This week’s Cyber Security Headlines – Week in Review is hosted by Rich Stroffolino with guest Edwin Covert, head of cyber risk engineering, Bowhead Specialty Underwriters and edwincovert.com
Cyber Security Headlines – Week in Review is live every Friday at 12:30pm PT/3:30pm ET. Join us each week by registering for the open discussion at CISOSeries.com
U.S. operation of “laptop farm” for North Korea shutdown
Tennessee resident Matthew Isaac Knoot has been arrested for allegedly running a ‘laptop farm’ to help North Korean IT workers secure remote jobs with American companies. Here’s how the scheme worked: Knoot would steal the identities of U.S. citizens and pose as U.S.-based IT professionals. Once hired, the company would send the work laptop to Knoot’s home, which he then gave the North Koreans access to, allowing them to log in remotely. If convicted, Knoot could face up to 20 years in prison, including a mandatory minimum of two years for aggravated identity theft.
NIST Releases First 3 Finalized Post-Quantum Encryption Standards
The U.S. Department of Commerce’s National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST) has finalized its principal set of encryption algorithms designed to withstand cyberattacks from a quantum computer.
Researchers around the world are racing to build quantum computers that would operate in radically different ways from ordinary computers and could break the current encryption that provides security and privacy for just about everything we do online. The algorithms announced today are specified in the first completed standards from NIST’s post-quantum cryptography (PQC) standardization project, and are ready for immediate use.
(NIST Releases First 3 Finalized Post-Quantum Encryption Standards)
2.7 billion National Public Data records leaked
Following up on a story we have been following Cyber Security Headlines [1][2], a hacker named “Fenice” has dumped two csv files totalling 277GB and containing a trove of 2.7 billion data records, including social security numbers, names, mailing addresses and other sensitive info. The data appears to have come from background-checking service National Public Data (also known as Jerico Pictures) in what is being referred to as one of the largest data breaches in history. On April 8, a cyber-criminal group named USDoD was attempting to sell the personal data belonging to people from the U.S., U.K., and Canada for $3.5 million. That data is now up for grabs on the BreachedForums dark web marketplace though some of the leaked data appears to be incorrect or out of date. National Public Data is also facing a class action suit related to the incident.
Thanks to today’s episode sponsor, ThreatLocker
ThreatLocker helps you take a proactive, default-deny approach to cybersecurity and provides a full audit of every action, allowed or blocked, for risk management and compliance. Onboarding and operation are fully supported by their US-based support team.
To learn more about how ThreatLocker can help keep your organization running efficiently and protected from ransomware, visit ThreatLocker.com.
Texas Attorney General sues GM for sale of driver data
Texas AG Ken Paxton has filed suit in the state district court of Montgomery County, for “false, deceptive, and misleading business practices.” His statement accuses General Motors of selling consumers “a comprehensive surveillance system that unlawfully records information about every drive they take and sells their data to any company willing to pay for it.” According to Politico, this is the first state lawsuit against an automaker for privacy violations. TechDirt does hasten to point out that both Republican and Democrat legislators have historically fought against passing comprehensive federal or state privacy protections that may have protected consumers from this type of exploitation.
(TechDirt)
Orion loses $60 million in BEC scam
Luxembourg-based company, Orion, who is a leading supplier of carbon black, a material used to make tires, ink, batteries, and plastics was tricked into making several wire transfers through a Business Email Compromise (BEC) attack. According to documents filed with the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC), a non-executive employee “was the target of a criminal scheme that resulted in multiple fraudulently induced outbound wire transfers to accounts controlled by unknown third parties.” Orion expects to record “a one-time pre-tax charge of approximately $60 million.” if the funds are not recovered.