The internet’s growth is by far the most amazing dynamic I’ve ever witnessed. We’ve all seen the charts on the speed of adoption of technologies.
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For example, to reach 50 Million users, it took the telephone over 75 years!
To reach the same user base, the Television took only 13 years.
For the internet, though, that was brought down to 4 years!
It took ChatGPT less than 2 months.
One of the dynamics that made the growth possible is automation of advertising service auctions. If you’ve ever advertised a business on Google, you know the process. At no point does any human being from Google get involved as you purchase your ad, which is what made Google so big so fast.
The 5 Top Cyber Security Stories Of The Week – March 13, 2023
Along with the amazing commerce efficiency this has brought though, it was and still is possible by thieves to abuse such automation for their own gain, and that’s our lead story this week:
1. BATLOADER Malware Uses Google Ads to Deliver Vidar Stealer and Ursnif Payloads.
For users that have a risk profile where this of concern, we recommend the uBlock Origin extension that works in Chrome and Chromium-based browsers like Brave and Edge. That way all Google ads are simply blocked and you experience a nice, clean search page.
2. How the FBI proved a remote admin tool was actually malware.
“NetWire was, in fact, a Remote Access Trojan — or RAT — malware and not a legitimate app to administer remote computers”. It is worth it for technology clients to validate and verify remote access tools being used. Zero Trust connectivity is a great mitigation against any unknown/untrusted remote access tool.
3. Go ahead and unplug this door device before reading. You’ll thank us later.
A reminder that just because something is new and shiny and does helpful things, does not mean in any way that it is safe.
4. Android app sent clipboard contents to remote server.
When you can’t even trust what your smartphone will do with your clipboard, that certainly is a reminder to be proactive on a security posture. Fortunately, in newer Android versions, Google has mitigated the risk in various ways.
5. New Version of Prometei Botnet Infects Over 10,000 Systems Worldwide.
“Prometei v3 is also noteworthy for using a domain generation algorithm (DGA) to build out its command-and-control (C2) infrastructure.” Again, one of the few mitigations strategies against this is an application of Zero Trust connectivity.
Did you know?
Zones.app may just help us all get better at timezone management. This week I have at least 3 meetings with people in places that did NOT change timezones. This helps with that.
