Cyberattack

The Over-Optimization Meltdown

In simple terms, Meltdown and Spectre are simple vulnerabilities to understand. Imagine a gang of thieves waiting for a stage coach carrying a month's worth of payroll. There are two roads the coach could take, and a fork, or a branch, where the driver decides which one to take. The driver could take either one. What is the solution? Station robbers along both sides of the branch, and wait to see which one the driver chooses. more

A Year in Review: 14,000 Routing Incidents In 2017

How was the state of the Internet's routing system in 2017? Let's take a look back using data from BGPStream. Some highlights: 13,935 total incidents (either outages or attacks like route leaks and hijacks); Over 10% of all Autonomous Systems on the Internet were affected; 3,106 Autonomous Systems were a victim of at least one routing incident; 1,546 networks caused at least one incident. more

CircleID’s Top 10 Posts of 2017

It is once again time for our annual review of posts that received the most attention on CircleID during the past year. Congratulations to all the 2017 participants for sharing their thoughts and making a difference in the industry. 2017 marked CircleID's 15th year of operation as a medium dedicated to all critical matters related to the Internet infrastructure and services. We are in the midst of historic times, facing rapid technological developments and there is a lot to look forward to in 2018. more

Meltdown and Spectre: Security is a Systems Property

I don't (and probably won't) have anything substantive to say about the technical details of the just-announced Meltdown and Spectre attacks. What I do want to stress is that these show, yet again, that security is a systems property: being secure requires that every component, including ones you've never heard of, be secure. These attacks depend on hardware features... and no, many computer programmers don't know what those are, either. more

Two Romanians Charged for Hacking Washington DC Police Computers Linked to Surveillance Cameras

US prosecutors have charged two Romanians with hacking Washington DC police computers linked to surveillance cameras just days before President Donald Trump's inauguration. more

Cyberattack Causes Operational Disruption to Critical Infrastructure Using New Malware TRITON

A new malware designed to manipulate industrial safety systems was deployed against a critical infrastructure organization that provides emergency shutdown capability for industrial processes, according to a report released today. more

Former Rutgers University Student and Two Other Men Plead Guilty to 2016 Mirai Botnet Attacks

A New Jersey man was one of the three who pled guilty to hacking charges and creating the massive Mirai botnet attacks which spread via vulnerabilities in IoT devices causing massive DDoS attacks. more

Russian-Speaking MoneyTaker Group Suspected of Stealing $10M From Companies in Russia, UK and US

According to report today, Russian-speaking hackers called MoneyTaker, are suspected of stealing nearly $10m by removing overdraft limits on debit cards and taking money from cash machines. more

A Digital ‘Red Cross’

A look into the past reveals that continuous developments in weaponry technology have been the reason for arms control conventions and bans. The banning of the crossbow by Pope Urban II in 1096, because it threatened to change warfare in favour of poorer peasants, the banning of poisoned bullets in 1675 by the Strasbourg Agreement, and the Geneva protocol banning the use of biological and chemical weapons in 1925 after world war 1, all prove that significant technological developments have caused the world to agree not to use certain weapons. more

Russia in Talks to Create Independent DNS

The Russian Security Council has proposed development of an independent DNS which would continue to work in the event of global internet malfunctions, according to a report from RT. more

DDOS and the DNS

The Mirai DDOS attack happened just over a year ago, on the 21st October 2016. The attack was certainly a major landmark regarding the sorry history of "landmark" DDOS attacks on the Internet. It's up there with the Morris Worm of 1988, Slammer of 2002, Sapphine/Slammer of 2009 and of course Conficker in 2008. What made the Mirai attack so special? more

IBM Launches Quad9, a DNS-based Privacy and Security Service to Protect Users from Malicious Sites

The new DNS service, called Quad9, is aimed at protecting users from accessing malicious websites known to steal personal information, infect users with ransomware and malware, or conduct fraudulent activity. more

Russia Targeted British Telecom, Media, Energy Sectors, Reveals UK National Cyber Security Centre

Speaking at The Times Tech Summit in London, Ciaran Martin, chief of the National Cyber Security Centre (NCSC), warned Russia is seeking to undermine the international system. more

Airplanes Vulnerable to Hacking, Says U.S. Department of Homeland Security

Researchers have been able to successfully demonstrate a commercial aircraft can be remotely hacked. more

Qatar Crisis Started With a Hack, Now Political Tsunami in Saudi Arabia - How Will You Be Impacted?

The world has officially entered what the MLi Group labels as the "New Era of The Unprecedented". In this new era, traditional cyber security strategies are failing on daily basis, political and terrorist destruction-motivated cyber attacks are on the rise threatening "Survivability", and local political events unfold to impact the world overnight and forever. Decision makers know they cannot continue doing the same old stuff, but don't know what else to do next or differently that would be effective. more