‘Twas the week before Christmas and all through the net, hackers wreaked havoc, on that, you can bet. Let’s dive into this week’s cybersecurity news recap…
Hundreds of thousands of Rhode Island residents have had their personal information compromised in what officials are describing as extortion.
The international cybercriminal group responsible has supposedly obtained personal information including social security numbers and bank information of residents who use government assistant programs like SNAP after breaching RIBridges’ online portal earlier this month. This group of hackers is holding the information for ransom, with a threat to release it if the ransom goes unpaid.
The system has been shut down in an effort to mitigate the threat, leaving residents applying for new benefits having to rely on paper applications in the meantime. Letters have been sent out to affected residents to inform them of the incident.
(–Source: Reuters
Read More: Rhode Island hit by data breach as hackers demand ransom | Reuters )
Around one million users of the healthcare digital answering service, ConnectOnCall, have had their personal health information stolen in a data breach earlier this year.
The information compromised in this incident includes patient names, phone numbers, dates of birth, and health information such as diagnoses, treatments, and prescriptions, as well as some social security numbers.
Affected individuals are being notified of the incident.
(–Source: TechCrunch
Read More: Called your doctor after-hours? ConnectOnCall hackers may have stolen your medical data | TechCrunch )
Google has issued a warning about a second wave of attacks against Gmail users as email scams surge. In the warning issued by Google, they mention that 3 types of cyberattacks are currently “in heavy use. Here’s what to watch out for:
Multiple versions of extortion scams are currently making rounds to Gmail users. These messages include frightening messages that usually include threats of harm or the release of personal information such as your home address.
Invoice scams, while not new, have been hitting inboxes hard this holiday season. In these scams, fake invoices are sent to the victim in hopes of tricking them into contacting the sender to dispute the charges.
Messages claiming to be either from a celebrity themself or claiming that a celebrity is endorsing a product or offering a deal that the victim may be interested in have also popped up more frequently over the past month.
Read more about these attacks and how you can prepare at the link below.
(–Source: Forbes
Read More: New Gmail Security Warning For 2.5 Billion—Second Attack Wave Incoming )
Notorious hacker, IntelBroker, is at it again. This time, the hacker has targeted Cisco and leaked 2.9 gigabytes of the company’s files onto the dark web.
The data stolen in this incident, which was the result of a configuration error during a data migration process, includes source code, certificates, and other internal documentation.
Cisco took several important actions following the breach in order to mitigate the attack, and has since updated its security measures to prevent a similar issue from happening in the future.
(–Source: Forbes
Read More: Cisco Data Leaked By Hacker )
In 2018. social media giant, Meta, experienced a Facebook security breach that exposed personal information of 29 million accounts globally. Following the investigations into the incident, Ireland’s Data Protection Commission (DPC) has fined Meta $263 million for failure to properly protect user data.
A Facebook bug beginning in July 2017 is responsible for this breach, as hackers used the bug to their advantage to generate user tokens and gain full access to affected accounts. This exposed personal data including full names, contact information, birthdates, locations, religious affiliations, and information about users’ children.
(–Source: DMR News (English) on MSN
Read More: Meta Fined $263 Million Over 2018 Facebook Data Breach in the EU )
