Summary Bullets:

• Facing serious internal IT security expertise limitations, many organizations are hiring lower-level staff and providing professional development on the job.
• This strategy appears to be yielding good results with many prepared to work on assignment independently within six months, according to an (ISC)² survey of hiring managers.

IT security organizations are under acute pressure.  Navigating an escalating threat environment often with a lack of internal expertise, companies are reassessing approaches to staffing and casting a wider net with respect to hiring for IT security roles.

Summary Bullets:

• Often under-resourced from an IT perspective and possessing a wealth of valuable personal data, educational institutions are prime targets for ransomware.

• With incidents against K-12 school systems rising dramatically, IBM is looking to help districts mount a better defense through its cybersecurity grant program.

The number of ransomware incidents levied against educational institutions is soaring. K-12 school systems in particular have suffered a brutal few years. To help mount a better defense, IBM is again offering cybersecurity support to public school districts in the US and a number of other countries.

Continue reading “IBM Expands Cybersecurity Grant Program to Help K-12 Institutions Battle Ransomware” →

Summary Bullets:

• As Russia continues to press into Ukraine, both countries are targets of cyberattacks raising concerns about emboldened hackers escalating their efforts to critical infrastructure in other regions

• With the SolarWinds hack of 2020 still a prominent memory, the US Senate passed legislation it promises to both improve transparency around security events and strengthen support for breached entities

With the Russian invasion of Ukraine looming large over the geopolitical climate, cyberattacks hitting both countries are evidence that threat actors are already playing a major role in the early days of the war. Cyberthreats have long been a top concern, but the current turmoil is lending an increasing urgency around threats to critical infrastructure beyond the current conflict. Russian-based threat actors proved their effectiveness with the SolarWinds attack in which multiple US government agencies including the Department of Defense, the State Department, and the Department of Homeland Security were breached.

One of the major challenges both public and private sector organizations face is a lack of information. This is in part because of actual security incidents getting buried in an impossibly high volume of false positives. But it is also the result of a lack of information sharing between and among peers. This week the US Senate passed legislation that promises to both help drive greater transparency around data breaches and ransomware payments and improve support for impacted organizations.

Summary Bullets:

• In the months leading up to Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, the country was laying the groundwork for cyberwar.

• But Ukraine is fighting back with the support of its own underground hacking community and hackers from beyond its borders playing a part in interfering with Russian operations and trying to stall the invading country’s momentum.

Cyberattacks have been used by hacktivists in the past to wage political and ethical battles for years. But in the days following Russia’s invasion of Ukraine is taking cyberwarfare to a new level. Months before to Russia’s February 24th military invasion of Ukraine, Russia took to cyberspace to infiltrate and in some cases destabilize networks within its neighbor. Reports of distributed denial of service (DDoS) attacks allegedly initiated by Russia surfaced the week before the invasion, flooding the networks of Ukraine’s defense ministry and two banks. The attacks against the banks were launched in two waves, with the first interrupting service. The second stage involved text messages to clients telling them the bank was no longer functioning.

And there are indicators that Russia had breached Ukraine’s months before and was lying in wait to attack, installing data wiper malware on hundreds of computers In Ukraine. The wiper malware can delete all files from a computer, essentially making the computer unusable.

Summary Bullets:

• Security researchers identified more than a dozen Bluetooth Classic stack vulnerabilities that affect at least 1,400 products

• This issue is highlighting broader cybersecurity challenges in the connected device world

Security researchers from Singapore University of Technology and Design cast a spotlight on vulnerabilities in 13 different Bluetooth chipsets that could put mobile and other connected devices at risk of breaches. Dubbed BrakTooth, with Brak being a Norwegian word for crash, the 16 identified vulnerabilities in the Bluetooth Classic stack can be exploited using a number of mechanisms including denial of service, firmware crashes, deadlocks, and arbitrary code execution (ACE). A wide range of devices from Dell laptops to consumer smart speakers and connected refrigerators could be vulnerable.