From The Blog
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NetSPI’s Offensive Security Offering Leverages Subject Matter Experts to Enhance Pen Testing
Written by Sean KalinichBlack Hat 2023 Las Vegas. The term offensive security has always been an interesting one for me. On the surface is brings to mind reaching…Written on Tuesday, 12 September 2023 17:05 in Security Talk Read 1257 times Read more...
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Black Kite Looks to Offer a Better View of Risk in a Rapidly Changing Threat Landscape
Written by Sean KalinichBlack Hat 2023 – Las Vegas. Risk is an interesting subject and has many different meanings to many different people. For the most part Risk…Written on Tuesday, 12 September 2023 14:56 in Security Talk Read 765 times Read more...
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Microsoft Finally Reveals how they Believe a Consumer Signing Key was Stollen
Written by Sean KalinichIn May of 2023 a few sensitive accounts reported to Microsoft that their environments appeared to be compromised. Due to the nature of these accounts,…Written on Thursday, 07 September 2023 14:40 in Security Talk Read 1143 times Read more...
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Mandiant Releases a Detailed Look at the Campaign Targeting Barracuda Email Security Gateways, I Take a Look at What this all Might Mean
Written by Sean KalinichThe recent attack that leveraged a 0-Day vulnerability to compromise a number of Barracuda Email Security Gateway appliances (physical and virtual, but not cloud) was…Written on Wednesday, 30 August 2023 16:09 in Security Talk Read 937 times Read more...
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Threat Groups Return to Targeting Developers in Recent Software Supply Chain Attacks
Written by Sean KalinichThere is a topic of conversation that really needs to be talked about in the open. It is the danger of developer systems (personal and…Written on Wednesday, 30 August 2023 13:29 in Security Talk Read 1005 times Read more...
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Leaked Data from Duolingo incident Shows US is most Impacted
Written by Sean KalinichDuolingo, is a language learning site (not to be confused with an LLM) and has a very large base of users. The site is a…Written on Tuesday, 29 August 2023 19:12 in Security Talk Read 1421 times Read more...
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We talk about the Ransomware Threat Landscape with SecureWorks at Black Hat 2023
Written by Sean KalinichBlack Hat 2023 – Las Vegas, NV – One of my personal focuses is understanding the “Why” behind changes in the threat landscape. In simple…Written on Tuesday, 29 August 2023 18:26 in Security Talk Read 1014 times Read more...
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Now Patched Flaw Leverages Abandoned Reply URL found in Entra ID allows for Privilege Escalation
Written by Sean KalinichMicrosoft has not been having the greatest of months. First it was identified that a stollen MSA signing key was used by a Nation State…Written on Monday, 28 August 2023 15:39 in Security Talk Read 1642 times Read more...
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Qrypt Looking to Attack the Inefficiencies in Quantum Encryption to make Quantum Secure Communication a Reality Today
Written by Sean KalinichBlack Hat 2023, Las Vegas – At Black Hat one of my favorite things to do is see what the latest buzzword(s)/phrases are. One of…Written on Monday, 28 August 2023 12:53 in Security Talk Read 1136 times Read more...
Recent Comments
- Sean, this is a fantastic review of a beautiful game. I do agree with you… Written by Jacob 2023-05-19 14:17:50 Jedi Survivor – The Quick, Dirty, and Limited Spoilers Review
- Great post. Very interesting read but is the reality we are currently facing. Written by JP 2023-05-03 02:33:53 The Dangers of AI; I Think I Have Seen this Movie Before
- I was wondering if you have tested the microphone audio frequency for the Asus HS-1000W? Written by Maciej 2020-12-18 14:09:33 Asus HS-1000W wireless headset impresses us in the lab
- Thanks for review. I appreciate hearing from a real pro as opposed to the blogger… Written by Keith 2019-06-18 04:22:36 The Red Hydrogen One, Possibly One of the Most “misunderstood” Phones Out
- Have yet to see the real impact but in the consumer segment, ryzen series are… Written by sushant 2018-12-23 10:12:12 AMD’s 11-year journey to relevance gets an epic finish.
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Apache Cassandra Database Manager Patches an RCE Vulnerability
Written by Sean Kalinich
Apache and their open-source tools have gotten a lot of press lately. After the Lgo4Shell vulnerability in their Log4J tool, and the massive response from vendors and security organizations we are now learning that researchers have discovered a remote code execution flaw in the NoSQL database management tool Cassandra. This time, unlike Log4J flaw the disclosure comes with a patch already available for installation.
Meta Settles 2012 Data Privacy Lawsuit to the Tune of $90 Million.
Written by Sean Kalinich
Meta (Facebook) has a long history of privacy and other abuses of the platform they control. We have seen everything from abusing facial recognition technology to tracking users’ internet history after existing the platform. These types of abuses are concerning for both obvious and not so obvious reasons. On the surface the collection of personal information outside of actual platform use by Facebook is not a good thing, but when you also roll in the fact that large tech groups like Facebook also share information with government agencies freely and without recourse it makes the problem larger.
Google Patches the First Zero-Day in Chrome for 2022
Written by Sean Kalinich
Google has announced the release of a new version of Chrome. The new version comes with fixes for eight vulnerabilities. Once of these vulnerabilities CVE-2022-0609, which is describes as a user-after-free vulnerability is already being exploited in the wild. This has led them to advise users to updated Chrome as soon as possible to avoid compromise. The flaws were found by Google’s own Threat Analysis Group.
CIA Found to have Run Bulk Data Collection Program that May Have Mishandled US Citizen Data.
Written by Sean Kalinich
On December 4th, 1981, then President Ronald Regan signed Executive Order 12333. This Order, further amended by EO13284 in 2003, 13355(2004) and 13470(2008), is what grants and governs the collection of intelligence by Federal agencies. These agencies include the NSA, the CIA and to a lesser extent the FBI and Department of Homeland Security. The collection of information includes what is often referred to as signal intelligence. This type of intelligence if the collection of any information that is transmitted via electronic means. This wonderful blanket definition has been the basis of many borderline illegal data collection programs and a few outright illegal ones.
Network Management Software from Moxa Has Five Critical Bugs that Could Allow for an RCE Attack
Written by Sean Kalinich
Management and a monitoring software are ubiquitous in the IT operation industry. They are force multipliers that allow for what are usually small teams to manage a large number of assets. By design they need to have elevated permission to accomplish their intended tasks. The problem is that these permissions also make them targets for attackers. This means that developers of these tools need to take extra steps to ensure that they are not vulnerable to attack or become the thing that compromises a network.
Cisco looking to Buy a Coner of the Market, makes a $20 Billion Buy Attempt of Splunk
Written by Sean Kalinich
According to reports form the Wallstreet Journal, Cisco has attempted to take over Splunk for more than $20 Billion. The acquisition would be the largest in Cisco’s history by far. Cisco has a history of buying technology companies and integrating them into their product suite. The aftereffects of these purchases are not always ideal from a consumer perspective. Although though an offer has been made the two companies are not in active talks.
Hacking Groups that Plant Fake Evidence Identified in Trukey and India, Where Else are They?
Written by Sean Kalinich
SentinelOne’s threat team has been tracking a couple of threat groups with an unusual goal. These groups are not looking to steal money or get a ransom, instead they are looking to track, monitor and incriminate specific targets. The targets that have been identified so far have been journalists and activists that oppose government practices. So far, the countries where these groups have been identified are limited to India and Trukey but if threat groups like this have been found there, it is likely they are everywhere.
Russia Shutters Four Marketplaces for Stolen Credit Cards on the Dark Web
Written by Sean Kalinich
The Dark Web (whispered in Letterkenny) is a playground for all kinds of illegal activity. One well traded item is Personal Information including Credit Card numbers. Due to the state of security in most organizations (Stuart!) there is no shortage of personally identifying information and credit cards for sale. There is a lot of money that trades hands around this as well, so it has been and will continue to be a target for law enforcement in the constant battle against the financial threat actor groups.
Linux Attacks and Malware on the Rise as the Workforce Shifts to Remote
Written by Sean Kalinich
The shift to services like AWS, GCP and more have meant that many organizations are also making a shift away from the Microsoft Windows platform and moving to a Linux centric environment and while this is a good move for the most part, it has left many open to exploit due to improper configurations and a lack of proper security tools to protect their environments.
Web Site Data Analytics Gathering May Violate GDPR, Google Analytics Does.
Written by Sean Kalinich
It seems that web site data analytics are now on the radar for privacy regulators in the EU, especially Google Analytics collection tools. Recently data protection regulators in Austria and France have rules that the collection of user data by Google combined with the unregulated transfer of this information out of the country (back to the US in particular) is a violation of GDPR.
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Nvidia-ARM Deall off Citing Regulatory Challenges
Written by Sean Kalinich
In September 2020 Nvidia announced that it was in talks to acquire ARM Holdings from SoftBank Group Corp. The deal was not surprising, but it did send waves through the industry. The concerns around this deal were and are the same as the ones currently surrounding the Microsoft-Activision deal. Given the level of competition in the industry, would Nvidia use its new purchase to create roadblocks for their competition? Nvidia has always maintained that they would never do anything like this, but their assurances were never enough to get past regulators.
Strategy, Tactics, and Logistics. How They Fit into the Threat Landscape
Written by Sean Kalinich
The Threat Landscape is an interesting topic of discussion. It is a constantly changing thing and even the best predictions can often fall short of the actual threat. This is because in most cases, the attackers are a step ahead of the defenders. They have the advantage, to coin a D&D phrase, they won the initiative roll. Defenders are always waiting to see what might happen, they plan without really knowing what the attackers are going to do which means they have to be secure everywhere (not really a possibility). To help them put their resources in the right places, most security teams rely on threat intelligence feeds and an understanding of the Threat Landscape.
Activision is Not the Only Purchase Microsoft is Eying as Rumors Pop Up Around a Mandiant Buy
Written by Sean Kalinich
The news has been abuzz about the $65+ Billion-dollar purchase of Activision/Blizzard by Microsoft. It has been seen as an opening shot in a new stage in the console wars and is, even now, under review by the FTC. However, there are rumors that Mandiant and Microsoft are in talks about a potential acquisition of the Incident Response company. These rumors come on the heels of an announcement by Mandiant that they are partnering with NextGen XDR developer SentinelOne. Where to start on this one…
UEFI Bootkits and Malware are Becoming More Common as Attackers Refine their Techniques.
Written by Sean Kalinich
UEFI (Unified Extensible Firmware Interface) was designed to replace the old and outdated BIOS (Baic Input Output System). The older BIOS setup was slow and not very secure. It gave attackers several entry points for infection and persistence at that level. The older BIOS standard was also susceptible to attack and compromise (think the Chernobyl BIOS virus). Something new needed to be put in place to help speed things up and help account for more complex hardware and software. Hence the UEFI was born.