly around login functionalities, is crucial as these are prime targets for credential stuffing and brute force attacks. A comprehensive security strategy should encompass all digital touchpoints, including APIs and mobile applications.

Imperva suggests several quick wins, such as blocking outdated browser versions, restricting access from bulk IP data centers, and implementing detection strategies for signs of automation, like unusually fast interactions. Regular monitoring for traffic anomalies, such as high bounce rates or sudden spikes, can help identify bad bot activity. Additionally, analyzing suspicious traffic sources, like single IP addresses, can provide valuable insights.

As bot technology advances, especially with AI, distinguishing between good and bad traffic will become more challenging. Therefore, Imperva advocates for layered defenses, including user behavior analysis, profiling, and fingerprinting, as essential measures for the travel industry.

Found this article interesting? This article is a contributed piece from one of our valued partners. Follow us on Twitter __ and LinkedIn to read more exclusive content we post.

Automated Threats Pose Increasing Risk to the Travel Industry

Learn about critical threats that can impact your organization and the bad actors behind them from Cybersixgill’s threat experts. Each story shines a light on underground activities, the threat actors involved, and why you should care, along with what you can do to mitigate risk. 
Cybersecurity professionals are facing unprecedented challenges as they strive to manage increasing workloads

_Learn about critical threats that can impact your organization and the bad actors behind them from Cybersixgill's threat experts. Each story shines a light on underground activities, the threat actors involved, and why you should care, along with what you can do to mitigate risk._

Cybersecurity professionals are facing unprecedented challenges as they strive to manage increasing workloads amidst limited budgets, inadequate staffing, and growing attack surfaces. Research indicates that a majority of these professionals find their jobs more difficult than ever, and a significant number are contemplating leaving their current positions due to the stress and demands of the role.

The value of cyber threat intelligence (CTI) in anticipating and mitigating potential attacks is widely recognized. However, security teams face several challenges in effectively utilizing CTI insights, which can turn a powerful cyber defense weapon into an additional burden that security professionals must contend with to perform their jobs effectively, further fueling their stress and frustration. Such issues include a lack of interoperability among cybersecurity tools, inadequate funding, and insufficient time. However, 44% of respondents cited the most significant obstacle as the lack of trained staff or skills to fully utilize CTI.

The shortage of skilled cybersecurity professionals is a long-term issue that has created a gap between the available CTI information and the ability of security teams to act upon it. This skills shortage, with a global deficit of around 4 million cybersecurity employees, exacerbates the challenges faced by organizations in protecting themselves from cyber threats.

Another critical issue for cybersecurity teams is the frequent requests for reports from board directors, senior executives, and other stakeholders. When major media outlets raise alarms about new, pervasive malware, top executives naturally seek immediate assurance and action from their cybersecurity teams. Producing these reports, however, is a time-consuming process. It involves gathering data from various open sources, analyzing the information, and compiling it into a comprehensive report. According to one survey, 60% of respondents spend up to 40% of their time responding to such cybersecurity news reports, time that is desperately needed for other critical tasks.

This problem is particularly pronounced for Managed Services Security Providers (MSSPs), who must often summarize findings and communicate them to multiple clients simultaneously. The extensive manual effort required for this reporting can strain already overburdened teams.

****Enter Cybersixgill's IQ Report Generator****

Cybersixgill has introduced a solution that promises significant relief: the IQ Report Generator. Leveraging the capabilities of Cybersixgill IQ, the company's generative AI offering, this tool allows security teams and MSSPs to create comprehensive CTI reports in a matter of minutes. This innovation represents a substantial shift from the traditional manual process of culling through disparate intelligence sources and navigating various platforms.

IQ Report Generator utilizes generative AI to rapidly compile and organize information into reports that are easily understandable by non-technical stakeholders, such as board members and C-level executives. These reports not only assess the current situation but also provide actionable insights and recommendations for next steps. For more technical audiences, IQ Report Generator can produce in-depth and detailed reports tailored to specific needs.

****Versatile Reporting Capabilities****

The AI report generator offers several parameters that users can adjust to customize their reports, including topic, audience, format, and timeframe. This flexibility ensures that the reports are relevant and useful for a variety of purposes. Here are some of the types of reports that can be generated:

*   **Incident Response Reports:** Detailing indicators of compromise, attack timelines, affected systems, and recommended actions.
*   **Threat Intelligence Briefings:** Assessing key threat trends, emerging threats, and their potential impact on the organization.
*   **Vendor Risk Reports:** Highlighting risks from third-party vendors and informing decision-making.
*   **Post-Incident Reports:** Summarizing lessons learned, recommendations for improvement, and strategies to prevent future incidents.
*   **Risk-Assessment Reports:** Evaluating overall cybersecurity risk, potential impacts, and mitigation strategies.

By automating the report-creation process, security teams have more time to focus on proactive measures to prevent cyberattacks and are also better able to manage the skills shortage that may impact their organization. MSSPs, in particular, can communicate risk and ROI to their clients more efficiently, especially when they need to generate multiple custom reports tailored to each client organization.

The reports generated by IQ Report Generator provide more than just raw data; they offer insights and recommendations for remediation, making them valuable tools for both strategic planning and immediate action. The ability to produce high-level summaries for executives and detailed technical reports for security teams ensures that all stakeholders receive the information they need in a format they can understand and act upon.

****Conclusion****

As cybersecurity threats continue to evolve and become more sophisticated, the demands on cybersecurity professionals will only increase. Tools like Cybersixgill's IQ Report Generator offer a much-needed solution to alleviate some pressures faced by these professionals. By automating the report generation process and providing actionable insights, IQ Report Generator enables security teams to focus on more critical tasks, ultimately enhancing their organizations' overall cybersecurity posture.

To learn more about this innovative tool, click here to see a quick demo, or contact Cybersixgill to generate a free CTI report in minutes.

Found this article interesting? This article is a contributed piece from one of our valued partners. Follow us on Twitter __ and LinkedIn to read more exclusive content we post.

Ease the Burden with AI-Driven Threat Intelligence Reporting 

A ShinyHunters hacker tells WIRED that they gained access to Ticketmaster’s Snowflake cloud account—and others—by first breaching a third-party contractor.

Hackers who stole terabytes of data from Ticketmaster and other customers of the cloud storage firm Snowflake claim they obtained access to some of the Snowflake accounts by first breaching a Belarusian-founded contractor that works with those customers.

About 165 customer accounts were potentially affected in the recent hacking campaign targeting Snowflake’s customers, but only a few of these have been identified so far. In addition to Ticketmaster, the banking firm Santander has also acknowledged that their data was stolen but declined to identify the account from which it was stolen. Wired, however, has independently confirmed that it was a Snowflake account; the stolen data included bank account details for 30 million customers, including 6 million account numbers and balances, 28 million credit card numbers, and human resources information about staff, according to a post published by the hackers. Lending Tree and Advance Auto Parts have also said they might be victims as well.

Snowflake has not revealed details about how the hackers accessed the accounts, saying only that the intruders did not directly breach Snowflake’s network. This week, Google-owned security firm Mandiant, one of the companies engaged by Snowflake to investigate the breaches, revealed in a blog post that in some cases the hackers first obtained access through third-party contractors, without identifying the contractors or stating how this access aided the hackers in breaching the Snowflake accounts.

But according to one of the hackers who spoke with WIRED through a text chat, one of those firms was EPAM Systems, a publicly traded software engineering and digital services firm, founded by Belarus-born Arkadiy Dobkin, with current revenue of around $4.8 billion. The hacker says his group, which calls themselves ShinyHunters, used data found on an EPAM employee system to gain access to some of the Snowflake accounts.

EPAM told WIRED that it does not believe that it played a role in the breaches and suggested the hacker had fabricated the tale. ShinyHunters has been around since 2020 and has been responsible for numerous breaches since then that involve stealing large troves of data and leaking or selling it online.

Snowflake is a large data storage and analysis firm that provides tools for companies to derive intelligence and insight from customer data. EPAM develops software and provides various managed services for customers worldwide, primarily in North America, Europe, Asia, and Australia, according to its web site, with about 60 percent of its revenue coming from customers in North America. Among the services EPAM provides customers is assistance with using and managing their Snowflake accounts to store and analyze their data. EPAM claims it has some 300 workers who are experienced in using Snowflake’s data analytics tools and services, and announced in 2022 that it had attained “Elite Tier Partner” status with Snowflake to leverage the latter’s analytics platform for its customers.

EPAM’s founder emigrated from Belarus to the US in the ’90s before founding his company in 1993 from his New Jersey apartment. Nearly two-thirds of EPAM’s 55,000 employees resided in Ukraine, Belarus, and Russia until Russia invaded Ukraine, at which point the company says it closed its Russia operations and moved some of its Ukrainian workers to locations outside of that country.

The hacker who spoke with WIRED says that a computer belonging to one of EPAM’s employees in Ukraine was infected with info-stealer malware through a spear-phishing attack. It’s unclear if someone from ShinyHunters conducted this initial breach or just purchased access to the infected system from someone else who hacked the worker and installed the infostealer. The hacker says that once on the EPAM worker’s system, they installed a remote-access Trojan, giving them complete access to everything on the worker’s computer.

Using this access, they say, they found unencrypted usernames and passwords that the worker used to access and manage EPAM customers’ Snowflake accounts, including an account for Ticketmaster. The hacker says the credentials were stored on the worker’s machine in a project management tool called Jira. The hackers were able to use those credentials, they say, to access the Snowflake accounts because the Snowflake accounts didn’t require multifactor authentication (MFA) to access them. (MFA requires that users type in a one-time temporary code in addition to a username and password, making accounts that use MFA more secure.)

While EPAM denies it was involved in the breach, hackers did steal data from Snowflake accounts including Ticketmaster's, and have extorted the owners of the data by demanding hundreds of thousands, and in some cases more than a million, dollars to destroy the data or risk having the hackers sell it elsewhere.

The hacker who spoke with WIRED didn’t identify all of the victims breached through EPAM but did indicate that Ticketmaster was one of them. Ticketmaster did not respond to a request for comment from WIRED. But Ticketmaster’s parent company, Live Nation, has acknowledged that data was stolen from its Snowflake account in May without revealing how much data was stolen or how the hackers accessed the Snowflake account. In a post offering the data for sale, however, the hackers indicated that they had taken data on 560 million Ticketmaster consumers.

The hacker claims that in some cases they were able to directly access the Snowflake account of EPAM customers using the plaintext usernames and passwords they found on the EPAM worker’s computer. But in cases where Snowflake credentials weren’t stored on the worker’s system, the hacker claims they sifted through stockpiles of old credentials stolen in previous breaches by hackers using infostealer malware and found additional usernames and passwords for Snowflake accounts, including ones harvested from the machine of the same EPAM worker in Ukraine.

Credentials harvested by infostealers are often posted online or made available for sale on hacker forums. If victims don’t change their login credentials after a breach, or don’t know their data has been stolen, those credentials can remain active and available for years. It’s especially problematic if those credentials are used across multiple accounts; hackers can identify the user through the email address they use as a login credential, and if that person reuses the same password, hackers can simply try those credentials in multiple places.

The hackers in this case say they were able to use credentials stolen by an infostealer in 2020 to access Snowflake accounts.

WIRED wasn’t able to independently confirm that the hackers were inside the EPAM worker’s machine or used EPAM to gain access to Ticketmaster’s data and other Snowflake accounts, but the hacker provided WIRED with a file that appears to be a list of EPAM worker credentials lifted from the company’s Active Directory database after they gained access to the worker’s computer.

Furthermore, in the blog post written by Mandiant, which was published after the hacker told WIRED about his group’s use of data harvested by infostealers, the security firm revealed that the hackers who breached Snowflake accounts used old data siphoned by infostealers to access some of the accounts. Mandiant said that about 80 percent of the victims it identified in the Snowflake campaign were compromised using credentials that had previously been stolen and exposed by infostealers.

And an independent security researcher who has been helping to negotiate the ransom transactions between the ShinyHunter hackers and victims of the Snowflake campaign pointed WIRED to an online repository of data harvested by an infostealer that includes data siphoned from the computer of the EPAM worker in Ukraine that the hacker says was used to gain access to the Snowflake accounts. This stolen data includes the worker’s browser history, which reveals the worker’s complete name. It also includes an internal EPAM URL pointing to Ticketmaster’s Snowflake account, as well as a plaintext version of the username and password that the EPAM worker used to access the Ticketmaster Snowflake account.

“This means that \[an EPAM worker\] who had access to that Snowflake \[account\] had password-stealing malware on their computer, and their password was stolen and sold on the dark web,” says the researcher, who asked to be identified only as Reddington, an identity they use online to communicate with cybercriminals. “This means that anyone that knew the correct URL to \[Ticketmaster’s\] Snowflake could have simply looked up the password, logged in, and stolen the data.”

An EPAM spokesperson did not seem to be aware when contacted by WIRED early this week that its company allegedly played a role in breaches of Snowflake accounts. “We do not comment on situations to which we are not a part,” she wrote in an email, suggesting the company did not believe it played any role in the campaign. When WIRED provided the spokeswoman with details about how the hackers say they obtained access to the system of an EPAM worker in Ukraine, she replied, “Hackers frequently spread false information to advance their agendas. We maintain a policy of not engaging with misinformation and consistently uphold robust security measures to protect our operations and customers. We are continuing our exhaustive investigation and, at this time, see no evidence to suggest that we have been affected or involved in this matter.”

WIRED followed up by providing the name of the Ukrainian worker whose machine the hackers allegedly compromised, as well as the username and password the worker used for accessing Ticketmaster’s Snowflake account, but the spokesperson did not respond to any additional questions.

It’s possible the ShinyHunter hackers did not directly hack the EPAM worker, and simply gained access to the Snowflake accounts using usernames and passwords they obtained from old repositories of credentials stolen by info stealers. But, as Reddington points out, this means that anyone else can sift through those repositories for these and other credentials stolen from EPAM accounts. Reddington says they found data online that was used by nine different infostealers to harvest data from the machines of EPAM workers. This raises potential concerns about the security of data belonging to other EPAM customers.

EPAM has customers across various critical industries, including banks and other financial services, health care, broadcast networks, pharmaceutical, energy and other utilities, insurance, and software and hi-tech—the latter customers include Microsoft, Google, Adobe, and Amazon Web Services. It’s not clear, however, if any of these companies have Snowflake accounts to which EPAM workers have access. WIRED also wasn’t able to confirm whether Ticketmaster, Santander, Lending Tree, or Advance AutoParts are EPAM customers.

The Snowflake campaign also highlights the growing security risks from third-party companies in general and from infostealers. In its blog post this week, Mandiant suggested that multiple contractors were breached to gain access to Snowflake accounts, noting that contractors—often known as business process outsourcing (BPO) companies—are a potential gold mine for hackers, because compromising the machine of a contractor that has access to the accounts of multiple customers can give them direct access to many customer accounts.

“Contractors that customers engage to assist with their use of Snowflake may utilize personal and/or non-monitored laptops that exacerbate this initial entry vector,” wrote Mandiant in its blog post. “These devices, often used to access the systems of multiple organizations, present a significant risk. If compromised by infostealer malware, a single contractor's laptop can facilitate threat actor access across multiple organizations, often with IT and administrator-level privileges.”

The company also highlighted the growing risk from infostealers, noting that the majority of the credentials the hackers used in the Snowflake campaign came from repositories of data previously stolen by various infostealer campaigns, some of which dated as far back as 2020. “Mandiant identified hundreds of customer Snowflake credentials exposed via infostealers since 2020,” the company noted.

This, accompanied by the fact that the targeted Snowflake accounts didn’t use MFA to further protect them, made the breaches in this campaign possible, Mandiant notes.

Snowflake’s CISO, Brad Jones, acknowledged last week that the lack of multifactor authentication enabled the breaches. In a phone call this week, Jones told WIRED that Snowflake is working on giving its customers the ability to mandate that users of their accounts employ multifactor authentication going forward, “and then we’ll be looking in the future to \[make the\] default MFA,” he says.

_Update 6/17/2024, 5:45 pm EDT: The article was updated to clarify the details that Santander has publicly revealed about the hack._

Hackers Detail How They Allegedly Stole Ticketmaster Data From Snowflake

Debian Linux Security Advisory 5695-1 - Manfred Paul discovered that an attacker with arbitrary read and write capability may be able to bypass Pointer Authentication in the WebKitGTK web engine.

-----BEGIN PGP SIGNED MESSAGE-----  
Hash: SHA512

- -------------------------------------------------------------------------  
Debian Security Advisory DSA-5695-1                   security@debian.org  
https://www.debian.org/security/                           Alberto Garcia  
May 22, 2024                          https://www.debian.org/security/faq  
- -------------------------------------------------------------------------

Package        : webkit2gtk  
CVE ID         : CVE-2024-27834

The following vulnerabilities have been discovered in the WebKitGTK  
web engine:

CVE-2024-27834

   Manfred Paul discovered that an attacker with arbitrary read and  
   write capability may be able to bypass Pointer Authentication.

For the oldstable distribution (bullseye), this problem has been fixed  
in version 2.44.2-1~deb11u1.

For the stable distribution (bookworm), this problem has been fixed in  
version 2.44.2-1~deb12u1.

We recommend that you upgrade your webkit2gtk packages.

For the detailed security status of webkit2gtk please refer to  
its security tracker page at:  
https://security-tracker.debian.org/tracker/webkit2gtk

Further information about Debian Security Advisories, how to apply  
these updates to your system and frequently asked questions can be  
found at: https://www.debian.org/security/

Mailing list: debian-security-announce@lists.debian.org  
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Debian Security Advisory 5695-1

By Waqas
Dell has announced a data breach, while a hacker using the alias Menelik is selling 49 million Dell customer data on the notorious Breach Forums.
This is a post from HackRead.com Read the original post: Dell Discloses Data Breach As Hacker Sells 49 Million Customer Data

Dell Inc., the technology giant, has notified its customers of a data breach. According to an email obtained by Hackread.com, the breach affected a Dell portal housing customers’ information and their purchase history with **Dell**.

****Details of the Breach****

Although the company did not disclose the number of affected customers, the data compromised in the incident includes:

*   **Full names**
*   **Physical address**
*   **Dell hardware and order information, including service tag, item description, date of order and related warranty information.**

Email sent by Dell to impacted customers (Screenshot credit: Hackread.com)

****Hacker Claims Responsibility****

The positive aspect is that email addresses, passwords, and banking or card data were not part of the breach. However, Hackread.com has verified that a hacker using the alias “Menelik” on **Breach Forums** has recently claimed responsibility for the breach.

It’s important to highlight that while the connection between Dell’s reported data breach and Menelik’s claim remains unconfirmed, the hacker maintains that this is indeed the same breach and has provided additional details regarding the compromised data. Specifically, Menelik alleges to have acquired the personal information of over 49 million Dell customers. This data comprises:

*   **City**
*   **Full Name**
*   **Address**
*   **Province**
*   **Postal Code**
*   **Warranty plan**
*   **Company Name**
*   **Dell Order Number**
*   **Dell Customer Number**
*   **System shipped date (order date)**
*   **Unique 7-digit service tag of the system.**

Sample data seen and analysed by Hackread.com

****Customers by Country****

Additionally, the hacker disclosed the countries with the highest number of affected Dell customers. These include:

1.  **India**
2.  **China**
3.  **Canada**
4.  **Australia**
5.  **United States**

****Dell Data Being Sold to One Buyer****

According to the hacker, the dataset consists of roughly 7 million rows of individual/personal purchase data and 11 million rows of consumer segment company data, and the rest comprises entries from enterprise clients, partners, educational institutions, and other entities. The data is currently being sold to a single buyer for an undisclosed amount.

The hacker on Breach Forums (Screenshot credit: Hackread.com)

****What Dell is Doing?****

Dell has taken several measures in response to the breach. They have notified law enforcement authorities and engaged a third-party forensic firm to investigate the incident.

Despite stating that they do not believe there is a significant risk due to the limited information compromised, the sale of data containing full names and physical addresses poses a considerable threat to customers.

This type of data exposure not only leaves individuals vulnerable to physical harm but also opens the door for threat actors to exploit the information in long-term **social engineering attacks**.

If you are among the victims of the recent Dell data breach, it’s crucial to remain alert. Hackers may use the stolen information to piece together additional details about you, including email addresses and data from previous breaches, increasing the risk of further exploitation.

1.  Acer Online Store Hacked; 34,000 Customers’ Data Stolen
2.  Critical Vulnerabilities Found in Pre-Installed Dell Software
3.  After Denial, AT&T Confirms Data Breach Affecting 73M Users
4.  Acer Data Breach: Hacker Claims to Sell 160GB of Stolen Data
5.  Trezor Data Breach Exposes Email and Names of 66,000 Users

Dell Discloses Data Breach As Hacker Sells 49 Million Customer Data

Red Hat Security Advisory 2024-2483-03 - An update for traceroute is now available for Red Hat Enterprise Linux 9.

    The following advisory data is extracted from:https://access.redhat.com/security/data/csaf/v2/advisories/2024/rhsa-2024_2483.jsonRed Hat officially shut down their mailing list notifications October 10, 2023.  Due to this, Packet Storm has recreated the below data as a reference point to raise awareness.  It must be noted that due to an inability to easily track revision updates without crawling Red Hat's archive, these advisories are single notifications and we strongly suggest that you visit the Red Hat provided links to ensure you have the latest information available if the subject matter listed pertains to your environment.- Packet Storm Staff====================================================================Red Hat Security AdvisorySynopsis:           Moderate: traceroute security updateAdvisory ID:        RHSA-2024:2483-03Product:            Red Hat Enterprise LinuxAdvisory URL:       https://access.redhat.com/errata/RHSA-2024:2483Issue date:         2024-04-30Revision:           03CVE Names:          CVE-2023-46316====================================================================Summary: An update for traceroute is now available for Red Hat Enterprise Linux 9.Red Hat Product Security has rated this update as having a security impact of Moderate. A Common Vulnerability Scoring System (CVSS) base score, which gives a detailed severity rating, is available for each vulnerability from the CVE link(s) in the References section.Description:The traceroute utility displays the route used by IP packets on their way to a specified network (or Internet) host.Security Fix(es):* traceroute: improper command line parsing (CVE-2023-46316)For more details about the security issue(s), including the impact, a CVSS score, acknowledgments, and other related information, refer to the CVE page(s) listed in the References section.Additional Changes:For detailed information on changes in this release, see the Red Hat Enterprise Linux 9.4 Release Notes linked from the References section.Solution:https://access.redhat.com/articles/11258CVEs:CVE-2023-46316References:https://access.redhat.com/security/updates/classification/#moderatehttps://access.redhat.com/documentation/en-us/red_hat_enterprise_linux/9/html/9.4_release_notes/indexhttps://bugzilla.redhat.com/show_bug.cgi?id=2246303

Red Hat Security Advisory 2024-2483-03

While other professions are making up ground, cybersecurity still lags behind in female representation, thanks to a lack of respect and inclusion.

Source: Valeriy Kachaev via Alamy Stock Photo

Right now, in 2024, at least three of every four cybersecurity professionals is male.

Cybersecurity is hardly the only male-dominated industry, but even in contrast to others — like law (53%), accounting (46%), and doctors of medicine (37%) — it lags behind.

According to new research from ISC2, women make up just 20% to 25% of the cybersecurity industry. And that figure, it noted, has remained relatively consistent for some years.

It stands out even more when compared with the racial makeup of the industry. While the majority of cyber pros over the age of 40 in the US, the UK, Canada, and Ireland are white, the majority under 40 are not. ISC2 found that over the past 12 months, a full two-thirds of new entrants to the industry from those countries have been non-white.

The takeaway? Cybersecurity is fixing its diversity problem, but only halfway.

**Gender Representation in Cyber, by the Numbers**

Just 4% of ISC2 survey respondents indicated that women make up a majority of their security teams. By contrast, 11% admitted they have no women on their teams at all.

There seems to be a mild networking effect at play, too. The average woman in security works with around 8% more women (30%) on average than men do (22%).

The problem is pretty much the same across industries, as the most-diverse sectors, like cloud services, automotive, and construction (all 28% female), don't far outpace the least-diverse (military and energy, each at 20%).

There are, however, some positive trends alongside the lagging ones.

Where only around 14% or 15% of cyber pros over age 40 are women, at least 25% under age 35 are (a relative improvement).

Most interestingly, the women who do make it into the cybersecurity field tend to rise up the corporate ladder at least as high as, if not higher than, their male counterparts. Women own executive titles at a similar clip to men. A greater percentage of them possess managerial-level roles, and a lesser percentage are ranked as individual contributors. And counterintuitive though it may sound, a greater percentage of women in security are involved in the hiring process than are men (33% to 24%).

That data, however, contrasts with other recent findings.

**The Root of the Problem: Exclusion**

In its "2023 State of Inclusion Benchmark in Cybersecurity" report, Women in Cybersecurity (WiCyS) tracked the ways in which women experience exclusion in the industry. "Respect" ranked as the worst issue on its list, but just behind respect was "career and growth opportunities."

"Women are experiencing a glass ceiling at around six years," reports Lynn Dohm, executive director at WiCyS. "You could imagine the journey for a woman in cybersecurity as they're advancing in their career, not necessarily getting the stretch assignments they're anticipating, perhaps their managers aren't taking initiative and identifying the trajectory of their career within the organization, they're getting passed up for promotions and experiencing that lack of respect with microaggressions, tokenism, comments. All of that leads up to the point where an individual would likely choose to step out of the career and move into other areas."

It's a self-fulfilling cycle: Too little female representation is leading more women to steer clear of security. As Dohm puts it: "Lack of diversity in the workforce is a symptom of the lack of inclusion."

Simply hiring more women doesn't solve the problem, either, since exclusion extends far deeper than any one person or organization can account for.

"The gender gap in cybersecurity begins long before women reach the workforce," explains Jessy McDermott, partner solution architect at Aqua Security. "I know firsthand as a former engineering student that this gap existed at the college level. For example, only four other women — out of an original 15, excluding myself — completed the engineering program alongside me at UMass Dartmouth. During those four years, I experienced an ongoing prejudice and doubt and saw how women were ultimately driven out of the field before they even graduated.

"This is only exacerbated as time goes on and women begin to see that careers in information technology or cybersecurity are 'male-dominated.' If you’re somehow able to get through college without being driven out of the field, you've just started the first leg of a never-ending journey. Ultimately, this can all lead to imposter syndrome, which myself and many female friends in the industry deal with. I have days where, even now, as a cybersecurity professional with years of experience under my belt, I still get challenged to show and, more importantly, prove my knowledge to others."

So, she adds, "I love how more companies are going out of their way to hire more women into the field, but to see a difference, women need internal support to feel confident and be successful in their roles."

**Non-Diversity Consequences to Companies**

Besides the obvious consequences for people, there are also consequences for uniformity for companies.

"When retention isn't there for female talent, it costs money, because it's pulling back out recruiting dollars. And it's also a reputational risk," Dohm notes.

"Broader than cybersecurity, there's a body of research that says the more perspectives you bring to the table, the better off you will be at problem solving," says Clar Rosso, CEO of ISC2. "In cybersecurity, which is a very complex, growing threat landscape, the more perspectives that we bring to the table to solve problems, the more likely we will be able to impact our cyber defense."

Dohm puts it tersely: "It's a security risk not having the diverse perspective that women bring to the cybersecurity workforce."

**About the Author(s)**

Nate Nelson is a freelance writer based in New York City. Formerly a reporter at Threatpost, he contributes to a number of cybersecurity blogs and podcasts. He writes "Malicious Life" -- an award-winning Top 20 tech podcast on Apple and Spotify -- and hosts every other episode, featuring interviews with leading voices in security. He also co-hosts "The Industrial Security Podcast," the most popular show in its field.

Cybersecurity Is Becoming More Diverse … Except by Gender

Plus: Microsoft scolded for a “cascade” of security failures, AI-generated lawyers send fake legal threats, a data broker quietly lobbies against US privacy legislation, and more.

It’s been a week since the world avoided a potentially catastrophic cyberattack. On March 29, Microsoft developer Andres Freund disclosed his discovery of a backdoor in XZ Utils, a compression tool widely used in Linux distributions and thus countless computer systems worldwide. The backdoor was inserted into the open source tool by someone operating under the persona “Jia Tan” after years of patient work building a reputation as a trustworthy volunteer developer. Security experts believe Jia Tan is the work of a nation-state actor, with clues largely pointing to Russia, although definitive attribution for the attack is still outstanding.

In early 2022, a hacker operating under the name “P4x” took down the internet of North Korea, after the country’s hackers had targeted him. This week, WIRED revealed P4x’s true identity as Alejandro Caceres, a 38-year-old Colombian American. Following his successful attack on North Korea, Caceres pitched the US military on a “special forces”-style offensive hacking team that would carry out operations similar to the one that made P4x famous. The Pentagon eventually declined, but Caceres has launched a startup, Hyperion Gray, and plans to further pursue his controversial approach to cyberwarfare.

In mid-February, millions of people lost internet access after three undersea cables in the Arabian Sea were damaged. Some blamed Houthi rebels in Yemen, who had been attacking ships in the region, but the group denied it had sabotaged the cables. But the rebel attacks are still likely to blame—albeit, in a bizarre way. A WIRED analysis of satellite images, maritime data, and more found that the cables were likely damaged by the trailing anchor of a cargo ship that the Houthi rebels had bombed. The ship drifted for two weeks before finally sinking, crossing paths with the cables at the time they were damaged.

The myth that Google Chrome’s Incognito mode provides adequate privacy protections can finally be put to rest. As part of a settlement over Google’s Incognito privacy claims and practices, the company has agreed to delete “billions” of records collected while users browsed in Incognito mode. It will also further clarify how much user data can be collected by Google and third parties while Incognito is enabled, and take further steps to protect user privacy. There are other privacy-focused browsers that can replace Chrome. But if you’re still using it, make sure to update it to patch some serious security flaws.

But that’s not all. Each week, we round up the security and privacy news we didn’t cover in depth ourselves. Click the headlines to read the full stories. And stay safe out there.

A 58-year-old hospital systems administrator pleaded guilty this week to US federal charges after he was caught using another man’s name for more than 30 years. Matthew David Keirans allegedly stole the identity of William Woods in 1988, when the two men worked at a hot dog cart in Albuquerque, New Mexico, according to the US Attorney's Office for the Northern District of Iowa. Over the decades, Keirans obtained employment, bank accounts, loans, and insurance, and paid taxes, under the Woods name. Keirans even had a child whose last name is Woods.

The real William Woods, meanwhile, reportedly learned that someone else was using his identity in 2019. At the time, Woods was unhoused and living in Los Angeles. He contacted a bank where “William Woods” had an account, providing his real Social Security card and California ID card to prove his identity. However, he could not answer the security questions to gain access. The bank called Keirans—who was pretending to be Woods—and Keirans convinced the bank employee that the real Woods should not have access to the accounts. The Los Angeles Police Department then arrested the real Woods and charged him with identity theft after Keirans provided officers with false documents and information.

In a nightmarish twist, during judicial proceedings, the real Woods accurately maintained that “William Donald Woods” was his true identity, prompting the court to order him to a mental institution. The real Woods ultimately spent 428 days in jail and 147 days in a mental hospital before his release.

The real Woods then continued to work to regain his true identity, eventually contacting authorities after learning that Keirans worked at a hospital in Iowa City. Investigators later confirmed the real Woods’ identity after obtaining a DNA test. Confronted with the evidence, Keirans confessed to a series of crimes and now faces a maximum sentence of 32 years in prison, a $1.25 million fine, and five years of supervised release.

**US Review Board Slams Microsoft for ‘Cascade of Avoidable Security Failures’**

The White-House mandated Cyber Safety Review Board issued a scathing report against Microsoft this week, accusing the tech giant of failing to stop a “preventable” intrusion by China-backed hackers of hundreds of Microsoft Exchange Online email accounts. To gain access to email accounts belonging to 22 organizations and 500 individuals worldwide, the hackers, known as Storm-0558, stole a Microsoft cryptographic key. The CSRB report chastises the company for failing to detect “the compromise of its cryptographic crown jewels,” inadequate security practices, and a “corporate culture that deprioritized both enterprise security investments and rigorous risk management,” among a “cascade” of other defeats.

The report also found that Microsoft still does not know how Storm-0558 obtained its key, accusing the company of making false statements after it initially claimed that the key was accidentally included in an April 2021 “crash dump.” The company has since updated its explanation of the intrusion to say that it still does not know how the hackers obtained the key. The CSRB issued 25 recommended steps that Microsoft—a major government contractor whose systems protect highly sensitive information—should take to better protect its systems.

**AI-Generated Lawyers Caught Spewing Fake Legal Threats**

The owner of the website Tedium received legal threats from a nonexistent “law firm” charging the publication with a copyright violation. The thing is, the “lawyers” behind the complaint were AI-generated. The “law firm” accused Tedium of using a photograph without the owner’s consent, and a "copyright infringement" notice offered to supposedly settle the matter, if only Tedium would agree to properly credit the photo’s “owner” and link out to their website. This was, of course, a backlink scam designed to boost the SEO ranking of the fake copyright holder’s page. Only this time, the scam was bolstered by a cast of AI-generated characters: a hot-shot team of young, "skilled lawyers" purportedly specializing in creative rights and commercial law.

**Data Behemoth Enlists Lobbyists Against Effort in US to Limit Deals With Spies**

An internal feud is underway in the US Congress over the fate of a beleaguered spy program called Section 702 and the commercial deals that US intelligence agencies have struck in recent years with global data brokers, purchasing information that government agents typically need a warrant to obtain. Consequently, the UK owner of LexisNexis—an “amalgam of publishers and data brokers, stitched together into a single information giant”—has retained the services of a Washington, DC, lobbying firm to engage with federal lawmakers over “potential privacy, data security, breach notification, data broker, and FISA reform legislation.” Politico reports that the company, RELX, previously used the firm, Venable, to combat privacy legislation aimed at restricting the kinds of personal data companies are allowed to sell to law enforcement.

**‘Weapon Scanners’ Eyed by New York’s Surveillant Mayor Boasts Abysmal Track Record**

New York City mayor Eric Adams is hastening his crusade against subway violence with a plan to test weapons scanners that claim to use artificial intelligence to detect whether commuters are carrying blades and firearms. Documents obtained by Hell Gate reveal what Adams failed to disclose at a press conference last week: that data already in the city’s hands show the technology is only rarely useful. After police officers permitted to carry firearms were factored out of one study at a Bronx hospital, the scanners were found to be accurate less than 1 percent of the time. (All told, more than 85 percent of the time, the scanners cast false suspicion on New Yorkers who were found to be unarmed.) The move by Adams follows New York governor Kathy Hochul’s deployment of hundreds of National Guard soldiers in the city’s subway systems. Adams first addressed a spate of homicides and stabbings across the city in March by sending hundreds of police officers underground to search commuters' bags at well over 100 subway stations—a tactic that roused resistance from a few locals this week who smashed ticket machines and disabled security cameras at a midtown station to protest the surveillance surge.

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