Your weekly top 5 technical and security issues Nerds should pay attention to:
Article Contents
Fake Ransomware Bitcoin Scam Claims “Your Site Has Been Hacked”.
A fake ransomware scam is going around that targets website contact forms. Please don’t fall for this.
A fake ransomware scam is going around that targets website contact forms. It sends an email to the site owner with the subject “Your Site Has Been Hacked.” The body of the email claims the hackers have exploited a vulnerability to gain access to the site’s database and “move the information to an offshore server.” The email threatens to ruin the site owner’s reputation by selling the site’s database, notifying customers that their information has been compromised, and de-indexing the site with search engines using blackhat techniques.
Read More: Fake Ransomware Bitcoin Scam Claims “Your Site Has Been Hacked”
Oracle’s BlueKai tracks you across the web.
The data spilled online. This is the answer to “Why are online trackers dangerous?” Time to revisit if you’re using all tracking blockers you should.
Have you ever wondered why online ads appear for things that you were just thinking about?
There’s no big conspiracy. Ad tech can be creepily accurate.
Tech giant Oracle is one of a few companies in Silicon Valley that has near-perfected the art of tracking people across the internet. The company has spent a decade and billions of dollars buying startups to build its very own panopticon of users’ web browsing data.
Read More: Oracle’s BlueKai tracks you across the web. That data spilled online
Moroccan Journalist Targeted With Network Injection Attacks Using NSO Group’s Tools.
Tools like this are now more available than ever and not limited to just high profile cases.
In October 2019 Amnesty International published the report “Morocco: Human Rights Defenders Targeted with NSO Group’s Spyware”, where we detailed the targeting of Moroccan human rights defenders Maati Monjib and Abdessadak El Bouchattaoui using surveillance technology produced by the company NSO Group. In this current report, Amnesty International now reveals that Omar Radi, another prominent human rights defender and journalist from Morocco was also targeted using NSO Group’s tools.
Read More: Moroccan Journalist Targeted With Network Injection Attacks Using NSO Group’s Tools
To evade detection, hackers are requiring targets to complete CAPTCHAs.
This bypasses sandbox-scanning services.
CAPTCHAs, those puzzles with muffled sounds or blurred or squiggly letters that websites use to filter out bots (often unsuccessfully), have been annoying end users for more than a decade. Now, the challenge-and-response tests are likely to vex targets in malware attacks.
Read More: To evade detection, hackers are requiring targets to complete CAPTCHAs
IRS Used Cellphone Location Data to Try to Find Suspects.
Remember, your location data is for sale.
The Internal Revenue Service (IRS) used cell phone data to try and hack potential suspects of fraud, a Senate aide told the Wall Street Journal.
In 2017 and 2018 the IRS Criminal Investigation unit had a subscription to Venntel, a company that obtains anonymized location data from the marketing industry and resells it to governments.
Read More: IRS used cell phone data to try to track potential suspects: report
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