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T.rex_scan v0.2 – Integrate Tools to Audit Web Sites

By MaxiSoler
T.rex_scan only facilitates the visualization when auditing a web page. With this script you can optimize your time, reducing the time you audit a page web since T.rex_scan executes the task you...

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Celebrating Decades of Success with Microsoft at the Security 20/20 Awards

By Sanjay Mehta

Effective collaboration is key to the success of any organization. But perhaps none more so than those working towards the common goal of securing our connected world. That’s why Trend Micro has always been keen to reach out to industry partners in the security ecosystem, to help us collectively build a safer world and improve the level of protection we can offer our customers. As part of these efforts, we’ve worked closely with Microsoft for decades.

Trend Micro is therefore doubly honored to be at the Microsoft Security 20/20 awards event in February, with nominations for two of the night’s most prestigious prizes.

Better together

No organization exists in a vacuum. The hi-tech, connectivity-rich nature of modern business is the source of its greatest power, but also one of its biggest weaknesses. Trend Micro’s mission from day one has been to make this environment as safe as possible for our customers. But we learned early on that to deliver on this vision, we had to collaborate. That’s why we work closely with the world’s top platform and technology providers — to offer protection that is seamless and optimized for these environments.

As a Gold Application Development Partner we’ve worked for years with Microsoft to ensure our security is tightly integrated into its products, to offer protection for Azure, Windows and Office 365 customers — at the endpoint, on servers, for email and in the cloud. It’s all about simplified, optimized security designed to support business agility and growth.

Innovating our way to success

This is a vision that comes from the very top. For over three decades, our CEO and co-founder Eva Chen has been at the forefront of industry leading technology innovation and collaborative success at Trend Micro. Among other things during that time, we’ve released:

  • The world’s first hardware-based system lockdown technology (StationLock)
  • Innovative internet gateway virus protection (InterScan VirusWall)
  • The industry’s first two-hour virus response service-level agreement
  • The first integrated physical-virtual security offering, with agentless threat protection for virtualized desktops (VDI) and data centers (Deep Security)
  • The first ever mobile app reputation service (MARS)
  • AI-based writing-style analysis for protection from Business Email Compromise (Writing Style DNA)
  • Cross-layer detection and response for endpoint, email, servers, & network combined (XDR)
  • Broadest cloud security platform as a service (Cloud One)

Two awards

We’re delighted to have been singled out for two prestigious awards at the Microsoft Security 20/20 event, which will kick off RSA Conference this year:

Customer Impact

At Trend Micro, the customer is at the heart of everything we do. It’s the reason we have hundreds of researchers across 15 threat centers around the globe leading the fight against emerging black hat tools and techniques. It’s why we partner with leading technology providers like Microsoft. And it’s why the channel is so important for us.

Industry Changemaker: Eva Chen

It goes without saying that our CEO and co-founder is an inspirational figure within Trend Micro. Her vision and strong belief that our only real competition as cybersecurity vendors are the bad guys and that the industry needs to stand united against them to make the digital world a safer place, guides the over 6000 employees every day. But she’s also had a major impact on the industry at large, working tirelessly over the years to promote initiatives that have ultimately made our connected world more secure. It’s not an exaggeration to say that without Eva’s foresight and dedication, the cybersecurity industry would be a much poorer place.

We’re all looking forward to the event, and for the start of 2020. As we enter a new decade, Trend Micro’s innovation and passion to make the digital world a safer place has never been more important.

 

The post Celebrating Decades of Success with Microsoft at the Security 20/20 Awards appeared first on .

Tax Scams – Everything you need to know to keep your money and data safe

By Trend Micro

Tax season has always been a pretty nerve-wracking time for hard-working Americans. But over the years, technology advances have arrived to gradually make the process a bit easier. The bad news is that they can also introduce new cyber risks and even more stress.

There are two things that cybercriminals are always on the hunt for: people’s identity data from their accounts, and their money. And during the tax-filing season both can be unwittingly exposed. Over the years, cybercriminals have adapted multiple tools and techniques to part taxpayers with their personal information and funds.

Let’s take look at some of the main threats out there and what you can do to stay safe.

What do they want?

Cybercrime is a highly efficient money-making business. Some reports suggest this underground economy generates as much as $1.5 trillion each year. (See Into the Web of Profit, April 2018, McGuire, Bromium.) And tax-related scams are an increasingly popular way for the bad guys to drive-up profits. The Internal Revenue Service (IRS) claims that “thousands of people have lost millions of dollars and their personal information” to such attacks.

The bottom line is that they’re after one of two things: to trick you into wiring funds to them, and/or to get hold of your personally identifiable information (PII), including bank account and Social Security Numbers (SSNs). This personal data can subsequently be used to defraud you or the IRS, or may be deployed in follow-on identity fraud schemes to capture illicit funds from you.

There are various ways cyber-criminals can achieve these goals. The most common is by using social engineering tactics to trick taxpayers into sending money or personal information. But they might also use malware, either delivered to you personally or targeted at your tax preparer. This means you not only have to look after your own cybersecurity but also demand that the third-party businesses you work with store and transmit your sensitive information securely.

Look out for these scams

Here’s a round-up of the most popular tactics used by tax scammers today:

Impersonation: The fraudster gets in touch pretending to be an IRS representative. This could be via email, phone, social media or even SMS. They usually claim you owe the IRS money in unpaid taxes or fines and demand a wire transfer, or funds from a prepaid debit card. Sometimes they may ask for personal and financial details—for example, by claiming you’re entitled to a large tax refund and they just need you to supply your bank account info.

These interactions are usually pushy. The scammer knows the best way of making you pay up is by creating a sense of urgency and, sometimes, shaming the individual into believing they’ve been withholding tax payments. Phishing emails may look highly convincing, right down to the logo and sender domain, while phone callers will use fake names and badge numbers. Sometimes the scammers use personal data they may have stolen previously or bought on the Dark Web to make their communications seem more convincing.

In some impersonation scams, the fraudsters may even pretend to work for charities and ask for personal details to help disaster victims with tax refund claims.

Spoofing, phishing, and malware: In some cases, a text, email or social media message spoofed to appear as if sent from the IRS or your tax preparer actually contains malware. The scammers use the same tactics as above but trick the recipient into clicking on a malicious link or opening an attachment laden with malware. The covert download that follows could result in: theft of your personal information; your computer being completely hijacked by hackers via remote control software; or a ransomware download that locks your computer until you pay a fee.

Fake tax returns: Another trick the scammers employ is to use stolen SSNs and other personal information to file tax returns on your behalf. They can then try to claim a large payment in tax refunds from the IRS. The PII they use to file in your name may have been taken from a third-party source without your knowledge, and the first you might hear of it is when you go to file a legitimate tax return. It can take months to resolve the problem.

Attacks targeting tax preparers: Over half of Americans use third-party tax preparation companies to help them with their returns. However, this offers another opportunity for scammers to get hold of your sensitive information. In one recently discovered campaign, malware deployed on tax preparers’ websites was designed to download to the visitor’s computer as soon as they loaded the page. The IRS warns that businesses large and small are potentially at risk, as scammers are keen to get hold of tax information which enables them to file highly convincing fake returns in your name.

What to do

The good news is that by taking a few simple steps you can insulate yourself from the worst of these scams. Remember: the IRS does not contact taxpayers by email, text messages or social media to request personal/financial information— so if you receive communications that do, they are definitely a scam. It’s also important to remember that scams happen all year round, not just in the run-up to the tax filing deadline. That means, unfortunately, that you need to be on your guard all the time.

Here are a few other recommendations:

  • Install anti-malware from a reputable provider to block phishing emails and websites and prevent malware downloads.
  • Be wary of any unsolicited messages purporting to come from your tax preparer or the IRS. Always contact them directly to check whether it’s a genuine communication or not.
  • Don’t click on any links in unsolicited emails, or download attachments.
  • Obtain an Identity Protection PIN from the IRS before filing your taxes. This will prevent fake returns being filed in your name.
  • Alert phishing@irs.gov about any unsolicited emails from IRS scammers.
  • Protect your log-ins with tax preparation companies. Switch on multi-factor authentication (MFA) if available, and/or use a password manager to make your logins hard to guess or crack.

It also pays to demand that your tax preparer take their own precautions to keep your data secure. They should not be sending sensitive data or documents unencrypted in emails and must take steps on their own to combat phishing emails that target employees, since these can cascade to you during your tax preparation process. Whether hosted in the cloud or running on-premises, the servers that hold your data should also have adequate protection—and you have a right (and a duty to yourself) to ask ahead of time what they’re doing to protect it.

According to the IRS tax preparers should put the following internal controls in place:

  • Install anti-malware on all web and storage servers and keep their software automatically updated.
  • Encourage the use of unique, strong passwords via a password manager for each account, and deploy multi-factor authentication technology for clients.
  • Encrypt all sensitive files and emails exchanged with strong password protections.
  • Back-up sensitive data regularly to a secure off-site source.
  • Wipe clean/destroy any old hard drives and printers containing sensitive data.
  • Limit access to taxpayer data to staff who need to know.

How Trend Micro can help

Trend Micro offers a range of security tools to help taxpayers keep their personal and financial information safe from fraudsters.

Our flagship consumer solution Trend Micro Security (TMS) provides the following protections:

  • Protects against phishing links in emails that can take you to fraudulent sites. Its Fraud Buster feature for Gmail and Hotmail extends this to webmail.
  • Blocks malicious website downloads and scans for malware hidden in attachments.
  • Protects against ransomware and theft of sensitive data via Folder Shield.
  • Protects and manages strong, unique passwords with Password Manager, which is bundled with Trend Micro Maximum Security.

To find out more, go to our Trend Micro Security website.

The post Tax Scams – Everything you need to know to keep your money and data safe appeared first on .

Riding another wave of success for our multi-layered detection and response approach

By Trend Micro

 

The corporate endpoint is a constant battle between cybersecurity white hats and criminal attackers. According to one study from the Ponemon Institute, 68% of organizations were victims of an attack on the endpoint in 2019. The risks and costs associated with undetected threats are immeasurable. Organizations need to detect and respond immediately before any significant damage is done.

In order to do this, CISOs must look beyond the endpoint to also include email, servers, cloud workloads and networks. This is the value of Trend Micro’s XDR platform. We heard feedback on this strategy recently, as Trend Micro was named a Leader in The Forrester Wave™: Enterprise Detection and Response, Q1 2020.

Under fire and over-stretched

Enterprise IT security teams are under unparalleled pressure. On one hand, they’re bombarded with cyber-attacks on a massive scale. Trend Micro detected and blocked over 52 billion such threats in 2019 alone. On the other hand, they’re facing a range of continuously evolving black hat tools and techniques including fileless malware, phishing, and supply chain attacks, that could lead to data theft and service outages. The stakes couldn’t be higher, thanks to an ever-tightening regulatory regime. All of this must be done with workforce challenges: the current cyber skills shortage for North American firms stands at nearly 500,000 workers.

These are the kinds of challenges facing Trend Micro customer MedImpact Healthcare Systems, the largest privately held pharmacy benefit manager (PBM) in the US. Processing more than one million healthcare claims daily, MedImpact must protect two primary data centers, three call centers staffed 24/7, and multiple private network routing centers — all to the strict compliance requirements of HIPAA, PCI DSS and other regulations.

As Frank Bunton, VP, CISO for MedImpact knows, effective endpoint detection and response (EDR) is vital to modern organizations. “EDR accelerates the threat analysis process so we can get to the solution faster,” says Bunton. “Speed to resolution is critical because we see attacks every day on just about every network.”

But MedImpact is similar to a lot of other organizations today in that it also appreciates the need to go beyond the endpoint for critical cross-layer detection and response. “XDR gives us the added confidence that our organization is protected on all fronts. If an endpoint detects a problem, it automatically uploads the suspect object to a tool that analyzes that problem and fixes it. By the time we are aware of an issue, the issue is resolved. There is no way we could manage this much information without extended security automation,” says Bunton.

The future is XDR

This is where XDR comes in. It has been designed to look not just at endpoint detection and response, but also to collect and correlate data from across the organization, including: email, endpoint, servers, cloud workloads, and networks. With this enhanced context, and the power of our AI and expert security analytics, the platform is able to identify threats more easily and contain them more effectively.

This matters to organizations like MedImpact, whose key challenge was “finding security solutions that could communicate with each other and share valuable data in real time.” XDR has visibility across the entire IT environment to detect earlier and with more confidence. It provides a single source of the truth and delivers fewer higher-fidelity alerts to enhance protection and maximize limited IT resources.

But don’t just take our word for it. Forrester gave us a perfect score for product vision, security analytics, performance, market presence and much more. “Trend Micro has a forward-thinking approach and is an excellent choice for organizations wanting to centralize reporting and detection with XDR but have less capacity for proactively threat hunting,” the report concluded.

To find out more… check out the Forrester report on leaders in this space.

Learn more from MedImpact’s success story.

 

The post Riding another wave of success for our multi-layered detection and response approach appeared first on .

Shift Well-Architecture Left. By Extension, Security Will Follow

By Raphael Bottino, Solutions Architect

A story on how Infrastructure as Code can be your ally on Well-Architecting and securing your Cloud environment

By Raphael Bottino, Solutions Architect — first posted as a medium article
Using Infrastructure as Code(IaC for short) is the norm in the Cloud. CloudFormation, CDK, Terraform, Serverless Framework, ARM… the options are endless! And they are so many just because IaC makes total sense! It allows Architects and DevOps engineers to version the application infrastructure as much as the developers are already versioning the code. So any bad change, no matter if on the application code or infrastructure, can be easily inspected or, even better, rolled back.

For the rest of this article, let’s use CloudFormation as reference. And, if you are new to IaC, check how to create a new S3 bucket on AWS as code:

Pretty simple, right? And you can easily create as many buckets as you need using the above template (if you plan to do so, remove the BucketName line, since names are globally unique on S3!). For sure, way simpler and less prone to human error than clicking a bunch of buttons on AWS console or running commands on CLI.

Pretty simple, right? And you can easily create as many buckets as you need using the above template (if you plan to do so, remove the BucketName line, since names are globally unique on S3!). For sure, way simpler and less prone to human error than clicking a bunch of buttons on AWS console or running commands on CLI.

Well, it’s not that simple…

Although this is a functional and useful CloudFormation template, following correctly all its rules, it doesn’t follow the rules of something bigger and more important: The AWS Well-Architected Framework. This amazing tool is a set of whitepapers describing how to architect on top of AWS, from 5 different views, called Pillars: Security, Cost Optimization, Operational Excellence, Reliability and Performance Efficiency. As you can see from the pillar names, an architecture that follows it will be more secure, cheaper, easier to operate, more reliable and with better performance.

Among others, this template will generate a S3 bucket that doesn’t have encryption enabled, doesn’t enforce said encryption and doesn’t log any kind of access to it–all recommended by the Well-Architected Framework. Even worse, these misconfigurations are really hard to catch in production and not visibly alerted by AWS. Even the great security tools provided by them such as Trusted Advisor or Security Hub won’t give an easy-to-spot list of buckets with those misconfigurations. Not for nothing Gartner states that 95% of cloud security failures will be the customer’s fault¹.

The DevOps movement brought to the masses a methodology of failing fast, which is not exactly compatible with the above scenario where a failure many times is just found out whenever unencrypted data is leaked or the access log is required. The question is, then, how to improve it? Spoiler alert: the answer lies on the IaC itself 🙂

Shifting Left

Even before making sure a CloudFormation template is following AWS’ own best practices, the first obvious requirement is to make sure that the template is valid. A fantastic open-source tool called cfn-lint is made available by AWS on GitHub² and can be easily adopted on any CI/CD pipeline, failing the build if the template is not valid, saving precious time. To shorten the feedback loop even further and fail even faster, the same tool can be adopted on the developer IDE³ as an extension so the template can be validated as it is coded. Pretty cool, right? But it still doesn’t help us with the misconfiguration problem that we created with that really simple template in the beginning of this post.

Conformity⁴ provides, among other capabilities, an API endpoint to scan CloudFormation templates against the Well-Architected Framework, and that’s exactly how I know that template is not adhering to its best practices. This API can be implemented on your pipeline, just like the cfn-lint. However, I wanted to move this check further left, just like the cfn-lint extension I mentioned before.

The Cloud Conformity Template Scanner Extension

With that challenge in mind, but also with the need for scanning my templates for misconfigurations fast myself, I came up with a Visual Studio Code extension that, leveraging Conformity’s API, allows the developer to scan the template as it is coded. The Extension can be found here⁵ or searching for “Conformity” on your IDE.

After installing it, scanning a template is as easy as running a command on VS Code. Below it is running for our template example:

This tool allows anyone to shift misconfiguration and compliance checking as left as possible, right on developers’ hands. To use the extension, you’ll need a Conformity API key. If you don’t have one and want to try it out, Conformity provides a 14-day free trial, no credit card required. If you like it but feels that this time period is not enough for you, let me know and I’ll try to make it available to you.

But… What about my bucket template?

Oh, by the way, if you are wondering how a S3 bucket CloudFormation template looks like when following the best practices, take a look:

   
A Well-Architected bucket template

Not as simple, right? That’s exactly why this kind of tool is really powerful, allowing developers to learn as they code and organizations to fail the deployment of any resource that goes against the AWS recommendations.

References

[1] https://www.gartner.com/smarterwithgartner/why-cloud-security-is-everyones-business

[2] https://github.com/aws-cloudformation/cfn-python-lint

[3] https://marketplace.visualstudio.com/items?itemName=kddejong.vscode-cfn-lint

[4] https://www.cloudconformity.com/

[5] https://marketplace.visualstudio.com/items?itemName=raphaelbottino.cc-template-scanner

The post Shift Well-Architecture Left. By Extension, Security Will Follow appeared first on .

Letter from the CEO: A time of kindness and compassion

By Trend Micro

Dear Customers,

Together, we are facing a truly unprecedented situation and we have all had to adapt to the new reality. The global coronavirus pandemic is affecting our families, our communities, our organizations – indeed, it affects our perspective and way of life. As you certainly have too, at Trend Micro we have been busy over the past few weeks ensuring our employees are safe while also delivering uninterrupted service and protection for our customers. We have made it a priority to help organizations around the globe strengthen their security and ensure business continuity while so many of their employees work remotely.

As a global company with headquarters in Japan, we have been exposed to COVID-19 from the very early days when it first erupted in Asia. We have seen the massive impact this novel coronavirus has had on all of us: from social distancing, to families being separated, illness and even death. Our thoughts and prayers go out to everyone who has been impacted by the virus, directly or indirectly.

The safety of our employees is our first priority and for the last few weeks the vast majority of our employees are all working from home – all 7,000 across 60 countries. It is heartwarming to see the different activities teams have launched to stay connected while being apart: virtual happy hours or morning coffee meetings, online sports classes to stay fit together, movie watching nights and even remote karaoke. I sometimes feel that we are more connected now than ever before.

In the midst of these difficult times, we have also seen the amazing power of positivity and kindness around the world. I am very touched and proud of how our employees, our Trenders, are stepping up even more than usual to engage in acts of generosity and community support. A few examples include:

  • Employee-initiated neighborhood help services such as shopping for the elderly
  • Tools developed to help our medical heroes, for example a 3D printed clip that allows medical staff to wear face masks more comfortably
  • New content for students and parents who are now working from home, developed by our Internet Safety for Kids & Families team
  • Over 60,000 masks donated to our communities
  • Give & Match activities supporting underserved neighborhoods in India and the Philippines, with the company matching each employee donation.

We have also seen Trenders donating some of their accrued paid vacation days to colleagues who might need additional time off to take care of family. There have been thousands of such acts of kindness – likely many more that I’m not even aware of. Knowing the passion of our employees, I know that there are new activities being organized and happening at this exact moment.

In this same spirit, it is very important to me – as well as the entire executive team – that we do the right thing for our employees and our customers during these difficult times, rather than focusing solely on what’s best for our bottom line. We intend to retain all of our employees, and are working to ensure that our teams that work on commission will continue to have a steady income, no matter how business goes. We know that not every company is as fortunate as we are, and many family members of our employees are out of jobs, so our executives have also committed to reducing their salaries if necessary, to ensure that every employee will receive company bonuses for the first half of 2020. If we protect our Trend Micro family, our Trend Micro family can protect and care for their communities.

I understand these times are difficult and while we are celebrating acts of kindness and positivity, many of our friends and families are struggling with health issues and other concerns. Our hearts go out to all those who are affected, to our healthcare workers and all essential employees who help keep our lives going. We thank you from the bottom of our hearts.

Please stay safe – and stay at home!

Kind regards,

Eva Chen

 

The post Letter from the CEO: A time of kindness and compassion appeared first on .

Why CISOs Are Demanding Detection and Response Everywhere

By Leah MacMillan

Over the past three decades, we’ve had time at Trend Micro to observe the industry trends that have the biggest impact on our customers. And one of the big things we’ve seen is that threats move largely in tandem with changes to IT infrastructure. This matters today because most organizations are transforming the way they run and manage their infrastructure—a daunting task on its own.

But with digital transformation also comes an expanded corporate attack surface, driving security leaders to demand enhanced visibility, detection & response across the entire enterprise — this is not just about the endpoint.

Transforming business

Over the past five years, there has been a major shift in the way IT infrastructure is delivered, and with that shift, increasing complexity. A big part of this change has been the use of the cloud, reflected in Gartner’s prediction that the market will grow to over $266 billion in 2020. Organizations everywhere are leveraging the cloud and DevOps to rapidly deliver new and differentiated applications and services for their customers, partners and employees. And the use of containers and microservices across a multi-cloud and hybrid environment is increasingly common.

In addition to leveraging public cloud services like IaaS, organizations are also rapidly adopting SaaS applications like Office 365, and expanding their use of mobile and collaborative applications to support remote working. Some are even arguing that working patterns may never be the same again, following the changes forced on many employers by the Covid-19 pandemic.

Combine these changes with networks that continue to extend to include branch offices and add new areas to protect like operational technology including industrial systems, and we can certainly see that the challenges facing the modern enterprise look nothing like they did a few years ago.

Under fire, under pressure

All of these infrastructure changes make for a broader attack surface that the bad guys can take advantage of, and they’re doing so with an increasingly wide range of tools and techniques. In the cloud there is a new class of vulnerabilities introduced through a greater use of open source, containers, orchestration platforms, supply chain applications and more. For all organizations, the majority of threats still prey upon the user, arriving via email (over 90% of the 52.3 billion we blocked in 2019), and they’re no longer just basic phishing attempts. There’s been an uptick in fileless events designed to bypass traditional security filters (we blocked 1.4 million last year). And Business Email Compromise (BEC) and ransomware continue to evolve, the latter causing major outages across local government, healthcare and other vulnerable sectors.

Organizations are often left flat-footed because they don’t have the in-house skills to secure a rapidly evolving IT environment. Mistakes get made, and configuration errors can allow the hackers to sneak in.

Against this backdrop, CISOs need visibility, detection and response capabilities across the extended enterprise. But in too many cases, teams are struggling because they have:

  • Too many security tools, in silos. Security leaders want to consolidate the 10, 20 or even 50+ security technologies currently in use across their organizations. And ideally, they need capabilities that work seamlessly together, sharing threat intelligence across security layers, and delivering a fully connected threat defense.
  • Too few people. Global cybersecurity skills shortages have now exceeded four million, with existing teams often overwhelmed by alerts, allowing serious threats to fly under the radar
  • Increased compliance pressures. CISOs are under pressure to comply with a number of regulations, and the impacts of non-compliance are increasingly strict. While newer, more demanding compliance requirements like GDPR and the California Consumer Privacy Act aim to protect data, they also present operational challenges for cloud teams with complex, manual and time consuming audits. Not to mention new regulations have teeth, with fines that can have a serious impact on the bottom line.  For example, as of March 2020, 227 GDPR fines had been levied, totalling over 466 million euros.

Beyond the endpoint

While endpoint detection and response (EDR) has become a popular response to some of these problems over recent years, the reality is that cyber-attacks are rarely straightforward and limited to the endpoint (as noted in the email statistic above). Security teams actually need visibility, detection, and response across the entire IT environment, so they can better contextualize and deal with threats.

This is what Trend Micro XDR offers. It provides visibility across not just endpoints but also email, servers, cloud workloads and networks, applying AI and expert security analytics to correlate and identify potential threats. The result is fewer, higher fidelity alerts for stretched IT security teams to deal with. Recognizing the skills shortage reality, we also offer a managed XDR service that augments in-house SOC activities with the power of Trend Micro security experts.

Detection and response is too important to be limited to the endpoint. Today’s CISOs need visibility, detection, and response everywhere.

The post Why CISOs Are Demanding Detection and Response Everywhere appeared first on .

Message from Eva Chen – as a human being, not a CEO: We need to speak out and act against racism

By Eva Chen

 

I would like to express my outrage over the brutal killings of George Floyd, Breonna Taylor, and Ahmaud Arbery – not as the CEO of an international company, but as a human being and a citizen of the world. It makes me very sad, but also intensely frustrated and angry to realize how little is being done around the world to overcome the blatant inequality and racism that persists. The disturbing, high-profile incidents in the past weeks expose in a cruel way how we live in a world where fear, uncertainty and discrimination continue to impact the lives of black people every single day.

 

As a global society, we should do better; we must be better.

 

At Trend Micro, we are committed to providing a safe, empathetic and respectful environment where we reject any form of racism and discrimination, with zero tolerance. We not only welcome diversity in our Trend Micro family, we encourage it, whether it is diversity of race, ethnicity, nationality, gender, gender identification, sexual orientation, physical ability, age, religion, veteran status, socio-economic status, and political philosophy. We believe it is our different backgrounds and experiences that make us who we are and make us as strong as we are. But we continue to listen and learn how to create equality for all.

 

I feel very strongly that we all need to do something and become a force for change. We have an obligation towards our communities and our children to leave this world in a better place. I am fortunate as a CEO to be able to use my voice to speak out against any kind of discrimination, against racism in any form. I ask that we all seek to expand our perspectives and heighten our awareness of others. We must open our eyes to the current and ugly truth and challenge any subconscious tendencies to avoid this painful reality of inequality!

 

Today I am inspired to lift up the voice of a young Trend Micro employee who posted on our internal web site:

 

“Progress is a process. Unity is part of the process.
Unity drives awareness…
Awareness drives education…
Education drives action…
Action drives change…
Let’s make a change!”

 

These are very difficult times for us as individuals, communities, and as nations. I ask you to join me in doing our part to fight racism – we can’t afford any more lives to be lost, any more children growing up deprived of their opportunities. First and foremost, we need to listen to our black communities and educate ourselves. And we must acknowledge that this is an ongoing issue – and continue to fight inequality every day, even when the protests don’t make headlines anymore. We can all make a difference. Speak out against injustice, listen to the stories of inequality, act, vote and make a change.

 

Together, we can make this world a better place!

Eva Chen

The post Message from Eva Chen – as a human being, not a CEO: We need to speak out and act against racism appeared first on .

Perspectives Summary – What You Said

By William "Bill" Malik (CISA VP Infrastructure Strategies)

 

On Thursday, June 25, Trend Micro hosted our Perspectives 2-hour virtual event. As the session progressed, we asked our attendees, composed of +5000 global registrants, two key questions. This blog analyzes those answers.

 

First, what is your current strategy for securing the cloud?

Rely completely on native cloud platform security capabilities (AWS, Azure, Google…) 33%

Add on single-purpose security capabilities (workload protection, container security…) 13%

Add on security platform with multiple security capabilities for reduced complexity 54%

 

This result affirms IDC analyst Frank Dickson’s observation that most cloud customers will benefit from a suite offering a range of security capabilities covering multiple cloud environments. For the 15% to 20% of organizations that rely on one cloud provider, purchasing a security solution from that vendor may provide sufficient coverage. The quest for point products (which may be best-of-breed, as well) introduces additional complexity across multiple cloud platforms, which can obscure problems, confuse cybersecurity analysts and business users, increase costs, and reduce efficiency.  The comprehensive suite strategy compliments most organizations’ hybrid, multi-cloud approach.

Second, and this is multiple choice, how are you enabling secure digital transformation in the cloud today?

 

This shows that cloud users are open to many available solutions for improving cloud security. The adoption pattern follows traditional on-premise security deployment models. The most commonly cited solution, Network Security/Cloud IPS, recognizes that communication with anything in the cloud requires a trustworthy network. This is a very familiar technique, dating back in the on-premise environment to the introduction of firewalls in the early 1990s from vendors like CheckPoint and supported by academic research as found in Cheswick and Bellovin’s Firewalls and Internet Security (Addison Wesley, 1994).

 

The frequency of data exposure due to misconfigured cloud instances surely drives Cloud Security Posture Management, certainly aided by the ease of deployment of tools like Cloud One conformity.

 

The newness of containers in the production environment most likely explains the relatively lower deployment of container security today.

 

The good news is that organizations do not have to deploy and manage a multitude of point products addressing one problem on one environment. The suite approach simplifies today’s reality and positions the organization for tomorrow’s challenges.

 

Looking ahead, future growth in industrial IoT and increasing deployments of 5G-based public and non-public networks will drive further innovations, increasing the breadth of the suite approach to securing hybrid, multi-cloud environments.

 

What do you think? Let me know @WilliamMalikTM.

 

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Beyond the Endpoint: Why Organizations are Choosing XDR for Holistic Detection and Response

By Trend Micro

The endpoint has long been a major focal point for attackers targeting enterprise IT environments. Yet increasingly, security bosses are being forced to protect data across the organization, whether it’s in the cloud, on IoT devices, in email, or on-premises servers. Attackers may jump from one environment to the next in multi-stage attacks and even hide between the layers. So, it pays to have holistic visibility, in order to detect and respond more effectively.

This is where XDR solutions offer a convincing alternative to EDR and point solutions. But unfortunately, not all providers are created equal. Trend Micro separates themselves from the pack by providing mature security capabilities across all layers, industry-leading threat intelligence, and an AI-powered analytical approach that produces fewer, higher fidelity alerts.

Under pressure

It’s no secret that IT security teams today are under extreme pressure. They’re faced with an enemy able to tap into a growing range of tools and techniques from the cybercrime underground. Ransomware, social engineering, fileless malware, vulnerability exploits, and drive-by-downloads, are just the tip of the iceberg. There are “several hundred thousand new malicious programs or unwanted apps registered every day,” according to a new Osterman Research report. It argues that, while endpoint protection must be a “key component” in corporate security strategy, “It can only be one strand” —complemented with protection in the cloud, on the network, and elsewhere.

There’s more. Best-of-breed approaches have saddled organizations with too many disparate tools over the years, creating extra cost, complexity, management headaches, and security gaps. This adds to the workload for overwhelmed security teams.

According to Gartner, “Two of the biggest challenges for all security organizations are hiring and retaining technically savvy security operations staff, and building a security operations capability that can confidently configure and maintain a defensive posture as well as provide a rapid detection and response capacity. Mainstream organizations are often overwhelmed by the intersectionality of these two problems.”

XDR appeals to organizations struggling with all of these challenges as well as those unable to gain value from, or who don’t have the resources to invest in, SIEM or SOAR solutions. So what does it involve?

What to look for

As reported by Gartner, all XDR solutions should fundamentally achieve the following:

  • Improve protection, detection, and response
  • Enhance overall productivity of operational security staff
  • Lower total cost of ownership (TCO) to create an effective detection and response capability

However, the analyst urges IT buyers to think carefully before choosing which provider to invest in. That’s because, in some cases, underlying threat intelligence may be underpowered, and vendors have gaps in their product portfolio which could create dangerous IT blind spots. Efficacy will be a key metric. As Gartner says, “You will not only have to answer the question of does it find things, but also is it actually finding things that your existing tooling is not.”

A leader in XDR

This is where Trend Micro XDR excels. It has been designed to go beyond the endpoint, collecting and correlating data from across the organization, including; email, endpoint, servers, cloud workloads, and networks. With this enhanced context, and the power of Trend Micro’s AI algorithms and expert security analytics, the platform is able to identify threats more easily and contain them more effectively.

Forrester recently recognized Trend Micro as a leader in enterprise detection and response, saying of XDR, “Trend Micro has a forward-thinking approach and is an excellent choice for organizations wanting to centralize reporting and detection with XDR but have less capacity for proactively performing threat hunting.”

According to Gartner, fewer than 5% of organizations currently employ XDR. This means there’s a huge need to improve enterprise-wide protection. At a time when corporate resources are being stretched to the limit, Trend Micro XDR offers global organizations an invaluable chance to minimize enterprise risk exposure whilst maximizing the productivity of security teams.

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Ask Me Anything – Celebrating The Fifth Anniversary Of My Monthly Threat Webinar

By Jon Clay (Global Threat Communications)

In July 2015, I did my first threat webinar. I had planned to do it on a monthly basis, and never imagined I would still be doing it five years later, but here I am, still creating monthly webinars. I still do. I started the webinar series to help people understand the different threats targeting our customers and I have always tried to focus on three areas:

  • Share information on what threats our customers deal with regularly
  • Talk about an actual threat and explain how it works
  • Discuss technologies versus solutions

This last point, discussing technologies versus solutions, has been one of the key items I try to follow as much as possible – after all, the goal of my webinars is to be educational, not a sales pitch.

Coming from a technical background, BS in Electrical Engineering from Michigan State University (Go Spartans!!), I enjoy learning about the new technologies being used to detect the latest threats and to ensure you know what to look for when selecting a vendor and/or a security solution. Over the years, I’ve discussed everything from APTs, coinminers, exploits, messaging threats, ransomware, underground activity and lots in between. It is pretty easy to find topics to discuss, as there is so much going on in our industry, and with the malicious actors regularly shifting their tactics, techniques and procedures, I can keep the content fairly fresh.

I really enjoy having guest speakers on my webinars to mix things up a bit for the viewers as well, as I know my limitations – there are just too many threats out there to keep up with all of them. The main reason I love doing the threat webinars is that I enjoy sharing information and teaching others about our industry and the threats affecting them.  If you want to check out any of my previous five years of webinars you can watch them here.

For my fifth year anniversary I wanted to try something different and I would like to do an open Q&A session. As I’ve never done this before, it will certainly be an interesting experience for me, but hopefully for you as well. I hope I can answer a majority of your questions, but I know some of you are way too smart for me, so please bear with me.

Our registration page for this webinar allows you to submit any pre-session questions that I’ll answer throughout the webinar. You can ask me anything that is on your mind and if I cannot get to your question, I’ll do my best to answer you afterwards in an email.

I hope to continue to do these webinars for the foreseeable future and I would like to end my post by thanking each and every one of you who has participated in my webinars over the years. It has been a pleasure, and I look forward to answering your questions.

Take care, stay healthy, and keep on smiling!

Jon

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ESG Findings on Trend Micro Cloud-Powered XDR Drives Monumental Business Value

By Trend Micro

This material was published by ESG Research Insights Report, Validating Trend Micro’s Approach and Enhancing GTM Intelligence, 2020.

 

 

 

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Connected Security Solutions Helps City of Tyler’s CIO to Reduce Costs While Enabling Delivery of Enhanced Community & Public Safety Services

By Trend Micro

“We’re here to serve” is Benny Yazdanpanahi’s motto as CIO for City of Tyler located in Texas. Supporting a population of approximately 107,000, Yazdanpanahi’s vision for his city relies on the use of data to deliver exceptional services to citizens, today and into the future.

 

Since joining the city nearly 19 years ago, Yazdanpanahi has continually challenged himself and his small IT team to stay agile and to keep the needs of the city’s citizens at the forefront. Today, Yazdanpanahi and his team use IT systems to make more informed decisions, enhance community services, and improve public safety.

 

“Our citizens, and especially the younger generation, want immediate access to information and online services,” said Yazdanpanahi. “We want to keep pace with the latest technologies, not only for citizens but also to make our city employees more effective and efficient.”

But Yazdanpanahi knows that a highly secure IT environment is essential to their continued success. “Many US cities have been hacked, so security is on top of everyone’s mind. As a city, we want to provide great services, but we have to provide them in a highly secure manner.”

To accomplish those security goals with limited resources and staff, Tyler’s leaders have been collaborating with Trend Micro for several years. The cybersecurity giant has brought a hands-on approach and an ability to stay ahead of the threats. Their adaptability to the threat landscape strengthens the city’s security posture and empowers the IT team to focus on serving the community.

 

The city has been able to stay secure without additional staff and resources. City employees don’t spend time resolving IT issues and improve their productivity to focus on things that mater for the city.

 

“If you don’t collaborate with a partner that’s highly experienced in the security field, you can easily get blindsided,” said Yazdanpanahi. “We need someone there, day in and out, focused on security. Trend Micro knows how to protect cities like us. They provide the kind of north, south, east, and west protection that makes my job easier and allows us to use our data to accomplish new, exciting things for our city.”

 

Read more about Benny’s journey to securing the city:

https://www.trendmicro.com/en_ca/about/customer-stories/city-of-tyler.html

 

 

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What is a VPN and How Does it Increase Your Online Security and Privacy?

By Trend Micro

The number of VPN users has grown considerably over the past few years. According to the report of Go-Globe, 25% of netizens worldwide have used a VPN at least once in the last 30 days. Recently, VPN usage has surged in many countries and its popularity may see VPN usage surpass the estimated profit of USD$27.10 billion by the end of 2020. The VPN global market only seems to increase as time goes by. So, why is that? What do VPNs provide that make them so attractive?

What is a VPN?

A VPN, or a Virtual Private Network, creates a secure communication “tunnel” from your computer to the internet. It encrypts your connection and prevents others from seeing the data you’re transferring. This keeps your data secure from any spying attempts—including from home over your wired connection, but particularly on public Wi-Fi networks, when you’re out and about in places such as coffee shops, restaurants, airports and hotels. It helps ensure that no one can steal your personal details, passwords, or credit card information.

How does a VPN work and why you need a VPN service?

Among other things, a VPN can conceal your IP address to make your online actions virtually untraceable and anonymous, providing greater privacy for everything you do. In fact, there are so many ways a VPN can protect your privacy and security, we need to take a deeper look at what other benefits a VPN can provide.

    1. Safeguard personal information

    This is the era of mobility and most transactions are being done by people on-the-go using their mobile devices to exchange data over public networks. From online shopping, to mobile banking or simply checking emails and social media accounts, these activities can expose your personal information and sensitive data to hackers and cybercriminals. This particularly applies to users relying on public Wi-Fi. Using a VPN will help to mitigate unwanted leakage or theft by securing data in transit to and from the systems that typically try to collect and store your private data.

      1. Access better streaming contents from other locations

      One of the main drivers for using a VPN is to access better streaming content and restricted websites from the region you’re accessing the internet from. This may be true in your own country, but when traveling abroad, there are also chances that you cannot visit a popular website or a social media platform from the country you’re visiting. While using a VPN, you can connect to an IP address in your country and have full access to your favorite media contents and avoid wasting membership fees that you will likely pay for this streaming service.

        1. Enhance browsing privacy

        Some retail apps, social media platforms, and search engines continuously collect and analyze results of your search history. They keep track of all your browsing activities such as items you viewed, contents you liked, and things you tapped and clicked, so they can provide you with more targeted contents and monetize these by showing the same information in your feed through ads.

        Note that, simply clearing your browsing history does not completely remove traces of these searches, and targeted ads can get annoying. This is where a VPN can help enhance your browsing privacy. The VPN hides your browser cached data and location from advertisers, which prevents them from serving up content based on your searches and location.

          1. Save cost on communicating with family and friends abroad

          Another motivating factor for the use of a VPN is to save on the cost of communicating with families and friends abroad. There are countries implementing restrictions on the use of certain messaging apps, banning their services. If you are planning to visit a country with such a restriction, a VPN can bypass this constraint, which allows you to make use of your trusted messaging app, eliminate the cost of long-distance calls to family and friends while abroad—and at the same time, maintain the level of security and encryption the messaging app provides.

            1. Escape content-based bandwidth-throttling

            The internet has evolved into streaming more content—videos, music, and more—and ISPs have responded by making higher data usage and higher throughput (bandwidth) pay-as-you-use-more services. But content is still at issue, particularly after the December 2017 FCC ruling. Potential ISP throttling based on content type, source, or destination (e.g., BitTorrent traffic), which could give priority to business over personal usage, is one of the reasons why everyday people are using VPN services, because a VPN provides more usage anonymity, preventing ISPs from potentially tracking your activities and limiting your bandwidth usage accordingly.

            Choosing the right VPN for you

            Now that you have some understanding of what a VPN is, and what benefits it can give you, it is also important to choose the right VPN for you.

            Due to regulatory requirements and laws governing data privacy and securing personal information online, the demand for VPNs is growing. In response, there are a large number of VPN providers in the market today. So how do you choose a reliable VPN? Here are some criteria to help you pick one that best suits your needs:

            • Faster and more data is better. Using a VPN can often decrease the speed of your internet connection, so you should pick a provider that has a good number of servers and locations and doesn’t pre-throttle your bandwidth. Some also have data limits, so you should opt for those with a higher data limit per month
            • Provides the best encryption. Look for a VPN providing sophisticated ciphers such as 256-bit AES end-to-end encryption.
            • Ensures safe browsing. Look for VPN that can filter and block malicious websites, online fraud, and internet scams and automatically safeguard your internet connection.
            • Provides full anonymity. It is crucial that a VPN vendor has a clear privacy policy. Trusted VPNs will not track the user’s websites, payment information, or online transactions, and do not keep logs.
            • Supports simultaneous devices. Select a VPN that is compatible with your devices and operating systems and can provide you a good number of simultaneous connections on your devices.
            • Cost versus use case. Heavier business usage should be contrasted with everyday consumer use. To pay less for the service (VPNs typically cost from $5 to $12 per month per device, though multi-device bundles are less), you might accept some data limits, if your use case is lighter; sacrifice some speed, if you’re not streaming movies when you’re out and about, (unlikely during the coronavirus lockdown); or some cross-regional server-selection capability, if you’re not travelling in content-restricted regions (since out-of-country travel is also being hampered by the pandemic).

            Trend Micro’s Home Division provides two low-cost, safety-focused VPN solutions for everyday users: Trend Micro VPN Proxy One and Trend Micro Wi-Fi Protection, both of which can address light-to-medium VPN needs and meet most of the checklist criteria above.

            Trend Micro VPN Proxy One offers fast, secure, stable and anonymous proxy connections for you to access various websites and applications. It connects to the best Trend Micro VPN server intelligently, without you having to do it, and does not limit bandwidth consumption. Trend Micro VPNs do not track your online activities, ensuring you a secure digital life and protecting your online privacy. Trend Micro VPN Proxy One is targeted to Mac and iOS devices.

            Trend Micro Wi-Fi Protection turns any public hotspot into a secure Wi-Fi network and VPN with bank-grade data encryption to keep your information safe from hackers. While your VPN is active, Trend Micro Wi-Fi Protection provides exceptional web threat protection and checks websites you visit to safeguard your browsing from online fraud and internet scam. The VPN automatically kicks in when connecting to a Wi-Fi network with low security, such as one with no encryption. Trend Micro Wi-Fi Protection is available for all platforms (PC, Mac, Android, and iOS). Bundles can be purchased for multiple devices and platforms and some bundles can include other Trend Micro products, depending on the region.

            Go to the Apple App Store for more details on Trend Micro VPN Proxy One; or for a 30-day trial or to buy, go here: Mac | iOS.

            Or visit Trend Micro Wi-Fi Protection for more information, or to buy the multi-platform solution.

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            How to exploit Format String Vulnerabilities

            By Srinivas

            Introduction In the previous articles, we discussed printing functions, format strings and format string vulnerabilities. This article provides an overview of how Format String vulnerabilities can be exploited. In this article, we will begin by solving a simple challenge to leak a secret from memory. In the next article, we will discuss another example, where […]

            The post How to exploit Format String Vulnerabilities appeared first on Infosec Resources.

            How to exploit Format String Vulnerabilities was first posted on September 30, 2020 at 8:28 am.
            ©2017 "InfoSec Resources". Use of this feed is for personal non-commercial use only. If you are not reading this article in your feed reader, then the site is guilty of copyright infringement. Please contact me at darren.dalasta@infosecinstitute.com

            Browser Forensics: Firefox

            By Nitesh Malviya

            Introduction Browsers have become an inherent part of our virtual life and we all make use of browsers for surfing the internet in some or the other way. Also, browsers can be used not only for surfing, we can make use of browsers for navigating through the file system of the OS. You might have […]

            The post Browser Forensics: Firefox appeared first on Infosec Resources.

            Browser Forensics: Firefox was first posted on September 30, 2020 at 12:54 pm.
            ©2017 "InfoSec Resources". Use of this feed is for personal non-commercial use only. If you are not reading this article in your feed reader, then the site is guilty of copyright infringement. Please contact me at darren.dalasta@infosecinstitute.com

            NDAA Conference: Opportunity to Improve the Nation’s Cybersecurity Posture

            By Tom Gann

            As Congress prepares to return to Washington in the coming weeks, finalizing the FY2021 National Defense Authorization Act (NDAA) will be a top priority. The massive defense bill features several important cybersecurity provisions, from strengthening CISA and promoting interoperability to creating a National Cyber Director position in the White House and codifying FedRAMP.

            These are vital components of the legislation that conferees should work together to include in the final version of the bill, including:

            Strengthening CISA

            One of the main recommendations of the Cyberspace Solarium Commission’s report this spring was to further strengthen CISA, an agency that has already made great strides in protecting our country from cyberattacks. An amendment to the House version of the NDAA would do just that, by giving CISA additional authority it needs to effectively hunt for threats and vulnerabilities on the federal network.

            Bad actors, criminal organizations and even nation-states are continually looking to launch opportunistic attacks. Giving CISA additional tools, resources and funding needed to secure the nation’s digital infrastructure and secure our intelligence and information is a no-brainer and Congress should ensure the agency gets the resources it needs in the final version of the NDAA.

            Promoting Interoperability

            Perhaps now more than ever before, interoperability is key to a robust security program. As telework among the federal workforce continues and expands, an increased variety of communication tools, devices and networks put federal networks at risk. Security tools that work together and are interoperable better provide a full range of protection across these environments.

            The House version of the NDAA includes several provisions to promote interoperability within the National Guard, military and across the Federal government. The Senate NDAA likewise includes language that requires the DoD craft regulations to facilitate DoD’s access to and utilization of system, major subsystem, and major component software-defined interfaces to advance DoD’s efforts to generate diverse and effective kill chains. The regulations and guidance would also apply to purely software systems, including business systems and cybersecurity systems. These regulations would also require acquisition plans and solicitations to incorporate mandates for the delivery of system, major subsystem, and major component software defined interfaces.

            For too long, agencies have leveraged a grab bag of tools that each served a specific purpose, but didn’t offer broad, effective coverage. Congress has a valuable opportunity to change that and encourage more interoperable solutions that provide the security needed in today’s constantly evolving threat landscape.

            Creating a National Cyber Director Position

            The House version of the NDAA would establish a Senate-confirmed National Cyber Director within the White House, in charge of overseeing digital operations across the federal government. This role, a recommendation of the Cyberspace Solarium Commission, would give the federal government a single point person for all things cyber.

            As former Rep. Mike Rodgers argued in an op-ed published in The Hill last month, “the cyber challenge that we face as a country is daunting and complex.” We face new threats every day. Coordinating cyber strategy across the federal government, rather than the agency by agency approach we have today, is critical to ensuring we stay on top of threats and effectively protect the nation’s critical infrastructure, intellectual property and data from an attack.

            Codifying FedRAMP

            The FedRAMP Authorization Act, included in the House version of the NDAA, would codify the FedRAMP program and give it a formal standing for Congressional review, a  critical step towards making the program more efficient and useful for agencies across the government. Providing this program more oversight will further validate the FedRAMP approved products from across the industry as safe and secure for federal use. The FedRAMP authorization bill also includes language that will help focus the Administration’s attention on the need to secure the vulnerable spaces between and among cloud services and applications.  Agencies need to focus on securing these vulnerabilities between and among clouds since sophisticated hackers target these seams that too often are left unprotected.

            Additionally, the Pentagon has already committed to FedRAMP reciprocity. FedRAMP works – and codifying it to bring the rest of the Federal government into the program would offer an excellent opportunity for wide-scale cloud adoption, something the federal government would benefit greatly from.

            We hope that NDAA conferees will consider these important cyber provisions and include them in the final version of the bill and look forward to continuing our work with government partners on important cyber issues like these.

             

             

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            Can You Decode Your Teen’s Texting Language?

            By Toni Birdsong
            texting slang

            It’s hard to believe, right, parents? In just a blink or two, you went from being the teenager dropping cool phrases like “rad” and “gnarly” to monitoring a teenager texting words like “lowkey,” “IRL” and “CD9” into her smartphone non-stop.*

            For generations, teens have been crafting terms to differentiate themselves from other age groups. The difference today is that smartphone texting has multiplied the scope of that code to include words, emojis, numbers, and hashtags.

            The times have changed, fo’ sho.’

            Digital Deciphering

            You don’t have to speak your child’s language (please don’t). However, with new terms and risks emerging online each day, it’s a good idea to at least understand what they are saying.

            Since kids have been spending more time online due to the pandemic, we thought we might discover a few new and interesting terms. We were right. We found stories of teens referring to the Coronavirus as “Miss Rona” and “Rona,” and abbreviating quarantine to “Quar.” A “Corona Bae” is the person you would only plan to date during a lockdown.

            Much of the coded language kids use is meant to be funny, sarcastic, or a quick abbreviation. However, there are times when a text exchange can slip into risky territory. Seemingly harmless, text exchanges can spark consequences such as bullying, sextortion, privacy violations, and emotional or physical harm.

            Stay Connected

            To help kids avoid dangerous digital situations, we recommend three things: 1) Talk early and often with your kids about digital risk and behavior expectations, 2) Explore and use parental monitoring software, and 3) Know your child’s friends and communities online and in real life.

            Note: Context is everything. Many of these terms are used in jest or as casual banter. Be sure to understand the context in which a word is used.

            A Few Terms You May See **

            Flex. This term means showing off. For example, “Look at her trying to flex with her new car.”

            Crashy. Description of a person who is thought to be both crazy and trashy.

            Clap back. A comeback filled with attitude.

            Cringey. Another word for embarrassing.

            Hop off. Mind your own business.

            Spill tea or Kiki. Dishing gossip.

            Sip tea. Listening to gossip.

            Salty. Mad, angry, jealous, bitter, upset, or irritated.

            “She gave me a salty look in class.”

            Extra. Over the top or unnecessarily dramatic.

            Left on read. Not replying to someone’s message.

            Ghosting. Ending a friendship or relationship online with no explanation.

            Neglext. Abandon someone in the middle of a text conversation.

            Ok, Boomer. Dismissing someone who is not up to date enough.

            (Throw) shade. Insult or trash talk discreetly.

            Receipts. Getting digital proof, usually in the form of screenshots.

            THOT. Acronym for That H__ Over There.

            Thirsty. A term describing a person as desperate or needy. “Look at her staring at him — she’s so thirsty.”

            Thirst trap. A sexy photograph or message posted on social media.

            Dis. Short for showing blatant disrespect.

            Preeing. A word that describes stalking or being stalked on Facebook.

            Basic. Referring to a person as mainstream, nothing special. Usually used in a negative connotation.

            Chasing Clout. A negative term describing someone trying too hard to get followers on social media.

            9, CD9, or Code9, PAW, POS. Parents are around, over the shoulder.

            99. All clear, the parents are gone. Safe to resume texting or planning.

            KPC. Keeping parents clueless.

            Cheddar, Cheese, or Bread. These are all terms that mean money.

            Cap. Means to lie as in “she’s capping.” Sending the baseball cap emoji expresses the same feeling. No capping means “I’m not lying.”

            Hundo P. Term that is short for “hundred percent;” absolutely, for sure.

            Woke. Aware of and outspoken on current on political and social issues.

            And I oop. Lighthearted term to describe a silly mistake.

            Big oof. A slightly bigger mistake.

            Yeet. An expression of excitement. For example, “He kissed me. Yeeeet!”

            Retweet. Instead of saying, “yes, I agree,” you say, “retweet.”

            Canceled. Absurd or foolish behavior is “canceled.” For example, “He was too negative on our date, so I canceled him.”

            Slap or Snatched. Terms that mean fashionable or on point. For instance, “Those shoes are slap” or “You look snatched.”

            And just for fun, here’s a laugh out loud video from comedian Seth Meyer’s on teen Coronavirus slang you’ll enjoy on YouTube.

            * lowkey (a feeling you want to keep secret), IRL (In Real Life), CD9 also Code9 (Adult Alert used to hide secretive activity). ** Terms collected from various sources, including NetLingo.com, UrbanDictionary.com, webopedia.com, and from tweets and posts from teens online.

            The post Can You Decode Your Teen’s Texting Language? appeared first on McAfee Blogs.

            US County Election Websites (Still) Fail to Fulfill Basic Security Measures

            By Steve Grobman
            Elections 2020

            In January 2020, McAfee released the results of a survey establishing the extent of the use of .GOV validation and HTTPS encryption among county government websites in 13 states projected to be critical in the 2020 U.S. Presidential Election. The research was a result of  my concern that the lack of .GOV and HTTPS among county government websites and election-specific websites could allow foreign or domestic malicious actors to potentially create fake websites and use them to spread disinformation in the final weeks and days leading up to Election Day 2020.

            Subsequently, reports emerged in August that the U.S. Federal Bureau of Investigations, between March and June, had identified dozens of suspicious websites made to look like official U.S. state and federal election domains, some of them referencing voting in states like Pennsylvania, Georgia, Tennessee, Florida and others.

            Just last week, the FBI and Department of Homeland Security released another warning about fake websites taking advantage of the lack of .GOV on election websites.

            These revelations compelled us to conduct a follow-up survey of county election websites in all 50 U.S. states.

            Why .GOV and HTTPS Matter

            Using a .GOV web domain reinforces the legitimacy of the site. Government entities that purchase .GOV web domains have submitted evidence to the U.S. government that they truly are the legitimate local, county, or state governments they claimed to be. Websites using .COM, .NET, .ORG, and .US domain names can be purchased without such validation, meaning that there is no governing authority preventing malicious parties from using these names to set up and promote any number of fraudulent web domains mimicking legitimate county government domains.

            An adversary could use fake election websites for disinformation and voter suppression by targeting specific citizens in swing states with misleading information on candidates or inaccurate information on the voting process such as poll location and times. In this way, a malicious actor could impact election results without ever physically or digitally interacting with voting machines or systems.

            The HTTPS encryption measure assures citizens that any voter registration information shared with the site is encrypted, providing greater confidence in the entity with which they are sharing that information. Websites lacking the combination of .GOV and HTTPS cannot provide 100% assurance that voters seeking election information are visiting legitimate county and county election websites. This leaves an opening for malicious actors to steal information or set up disinformation schemes.

            I recently demonstrated how such a fake website would be created by mimicking a genuine county election website and then inserting misleading information that could influence voter behavior. This was done in an isolated lab environment that was not accessible to the internet as to not create any confusion for legitimate voters.

            In many cases, election websites have been set up to provide a strong user experience versus a focus on mitigating concerns that they could be spoofed to exploit the communities they serve. Malicious actors can pass off fake election websites and mislead large numbers of voters before detection by government organizations. A campaign close to election day could confuse voters and prevent votes from being cast, resulting in missing votes or overall loss of confidence in the democratic system.

            September 2020 Survey Findings

            McAfee’s September survey of county election administration websites in all 50 U.S. states (3089 counties) found that 80.2% of election administration websites or webpages lack the .GOV validation that confirms they are the websites they claim to be.

            Nearly 45% of election administration websites or webpages lack the necessary HTTPS encryption to prevent third-parties from re-directing voters to fake websites or stealing voter’s personal information.

            Only 16.4% of U.S. county election websites implement U.S. government .GOV validation and HTTPS encryption.

            States # Counties # .GOV % .GOV # HTTPS % HTTPS # BOTH %BOTH
            Alabama 67 8 11.9% 26 38.8% 6 9.0%
            Alaska 18 1 5.6% 12 66.7% 1 5.6%
            Arizona 15 11 73.3% 14 93.3% 11 73.3%
            Arkansas 75 18 24.0% 30 40.0% 17 22.7%
            California 58 8 13.8% 45 77.6% 6 10.3%
            Colorado 64 21 32.8% 49 76.6% 20 31.3%
            Connecticut 8 1 12.5% 2 25.0% 1 12.5%
            Delaware 3 0 0.0% 0 0.0% 0 0.0%
            Florida 67 4 6.0% 64 95.5% 4 6.0%
            Georgia 159 40 25.2% 107 67.3% 35 22.0%
            Hawaii 5 4 80.0% 4 80.0% 4 80.0%
            Idaho 44 6 13.6% 28 63.6% 5 11.4%
            Illinois 102 14 13.7% 60 58.8% 12 11.8%
            Indiana 92 28 30.4% 41 44.6% 16 17.4%
            Iowa 99 27 27.3% 80 80.8% 25 25.3%
            Kansas 105 8 7.6% 46 43.8% 2 1.9%
            Kentucky 120 19 15.8% 28 23.3% 15 12.5%
            Louisiana 64 5 7.8% 12 18.8% 2 3.1%
            Maine 16 0 0.0% 0 0.0% 0 0.0%
            Maryland 23 9 39.1% 22 95.7% 8 34.8%
            Massachusetts 14 3 21.4% 5 35.7% 2 14.3%
            Michigan 83 9 10.8% 63 75.9% 9 10.8%
            Minnesota 87 5 5.7% 59 67.8% 5 5.7%
            Mississippi 82 8 9.8% 30 36.6% 5 6.1%
            Missouri 114 8 7.0% 49 43.0% 7 6.1%
            Montana 56 15 26.8% 21 37.5% 8 14.3%
            Nebraska 93 35 37.6% 73 78.5% 32 34.4%
            Nevada 16 3 18.8% 13 81.3% 2 12.5%
            New Hampshire 10 0 0.0% 0 0.0% 0 0.0%
            New Jersey 21 3 14.3% 11 52.4% 2 9.5%
            New Mexico 33 7 21.2% 20 60.6% 6 18.2%
            New York 62 15 24.2% 48 77.4% 14 22.6%
            North Carolina 100 37 37.0% 69 69.0% 29 29.0%
            North Dakota 53 3 5.7% 19 35.8% 2 3.8%
            Ohio 88 77 87.5% 88 100.0% 77 87.5%
            Oklahoma 77 1 1.3% 24 31.2% 1 1.3%
            Oregon 36 1 2.8% 22 61.1% 0 0.0%
            Pennsylvania 67 11 16.4% 40 59.7% 7 10.4%
            Rhode Island 5 2 40.0% 3 60.0% 0 0.0%
            South Carolina 46 15 32.6% 33 71.7% 13 28.3%
            South Dakota 66 2 3.0% 14 21.2% 1 1.5%
            Tennessee 95 23 24.2% 38 40.0% 12 12.6%
            Texas 254 10 3.9% 86 33.9% 6 2.4%
            Utah 29 8 27.6% 16 55.2% 7 24.1%
            Vermont 14 0 0.0% 0 0.0% 0 0.0%
            Virginia 95 33 34.7% 61 64.2% 35 36.8%
            Washington 39 7 17.9% 26 66.7% 6 15.4%
            West Virginia 55 18 32.7% 33 60.0% 16 29.1%
            Wisconsin 72 16 22.2% 61 84.7% 11 15.3%
            Wyoming 23 4 17.4% 15 65.2% 2 8.7%
            Total 3089 611 19.8% 1710 55.4% 507 16.4%

            We found that the battleground states were largely in a bad position when it came to .GOV and HTTPS.

            Only 29% of election websites used both .GOV and HTTPS in North Carolina, 22% in Georgia, 15.3% in Wisconsin, 10.8% in Michigan, 10.4% in Pennsylvania, and 2.4% in Texas.

            While 95.5% of Florida’s county election websites and webpages use HTTPS encryption, only 6% percent validate their authenticity with .GOV.

            During the January 2020 survey, only 11 Iowa counties protected their election administration pages and domains with .GOV validation and HTTPS encryption. By September 2020, that number rose to 25 as 14 counties added .GOV validation. But 72.7% of the state’s county election sites and pages still lack official U.S. government validation of their authenticity.

            Alternatively, Ohio led the survey pool with 87.5% of election webpages and domains validated by .GOV and protected by HTTPS encryption. Four of Five (80%) Hawaii counties protect their main county and election webpages with both .GOV validation and encryption and 73.3% of Arizona county election websites do the same.

            What’s not working

            Separate Election Sites. As many as 166 counties set up websites that were completely separate from their main county web domain.  Separate election sites may have easy-to-remember, user-friendly domain names to make them more accessible for the broadest possible audience of citizens. Examples include my own county’s www.votedenton.com as well as www.votestanlycounty.com, www.carrollcountyohioelections.gov, www.voteseminole.org, and www.worthelections.com.

            The problem with these election-specific domains is that while 89.1% of these sites have HTTPS, 92.2% lack .GOV validation to guarantee that they belong to the county governments they claim. Furthermore, only 7.2% of these domains have both .GOV and HTTPS implemented. This suggests that malicious parties could easily set up numerous websites with similarly named domains to spoof these legitimate sites.

            Not on OUR website. Some smaller counties with few resources often reason that they can inform and protect voters simply by linking from their county websites to their states’ official election sites. Other smaller counties have suggested that social media platforms such as Facebook are preferable to election websites to reach Internet-savvy voters.

            Unfortunately, neither of these approaches prevents malicious actors from spoofing their county government web properties. Such actors could still set up fake websites regardless of whether the genuine websites link to a .GOV validated state election website or whether counties set up amazing Facebook election pages.

            For that matter, Facebook is not a government entity focused on validating that organizational or group pages are owned by the entities they claim to be. The platform could just as easily be used by malicious parties to create fake pages spreading disinformation about where and how to vote during elections.

            It’s not OUR job. McAfee found that some states’ voters could be susceptible to fake county election websites even though their counties have little if any role at all in administering elections. States such as Connecticut, Delaware, Maine, Massachusetts, New Hampshire, Rhode Island and Vermont administer their elections through their local governments, meaning that any election information is only available at the states’ websites and those websites belonging to major cities and towns. While this arrangement makes county-level website comparisons with other states difficult for the purpose of our survey, it doesn’t make voters in these states any less susceptible to fake versions of their county website.

            There should be one recipe for the security and integrity of government websites such as election websites and that recipe should be .GOV and HTTPS.

            What IS working: The Carrot & The Stick

            Ohio’s leadership position in our survey appears to be the result of a state-led initiative to transition county election-related content to .GOV validated web properties. Ohio’s Secretary of State used “the stick” approach by demanding by official order that counties implement .GOV and HTTPS on their election web properties. If counties couldn’t move their existing websites to .GOV, he offered “the carrot” of allowing them to leverage the state’s domain.

            A majority of counties have subsequently transitioned their main county websites to .GOV domains, their election-specific websites to .GOV domains, or their election-specific webpages to Ohio’s own .GOV-validated https://ohio.gov/ domain.

            Examples:

            https://adamscountyoh.gov/elections.asp
            https://www.allen.boe.ohio.gov/
            https://boe.ashland.oh.gov/
            https://www.boe.ohio.gov/ashtabula
            https://elections.bcohio.gov/
            https://www.carrollcountyohioelections.gov/
            https://boe.clermontcountyohio.gov/
            https://crawfordcountyohioboe.gov/
            https://vote.delawarecountyohio.gov/
            https://votehamiltoncountyohio.gov/

            While Ohio’s main county websites still largely lack .GOV validation, Ohio does provide a mechanism for voters to quickly assess if the main election website is real or potentially fake. Other states should consider such interim strategies until all county and local websites with election functions can be fully transitioned to .GOV.

            Ultimately, the end goal success should be that we are able to tell voters that if they don’t see .GOV and HTTPS, they shouldn’t believe that a website is legitimate or safe. What we tell voters must be that simple, because the general public lacks a technical background to determine real sites from fake sites.

            For more information on our .GOV-HTTPS county website research, potential disinformation campaigns, other threats to our elections, and voter safety tips, please visit our Elections 2020 page: https://www.mcafee.com/enterprise/en-us/2020-elections.html

            The post US County Election Websites (Still) Fail to Fulfill Basic Security Measures appeared first on McAfee Blogs.

            FedRAMP – What’s the Big Deal?

            By Tom Gann

            If you are someone who works for a cloud service provider in the business of federal contracting, you probably already have a good understanding of FedRAMP. It is also likely that our regular blog readers know the ins and outs of this program.

            For those who are not involved in these areas, however, this acronym may be more unfamiliar. Perhaps you have only heard of it in passing conversation with a few of your expert cybersecurity colleagues, or you are just curious to learn what all of the hype is about. If you fall into this category – read on! This blog is for you.

            At first glance, FedRAMP may seem like a type of onramp to an interstate headed for the federal government – and in a way, it is.

            FedRAMP stands for the Federal Risk and Authorization Management Program, which provides a standard security assessment, authorization and continuous monitoring for cloud products and services to be used by federal agencies. The program’s overall mission is to protect the data of U.S. citizens in the cloud and promote the adoption of secure cloud services across the government with a standardized approach.

            Once a cloud service has successfully made it onto the interstate – or achieved FedRAMP authorization – it’s allowed to be used by an agency and listed in the FedRAMP Marketplace. The FedRAMP Marketplace is a one-stop-shop for agencies to find cloud services that have been tested and approved as safe to use, making it much easier to determine if an offering meets security requirements.

            In the fourth year of the program, FedRAMP had 20 authorized cloud service offerings. Now, eight years into the program, FedRAMP has over 200 authorized offerings, reflecting its commitment to help the government shift to the cloud and leverage new technologies.

            Who should be FedRAMP authorized?

            Any cloud service provider that has a contract with a federal agency or wants to work with an agency in the future must have FedRAMP authorization. Compliance with FedRAMP can also benefit providers who don’t have plans to partner with government, as it signals to the private sector they are committed to cloud security.

            Using a cloud service that complies with FedRAMP standards is mandatory for federal agencies. It has also become popular with organizations in the private industry, which are more often looking to FedRAMP standards as a security benchmark for the cloud services they use.

            How can a cloud service obtain authorization?

            There are two ways for a cloud service to obtain FedRAMP authorization. One is with a Joint Authorization Board (JAB) provisional authorization (P-ATO) and the other is through an individual agency Authority to Operate (ATO).

            A P-ATO is an initial approval of the cloud service provider by the JAB, which is made up of the Chief Information Officers (CIOs) from the Department of Defense (DoD), Department of Homeland Security (DHS) and General Services Administration (GSA). This designation means that the JAB has provided a provisional approval for agencies to leverage when granting an ATO to a cloud system.

            The head of an agency grants an ATO as part of the agency authorization process. An ATO may be granted after an agency sponsor reviews the cloud service offering and completes a security assessment.

            Why seek FedRAMP approval?

            Achieving FedRAMP authorization for a cloud service is a very long and rigorous process, but it has received high praise from security officials and industry experts alike for its standardized approach to evaluate whether a cloud service offering meets some of the strongest cybersecurity requirements.

            There are several benefits for cloud providers who authorize their service with FedRAMP. The program allows an authorized cloud service to be reused continuously across the federal government – saving time, money and effort for both cloud service providers and agencies. Authorization of a cloud service also gives service providers increased visibility of their product across government with a listing in the FedRAMP Marketplace.

            By electing to comply with FedRAMP, cloud providers can demonstrate dedication to the highest data security standards. Though the process for achieving FedRAMP approval is complex, it is worthwhile for providers, as it signals a commitment to security to government and non-government customers.

            McAfee’s Commitment to FedRAMP

            At McAfee, we are dedicated to ensuring our cloud services are compliant with FedRAMP standards. We are proud that McAfee’s MVISION Cloud is the first Cloud Access Security Broker (CASB) platform to be granted a FedRAMP High Impact Provisional Authority to Operate (P-ATO) from the U.S. Government’s Joint Authorization Board (JAB).

            Currently, MVISION Cloud is in use by ten federal agencies, including the Department of Energy (DOE), Department of Health and Human Services (HHS), Department of Homeland Security (DHS), Food and Drug Administration (FDA) and National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA).

            MVISION Cloud allows federal organizations to have total visibility and control of their infrastructure to protect their data and applications in the cloud. The FedRAMP High JAB P-ATO designation is the highest compliance level available under FedRAMP, meaning that MVISION Cloud is authorized to manage highly sensitive government data.

            We look forward to continuing to work closely with the FedRAMP program and other cloud providers dedicated to authorizing cloud service offerings with FedRAMP.

             

            The post FedRAMP – What’s the Big Deal? appeared first on McAfee Blogs.

            Home-Point Cybersecurity: Bring Your Enterprise Home

            By Kent Landfield

            For more than 20 years, the cybersecurity industry has been focused on enterprises, not on a larger national integrated security environment – and certainly not on comprehensive home security. Smart devices that make home life more convenient have been growing in acceptance and adoption, but by and large, the industry continues to concentrate on enterprise security. Even from a standards perspective, the National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST) has focused on enterprises and the federal government, not the home.

            The NIST Cybersecurity Framework, for example, a highly regarded security framework, is intended  for enterprises, not homes. Yet today, the devices and connectivity in many homes outnumber those in small businesses of 20 years ago. Homes are following along the same path as small businesses, and like them, need more focused attention and protection.

            COVID-19 forced organizational change in the blink of an eye, forcing an overnight transition from mostly centralized work environments to a highly distributed work-from-home infrastructure.  This rapid shift to working from unsecured and unmanaged environments (IT, IoT, mobile, cloud, etc.), has greatly complicated organizational cybersecurity exposure challenges while creating a massive expansion of the digital attack surface. With many employees having to use personal devices for business purposes, enterprises now need to consider adopting policies that provide them greater management and control over these personal devices. The security challenge once focused on BYOD (bring your own device) has now morphed into BYEH — “Bring Your Enterprise Home.” We need new security standards and practices to address this shift.

            While my company and others had the policies, management processes, controls, equipment and software in place to protect this new corporate ecosystem, they did so with the understanding the home is a very inhospitable security environment at present.

            In my own home, for instance, there are many different systems of devices (wireless lighting, smart locks, multiple smart TVs, multiple streaming devices, smart plugs, wireless security system, digital assistants, wireless speakers, cameras, thermostats, and other home management connected devices.  And this is before we add in the computers, laptops, iPads and smart phones for all its residents. An ever-growing number of IoT devices are helping people to transform their houses into smart homes, but homeowners often don’t know how to secure these devices. Additionally, many of the products don’t communicate or integrate with each other, exacerbating the discovery of security weaknesses.

            Today, a bad actor can break into a home and steal things of value – bank account, credentials, sanity (by turning smart lights on and off at 3 am and blasting music from connected speakers) – without even physically walking through the door. This is a major problem for individuals, but it’s an even greater problem for enterprises and governments turning to remote work to continue operations during the COVID-19 pandemic.

            Take all of the devices in each home, smart or otherwise, multiplied by all of the federal government employees alone, and you’ll have a vision for how large a threat vector we’ve just created by asking employees to work from home. Then add in government contractors, who may or may not have access to the same level of security as permanent employees.  Then realize this is not just a government problem but a whole-of-nation problem, where businesses and other organizations need to assure their staffs’ remote access to their corporate properties are protected and secure.

            Cybersecurity is not the only area we need to address. For example, ISPs often give priority to supporting enterprise customers when there are outages.  Timelines from reporting-to-fix for enterprises is measured in hours, while timelines for correcting consumer outages is quite often measured in days.  Now, however, the lines between what is a remote critical connection and what is not are highly blurred. How does an organization indicate to an ISP that a specific connection needs a critical designation and a priority response? How do we extend the concept of “home-points” being a component in an individual enterprise’s infrastructure?

            Relatedly, broadband access and network connection speeds are now more important than ever. It may be time for the Federal Communications Commission to rethink its designation of broadband, as 25/3 Mbps is not really suitable for a family with multiple children engaged in remote learning while Mom and Dad work from home.

            The waves of change that COVID-19 has set in motion have turned homes into workspaces, making every connected device in a home a risk to each person’s employer.  Now the home isn’t just a smart home; it’s a remote office, as well as a schoolroom, a doctor’s office and the front door to malls and grocery stores.

            As we work to adapt our economy and country in the wake of the pandemic, it’s critical that we also rethink the security of our homes to ensure there are standards for protection in place. Our homes are now part of an enterprise environment. It’s time that we as a nation considered the home as such and adopted policies and security practices to meet the new BYEH reality.

            The post Home-Point Cybersecurity: Bring Your Enterprise Home appeared first on McAfee Blogs.

            Finding the Success Among the Pandemonium that is 2020

            By Arve Kjoelen

            Even the best psychics, science fiction and horror writers could not have predicted or written 2020.  

            It’s been quite the year. I am thankful that it’s almost over. 

            The COVID-19 Coronavirus started a global lockdown that sent millions of people to work from home, or wherever they could shelter in place. Personally, working at home didn’t seem like a bad option at the time.  But after 8 months, sheltering in place, working from home, and sharing your Internet bandwidth with three others who also need real-time audio and video can be exhausting. 

            Professionally, it’s another story. It’s hard to understate the magnitude of the change. It was as if someone flipped a switch. One day, most of McAfee’s 7,000+ employees could be found working in McAfee offices. The next day, we had 7,000 “offices” of one person each. They were now voices heard on a phone, logging in from remote locations. 

            Whereas previously just 2% of workers were remote full time globally, by April 2020, 42% of the workforce was remote according to Stanford University economics professor Nicholas Bloom. By late August, the number of workers at home dropped to 35%. That said, once the pandemic ends, about 55% of employers surveyed by PWC said they expected staff to work from home at least one day a week. And more than 80% of employees said they supported that idea. In fact, Facebook, Microsoft and Twitter have all said remote work would be a permanent option. 

            Most organizations have found a way to make do with existing infrastructure. Since we’re apparently in it for the long-haul, it’s time to go back and verify that all appropriate security protections are in place. Because – let’s face it – in many organizations, security during this transition had to be prioritized behind keeping the business running. Cyber hygiene had to wait while organizations worldwide raced to the cloud in order to get their teams online and productive again.  

            Cybercriminals know home networks are often less secure and have leaped at the opportunity to find new and easier ways to access data and systems. In fact, McAfee’s Advanced Threat Research team observed a 630% increase in external attacks on cloud accounts with the greatest concentration on collaboration services (CARR). And, during Q2 of 2020, McAfee’s global network of more than a billion sensors registered a 605% increase in total COVID-19-themed threat detections. 

             For a security company like McAfee, the pandemic is an opportunity to share some lessons to help protect your people and data without getting in your teams’ way.  It will not surprise you to learn we primarily run our own products and relied on them heavily for our WFH transition. I will be touting some of the benefits of our products in this article. 

            1. Maximize Visibility and Control 

            For many companies, the rapid transition resulted in less visibility and control than when everyone was in the office behind a web gateway. With WFH, visibility and control across the entire organization – cloud, web as well as both managed and unmanaged devices is imperative.  

            McAfee MVISION Complete, part of our new Device-to-Cloud suites, provides this visibility and control across endpoint, web and cloud.  The solution unifies MVISION Insights, Endpoint, cloud access security broker (CASB), data loss prevention (DLP), cloud-based Secure Web Gateway (SWG) and (soon) remote browser isolation technologies to deliver comprehensive device-to-cloud protection. It enables us to: 

            • Secure corporate devices against ransomware and other advanced malware with our endpoint anti-malware and endpoint detection and response (EDR) technology; 
            • Manage web and cloud access from anywhere through our SWG; 
            • Improve our phishing and web protections with the remote browser isolation technology from McAfee’s acquisition of LightPoint last year; 
            • Control shadow and sanctioned cloud services via integrated CASB; and 
            • Protect data on endpoints, web and in cloud services with unified DLP.

            2. Run an Effective Threat Management Program 

            Threat Intelligence programs are designed to answer questions such as:  

            1. Who is targeting me?  
            2. What are they after? 
            3. Am I protected? 
            4. If not, how can I become protected? 

             Questions like these are called Intelligence Requirements, and some threat management programs flounder because they focus on answering the first two questions.  Others struggle because they don’t have the resources to answer the last two in a good way.  It takes substantial time to walk through indicators of compromise (IOCs) and determine whether you have coverage on your endpoints, your IPS, your Web Gateway, etc.  It can take longer to update coverage.  Having 95% coverage can sound like a lot, but advanced actors always seem to be able to locate the unprotected 5%.  

            3. Plan for Increased Threats to Home Workers 

            WFH has put a premium on making sure employees can depend on the same level of security they received in the office. In a post-pandemic future where WFH continues to be prevalent, cyber adversaries will focus their innovation on WFH users.  To get ahead of this trend, we must find ways to increase our protections for WFH users.   

            4. Future-Proof … with the Right Protections 

            Enterprise security teams should plan for the likelihood that some of their employees working from home are going to get breached. It may be a compromised computer. It may be a connected IOT device. People will do the wrong thing, so it is important here to mitigate risk. 

            The technical measures listed earlier are a good start.  In addition, you’ll need to make sure WFH users are patched as aggressively as they were when on-site. And, that you have a process for following up with the last 5% who are out of office during patch installation, or who power down their laptop during installation.  You’ll also need vulnerability scanning agents installed on user workstations.

            Finally, I see a renewed move back to centralizing the data to limit the endpoint exposure. 

            5. Education Never Ends 

            There’s no getting around it. People are both a company’s biggest asset … and also a company’s biggest security liability. Many employees are still prone to making silly security mistakes by ignoring best practices. So, any WFH security approach ought to feature a big education component. Spend more time with employees to educate and inform how to improve their security practices. What’s practical guidance for employees? There’s no one-size-fits all but the best advice I can offer is to be realistic. Don’t send out a detailed, 20-page paper on wireless security and expect miracles. The message needs to be brief, clear and simple.   

            I’d love to hear what you’re doing to secure your distributed teams… leave comments below. 

            The post Finding the Success Among the Pandemonium that is 2020 appeared first on McAfee Blogs.

            The Hidden Costs of Cybercrime on Government

            By Tom Gann

            Organizations across the country – from the private sector to the federal government –  have become more digital, especially following the shift to remote work this year. It’s no surprise that cybercriminals around the world have taken notice. According to a new report by McAfee and the Center for Strategic and International Studies (CSIS), cybercrime is now a nearly trillion-dollar industry, and the government sector is not immune.

            Across the board, the issue continues to rise – increasing the cost of cybercrime by nearly 50% since our last report in 2018. The threats to the government from cybercriminals are even greater, leading to potential national security risks as dark actors look to steal U.S. secrets and intellectual property.

            All levels of government – from state and local to the federal government here in Washington – are taking steps to mitigate the issues, but they must do so differently than their private sector counterparts. Government respondents to the survey reported the highest number of malicious attacks, highlighting the high-stakes environment in which governments operate.

            Unfortunately, the report also found that while government organizations face more attacks than their private-sector counterparts, they also take longer to remediate them, leaving our government services, infrastructure, and other critical aspects of society at risk for longer than they need.

            A Discussion With CSIS

            Earlier this week, McAfee’s CTO Steve Grobman joined CSIS for a conversation on the report and how we can continue to prepare for and mitigate the risk of cybercrime and its hidden costs with CSIS’ Jim Lewis and Zhanna Malekos Smith, former Federal CISO Grant Schneider and the FBI’s Jonathan Holmes.

            Kicking off the discussion, Schneider highlighted the importance of the workforce and the need to take care of them so organizations can quickly rebound from an incident. Schneider noted that if an office were robbed, no one would blame the team, but with cybercrime, victims are often seen as the issue – leading to reduced employee morale and more issues later down the line.

            Instead, Schneider argued on the importance of preparing the workforce and that preparation can take several forms, including risk management through NIST’s risk management framework. He also called for organizations to develop a recovery plan, engaging different departments, leadership and the public to be ready for when an incident occurs.

            In his discussion of the report’s findings, McAfee CTO Steve Grobman noted they weren’t shocking. Grobman said that as we adopt new technologies, adversaries will continue to find new attack vectors.

            This year was particularly notable as much of the federal government transitioned to a remote work environment overnight. As the workforce went remote – critical government information was accessed from home internet routers that lacked the same level of security as government office networks, increasing adversaries’ ability to successfully launch attacks.

            Luckily, as Grobman noted, there are ways lawmakers can mitigate the threat of ransomware against government and the private sector.

            What’s the solution?

            Across the country, governments are facing ransomware attacks at an alarming rate, and every one of them – at every level – needs to have a plan in place. There needs to be a data-based discussion with leadership to decide how to balance the daily blocking and tackling of threats with limited complication to the continuation of operations and preparation for big intrusions like we’ve seen happen this year.

            There are also policy solutions – many of these criminal groups operate in countries that allow them to do so. When negotiating trade deals with countries, the level of cybercrime and the government’s cooperation with or against those groups must be considered.

            The cost of cybercrime is now nearly 1% of the global GDP, and it will only continue to rise, impacting companies and governments around the world unless we come together to stop it through basic cyber hygiene, preparation and policy solutions.

            The post The Hidden Costs of Cybercrime on Government appeared first on McAfee Blogs.

            McAfee MVISION for Endpoint is FedRAMP Moderate As Federal Cloud Usage Continues to Rise

            By Tom Gann

            Last month, I discussed the FedRAMP program’s basics and why it’s such a big deal for the federal government. In short, the program protects the data of U.S. citizens in the cloud and promotes the adoption of secure cloud services across the government with a standardized approach.

            But within the FedRAMP program, there are different authorizations. We’re pleased that McAfee MVISION for Endpoint Access recently achieved FedRAMP Moderate Authorization, which allows users from federal agencies, state and local government, and other industries in regulated environments to manage Controlled Unclassified Information (CUI) such as personally identifiable information (PII) and routine covered defense information (CDI).

            As organizations across the country continue to adapt to a remote workforce, the U.S. government is “in a race to modernize its IT infrastructure to support ever more complicated missions, growing workloads and increasingly distributed teams—and do so facing a constantly evolving threat landscape,” Alex Chapin, our VP of DoD and Intelligence notes.

            And he’s right – with the 2021 federal fiscal year in full focus, federal agencies are continuing to push cloud computing as the COVID-19 pandemic continues, creating a real need for security in these applications.

            The FedRAMP Moderate designation allows MVISION to provide the command and control cyber defense capabilities government environments need to enable on-premises and remote security teams, allowing them to maximize time and resources, enhance security efficiency and boost resiliency.

            This is a massive win for the federal government as it continues to build out its remote workforce capabilities at a time when the GAO is continuing to release best practices for telework, highlighting how remote work is here to stay in the federal government.

            MVISION Cloud is currently in use by ten federal agencies, including the Department of Energy (DOE), Department of Health and Human Services (HHS), Department of Homeland Security (DHS), Food and Drug Administration (FDA) and National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA).

            At McAfee, we are dedicated to ensuring our cloud services are compliant with FedRAMP standards to help the federal government secure its digital infrastructure and prepare for an increasingly digital operation. We look forward to working closely with the FedRAMP program and other cloud providers dedicated to authorizing cloud service offerings with FedRAMP.

            The post McAfee MVISION for Endpoint is FedRAMP Moderate As Federal Cloud Usage Continues to Rise appeared first on McAfee Blogs.

            Why SolarWinds-SUNBURST is a Wake up Call

            By Steve Grobman

            On December 13, 2020, FireEye announced that threat actors had compromised SolarWinds’s Orion IT monitoring and management software and used it to distribute a software backdoor to dozens of that company’s customers, including several high profile U.S. government agencies.

            Game Changing Attack Vector

            This campaign is the first major supply chain attack of its kind at scale and represents a shift in tactics where a nation state has employed a new weapon for cyber-espionage.  Just as the use of nuclear weapons at the end of WWII changed military strategy for the next 75 years, the use of a supply chain attack will change the way we need to consider defense against cyber-attacks.

            This supply chain attack operated at the scale of a worm such as WannaCry in 2017, combined with the precision and lethality of the 2014 Sony Pictures or 2015 U.S. Office of Personnel Management (OPM) attacks.

            The impact of this attack shows how a high-volume commercial software product can impact many organizations simultaneously. In the past, cyber-attacks such as WannaCry relied on vulnerabilities, exploiting organizations that failed to install critical patches. In the case of SolarWinds-SUNBURST, any organization that simply updated its software could be vulnerable to attack, which is why we saw the impact across multiple agencies in the federal government and private sector.  Furthermore, the backdoor used stealth tactics to monitor if it was being analyzed by looking for the presence of debuggers and network monitors and suppressing communications and alerts of other malicious behavior in those scenarios.

            Broad Reach and Impact

            From a U.S. national security perspective, this attack enables the nation’s enemies to steal all manner of information, from inter-governmental communications to national secrets. Attackers can, in turn, leverage this information to influence or impact U.S. policy through malicious leaks.

            The attack impacted private companies as well. Unlike government networks which isolate classified information both from the internet and non-classified material, private organizations often have critical intellectual property on the same internet-facing network they store non sensitive information.  Exactly what corporate intellectual property or private data on employees has been stolen will be difficult to determine, and the full extent of theft may never be fully known.

            These cyber supply chain attacks are a concern for consumers as well. In today’s highly interconnected homes, a breach of consumer electronics companies can result in attackers using their access to smart appliances such as TVs, virtual assistants, and smart phones to steal their information or act as a gateway to attack businesses while users are working remotely from home.

            Endless Possibilities for Attackers

            What makes this campaign so insidious is that the attackers used trusted SolarWinds software to infiltrate victim organizations with the SUNBURST backdoor, which then enabled the attacker to take any number of secondary steps. This could involve stealing data, destroying data, holding critical systems for ransom, orchestrating system malfunctions that could result in kinetic damage, or simply implanting additional malicious content throughout the organization to stay in control and maintain access even after the initial threat appears to have passed.

            Encourages the Wrong Behavior

            Such an attack is particularly challenging in that it raises concerns around best practices cybersecurity professionals have been trying to communicate for years. For decades, we have been saying that it is critical to patch and keep software updated. In this case, however, it was patching and bringing new software into an environment that opened organizations up to attack.

            Organizations must not read into these SolarWinds-SUNBURST revelations that they should not prioritize keeping their environments up to date. Doing so would certainly open them up to a variety of other attacks.

            How do we reconcile these two conflicting security viewpoints? Organizations and cybersecurity practitioners must be vigilant in their review and understanding of the software being brought into their environments. Additionally, they must identify their most critical information and data and apply the principles of least privilege to these items, ensuring that sensitive information such as national secrets and intellectual property are protected.

            Daisy Chained Victims Amplify Impact

            One additional area of concern is when software vendors are impacted.  In this scenario, it is possible for there to be a daisy chain effect. The adversary could modify either source code or a development toolchain within a victim’s environment to plant additional backdoors that are then distributed to their customers.

            Conclusion and More Information

            The SolarWinds-SUNBURST campaign is like a “smart bomb” on a crowded landscape of “dumb bomb” cyber threats. WannaCry was a dumb bomb in that it was fully autonomous and indiscriminate in what it attacked. Whereas this SolarWinds-SUNBURST attack is a “precision guided” smart cyber weapon that is being used to target specific organizations in very specific ways. Every organization that is of interest to the attacker might be targeted slightly differently.

            McAfee has incorporated technical indicators gleaned from the FireEye and SolarWinds incidents into our cyber defenses and solutions portfolio to protect our environment and customers. The details of these supplemental protections can be found in McAfee’s knowledge base (KB) articles KB89830 and KB93861.

            Please also see the following analysis blogs focused on SolarWinds-SUNBURST:

             

            The post Why SolarWinds-SUNBURST is a Wake up Call appeared first on McAfee Blogs.

            Europe’s Quantum Story is Accelerating, and the World Will be Better for it

            By Chris Hutchins

            Quantum computing is the next frontier in computer science. It can bring untold benefits, allowing the development of new materials, tackling pandemics and making the world a greener, safer place. But it also threatens to break the encryption that keeps our data safe from prying eyes. France’s recent announcement to invest €1.8b into Europe’s quantum computing effort – on top of Germany’s two billion euros and the EU’s one billion euro quantum strategy – will help ensure Europe doesn’t miss the boat on what is set to become the cornerstone of innovation in the coming decades.

            In short, quantum computing is an entirely new paradigm for making calculations on computers. Today, all computing relies on sequences of ones and zeroes to make increasingly complex calculations, culminating in the smartphones, cloud services and the supercomputers that exist today.

            Quantum computing uses peculiar characteristics of physics to allow machines to perform complex algebra calculations in one fell swoop: “It would take ten thousand years to factor something on the fastest computer today, that could be minutes or seconds given a sufficiently powerful quantum computer,” said McAfee’s chief technology officer Steve Grobman on a recent podcast. “Think about it more as waves than binary,” added John King, a McAfee research fellow also on the podcast. “You reinforce the ones that you want, and dampen the ones that you don’t want,” he said.

            To achieve these quirks of physics requires machines operating at temperatures colder than outer space, so it is unlikely that every person will have a quantum computer in their basement anytime soon. However, with the Internet and cloud computing, we will have the ability to harness the power of quantum computing remotely, just like data centres can be used from hundreds of kilometers away at the tap of a few buttons in a web browser today.

            Nor is quantum computing always going to be superior to the well-developed binary technologies in place today, which are handsomely suited to making precise calculations. “Quantum computing is not well suited for general purpose computing, but for solving very specific math problems that are well suited to the quantum model,” said Grobman.

            But the pattern-recognising abilities of quantum algorithms are uniquely well suited to complex problem. Think how to best distribute COVID-19 vaccines across populations, or even the world, or optimising global shipping networks leading to lower emissions from boats and planes.

            On the flipside quantum is also, unfortunately, much better at breaking encryption algorithms than tradiditional computing power . Data that is considered secure today could be rendered public knowledge in the coming decade’s advances in quantum technology, with massive implications for company secrets and national security.

            In the US and China, private and public actors are already pouring huge investments into quantum, and without considerable efforts, Europe exposes itself to gaping security holes, and missing out on harnessing the power of quantum to solve pressing problems such as climate change.

            This is why France’s recent announcement is not just timely, but necessary, for Europe to continue charting a path of global success in the future. Today, the theory of quantum computers is way ahead of their actual capability. But in 10 years, it will be a different story, and given the scale of the challenge, acting now is of essence.

            Making the most of quantum is not just about building the computers themselves. The entire paradigm of computer science is being upended. Europe is already facing a shortage of computer scientists, and its future computer science graduates must have the tools and knowledge needed to harness this new technology. This is why France is right to focusing funding not only on research and equipment, but also talent and skills to power this computer science revolution.

            For McAfee, making the digital world safe is a top priority, and naturally our attention gravitates toward the opportunities and threats quantum computing poses to keeping data secure and safe.

            But making the world a safer place isn’t just about preventing cyberattacks and encrypting valuable data. It’s equally about making the world greener and using the power of technology to solve our pressing societal and economic challenges. Quantum computing will play a key role in all these goals, provided the technology is in the right hands. Bad actors see the same opportunities in quantum to disrupt and bring chaos as we see in making the world a better place, and the only way to stymie their efforts is ensuring that Europe, along with the US and others determined to make the world a better place, stay one step ahead.

             

            The post Europe’s Quantum Story is Accelerating, and the World Will be Better for it appeared first on McAfee Blogs.

            XDR – Please Explain?

            By Rodman Ramezanian

            SIEM, we need to talk! 

            Albert Einstein once said, “We cannot solve our problems with the same thinking we used when we created them”. 

            Security vendors have spent the last two decades providing more of the same orchestration, detection, and response capabilities, while promising different results. And as the old adage goes, doing the same thing over and over again whilst expecting different results is…? I’ll let you fill in the blank yourself.   

            Figure 1: The Impact of XDR in the Modern SOC: Biggest SIEM challenges – ESG Research 2020

            SIEM! SOAR! Next Generation SIEM! The names changed, while the same fundamental challenges remained: they all required heavy lifting and ongoing manual maintenance. As noted by ESG Research, SIEM – being a baseline capability within SOC environments – continues to present challenges to organisations by being either too costly, exceedingly resource intensive, requiring far too much expertise, and various other concerns. A common example of this is how SOC teams still must create manual correlation rules to find the “bad” connections between logs from different products, applications and networks. Too often, these rules flooded analysts with information and false alerts and render the product too noisy to effective. 

            The expanding attack surface, which now spans Web, Cloud, Data, Network and more, has also added a layer of complexity. The security industry cannot only rely on its customers’ analysts to properly configure a security solution with such a wide scope. Implementing only the correct configurations, fine-tuning hundreds of custom log parsers and interpreters, defining very specific correlation rules, developing necessary remediation workflows, and so much more – it’s all a bit too much. 

            Detections now bubble up from many siloed tools, too, including Intrusion Prevention Systems (IPS) for network protection, Endpoint Protection Platforms (EPP) deployed across managed systems, and Cloud Application Security Broker (CASB) solutions for your SaaS applications. Correlating those detections to paint a complete picture is now an even bigger challenge. 

            There is also no ‘R’ in SIEM – that is, there is no inherent response built into SIEM. You can almost liken it to a fire alarm that isn’t connected to the sprinklers.  

            SIEMs have been the foundation of security operations for decades, and that should be acknowledged. Thankfully, they’re now being used more appropriately, i.e. for logging, aggregation, and archiving.  

            Now, Endpoint Detection and Response (EDR) solutions are absolutely on the right track – enabling analysts to sharpen their skills through guided investigations and streamline remediation efforts – but it ultimately suffers from a network blind spot. Similarly, network security solutions don’t offer the necessary telemetry and visibility across your endpoint assets.

            Considering the alternatives

            Of Gartner’s Top 9 Security and Risk Trends for 2020, “Extended detection and response capabilities emerge to improve accuracy and productivity” ranked as their #1 trend. They noted, “Extended detection and response (XDR) solutions are emerging that automatically collect and correlate data from multiple security products to improve threat detection and provide an incident response capability…The primary goals of an XDR solution are to increase detection accuracy and improve security operations efficiency and productivity.” 

            That sounds awfully similar to SIEM, so how is an XDR any different from all the previous security orchestration, detection, and response solutions? 

            The answer is: An XDR is a converged platform leveraging a common ontology and unifying language. An effective XDR must bring together numerous heterogeneous signals, and return a homogenous visual and analytical representation.. XDR must clearly show the potential security correlations (or in other words, “attack stories”) that the SOC should focus on. Such a solution would de-duplicate information on one hand, but would emphasize the truly high-risk attacks, while filtering out the mountains of noise. The desired outcome would not require exceeding amounts of manual work; allowing SOC analysts to stop serving as an army of “translators” and focus on the real work – leading investigations and mitigating attacks. This normalized presentation of data would be aware of context and content, be advanced technologically, but simple for analysts to understand and act upon. 

            SIEMs are data-driven, meaning they need data definitions, custom parsing rules and pre-baked content packs to retrospectively provide context. In contrast, XDR is hypothesis driven, harnessing the power of Machine Learning and Artificial Intelligence engines to analyse high-fidelity threat data from a multitude of sources across the environment to support specific lines of investigation mapped to the MITRE ATT&CK framework.  

            The MITRE ATT&CK framework is effective at highlighting “how bad guys do what they do, and how they do it.” While traditional prevention measures are great at “spot it and stop it” protections, MITRE ATT&CK demonstrates there are many steps taking place in the attack lifecycle that aren’t obvious. These actions don’t trigger sufficient alerting to generate the confidence required to support a reaction.  

            XDR isn’t a single product. Rather, it refers to an assembly of multiple security products (and services) that comprise a unified platform. An XDR approach will shift processes and likely merge and encourage tighter coordination between different functions like SOC analysts, hunters, incident responders and IT administrators.  

            The ideal XDR solution must provide enhanced detection and response capabilities across endpoints, networks, and cloud infrastructures. It needs to prioritise and predict threats that matter BEFORE the attack and prescribe necessary countermeasures allowing the organisation to proactively harden their environment. 

            Figure 2: Where current XDR approaches are failing

            McAfee’s MVISION XDR solution does just that, by empowering the SOC to do more with unified visibility and control across endpoints, network, and cloud. McAfee XDR orchestrates both McAfee and non-McAfee security assets to deliver actionable cyber threat management and support both guided and automated investigations. 

            What if you could find out if you’re in the crosshairs of a top threat campaign, by using global telemetry from over 1 billion sensors that automatically tracks new campaigns according to geography and industry vertical? Wouldn’t that be insightful? 

            “Many firms want to be more proactive but do not have the resources or talent to execute. McAfee can help bridge this gap by offering organisations a global outlook across the entire threat landscape with local context to respond appropriately. In this way, McAfee can support a CISO-level strategy that combines risk and threat operations.” 

            – Jon Oltsik, ESG Senior Principal Analyst and Fellow
             

            But, hang on… Is this all just another ‘platform’ play?  

            Take a moment to consider how ‘platform’ offerings have evolved over the years. Initially designed to compensate for the heterogeneity and volume of internal data sources and external threat intelligence feeds, the core objective has predominantly been to manifest data centrally from across a range of vectors in order to streamline security operations efforts. We then saw the introduction of case management capabilities. 

            Over the past decade, the security industry proposed solving many of  the challenges presented in SOC contexts through integrations. You would buy products from a few different vendors, who promised it would all work together through API integration, and basically give you some form of pseudo-XDR outcomes we’re exploring here.  

            Frankly, there are significant limitations in that approach. There is no data persistence; you basically make requests to the lowest API denominator on a one-to-one basis. The information sharing model was a one-way ‘question and answer’ leveraging a scheduled push-pull methodology. The other big issue was the inability to pull information in whatever form – you were limited to the API available between the participating parties, with the result ultimately only as good as the ‘dumbest’ API.  

            And what about the lack of any shared ontology, meaning little to no common objects or attributes? There were no shared components, such as UI/UX, incident management, logging, dashboards, policy definitions, user authentication, etc. 

            What’s desperately been needed is an open underlying platform – essentially like a universal API gateway scaled across the cloud that leverages messaging fabrics like DXL that facilitate easy bi-lateral exchange between many security functions – where vendors and partner technologies create tight integrations and synergies to support specific use cases benefitting SOC ecosystems. 

            Is XDR, then, a solution or product to be procured? Or just a security strategy to be adopted? Potentially, it’s both. Some vendors are releasing XDR solutions that complement their portfolio strengths, and others are just flaunting XDR-like capabilities.  

             Closing Thoughts

            SIEMs still deliver specific outcomes to organisations and SOCs, which cannot be replaced by XDR. In fact, with XDR, a SIEM can be even more valuable. 

            For most organisations, XDR will be a journey, not a destination. Their ability to become more effective through XDR will depend on their maturity and readiness to embrace all the required processes. In terms of cybersecurity maturity, if you’d rate your organisation at a medium to high level, the question becomes how and when.  

            Most organisations using an Endpoint Detection and Response (EDR) solution are likely quite ready to embrace XDR’s capabilities. They are already investigating and resolving endpoint threats and they’re ready to expand this effort to understand how their adversaries move across their infrastructure, too. 

            If you’d like to know more about how McAfee addresses these challenges with MVISION XDR, feel free to reach out! 

            The post XDR – Please Explain? appeared first on McAfee Blogs.

            SOC Health Check: Prescribing XDR for Enterprises 

            By Scott Howitt

            It is near-certain the need for security across the enterprise will never cease – only increase if year-over-year trends are any indication. We constantly see headlines with repetitive buzzwords and phrases calling attention to the complexity of today’s security operations center (SOC) with calls to action to reimagine and modernize the SOC. We’re no different here at McAfee in believing this to be true.   

            In order for this to happen, however, we need to update our thinking when it comes to the SOC.   

            Today’s SOC truly serves as an organization’s cybersecurity brain. Breaking it down, the brain and SOC are both the ultimate central nervous system and are extremely complex. While the brain fires neurons, connects synapses, and constantly communicates in order for the body to function, the SOC similarly works as a centralized system where people, processes, and technology must be in-sync to function. The unfortunate reality is though, SOC analysts and staff do not feel empowered to act in this manner. According to the 2021 SANS Cyber Threat Intelligence Report, respondents cited several reasons for not being able to implement cybersecurity holistically across their organization, including lack of trained staff, time, funding, management buy-in, technical capabilities, and more.  

            The technology that has the power to enable this synchronicity and further modernize enterprise security by taking SOC functionality to the next level is already here – Extended Detection and Response (XDR). It has the ability to provide prevention, detection, analysis, and response in a purposefully orchestrated and cooperative way, with its components operating as a whole. Think of it this way: XDR mimics the brain’s seamlessness in operation, with every element working toward the same goal of maintaining sound security posture across an entire organization.   

             Put another way, the human brain has approximately 100 trillion synapses, synchronizing and directing to make it possible to walk and chew bubble gum at the very same time with seemingly no effort on the human’s end. However, if one synapse misfires or becomes compromised due to an unknown element – you might end up on the ground.   

             Similarly, we’re already seeing many enterprises falter, trip, and fall. According to Ernst & Young, 59% of companies experienced a significant breach in the last twelve months – and only 26% of respondents say the SOC identified that event. These statistics show the case for XDR is clear – and that it is time to learn and reap the benefits of taking a proactive approach.     

            Purposeful Analysis vs. Analysis Paralysis  

            Organizations are still vulnerable to malicious actors attempting to take advantage of disparate remote workforces – and we’re seeing them get craftier, acting faster and more frequently. This is where XDR offers a pivotal differentiator by providing actionable intelligence and integrated functionality across control vectors, resulting in more proactive investigation cycles.    

            When it comes to analysis, data can quickly become overwhelming, introducing an opportunity to miss critical threats or malicious intent with more manual or siloed processes. Meaningful context is crucial and no industry is exempt from needing it.  

            This is where McAfee is providing the advantage with MVISION XDR powered MVISION Insights. The ability to know likely and prioritized threat campaigns based on geographical and industry prevalence – and have them correlated and assessed across your local environment – provides the situational awareness and analysis that can allow SOC teams to act before threats occur. Additionally, as endpoints only promise to increase, MVISION XDR works in conjunction with McAfee’s endpoint protection platform (EPP), increasing effectiveness with added safeguards including antivirus, encryption, data loss prevention technologies and more at the endpoint.  

            Think of the impact and damage that can happen without this crucial and context MVISION Insights can provide. The consequences can be dire when looking at industries that have faced extreme upheaval.  

            For example, in keeping with our theme, we know the importance of essential healthcare workers and cannot be grateful enough for their contributions. But as the industry faces extreme challenges and an increase in both patient load and data, we also need to be paying close attention to how this data is being managed, who has privilege to it, and what threats exist as even this typical in-person industry shifts virtual due to our updated circumstances. Having meaningful context on potential threats will help this industry avoid added challenges so focus can remain steadfast on creating impact and positive results.  

            Greater Efficiency is Essential  

            Outside of the tremendous advantage of being less vulnerable to threats and breaches due to proactivity, incredible efficiencies can be gained by freeing cybersecurity staff from those previously manual tasks and management of multiple silos of solutions. The time is definitely now too – according to (ISC)², 65% of organizations already report a shortage of cybersecurity staff.  

             Coupled with staff shortages and lack of skilled workers, an IBM report also found that the average time to detect and contain a data breach is 280 days. Going back to the view that the SOC serves as an organization’s cybersecurity brain – 280 days can cause massive amounts of damage if an anomaly in the brain were to occur unnoticed or unaddressed.   

            For the SOC, the longer a breach goes undetected, the more information and data becomes vulnerable or leaked – leading not only to a disruption in business, but ultimately financial losses as well.   

            The SOC Has a Cure  

             XDR is the future of the SOC. We know that simplified, cohesive visualization and control across the entire infrastructure leads the SOC to better situational awareness – the catalyst for faster time to remediation. The improved, holistic viewpoint XDR provides across all vectors from endpoint, network, and cloud helps to eliminate mistakes and isolated endeavors across an organization’s entire IT framework.   

            With AI-guided investigation, analysts have an automatic exchange of data and information to move faster from validation to decision when it comes to threats. This is promising as organizations not only tackle a shortage in cybersecurity staff, but skilled workers as well. According to the same (ISC)² survey as above, 36% of those polled cite lack of skilled or experienced staff being a top concern.   

            Knowing the power of data and information, we can confidently assume that malicious actors will never stop their quest to infiltrate and extort enterprises. True to the well-known anecdote, this knowledge brings about great responsibility. Enterprises will face challenges as threats increase while talent and staff decrease – all while dealing with vendor sprawl and choice-overload across the market.   

            SOC Assessment Tool

            Check Your SOC Maturity Level

            Time to schedule a check-up for your SOC. It may not be as healthy as you think and true to both the medical and security industries, proactivity and prevention can lead to optimized functionality.

            Take the Assessment Now

              Want to learn more about McAfee’s investment in XDR and explore its approach? Check out McAfee MVISION XDR.   

            The post SOC Health Check: Prescribing XDR for Enterprises  appeared first on McAfee Blogs.

            Don’t Let Tax Fraud Ruin Your IRS Refund

            By Baker Nanduru
            Tax Scams

            Don’t Let Tax Fraud Ruin Your IRS Refund

            Here’s how to lock down your data this tax season

            Tax season is always a high time for scams that put our money and information at risk. But this year securing your data may be more important than ever, due to a spike in unemployment fraud.

            Millions of Americans have lost their jobs over the course of the pandemic, and states have seen a surge in unemployment applications, including fake claims using stolen information. In California, authorities report that between $10 billion and $30 billion was recently paid in fraudulent unemployment claims, while in New York authorities identified $5.5 billion in fake jobless claims since March of 2020.

            ictims don’t even know that their information was used for a fraudulent claim until they receive an unemployment letter from their state, or a tax form from the IRS. Whether you’re concerned about your personal data, or just want to safely file your IRS return and hopefully get a tax refund, let’s take some steps to protect your private information for this tax season, and beyond.

            The first thing to know is that there are a that we see evolving each year – according to the IRS, Criminal Investigation identified $2.3 billion in tax fraud schemes just last year. So, it’s always a good idea to take caution and be skeptical whenever you see something that seems too good to be true, like a free tax filing service you’ve never heard of before.

            But recently, with so many people out of work, bad actors have decided to focus their attention on filing fraudulent jobless claims using stolen information from people who were actually employed.

            Think You May Be a Victim of Tax Fraud?

            If you’ve received a notice about unemployment benefits that you never applied for, contact your state unemployment agency and submit a claim. Then follow up with the Federal Trade Commission since they can help you by placing a fraud alert on your credit. This lets lenders know that you may be a victim of fraud, prompting them to take extra steps to verify your identity. The good news is that in the U.S. you only have to notify one of the three national credit bureaus and they will transmit your request to the other two.

            My colleague Judy has shared some easy ways you can check your credit report and even freeze your credit in a blog post here. Starting 2021, you can also register for a six-digit Identity Protection PIN (IP PIN) with the IRS to add another layer of verification to protect yourself from tax-related identity theft.

            How to Keep Your Private Information Safe This Tax Season and Year-Round

            Of course, tax season isn’t the only time your data can fall into the wrong hands. Keep your personal information safe by adopting these best practices and robust tools.

            • Use comprehensive security software—For protection against the growing range of threats, choose holistic security software that goes beyond traditional antivirus products, by protecting your identity and privacy wherever and however you connect.

            • Search and surf safely—Whether you are looking for tax information, or ways to file your return online, be careful where you click. A tool like McAfee® WebAdvisor included in McAfee Total Protection can help you avoid dangerous websites and risky links by warning you about them in the search results, before you click.
            • Double down on password protection—Besides online scams, data breaches are another main way that the bad guys get their hands on your personal information. That’s why you need unique and strong passwords for each of your sensitive accounts. This way, if your password is obtained through a data breach, it cannot be used to gain entry to your other accounts. The easiest way to do this is to employ a password manager, like the one included in McAfee Total Protection, which can create and remember complicated passwords for you, and save them across all of your devices.
            • Protect your privacy—Take the stress out of monitoring your data by using a tech tool like our new privacy and identity protection app, available in the U.S. It can alert you if your personal information has been shared on the dark web, where cybercriminals buy and sell information. We’ll help you immediately change the passwords on compromised accounts. It also includes a virtual private network, which allows you to safely and easily connect to the internet, shielding your private information from prying eyes.

            Stay Updated

            To stay updated on all things McAfee and on top of the latest consumer and mobile security threats, follow @McAfee_Home  on Twitter, subscribe to our email, listen to our podcast Hackable?, and ‘Like’ us on Facebook.

             

             

            The post Don’t Let Tax Fraud Ruin Your IRS Refund appeared first on McAfee Blogs.

            Who loves tax season besides accountants? Hackers

            By Judith Bitterli
            Protect Your IRS Refund

            Who loves tax season besides accountants? Hackers

             It’s tax time in the United States, and even if you’re pretty sure you did everything right, you’re worried. Did I file correctly? Did I claim the right deductions? Will I get audited? Unfortunately, tax season brings out scammers eager to take advantage of your anxiety.

            The tax scam landscape

            First, know that you’re probably doing a good job with your taxes. Less than 2% of returns get audited and most discrepancies or adjustments can get handled easily if you address them promptly.

            Still, wariness of the IRS and intricate tax laws makes for ripe pickings when it comes to hackers, who prey on people’s fear of audits and penalties. Common scams include fake emails, phone calls from crooks posing as IRS agents, and even robocalls that threaten jail time. With the information they get from you, hackers can take things a step further by stealing your identity and filing tax claims in your name.

            As if we didn’t have enough to worry about at tax time.

            The good news is that you have plenty of ways to protect yourself from hackers. Check out these tips to stay safe this tax season.

            The IRS Dirty Dozen: 12 tax-season scams

            Straight from the authority itself, the IRS has published its top 12 tax season scams with new warnings brought on by the events of 2020.

            For example, new to this year are scams associated with stimulus checks sent out by the government. The IRS says they have seen “… a tremendous increase in phishing schemes utilizing emails, letters, texts and links. These phishing schemes are using keywords such as “coronavirus,” “COVID-19” and “Stimulus” in various ways.”

            This is very important: The IRS does not use email. If you get an email from someone saying they are the IRS and they want to talk with you about a problem, it is a scam.

            Here’s what the IRS has to say:

            The IRS will never initiate contact with taxpayers via email about a tax bill, refund, or Economic Impact Payments. Don’t click on links claiming to be from the IRS. Be wary of emails and websites − they may be nothing more than scams to steal personal information.

            Social media attacks also made the IRS Dirty Dozen. In a social media attack, scammers harvest information from social media profiles. Hackers use the information to gain access to your online accounts in social media and beyond, like your bank account. Make it hard for them. Make your social media profiles private so that only friends and family can see them. Also consider so you can be safer from these kinds of crimes.

            Get an email or call from the IRS? Here’s how to know if it was legit.

            When a hacker poses as an IRS agent, they try to get personal information from you, like your social security number. They might demand payment, sometimes under the threat of penalties or even jail time. These strong-arm tactics are a dead giveaway that the email or phone call is fake.

            What will the IRS do? Usually, the IRS will first mail a bill to any taxpayer who owes taxes. IRS collection employees might call on the phone or make an unannounced visit to your home or business. If they require a payment, the payment will always be to the U.S. Treasury. Read about other ways to know what the IRS won’t do when they contact you.

            And remember: the IRS does not use email to contact you about tax problems.

            File A.S.A.P. and check your credit report

            A good defense is a good offense. File early. Protect yourself by filing your claim before they have a chance to file one as you. You don’t want to be one of those identity theft victims who finds out you’ve been scammed when you file your taxes only to get a notice in the mail saying your tax claim has already been filed.

            Here’s other tool that can help you fight identity theft. And get this: it’s not only helpful, it’s free.  Through the Federal Trade Commission, you are entitled to a free copy of your credit report from each of the three major credit reporting companies once every 12 months. In this report, you can find inaccuracies in your credit or evidence of all-out identity theft.

            Keep in mind that you get one report from each of the reporting companies each year. That works out to three reports total in one year. Consider this: if you request one report from one credit reporting company every four months, you can spread you free credit report coverage across the whole year.

            Security software can help you protect your digital wellness

            The idea is that, just like with your physical wellness, there are lots of steps you can take to protect your digital wellness. We’ve covered some of those steps in this blog. Consider one more: protect your digital life with a holistic security solution like McAfee Total Protection so you can enjoy life online knowing your precious data is protected. Tax time or otherwise, security software is always a smart move.

            Stay Updated 

            To stay updated on all things McAfee and on top of the latest consumer and mobile security threats, follow @McAfee_Home  on Twitter, subscribe to our email, listen to our podcast Hackable?, and ‘Like’ us on Facebook.

             

            The post Who loves tax season besides accountants? Hackers appeared first on McAfee Blogs.

            How to Spot, and Prevent, the Tax Scams That Target Elders

            By Judith Bitterli
            tax scams that target seniors

            How to Spot, and Prevent, the Tax Scams That Target Elders

            Elder scams cost seniors in the U.S. some $3 billion annually. And tax season adds a healthy sum to that appalling figure.

            What makes seniors such a prime target for tax scams? The Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) states several factors. For one, elders are typically trusting and polite. Additionally, many own their own home, have some manner of savings, and enjoy the benefits of good credit—all of which make for an ideal victim profile.

            Also according to the FBI, elders may be less able or willing to report being scammed because they may not know the exact way in which they were scammed, or they may feel a sense of shame over it, or even some combination of the two. Moreover, being scammed may instill fear that family members will lose confidence in their ability to look after their own affairs.

            If there’s one thing that we can do for our elders, it’s help them raise their critical hackles so they can spot these scams and stop them in their tracks, particularly around tax time. With that, let’s see how crooks target elders, what those scams look and feel like, along with the things we can do to keep ourselves and our loved ones from getting stung.

            The IRS imposter scam

            The phone rings, and an assertive voice admonishes an elder for non-payment of taxes. The readout on the caller ID shows “Internal Revenue Service” or “IRS,” the person cites an IRS badge number, and the victim is told to pay now via a wire transfer or prepaid gift card. The caller even knows the last four digits of their Social Security Number (SSN). This is a scam.

            The caller, and the claim of non-payment, are 100 percent bogus. Even with those last four digits of the SSN attempting to add credibility, it’s still bogus. (Chances are, those last four digits were compromised elsewhere and ended up in the hands of the thieves by way of the black market or dark web so that they could use them in scams just like these.)

            Some IRS imposter scams take it a step further. Fraudsters will threaten victims with arrest, deportation, or other legal action, like a lien on funds or the suspension of a driver’s license. They’ll make repeated calls as well, sometimes with additional imposters posing as law enforcement as a means of intimidating elders into payment.

            The IRS will never threaten you or someone you know in such a way.

            In fact, the IRS will never call you to demand payment. Nor will the IRS ever ask you to wire funds or pay with a gift card or prepaid debit card. And if the IRS claims you do owe funds, you will be notified of your rights as a taxpayer and be given the opportunity to make an appeal. If there’s any question about making payments to the IRS, the IRS has specific guidelines as to how to make a payment properly and safely on their official website.

            It’s also helpful to know what the IRS will do in the event you owe taxes. In fact, they have an entire page that spells out how to know it’s really the IRS calling or knocking at your door. It’s a quick read and a worthwhile one at that.

            In all, the IRS will contact you by mail or in person. Should you get one of these calls, hang up. Then, report it. I’ll include a list of ways you can file a report at the end of the article.

            Tax scams and robocalls

            Whether it’s a disembodied voice generated by a computer or a scripted message that’s been recorded by a person, robocalls provide scammers with another favorite avenue of attack. The approach is often quite like the phone scam outlined above, albeit less personalized because the attack is a canned robocall. However, robocalls allow crooks to cast a much larger net in the hopes of illegally wresting money away from victims. In effect, they can spam hundreds or thousands of people with one message in the hopes of landing a bite.

            While perhaps not as personalized as other imposter scams, they can still create that innate sense of unease of being contacted by the IRS and harangue a victim into dialing a phony call center where they are further pressured into paying by wire or with a prepaid card, just like in other imposter scams. As above, your course of action here is to simply hang up and report it.

            IRS email scams and phishing attacks

            Here’s another popular attack. An elder gets an unsolicited email from what appears to be the IRS, yet isn’t. The phony email asks them to update or verify their personal or financial information for a payment or refund. The email may also contain an attachment which they are instructed to click and open. Again, all of these are scams.

            Going back to what we talked about earlier, that’s not how the IRS will contact you. These are phishing attacks aimed at grifting prized personal and financial information that scammers can use to commit acts of theft or embezzlement. In the case of the attachment, it very well may contain malware that can do further harm to their device, finances, or personal information.

            If you receive one of these emails, don’t open it. And certainly don’t open any attachments—which holds true for any unsolicited email you receive with an attachment.

            Preventing tax scams from happening

            Beyond simply knowing how to spot a possible attack, you can do several things to prevent one from happening in the first place.

            Physical security

            First let’s start with some good, old-fashioned physical security. You may also want to look into purchasing a locking mailbox. Mail and porch theft are still prevalent, and it’s not uncommon for thieves to harvest personal and financial information by simply lifting it from your mailbox.

            Another cornerstone of physical security is shredding paper correspondence that contains personal or financial information, such as bills, medical documents, bank statements and so forth. I suggest investing a few dollars on an actual paper shredder, which are typically inexpensive if you look for a home model. If you have sensitive paper documents in bulk, such as old tax records that you no longer need to save, consider calling upon a professional service that can drive up to your home and do that high volume of shredding for you.

            Likewise, consider the physical security of your digital devices. Make sure you lock your smartphones, tablets, and computers with a PIN or password. Losing a device is a terrible strain enough, let alone knowing that the personal and financial information on them could end up in the hands of a crook. Also see if tracking is available on your device. That way, enabling device tracking can help you locate a lost or stolen item.

            Digital security

            There are plenty of things you can do to protect yourself on the digital front too. Step one is installing comprehensive security software on your devices. This will safeguard you in several ways, such as email filters that will protect you from phishing attacks, features that will warn you of sketchy links and downloads, plus further protection for your identity and privacy—in addition to overall protection from viruses, malware, and other cyberattacks.

            Additional features in comprehensive security software that can protect you from tax scams include:

            • File encryption, which renders your most sensitive files into digital gibberish without the encryption key to translate them back.
            • A digital file shredder that permanently deletes old files from your computer (simply dropping them into the desktop trashcan doesn’t do that—those files can be easily recovered).
            • Identity theft protection, which monitors the dark web for your personal info that might have been leaked online and immediately alerts you if you might be at risk of fraud.

            And here’s one item that certainly bears mentioning: dispose of your old technology securely. What’s on that old hard drive of yours? That old computer may contain loads of precious personal and financial info on it. Look into the e-waste disposal options in your community. There are services that will dispose of and recycle old technology while doing it in a secure manner so the data and info on your device doesn’t see the light of day again.

            Spot a tax scam? Report it.

            As said earlier, don’t let a bad deed go unreported. The IRS offers the following avenues of communication to report scams.

            • Contact the Treasury Inspector General for Tax Administration to report a phone scam. Use their “IRS Impersonation Scam Reporting” web page. You can also call 800-366-4484.
            • Report phone scams to the Federal Trade Commission. Use the “FTC Complaint Assistant” on FTC.gov. Please add “IRS Telephone Scam” in the notes.
            • Report an unsolicited email claiming to be from the IRS, or an IRS-related component like the Electronic Federal Tax Payment System, to the IRS at phishing@irs.gov.

            Stay safe this tax season!

            In all, learning to recognize the scams that crooks aim at elders and putting some strong security measures in place can help prevent these crimes from happening to you or a loved one. Take a moment to act. It’s vital, because your personal information has a hefty price tag associated with it—both at tax time and any time.

            Stay Updated 

            To stay updated on all things McAfee and on top of the latest consumer and mobile security threats, follow @McAfee_Home  on Twitter, subscribe to our email, listen to our podcast Hackable?, and ‘Like’ us on Facebook.

             

            The post How to Spot, and Prevent, the Tax Scams That Target Elders appeared first on McAfee Blogs.

            Tax Season is Here: Avoid These Common Scams Targeting Canadians  

            By Jean Treadwell
            tax scams

            Tax Season is Here: Avoid These Common Scams Targeting Canadians

            Tax return preparation might be a little more complicated this year than usual for many Canadians with millions receiving Canada Emergency Response Benefit (CERB) payments and about 40% of the Canadian labor force turned to self-employment options to help them financially weather the pandemic storm.

            Where there’s money and uncertainty, you’re likely to find scammers. After all, scammers tend to capitalize on uncertainty and use it as the entry point for their attacks. Whether it’s through a phishing email with a phony notice of reassessment, a text message threatening arrest, or a fake phone call from the Canada Revenue Agency (CRA), hackers often employ elements of fear in their attacks. McAfee’s 2021 Consumer Security Mindset study revealed that roughly 2 out of 3 Canadians (65%) plan to do their taxes online in 2021, with 12% of them doing so for the first time. With the increase in activities online, consumers are potentially exposed to more digital risks and threats, and knowing how these hackers tend to work doesn’t mean you have to live in fear. To help you identify and avoid potential threats, let’s take a look at some of the most common scams that hackers use during tax season.

            Phone scams

            Phone scams take one of two primary forms:

            • Robocalls – Pre-recorded message by a person or a voice-to-speech app that allows scammers to reach thousands of potential victims. The message may direct the recipient to call a number or visit a site that will attempt to steal their personal or financial information. In some cases, it may direct them to a phony call center that will try to collect payment for a bogus debt.
            • Imposter calls – This occurs when a person posing as a CRA representative falsely claims that you owe money and demands that you make immediate payment. Scammers can take various approaches here, such as threatening arrest or license revocation. It’s important to note that the CRA will never resort to these tactics even if there is an issue with your tax return.

            Some sophisticated scammers will weave stolen personal or financial data that they purchased on the dark web into their calls, such as bank or social insurance information. They intend to make their phony claims sound legitimate, hoping that an unsuspecting user will hand over their data or make a fraudulent payment.

            So, what does a real call from the CRA entail? The CRA clearly outlines the reasons they’d be calling on their 2020 Tax Tips page and ways that you can follow up with the CRA to determine if a call is legitimate.

            Email phishing scams

            There are two instances where the CRA may contact you by email. One is during a telephone call or meeting with a legitimate CRA agent. The second is to send you a notification that you have a message or document for your review on a secure CRA site such as My Account, My Business Account, or Represent a Client. Anything else is likely a scam.

            The one time where the CRA will send you an email containing links is if you have a call or meeting with an agent, as outlined above. Otherwise, you can be confident that an email with links is a scam.

            Text and instant message scams

            This one is relatively straightforward: the CRA will never contact you via text, instant messaging, Facebook, WhatsApp, or any similar messaging service. If you receive such a message, delete it, and don’t click on any links embedded within it.

            Tax payment scams

            In many cases, hackers will aim to separate you from your money by demanding immediate payment in some form or other. They may request payment in pre-loaded debit cards, gift cards, e-transfer, or even bitcoin. Know that the CRA will never request payment in any of those forms.

            When in doubt, ask yourself why this email or phone caller is demanding that you act immediately. Have you filed on time? Have you received written notice from the CRA already? Do you owe an installment payment?  If the person contacting you leaves you unsure, you can confirm that the contact was legitimate by calling the CRA.

            Stay protected from fraud and theft this tax season

            While recognizing the signs of tax-related fraud can help ease the burdens associated with these schemes, there are multiple steps you can take to prevent becoming a victim of tax scams in the first place. Follow these tips to stay on top of your tax return while securing your digital life:

            Use password protection as a first line of defense

            Devices benefit from physical security. This is as simple as locking your smartphones, tablets, and computers with a PIN or password. Should one of those devices get lost or stolen, a lock provides a barrier for those who might try to access your personal and financial information on them.

            Use a holistic  security solution

            Protecting your devices with comprehensive security software can help block the phishing emails and suspicious links that make up many of these tax attacks. Likewise, it can further protect you from ransomware attacks, another type of tax scam on the rise, where crooks hold your data hostage for a price. All in all, security software is always a smart move—tax time or any time.

            Dispose of your old technology and data securely

            Consider what’s on your old computer hard drive or stored away on your phone. Old devices tend to contain loads of precious personal and financial information. Look into the e-waste disposal options in your community that will recycle your old technology and do so securely.

            Look after your physical security as well

            While so many of our finances are handled electronically today (taxes included), we’d be remiss if we didn’t talk about physical security as well. Mail and porch theft still occur, which is one more way a thief can steal your personal and financial information to use in a scam. A locking mailbox is a purchase you may want to consider if you don’t have one already.

            Think you’ve been a victim of a tax scam or identity theft?

            Recognizing the signs of tax-related fraud could allow you to take action and significantly suppress the repercussions. If you suspect you’ve fallen victim to fraud or believe that you’ve been tricked into giving away personal information as part of a scam, contact your local police service and make a report.

            By staying proactive and vigilant, you’ll be in a better position to protect your identity and your data—and live your digital life with safety at the forefront.

            Stay Updated 

            To stay updated on all things McAfee and on top of the latest consumer and mobile security threats, follow @McAfee_Home  on Twitter, subscribe to our email, listen to our podcast Hackable?, and ‘Like’ us on Facebook.

             

            The post Tax Season is Here: Avoid These Common Scams Targeting Canadians   appeared first on McAfee Blogs.

            What Is a DDoS Attack and How to Stay Safe from Malicious Traffic Schemes

            By McAfee
            What is a DDoS attack?

            What Is a DDoS Attack and How to Stay Safe from Malicious Traffic Schemes

            Imagine you’re driving down a highway to get to work. There are other cars on the road, but by and large everyone is moving smoothly at a crisp, legal speed limit. Then, as you approach an entry ramp, more cars join. And then more, and more, and more until all of the sudden traffic has slowed to a crawl. This illustrates a DDoS attack.

            DDoS stands for Distributed Denial of Service, and it’s a method where cybercriminals flood a network with so much malicious traffic that it cannot operate or communicate as it normally would. This causes the site’s normal traffic, also known as legitimate packets, to come to a halt. DDoS is a simple, effective and powerful technique that’s fueled by insecure devices and poor digital habits. Luckily, with a few easy tweaks to your everyday habits, you can safeguard your personal devices against DDoS attacks.

            DDoS Attacks Are on the Rise

            The expansion of 5G, proliferation of IoT and smart devices, and shift of more industries moving their operations online have presented new opportunities for DDoS attacks. Cybercriminals are taking advantage, and 2020 saw two of the largest DDoS offensives ever recorded. In 2020, ambitious attacks were launched on Amazon and Google. There is no target too big for cybercriminals.

            DDoS attacks are one of the more troubling areas in cybersecurity, because they’re incredibly difficult to prevent and mitigate.. Preventing these attacks is particularly difficult because malicious traffic isn’t coming from a single source. There are an estimated 12.5 million devices that are vulnerable to being recruited by a DDoS attacker.

            Personal Devices Become DDoS Attack Soldiers

            DDoS attacks are fairly simple to create. All it takes are two devices that coordinate to send fake traffic to a server or website. That’s it. Your laptop and your phone, for example, could be programmed to form their own DDoS network (sometimes referred to as a botnet, more below). However, even if two devices dedicate all of their processing power in an attack, it still isn’t enough to take down a website or server. Hundreds and thousands of coordinated devices are required to take down an entire service provider.

            To amass a network of that size, cybercriminals create what’s known as a “botnet,” a network of compromised devices that coordinate to achieve a particular task. Botnets don’t always have to be used in a DDoS attack, nor does a DDoS have to have a botnet to work, but more often than not they go together like Bonnie and Clyde. Cybercriminals create botnets through fairly typical means: tricking people into downloading malicious files and spreading malware.

            But malware isn’t the only means of recruiting devices. Because a good deal of companies and consumers practice poor password habits, malicious actors can scan the internet for connected devices with known factory credentials or easy-to-guess passwords (“password,” for example). Once logged in, cybercriminals can easily infect and recruit the device into their cyber army.

            Why DDoS Launches Are Often Successful

            These recruited cyber armies can lie dormant until they’re given orders. This is where a specialized server called a command and control server (typically abbreviated as a “C2”) comes into play. When instructed, cybercriminals will order a C2 server to issue instructions to compromised devices. Those devices will then use a portion of their processing power to send fake traffic to a targeted server or website and, voila! That’s how a DDoS attack is launched.

            DDoS attacks are usually successful because of their distributed nature, and the difficulty in discerning between legitimate users and fake traffic. They do not, however, constitute a breach. This is because DDoS attacks overwhelm a target to knock it offline — not to steal from it. Usually DDoS attacks will be deployed as a means of retaliation against a company or service, often for political reasons. Sometimes, however, cybercriminals will use DDoS attacks as a smokescreen for more serious compromises that may eventually lead to a full-blown breach.

            3 Ways to Prevent Your Devices from Being Recruited

            DDoS attacks are only possible because devices can be easily compromised. Here are three ways you can prevent your devices from participating in a DDoS attack:

            1. Secure your router: Your Wi-Fi router is the gateway to your network. Secure it by changing the default password. If you’ve already thrown out the instructions for your router and aren’t sure how to do this, consult the internet for instructions on how to do it for your specific make and model, or call the manufacturer. And remember, protection can start within your router, too. Solutions such as McAfee Secure Home Platform, which is embedded within select routers, help you easily manage and protect your network.
            2. Change default passwords on IoT devices: Many Internet of Things (IoT) devices, smart objects that connect to the internet for increased functionality and efficiency, come with default usernames and passwords. The very first thing you should do after taking your IoT device out of the box is change those default credentials. If you’re unsure of how to change the default setting on your IoT device, refer to setup instructions or do a bit of research online.
            3. Use comprehensive security: Many botnets are coordinated on devices without any built-in security. Comprehensive security solutions, like McAfee Total Protection, can help secure your most important digital devices from known malware variants. If you don’t have a security suite protecting your devices, take the time to do your research and commit to a solution you trust.

            Now that you know what a DDoS attack is and how to protect against it, you’re better equipped to keep your personal devices and safe and secure.

            Stay Updated

            To stay updated on all things McAfee and on top of the latest consumer and mobile security threats, follow @McAfee_Home on Twitter, subscribe to our email, listen to our podcast Hackable?, and ‘Like’ us on Facebook.

             

            The post What Is a DDoS Attack and How to Stay Safe from Malicious Traffic Schemes appeared first on McAfee Blogs.

            More Money, Less Problems: XDR Investment Can Protect the Financial Services Industry

            By Scott Howitt

            The connection between cybersecurity and poet Ralph Waldo Emerson is not directly evident, however he once said, “money often costs too much.”

            This statement rings true across the financial services industry, as money is a key driver for cybercriminals acting with malicious intent. The always-on eye of Sauron on the financial services industry means there are greater implications to keep this industry safe as a top target – and to keep money where it belongs.

            IT teams across these organizations have historically invested heavily in technology stacks to combat fraud and decrease the likelihood of an attack or breach, but attacks keep getting more sophisticated and frequent. This Sisyphean task of keeping up with modern-day breaches is complex, and protecting the money is costly, as Ralph’s quote woefully reminds us.

            McAfee’s “Hidden Costs of Cybercrime” report supports this current state of the financial services industry, indicating that these organizations spend up to $3,000 per employee on cybersecurity. Another survey from the Financial Services Information Sharing and Analysis Center (FS-ISAC) found that, depending on company size, financial institutions spend between 6% and 14% of IT budgets for defense.

            This spending shows no sign of stopping as organizations will always have the onus to protect data, employees, and their own bottom lines. As long as cybercriminals exist, the need for cybersecurity will be omnipresent. However, there is a major change the financial services industry can implement to manage threats faster with higher efficacy and become more proactive instead of reactive: Extended Detection and Response (XDR).

            Couldn’t Stop Past Breaches? Time to Stop Future Ones

            It’s been less than 10 years since JPMorgan Chase & Co. fell victim to the largest known cyberattack at the time – one that occurred two months after it had vowed to spend a quarter-billion dollars a year on cybersecurity. Due to the breach, they increased the planned spend to half a billion dollars, per Forbes. Similarly, Capital One Financial Corp. more recently agreed to pay an $80 million dollar fine, pledging also to increase its cybersecurity efforts as a result of a breach that disclosed more than 100 million customer records.

            Both of these financial institutions present examples where XDR could have provided a benefit and perhaps thwarted these major breaches. With its ability to coordinate systems and processes as well as automatically aggregate threat analysis and remove manual hunting and analysis, XDR acts as a modern-day catalyst for security operations center (SOC) success. This combination of prevention, detection, analysis, and response across the SOC and enterprise allows for better decisions that are made faster.

            Taking a closer look at the JPMorgan breach, it was only uncovered due to a routine and typical scan conducted by the SOC team. Hackers were able to infiltrate using custom malware and a previously unknown flaw, entering via a website owned by JPMorgan to then stealthily extract data over the course of months – all without being caught by SOC teams.  This is not uncommon, as recent Ernst & Young research cited that only 26% of the SOCs polled identified a threat event.

            XDR’s ability to control access across an organization’s entire infrastructure from a unified and coordinated interface, coupled with more interconnected visualization across the SOC, provides the context needed to look at cybersecurity in a holistic manner. This is critical given the erratic lateral movements of advanced threats. This means all vectors are protected together, from endpoint, network, and the cloud; therefore, providing better context and overall awareness of security posture across an entire organization.

            Breaches are a Promise, Losses Don’t Have to Be

            This gift of proactivity empowering the SOC to act quicker cannot come at a better time as threat actors are still leveraging the upheaval COVID-19 wrought to take advantage of vulnerabilities created due to the pandemic. Not to mention, companies and employees are not clamoring to return to the office where endpoints are easier to track and manage.

            The National Association for Business Economics found that only about 1 in 10 companies expect all employees to return to their pre-pandemic work arrangements. With employees apt to use personal devices, causing an ever-increasing endpoint explosion, hackers may again have an easy entry point to conduct crime. All industries are vulnerable, but the financial services industry remains forever-lucrative due to the monetary gains that could be achieved.

            With an increase in virtual transactions and use of personal devices to conduct business, the industry is ripe for phishing attempts, malware, and ransomware attacks. Hackers are taking advantage of these surges, with McAfee and IC3 data indicating that business email compromise (BEC) scams have been increasing. This means, it may not take a zero-day approach or strategy from hackers to infiltrate if existing systems and solutions already prove insecure.

            Cost is often a barrier to entry for many industries, but the financial services industry has shown it is committed to investing in cybersecurity, knowing it has the most to lose. There has been success across the industry due to this guarantee, but the breaches that do get thwarted do not make the headlines. Nonetheless, undetected breaches – and the reputation-damaging headlines that appear alongside them – lead to more information and data loss and disruption to business. For financial institutions seeking to eliminate the losses associated with cybercrime, XDR is worth exploring.

            Want to learn more about McAfee’s investment in XDR and explore its approach? Check out McAfee MVISION XDR and schedule a check-up for your SOC.

             

            The post More Money, Less Problems: XDR Investment Can Protect the Financial Services Industry appeared first on McAfee Blogs.

            AI Is Alive! But Not Without Our Help

            By Arnie Lopez

            “It’s alive! It’s alive!”

            Even if you haven’t seen the 1931 film Frankenstein, you are more than likely familiar with the story of the “monster” created by Victor Frankenstein. You may associate this cry from its titular character with the image of what Victor conjured finally opening its eyes and slowly lurching off the table.

            While amusing and entertaining, this ongoing trope has a flaw that has tainted most of our memories. The fact is, in Mary Shelley’s classic 1818 novel of the same name, Victor does not excitedly exclaim when that first forward lurch occurs – but rather runs away and hides.

            That’s right – fear was the first instinct met when a human, Victor, created and powered a non-human entity. While a work of fiction, was this our first brush with the concept of Artificial Intelligence (AI)? We don’t necessarily align the year 1818 in our minds as a technologically booming era. We have certainly come a long way from shipbuilding patents equaling the heights of technology to the technology that empowers life and business today.

            So why are so many of us still fearful like Victor when it comes to AI? Especially since, in its earnest efforts, most AI technology today is designed to better processes, outcomes, and experiences – not to mention ensure greater security and control. We constantly see doom-and-gloom headlines asking whether AI will replace human jobs or touting added expenses associated with implementation. There’s even an entire Wikipedia page devoted to the notion of an “AI Takeover.”

            But the truth is, AI – and machine learning – technology has gotten to the point today where it is more of an anomaly if a company or business does not implement it in some form. It is so commonplace that many of us don’t even know it is there. From smart assistants to progressing the healthcare industry at a time where it needs all the efficiencies it can afford, AI is everywhere and the security industry is no stranger when it comes to benefitting from its advances as well.

            Human-Machine Teaming

            Our company looks at AI as an enhancement not a replacement. We know AI can improve experiences, create greater efficiencies, and solve complex problems – but at the same time are realistic. We know that humans alone cannot possibly address and respond to the sheer amount of threats businesses face today. But we also know that machines and technology do not currently have the creativity, wit, and wisdom that humans possess.

            This is an important factor in the cybersecurity industry. This realism and notion that AI is an enhancement aligns with the concepts and origins of AI itself.

            Most AI we see today can be categorized as strong AI, or AGI – artificial general intelligence, and weak AI. The latter means that humans are involved in some facet of programming the technology, whereas with strong AI, technology is able to use algorithms to process, inform, and make decisions independent of human interaction. What we don’t talk about as much is artificial superintelligence (ASI), where technology gains advanced cognitive abilities that can match – or even surpass – a human.

            ASI can be ideal for many industries, but we’re not quite there yet. Since most AI today is still in the strong AI stage, AKA the enhancement phase where humans are still needed to process and define what technology currently cannot: emotion. Machines cannot currently replace thinking like a threat actor – imagining scenarios that only humans experience, intuition, motive, and brain power can conjure.

            Therefore, we need humans and machines working together as a team. Machines are able to keep pace with the number of emerging threats and help security operation center analysts manage a tremendous amount of data and convert it into actionable intelligence. But human skill is needed to prioritize threats based on context, insight, and consciousness that machines don’t have.

            It is increasingly important to remember this as we see adversarial AI on the rise and threat actors use AI to infiltrate AI-powered solutions. With this increase, speed of response is crucial, which is where we see AI have the most impact across the cybersecurity industry when coupled with human strategy to reduce potential damage done to an organization.

            Fear Not, Knowledge Will Lead the Way

            We are far from the point where AI needs to invoke fear, but we have a responsibility to know the shortcomings of current AI alongside its benefits.

            This open-minded outlook is critical as AI in its truest form is about intelligence – and we can always add to and grow intelligence. The concept of always-on learning levels the playing field for both humans and machines. We’re the same in this aspect in that the possibilities are endless based on what we both can conjure and create based on education, learning, and knowledge.

            The post AI Is Alive! But Not Without Our Help appeared first on McAfee Blogs.

            McAfee Awarded “Cybersecurity Excellence Awards”

            By McAfee
            Cybersecurity Excellent Awards

            In a year where people relied on their digital lives more than ever before and a dramatic uptick in attacks quickly followed, McAfee’s protection stood strong. 

            We’re proud to announce several awards from independent third-party labs, which recognized our products, protection, and the people behind them over the course of last year. 

            Recognized four times over for our people and products 

            The Cybersecurity Excellence Awards is an annual competition honoring individuals and companies that demonstrate excellence, innovation, and leadership in information security. We were honored with four awards: 

            • As a company, we were recognized as the Gold Winner for the Best Cybersecurity Company in North America in a business with 5,000 to 9,999 employees. 
            • For security software, McAfee LiveSafe was presented with the Gold Winner for AntiVirus, which also includes further controls for privacy and identity protection, along with a renewed focus on making it easy for people to protect themselves while learning about security in the process.  
            • McAfee Secure Home Platform, our connected home security that provides built-in security for all the connected devices in your home, was the Gold Winner for Cybersecurity for Connected Homes in North America. 
            • Our leadership was recognized as well, with our SVP of Consumer Marketing, Judith Bitterli being named the Silver Winner for the Cybersecurity Marketer of the Year in North America. This award acknowledges her contributions to McAfee’s marketing strategy and growth, along with her “Safer Together” program that offered support to people as they shifted to schooling, telehealth, dating, and job hunting from home during the pandemic. 

            Awards for McAfee product development and product performance 

            Further recognition came by way of three independent labs known for their testing and evaluation of security products. Once more, this garnered several honors:  

            • McAfee was named a winner of SE Labs’ second annual Best Product Development award, which evaluates security solutions by “testing like hackers.” More formally, they base their awards on “a combination of continual public testing, private assessments and feedback from corporate clients who use SE Labs to help choose security products and services.” 
            • Germany-based AV-Test named McAfee Total Protection the winner for its Windows Best Performance for Home Users category. Likewise, it also scored a perfect 18 out of 18 in categories spanning, Protection, Performance, and Usability in its most recently published testing (for February 2021). 
            • AV-Comparatives named McAfee Total Protection the Silver Winner for Performance and gave McAfee three Advanced+ and two Advanced Awards in the year’s tests overall, stating that, “Its user interface is clean, modern, and touch-friendly. The program’s status alerts are exemplary.” 

            Continuous updates keep you protected with the latest advances 

            As the threat landscape continues to evolve, our products do as well. We’re continually updating them with new features and enhancements, which our subscribers receive as part of automatic product updates. So, if you bought your product one or two years ago, know that you’re still getting the latest award-winning protection with your subscription. 

            We’d like to acknowledge your part in these awards as well. None of this is possible without the trust you place in us and our products. With the changes in our work, lifestyles, and learning that beset millions of us this past year, your protection and your feeling of security remain our top priority. 

            With that, as always, thank you for selecting us. 

            Stay Updated  

            To stay updated on all things McAfee and on top of the latest consumer and mobile security threats, follow @McAfee_Home  on Twitter, subscribe to our email, listen to our podcast Hackable?, and ‘Like’ us on Facebook. 

            The post McAfee Awarded “Cybersecurity Excellence Awards” appeared first on McAfee Blogs.

            Trust Nobody, Not Even Yourself: Time to Take Zero Trust Seriously

            By Adam Philpott

            In the working world, there’s a chance you’ve come across your fair share of team-building exercises and workshops. There’s one exercise that comes to mind that often results in worried, and uneasy faces during these seminars: The Trust Fall. This is where you fall backward with the expectation that your colleague will catch you before you hit the ground.  

             Whether you have been with an organization for many years or just started, the same “pit in stomach” feeling reverberates across bellies as people exchange nervous glances and weigh their odds against whomever they may be paired up with when The Trust Fall is announced. That feeling is doubt, and it isn’t fun. And the problem is, once doubt is introduced, it tends to stealthily expand in its always-on, silent, and transparent ways, either serving as an incessant top-of-mind presence or staying at bay only to rear its troubling head at an unexpected moment until it is addressed.  

            “I saw Chris drop his stapler once, will he drop me?” “I know Betsy is the Godmother to my children, but what if she sneezes as I’m falling?” “I just started at this company yesterday, I don’t trust anybody I don’t know!”  

            If you’re wondering what Trust Falls have to do with cybersecurity, we just need to take a deeper look at the concept of trust in its simplest definition. Trust is a concrete concept: it is either there or it is not. Trusting your colleagues is based on multiple parameters; will they be strong enough to catch me, do they look mature enough to take this seriously, how did they behave when the game was announced – trust is not easily won and can also be quickly lost. 

            This is a necessity in today’s enterprises as computing has moved from private data centers to most everything consumed as a service. There are endless choices to compare, contrast, and comprise a technology stack, but when organizations start leveraging outside infrastructure, tools, and solutions – the sense of trust in these solutions weakens, since integrity can be promised, but should never be assumed.  

            Examples of this are abundant. As we see organizations explore the concept of trust more and attempt to align practices with the reality of today’s security circumstances, we are seeing an increasing number of trust models being exploited via poor management. Intent and implementation are not enough against today’s threats.   

            So, my question to security operation center (SOC) staff, IT leaders, and the c-suite is: Do you have complete trust in your current security infrastructure?  

            In all honesty, can you with no doubt in your mind, say your organization’s data and computing are secure? Is there any area you are unsure about?  

            If you hesitated when responding, even if for just a moment, keep reading.  

            Business as Usual is Not a Safe Space 

            Putting guards up, constantly looking over your shoulder, always expecting the worst or for the other shoe to drop – these are not desirable feelings. As a security professional, these are the feelings that cause them to stock up on antacids, with them knowing they are the front-line defense keeping an organization secure and in turn, revenue flowing. For the CIO and CISO, the onus is daunting as they face the challenge to piece together fragmented and disparate infrastructure from a strategic standpoint to best serve the business in an efficient, transparent manner all while simultaneously maintaining compliance and data integrity.  

            While we want to believe that trust is an intrinsic trait – that we’re born bright-eyed and bushy-tailed ready to spout only the truth – we also unfortunately know the reality is not everybody has good intentions. We constantly see this unfold across the security industry where a company is breached, recognizing the flaw(s) that allowed the breach to occur, to then implement a solution to fix the issue. This break-fix cycle can result in always looking backwards and rushing around to fix yesterday’s problem to quickly get business functions up and running without looking at underlying problems or issues.   

            And no industry is immune. Hackers are coming after everything from Happy Hours and breakfast routines to our more personal and high-stakes data across the financial services and healthcare industries. They’re more strategic too, and we can only expect them to continue to evolve. Adversaries today are looking for “low-hanging fruit” targets to take advantage of trust models and move laterally within an organization – first finding an avenue to exploit and enter to later gain access to higher-value targets, data, and assets.   

            The rush to get business–as–usual back on track is made doubly difficult as business momentum doesn’t stop. Organizations are introducing new SaaS services, development teams are writing new code, and even software that you have already reviewed has new features rolled out. The wealth of personal and corporate cloud apps can lead to hasty decisions; increased sprawl of an organization’s tech stack as new tools and solutions are introduced; as well as new policies, updates, and procedures for staff to learn and execute. This can all compound into more time spent addressing and fixing the past with blinders on to the future and other vulnerabilities that may exist.  

            From Zero to Hero 

            If this past pandemic-filled year has taught us anything, it is that plans do not always go according to plan.  

            Organizations that have traditionally leveraged a more piecemeal and solutions-based approach to security were blindsided as the work from home era was thrust upon them. From companies updating or adopting collaboration tools, sharing more data digitally, and opening access to external users to create greater efficiencies – the rule book was thrown out the window and malicious actors started looking at all the data being produced and shared like kids in a candy store.  

            The impact of these plans gone awry isn’t pretty and perhaps risk could have been mitigated by using a least or earned trust model as a strategic framework to ensure sound security posture. The ‘Zero Trust’ concept coined more than a decade ago outlining a model of restricting access and control across an organization’s infrastructure is only now getting increased attention.   

            The harsh reality is, cybercrime is up 300% since the pandemic began, according to the FBI’s Internet Crime Complaint Center (IC3). At a time when bottom lines are more important than ever as businesses bounce back, our Hidden Cost of Cybercrime report adds that 35% of those surveyed said security incidents resulting in system downtime cost them between $100,000 and $500,000.  

            The correlation of a pandemic occurring and malicious actors taking advantage of weaknesses caused by it is crystal clear, leading to increased awareness. In its Responding to COVID-19: What We are Hearing From Legal and Compliance Leaders report, Gartner states that 52% of legal and compliance leaders are concerned about third-party cybersecurity risks since COVID-191. Knowing that the increased number of remote workers and their mobile (and potentially unmanaged) endpoints are leading to more breaches and that these breaches are increasingly costly, organizations need to get a handle on their existing architecture and shift from awareness to action, eliminating assumptions of who is safe or allowed access.  

            A Zero Trust mentality allows organizations to restrict and compartmentalize access and data manipulation while still maintaining optimal user experience and productivity levels. Guidelines such as those from the National Institute of Standards & Technology (NIST) can provide a practical framework to explore and implement Zero Trust.  

            With hackers getting more sophisticated to impersonate and infiltrate networks via verified users, it is time to go back to the drawing board – starting at zero and assuming everything is a threat until proven otherwise. This is a mindset shift and strategy, not another tool or solution to plug in. It involves a recognition of the importance of context and control over security posture, which can only be attained with continuous assessment. It is also about acknowledging trust is about risk – and that while risk is sometimes necessary for growth, it cannot outweigh the reward, so must be strategically managed. This line of thinking must be carefully navigated as more and more enterprises seek to define and assign accountability and responsibility across infrastructure.  

            While the journey to Zero Trust isn’t the same for every organization, the imperative to adopt Zero Trust is, given our collective experiences throughout the last year and cybercrime poised to keep increasing. It is time to stop looking over shoulders and anticipating the worst, acting only in a reactive manner, and instead feel empowered to erase doubt when maintaining security and compliance across an organization.  

            To learn more and start the journey toward implementing a Zero Trust strategy, I encourage you explore McAfee’ Zero Trust Security hub.

             

            Source: 1 Gartner Press Release, Gartner Says 52% of Legal & Compliance Leaders Are Concerned About Third-Party Cybersecurity Risk Since COVID-19, April 24, 2020. https://www.gartner.com/en/newsroom/press-releases/2020-04-24-gartner-says-52-percent-of-legal-and-compliance-leaders-are-concerned-about-third-party-cybersecurity-risk-rince-covid-19 (URL can be added as a hyperlink in source title)  

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            Ransomware Task Force Releases its Comprehensive Framework for Action

            By Kent Landfield

            Since ransomware’s introduction in 1989 in the form of the AIDS Trojan, also known as PS Cyborg, distributed on diskettes, ransomware has continually increased and evolved into a heinous threat to our national security, public safety, and to our economic and public health. With ransoms paid in 2020 reaching more than $300+ million, it has become a disruptive economic leach on the resources of its victims. Local governments, educational organizations, hospitals, critical infrastructure services, businesses and organizations of all sizes have had to decide what to do when presented with a ransomware demand. These activities are highly disruptive, causing far more costs to the victims than just the cost of the ransom.

            Ransomware is highly profitable. Today malicious actors are organized and coordinate their operations. We are seeing Ransomware as a Service (RaaS) businesses making it easy for those without the skills or infrastructure to threaten us as well. The scourge of ransomware must be addressed.

            The Institute for Security and Technology (IST) stood up and initiated the Ransomware Task Force (RTF) late last year to address ransomware in a more wholistic fashion. In partnership with a broad coalition of 60+ experts from cybersecurity vendors, financial services, governments, law enforcement, non-profits, and international organizations, the RTF developed and released Combating Ransomware: A Comprehensive Framework for Action.

            As you might expect, there were some very tough conversations during the development of the recommendations. For example, prohibiting / outlawing ransomware payments was one area of contention. There are valid reasons to want to prohibit payments. No one wants their corporate funds or governmental tax dollars going to pay for other forms of cybercrime or elicit nation state activities. Sadly, the state of cybersecurity maturity, in the U.S. alone, is not ready for such a step. Consensus was reached that we are really not ready to play that game of chicken.

            Ransomware is a global problem and while many of the recommendations in the framework for action are directed at specific U.S. government bodies, it is important our international partners map the recommendations onto their specific governmental structures.  Throughout the report it is clear the recommendations are global in nature and that coordinated, international diplomatic and law enforcement efforts are critical. There are 48 recommendations as a part of the report. Most of the recommendations are not technical but rather legal, economic, and diplomatic tools.

            It is heartening to see the level of activity focused on addressing ransomware in the new administration. The Department of Justice is standing up a new task force dedicated to dealing with ransomware. The Department of Homeland Security (DHS) recently formed a ransomware task force and launched a 60-day sprint.  Participating in the RTF Launch event, DHS Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas said the IST RTF report will help guide a whole-of-government approach to the problem.  He also stated the White House is developing a plan to combat ransomware.

            While all these efforts are welcomed, my hope is that the great work of the IST RTF described in Combating Ransomware: A Comprehensive Framework for Action is used as a foundation  to feed these and future efforts so we can see real progress in the actionable outcomes we all desire.

            I’d like to thank IST CEO Philip Reiner and his outstanding team for allowing me to participate as a member of the RTF. To all my fellow RTF members, I hope to work with each of you again.

             

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            Stupid Is as Stupid Does: XDR Is About the Journey, Not the Destination

            By Arnie Lopez

            Music is lovely, isn’t it?

            It has the ability to brighten days with upbeat bars or provide a comfortable place of solace and reflection via gentle, soothing notes. Whether you typically opt for Black Sabbath, Shakira, or Bob Marley, music meets our ears in many different ways – and harmony is not always one-size-fits-all. We recognize this when a friend, sibling, partner, or stranger earnestly (yet tonelessly) attempts to mimic Mariah Carey’s five-octave range, resulting in room-clearing screeches that can only be found in a nature documentary.

            While I’m not a Grammy-winning artist myself, my point is that harmony is relatable and relevant across any industry, method, measure, or format – even security. Trends and messaging have increasingly pointed to the consolidation of everything across Security Operations Centers (SOC) so they can act in a harmonious manner, not missing a beat to provide protection across the entire enterprise. We’ve seen this as conversations shift from endpoint detection and response (EDR) to extended detection and response (XDR), with the latter promising lower total cost of ownership as well as improved protection and productivity. Who wouldn’t want this!

            But the truth is, it isn’t lack of desire for full protection in the most cost-effective and efficient manner, but lack of knowledge or perceived roadblocks. Enterprises across the world have been affected by the global pandemic, uprooting familiar processes. Companies were forced to introduce quick, sometimes temporary solutions for larger systemic issues all without 100 percent certainty where endpoints may lie and what damage this vulnerability presents, especially as bad actors extort the chaos created by COVID-19 to double down on attacks.

            This upheaval has started to settle down and enterprises now have more time and energy to audit their businesses and processes with fresh eyes. It isn’t a matter of the pandemic, with hope, nearing its end, to just re-plug in an existing solution stack – but rather looking at how the business has changed and adapting to these changes for now and into the future. This includes changes across staff, solutions, shifting skillsets to manage increased workloads, and yes – increased, and perhaps hasty, consolidation attempts.

            Penning the Lyrics

            According to Enterprise Strategy Group, more than 80 percent of organizations are singing the tune of change with plans to increase spending on threat detection and response. They are hearing the melodious mandate to meet the needs of today’s “new-normal-digitally transformed-modern” enterprise. For many, this means an investment in extended detection and response (XDR) technology.

            Enterprises are already feeling the pressure. They have their bottom lines trapped on repeat, looping in their minds. They are seeking counsel, support, and direction – not to be chastised by their choices – but rather guided to create and implement strategies that best fit their business.

            That being said, the potential for XDR is tremendous. But you have to crawl before you can walk. I’m sure many of us may feel silly, or even stupid, thinking back to when we carried Walkman and Discmans, clunkily fumbling for them in our pockets or purses, forever tethered to the device if you wanted to listen to music. But at the same time, we recognize the progression from Walkman to iPod to iPhone to Bluetooth and voice-activated technology, and more. The Discman and Walkman crawled so digitized music could walk.

            This natural progression is no different in the security industry, and the onus is on vendors to make this connection. Enterprises, after all, are not still storing floppy disks locked in a filing cabinet as a security measure. While XDR is the latest technology, the journey to XDR includes the fundamental need of endpoint detection and response (EDR) capabilities. EDR is a foundational piece in getting XDR right – or put another way, XDR is an efficient evolution of EDR platforms. EDR crawled so XDR could walk. XDR will walk so the next technology can fly.

            Hitting the Right Notes

            This is what true innovation is, the constant desire to advance processes, products, and experiences. It is what XDR promises, to improve and streamline processes across enterprise SOCs, providing meaningful context, actionable intelligence, and the visibility and control necessary to connect solutions that orchestrate together in symphonic harmony.

            In fact, from a philharmonic standpoint, symphonies by definition are made up of different types of instruments (endpoints) generating music (data) where each requires incredibly specific methods of tuning and expertise by musicians (SOC analysts) in order to ensure they can be harmonious with the group. Musicians are not born with their skillset, but rather they test and learn – and fail – trying to see which instrument is the best fit for them, which notes they can hit, and which notes are best suited for another instrument or musician to manage.

            We must be the conductor and connecting point here to show the true benefits and value of XDR. While the journey is different for every enterprise (and vendor), the end goal is a protected society where good prevails over bad. It is our job to guide these choices and take responsibility regardless of where an enterprise is at in their journey – to show how innovation builds on itself, always striving to better experiences and outcomes.

            Where are you in the journey to XDR? Check out the on-demand webinar below and start asking questions.

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            Defending Cybersecurity Can’t Be Done Blindfolded–The EU’s NIS2 Review Can Set This Right

            By Chris Hutchins

            Cybercriminals are currently enjoying a golden age, with the volume and severity of attacks growing constantly, and an ability to commit hostile acts with impunity. The EU, in its overhaul of cybersecurity laws dubbed NIS2, is committed to ensuring that what’s illegal offline should also be illegal online. For that to happen, cybersecurity researchers need to have access to all the tools possible to detect, trace and prevent crime online, including access to the Internet’s yellow pages, also known as the WHOIS search.

            Cyberthreat research is both an arts and science discipline. Our experts and software detection analysis in the ATR group sift through an enormous amount of data, from a broad range of sources, to detect the signs of a past, ongoing or future cyberattack. Each source of data that is out of reach is one tool less with which to keep up with cybercriminals. Access to the full set of WHOIS data, or lack thereof, is not going to make or break the future of cyber threat research. But it would give criminals an advantage, which is at odds with the core objective of the EU’s cybersecurity review.

            The WHOIS search originally contained all the data of a person registering a website, including the contact details of the person responsible for the website. This information is crucial in the event a legitimate website comes under attack from malicious actors

            But by continually scanning the registration data, cyber researchers can also pick up patterns that are indicative of malicious activity, such as preparing a botnet or priming a large number of websites ahead of a denial-of-service (DDOS) attack.

            Using WHOIS data is particularly useful in preventing future cyber-incidents. Looking at data that indicates that a website or collection of websites are being rigged for a cyberattack can help stop the attack in its cradle. This data can also help cybersecurity researchers minimise the risk of false positives, where the contact data is consistent with a legitimate user, which will minimise the potential disruption for companies and people that have done nothing wrong but whose websites may have been flagged as suspicious.

            This data was put out of reach after the EU’s GDPR law came into force, with the unfortunate and clearly unintended consequence of depriving cybersecurity researchers, law enforcement agencies and others from an important pool of data used to fight and prevent cybercrime.

            With the review of the EU’s cybersecurity law, NIS2, we have a chance to set things right, by providing a legal basis to access personal data such as the contact details in the WHOIS, for the purpose of fighting crime online, without undermining the important privacy protections introduced in the GDPR. It is now up to lawmakers to ensure that this provision remains intact, as they consider whether to introduce amendments to the cybersecurity legislation text.

             

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            Through Your Mind’s Eye: What Biases Are Impacting Your Security Posture?

            By Lynda Grindstaff

            Cybersecurity and biases are not topics typically discussed together. However, we all have biases that shape who we are and, as a result, impact our decisions in and out of security. Adversaries understand humans have these weaknesses and try to exploit them. What can you do to remove biases as much as possible and improve your cybersecurity posture across all levels of your organization?

            Cybersecurity personnel have many things to address and decisions to make every day — from what alerts to investigate, to what systems to patch for the latest vulnerabilities, to what to tell the board of directors. However, our brains don’t give each decision equal attention—we take mental shortcuts. These mental shortcuts are known as biases and they allow us to react quickly.

            In this two-part blog series, we’ll explore the types of cognitive biases that could be affecting your company’s security posture and give you tips on how to address these biases.

            Part One: Types of Cognitive Biases

            Do you feel you are biased? We all are to some extent. What do you see when you look at this picture below? Faces or a vase? Some people may see one or the other and some see both. This is representative of what happens in real life. Many of us are at the same meeting together but leave with different perspectives about the discussion. This is our cognitive biases influencing us.

            A cognitive bias is a result of our brain’s attempt to simplify processing of information. The formal definition says it is “a systematic pattern of deviation from norms in judgment”.  We as individuals create our own “subjective reality” from the perception of the inputs. Our construction of reality, not the input, may dictate how we behave.

            Availability Bias

            Availability bias is a mental shortcut that our brains use based on past examples relating to information that is “available” to us around a specific topic, event, or decision. This information could come from things we saw on the news, heard from a friend, read, or experienced. When we hear information frequently, we can recall it quickly, and our brains feel it is important as a result. With all the urgent interrupts and overall volume of decisions needing to be made by CISOs and other cyber executives, it is very easy to get caught up in decision making based on past or recent information.

            Availability bias impacts security in many ways. We often see the impact in the areas of risk assessment, preparedness, decision making and incident response. In the area of risk assessment, availability bias may arise when the company board of directors looks for an updated risk assessment. Rather than focusing on the entire company, data could be presented with respect to an area for which another company had a breach. For example, we have seen SolarWinds in the news a lot throughout the first quarter of this year, and our inclination might be to assess our risk in the context of that incident. However, the assessments should look at all aspects of the business in depth and not just focus on the supply chain risks. Are there issues that require more attention than what is trending in the news?

            We also see availability bias in preparedness when organizations prepare for high impact, low probability events instead of preparing for high probability events. What we should worry about doesn’t always align with what we do worry about. Events that have a high impact but low probability of occurring, such as an airplane crash, a shark attack, or volcano eruption, often receive much attention but are less likely to occur. We remember these much more than we remember higher probability events like falling off a ladder or automobile accidents. For instance, can you name the last phishing campaign you heard about or the last time someone’s PII was stolen? Probably not, but these are examples of the high probability events your organization most likely needs to prepare for.

            In the area of decision making, your CISO or the cybersecurity analysts may make decisions in favor of hot topics in the news. These topics may overshadow other information they know or is so mundane that it becomes background noise. As a result, decisions made are not well rounded. For example, if there was a recent IoT related issue like Dyn in 2016, your analysts may over focus on IoT related security decisions and neglect things like investing in new security controls for your mobile devices.

            Availability bias also surfaces during critical incidents when emotions are typically running high and the focus is on quickly addressing the issue at hand. Focusing on securing the specific area where the incident occurred may leave us blind to another issue waiting in the wings. Let’s pretend someone broke into your home through a window, your first thought may be to secure all the windows quickly; however, if you didn’t look at all your security risks, you may forget that you can shake your garage door lock, and it’ll pop open.

            Our analysts are typically exploring data thoroughly though executives may not always see the in-depth information. If you are at the executive level, I would recommend you review all the facts and consciously look beyond what is available quickly so you get the full picture of the incident, how prepared you are, risks, etc. If you are an analyst or in a position of influence, I would recommend summarizing the facts in way that accurately reflects the probability of those events occurring as well as considering all possible events.

            Confirmation Bias

            Another bias that appears in cybersecurity is confirmation bias. This is when you look for things to “confirm” your own beliefs or you remember things that only conform to your beliefs (similar to availability bias). For example, your news feed may be full of things related to your political beliefs based on what articles you clicked on, shared, or liked. Chances are it’s not filled with things that oppose your beliefs.  A few areas where confirmation bias is seen in cybersecurity is in decision making, security hygiene, risk assessment, preparedness, and penetration testing.

            When you are making decisions, are you considering different points of view or just looking to your close group of trusted advisors who may think like you? Are you willing to push and challenge your own beliefs to ensure you are making the best decisions for the company?

            When was the last time you reviewed your company’s security hygiene? Are you diligent about updating systems or do you believe it won’t happen to you because nothing has happened in the past? Are you using an XDR solution in your environment or do you feel you don’t need it because all your current systems are serving your needs just fine? Do you feel you are more secure when you are in the cloud vs on-prem despite human error affecting both?

            How do you approach cybersecurity preparedness? Are you passive, reactive, or progressive? Similar to hygiene, do you feel an incident won’t happen to you so you look for data to confirm that? Or are you the opposite and feel you may repeat incidents if you don’t do everything possible to look for data to confirm those beliefs? If you are an executive, are you reviewing the facts and evidence for all your cyber processes or just those that you personally know well from early on in your career?  I’ve seen some analysts ignore some of their alerts because they weren’t quite sure how to deal with them. As a result, they fall back on what they know or information that is readily available.

            Sometimes organizations may hire third party companies or employ penetration testing performed on their environments. When you define the scope of work, are you looking for all the gaps or holes or just focusing on the weaknesses and strengths? When the results come in, do you address everything that is recommended or only focus on the items you believe will impact you?

            It is hard to look beyond what we believe because in our eyes it is ground truth.  It is important in making security decisions that we look beyond what we want to hear or see to ensure we are getting what we need to hear and see.

            Unconscious or Implicit Bias

            Unconscious or implicit biases are social stereotypes about certain groups of people that we form outside of our own conscious awareness. Just as you see in the picture, our mind is like an iceberg where the conscious mind is what we can recall quickly and are aware of. The subconscious mind stores our beliefs, previous experiences, memories, etc. When you have an idea, emotion, or memory from the past, it’s recalled from our subconscious by our conscious mind. The third layer – our unconscious mind – is deep inside our brain.

            Everyone holds unconscious beliefs about various social groups, and these biases stem from our tendency to organize social worlds by categorizing them quickly. We often think about unconscious bias in the context of negative biases, but there are also positive unconscious biases, for example feeling a connection to someone from your hometown or college alma mater. Unconscious bias impacts security in the areas of decision making, risk assessment, incident response, cyber security policies and procedures, and identity and access management.

            In the area of decision making, I’ve seen executives blindly trust the IT team because they are perceived as being the “experts”. While this may be true, they are wrestling with the same unconscious biases and skills shortages many of us are. Just as it’s important to seek out additional information and facts when making your own decisions, it’s equally important to review the data and provide feedback and alternate opinions to others. Often, it’s easy to go with the majority and not rock the boat. If you feel that something needs to change or be addressed differently, don’t be afraid to go against the flow. Mark Twain is quoted, “Whenever you find yourself on the side of the majority, it’s time to pause and reflect.” When was the last time you went against the majority?

            Another unconscious bias that sometimes arises is related to age. Some people feel older workers are a greater risk to a company than younger workers because they perceive older workers as not being “up to date” on newer technologies. Conversely, some feel younger people engage in risky behavior like visiting potentially suspect websites or sharing too much information on social media.  As a result, security analysts may focus on the wrong areas as the source of a security risk or issue based on their biases.

            If you had an incident, how would you respond? Would you blame an unsecure IT environment, incompetent end users or would you look at the facts and evidence in and outside of your beliefs to determine what happened? How would you and your team respond to the incident? If your security operations team felt that IT had not done their part prior to the incident, you may be looking in the wrong area for the source of the incident. You may have heard the acronym PEBKAC. For those that don’t know what it means, it stands for “problem exists between the keyboard and chair”. Are you sure the problem is PEBKAC or does it lie somewhere in your environment?

            Implicit trust is another form of unconscious bias. When was the last time your cybersecurity policies and procedures were thoroughly reviewed? Let’s say you feel your SOC analyst is amazing, and you trust everything they say. Because of this implicit trust, you don’t think to dive into the details. As a result, you could have a firewall running without any defined rules but wouldn’t know because you’ve never checked. This doesn’t mean your SOC analyst isn’t trustworthy, just that you shouldn’t allow your unconscious bias to overrule the necessary checks and balances.

            We can sometimes also be led to overconfidence by unconscious bias. For example, when writing a paper or an article, we can be certain that there are no mistakes or typos, but often it’s because we’ve read or reviewed it so many times that our unconscious mind reads it as it should be and not what it actually is. Similarly, in the area of identity and access management, security analysts and software developers may blame users for issues and fail to look at the internal infrastructure or their own code because they have a false confidence that leads them to believe they couldn’t possibly be the problem.

            To overcome unconscious and implicit bias, ensure you are sticking to the facts and asking all stakeholders, including those you may disagree with for inputs. Also look in the mirror. Did you make a mistake or are you excusing your behavior instead of facing it? Also, don’t be afraid to follow the words of Mark Twain and pause and reflect to ensure you are making the correct decision, addressing the incident in the correct way, or hiring the right person.

            Because we all have biases and take mental shortcuts, we need to make a conscious effort to address them.  Look beyond what you want to hear or see and what shows up in your news feeds to address availability and confirmation bias. Ensure you are sticking to the facts and asking all stakeholders, including those you disagree with, for inputs to overcome unconscious and implicit bias. You don’t want to be the next company in the news because your biases got in the way.

             

             

            The post Through Your Mind’s Eye: What Biases Are Impacting Your Security Posture? appeared first on McAfee Blogs.

            Give CISOs a Shot – They Deserve It

            By Scott Howitt

            Imagine this scenario: a CEO, CIO, CTO, CISO walk into a bar…   

            The CTO has heard about cocktails that go beyond the “pour and shake,” and asks the bartender what they know about molecular gastronomy to take their drink to the next level. The CIO considers the CTO’s choice, weighing the risk versus reward of trying something new. The CEO orders a Long Island iced tea – a bold, ambitious, and challenging choice that incorporates a bit of everything, but they know in their gut it is the right decision and direction. The CISO orders a water.  

            Why? Because somebody always must be the designated driver, taking the responsibility to protect the integrity of the entire team and organization. They are the eyes and ears, proactively anticipating what may happen, knowing the onus is also on them to respond reactively to anything that may occur.  

            While in a bar this may mean things getting a bit rowdy, in the security operations center (SOC) it means an entire business can be compromised, creating a catastrophic spiral of events that can have massive impact and implications for customers, not to mention severe cost to the business.  

            Needless to say, the consequences are more extreme than a hangover. They remain always-on in the mind of the CISO – and this isn’t the only challenge the role faces. It is no secret in the security industry that elevating the role of the CISO to carry equal weight and footing as the rest of the executive or c-suite has been an uphill battle. While progress has certainly been made, there is always more work to be done to thwart and combat the seemingly never-ending barrage of threats that continue to emerge.  

            Navigating ‘Whiskey’ Business 

            Nearly every industry has been impacted in some manner by the events of 2020 and so far, across 2021. Attacks have increased and promise to become even more plentiful, more sophisticated. Enterprises and organizations have struggled against unforeseen challenges, yet at the same time have faced increased pressure and demand to modernize, digitize, and transform.  

            We’ve seen that with today’s distributed workforce, cloud usage has increased, and enterprises are tasked with maintaining efficiency across even more endpoints – and keeping those endpoints safe. This has presented a tremendous opportunity for CISOs to maximize their full power and impact by proving to be the clear connection and catalyst merging technology and business.  

            This means today’s CISOs may need to do more with less, convincing fellow c-suite members that integration is more important than introducing new toolsets, applications, or solutions at a time when enterprises may be more vulnerable or susceptible to risk due to staffing constraints or conflicting priorities across the business. With the amount of change rapidly occurring across enterprises, CISOs have an increased impetus, responsibility, and opportunity to show enhanced value to the organization. They must continue to shift the perception that security can be a barrier to business efficiency and success and instead show that security is more than a compliance function, but a true business enabler.  

            One Part Security, Two Parts Business 

            In order for CISOs to be successful, they must stay steadfast in aligning with the CIO, CTO, CEO, and all the way up to the board. They can do this by showing up with data to demonstrate the impact (both past and potential) made to business, including proof points related to vendor sprawl and legacy technologies (and any associated cost or complexity) as well as insight into threats that were prevented and the damage they could have caused.  

            CISOs will also need to continue the shift on their end, adapting their role and approach from waiting for a compromise to happen to understanding threat actors, their common techniques, and how to get ahead. In short, they need to become what they fight against – proactive threat management means you need to think like a threat actor. Ideally, the CISO should not only be able to articulate business risks and impacts – they also need to show foresight and maturity to suggest controls or process improvements that can improve business efficiencies because security is built in to protect and enable this agility.  

            Once CISOs truly understand the business side of an organization and can not only relate but prove this value to the rest of the c-suite, they can be viewed as more of a strategic partner. With this line of thinking, the SOC can move from being viewed as a cost center to being a more deliberate and proactive part of the enterprise facilitating business success.  

             

             

            The post Give CISOs a Shot – They Deserve It appeared first on McAfee Blogs.

            Through Your Mind’s Eye: How to Address Biases in Cybersecurity – Part 2

            By Lynda Grindstaff

            In Part 1 of our Through Your Mind’s Eye series, we explored how our brains don’t give each decision we make equal attention, and we take mental shortcuts known as biases. These biases allow us to react quickly, but they can also lead to mistakes and oversights.  Because we all have biases that shape who we are, our decisions in and out of cybersecurity can be impacted in both good and bad ways.

            Safety Bias

            Safety bias is focusing on shortcomings so as not to take a risk. Many studies have shown that we as humans would prefer not to lose money even more than we’d prefer to gain money.  You may have heard about studies where people are offered a lower amount of money now or higher amount in two years. Most participants took the sure thing of money now rather than wait for more. However, this changes when people are faced with a loss decision. For instance, when asked if they would rather definitely lose $100 or take a 50% chance of losing $1000, most say they would take the option to risk losing $1000. Because of safety biases, progress in decision making is slowed and healthy forms of risk taking are held back.

            Safety bias is seen in security development operations, risk assessment, policies and procedures, decision making, and identity and access management.  For the area of security development operations, is your dev ops team applying traditional network controls to the cloud or are they looking at how they can refactor to help take their organization to the next level? Are they stuck in the past or moving to the future?

            When was the last time you reviewed your security products and their capabilities for risk assessment? Are you keeping what you have because you already purchased those solutions, or are you reviewing them to ensure they’re the best at keeping your organization safe? For example, does your current solution have a vulnerability scanner that can identify advanced vulnerabilities? Would you upgrade if it didn’t? If you aren’t evaluating your security products against emerging threats on a regular basis, your risks can be impacted without realizing it.

            There are also parallels with our example above where participants took the immediate sure thing. The same thinking causes companies to invest in solutions that may be overkill to address overly specific and high impact/low probability risk factors. They are solving for something with a low probability of happening and, as a result, may be spending much more on policies and procedures than necessary.

            When there is an ambiguity in decision making, system owners may be reluctant to upgrade or apply the latest patches. There may also be an unwillingness of end-users to configure security features, and a lack of interest from developers to add new security features to an existing application.  As a result, these system owners err on the side of caution so as to not break or change something since they see this as more of a risk than installing the latest patches. Likewise, developers may opt for cost savings rather than add in security features.

            As you move from on-prem to cloud solutions, have you considered what software applications need to be retooled for optimization in the cloud for your identity and access management requirements? What new identity analytics solutions need to be put in place to be prepared for the future? Or are you keeping things “as is” because that is the safe thing to do?

            Some social scientists lump the ostrich effect with safety bias. The ostrich effect is based on a myth that ostriches bury their head in the sand when they sense danger. Is your team “burying their heads in the sand” when they need to make a risky decision?

            To overcome safety bias, get some distance between you and the decision being made. Imagine a past self already having made the choice successfully in order to weaken the perception that there will be loss. Another idea, if you feel this is something happening in your environment, is to balance out your team with both risk-taking and risk adverse team members.

            Other Biases That Could Arise

            Framing Effect – The framing effect also influences safety bias and relates to how something is “framed” or described. For instance, if something is worded in a negative way to emphasize the potential for loss, the receiver may be afraid to take a risk. You may have seen commercials for cyber services that say, “1 in 5 companies lost their data while using another service”. Instead of focusing on the 4 that did not lose their data, they focused on the 1 that did lose so you’ll think about them protecting you instead of their competition. Another example that drives home the point is related to health. Let’s say you needed an operation. How would you feel if the doctor told you that you had an 80% chance of recovery? Now what if the doctor said you had a 20% chance of death by having this same operation? Would you think differently how you approached the operation? Pay attention to how statements are phrased to overcome gut reactions when deciding.

            Affinity Bias – Affinity bias is gravitating to what we know or are comfortable with as opposed to the unknown. For example, when you see a stranger wearing your college alma mater sweatshirt in another city you instantly feel a connection to them even though you have never met. This creates an “in-group” bias. This can manifest in cyber as an aversion to new product offerings. Are you still using the same solutions you’ve been using for the last 20 years because they are familiar and comfortable to you or are you using an XDR solution now? You may also feel your direct team alone has all the right answers and no one else knows how to secure the environment or application better than your team. Is that because it’s true or because you are most comfortable with them?

            Similarity Bias – Similarity bias occurs because we as humans are highly motivated to see ourselves and those who are similar to us in a favorable light. We unconsciously create “ingroups” and “outgroups”. These could be related to the city or country where we grew up or live today, where we went to school, areas of interest, etc. Are you hiring people who are similar to who you currently have on the team or are you looking for skills and individuals that bring diverse perspectives or meet your needs in the next 1-2 years?

            Loss Aversion – An example of loss aversion can be observed when companies have already invested in their traditional IT infrastructure so why move to the cloud? Moving to the cloud takes time and resources. Instead of modernizing, they keep buying new servers and storage to keep the environment running as it had been for decades.

            Distance Bias – Distance bias is prioritizing what is nearby whether it is in physical space, time, or other domains. Prior to the pandemic when we were in conference rooms having conversations, how many times did you observe people in the meeting room failing to gather inputs from their remote colleagues on the phone? Or have you decided based on what you needed to do sooner in time instead of considering the long-term effects of what was best for the company?

            How to Address Biases in Cybersecurity

            As you saw in each of the biases featured in both of our articles, they are not mutually exclusive. There are many overlaps between the different types of cognitive biases. How do we address these?

            1. Acknowledge – Security is not just one product, but a combination of products, process, and technology. All of which depends on human behavior, and human behavior lends itself to biases. Acknowledging this helps us to uncover which biases we fall victim to.
            2. Seek & Review the data objectively before deciding – Don’t base a decision on what was done previously or of the only the opinion of an “expert”. Review the data, look at how the options were framed and provide feedback. This can help address availability bias, confirmation bias, and framing effect.
            3. Include everyone that needs to have an input on the decision or incident (including those who you may not agree with). This addresses confirmation bias and unconscious bias.
            4. Utilize third party companies to help evaluate in an unbiased way. Third party companies can review your policies and procedures, perform pen testing, and risk assessment just to name a few things. This objective opinion can address all the biases we discussed.
            5. Look to the future without attachment to the past. Ensure you are using monitoring tools that have the capability to understand human weakness and provide proper analysis based on user behavior analytics. This can address safety bias, loss aversion, affinity bias, and similarity bias.
            6. Don’t group human behaviors. Instead, look at individual behaviors – including your own. Educate your employees that many cyber issues are due to cognitive biases that attackers target in combination with technical flaws.

            Where to go from here:

            Awareness of the cognitive biases at play for you and your teams is one of the first steps to ensuring your company is not at risk. After you have acknowledged the possibility of biases and flaws in your environment, examine where you may have biases influencing your cybersecurity posture. This requires personal insight and empathy by all involved.

            Begin to educate others on where and how biases could be impacting your cybersecurity posture. Once that is done, have a thorough review of your current cybersecurity posture and adjust as necessary. Over the next few months, work on building habits across the team to ensure you are consciously removing biases that could be influencing your cybersecurity posture.

            Our adversaries understand human biases and actively try to exploit them. Removing these biases as much as possible can help you and your team improve your security posture and defend your organization across all levels.

            The post Through Your Mind’s Eye: How to Address Biases in Cybersecurity – Part 2 appeared first on McAfee Blogs.

            Why Security is Now the Foundation of Good Customer Experience

            By Raj Samani

            What does ‘good customer service’ mean to you in 2021? A friendly greeting when you enter a shop? Quickly fixing any issues with deliveries? Or, perhaps the company you entrust with your data maintaining strong security and privacy practices?

            It’s been a long time since digital technology was a special interest topic. Product launches, business deals, and new innovations were once reported on only in industry magazines – now, you’d be hard pressed to find a mainstream newspaper that doesn’t have some kind of technology section. We’ve quickly become used to the fact that when the tech giants talk, everybody listens.

            More recently, however, it’s become clear that the internet has taken another step towards the centre of the public conversation. While new devices and technological advancements are still (mostly) kept in separate sections of the media or tagged on to the end of the TV news, problems with technology often land straight on the front page.

            Outside observers have spent decades treating hacks and attacks as something arcane, as a distant problem that only the technologists can understand and only they have to deal with. Consumers, meanwhile, were left to hope that any issue would soon be fixed – whether that’s waiting for access to their files to be restored or trying again the next day to get into a website.

            Cybersecurity is now everything-security

            A few recent stories have underlined that those days are, or should be, behind us. In just the last two months, ransomware attacks have interrupted the operations of pipelines, food producers and the health sector. For many, this has been followed as a story about the international nature of cybercrime and claims that cryptocurrencies are enabling new types of attack.

            For those communities reliant on the targeted organisations, however, these cyber-attacks can mean higher costs when fueling their cars to get to work, or product shortages in their weekly shop. We know that there’s a lot of technical interest in analysing ransomware such as DarkSide, or the many other groups attacking sectors like manufacturing, oil and gas, and healthcare. We always need to remember, however, that the focus is not just how these attacks work, but how we can prevent the real-world impacts they have on people’s daily lives.

            These are extreme examples: they are incredibly high-value targets, which criminal groups will go to extraordinary lengths in order to disrupt, and which have national consequences when they are affected. Services like online retail and customer support can be disrupted in just the same way. From the perspective of the people who use these services, however, the fact that these were ransomware attacks doesn’t matter. Whether it’s due to attacks, accidents, or mismanagement, what matters is the betrayal of trust and the knock-on effects of service loss.

            Customer experience means more than a nice interface

            Examples like this are why I believe that we should see cybersecurity as a much wider foundation than we do, underpinning not just a business’s IT infrastructure, but its reputation, its revenue and, yes, its customer experience.

            In crowded markets, customer experience is often the key differentiator between competing businesses. A lot of the disruption that we’ve seen in many sectors thanks to the growth of digital and online approaches has come down to a better, more premium customer experience. Whole industries have arisen around easier ways to order taxis, listen to music, and buy food.

            As consumers continue to seek better, simpler experiences, they will (and, I think, should) also start paying close attention to how businesses respond to such incidents and maximise service levels. Key things that shoppers might want to look for when weighing up their choices include:

            • Does the company meet (or even exceed) data privacy standards, and is this detailed in a simple manner that is understandable to its customers?
            • Is the company transparent about who they share your data with, and why, before asking for it?
            • Has the company been open when it has experienced a security incident?

            Businesses, meanwhile, should be looking at how the efforts they take around cybersecurity can form part of the way they build customer confidence. By communicating clearly about the defensive measures we take – and, vitally, framing them in terms of the outcomes they have on people’s lives, not just the technical details – we can all help to make the public savvier about how they can make sure they truly rely on the services they rely on.

            The post Why Security is Now the Foundation of Good Customer Experience appeared first on McAfee Blogs.

            Restricting Supplier Choice Isn’t an Option to Enhance Digital Sovereignty

            By Chris Hutchins

            Digital sovereignty and strategic autonomy are phrases that are used almost daily in EU policy circles, loosely framed around the EU’s ability to carve out its own future in the digital sphere, rather than having its terms dictated from abroad. To achieve digital sovereignty in practice, having access to as broad a range of suppliers is key, not unnecessarily restricting the market.

            Our ability to self-determine Europe’s digital future is at risk when we become reliant on one source, that much is clear, and has been demonstrated recently in the global supply shortage of microchips. All measures that reduce this dependency will benefit digital sovereignty, which in practice means expanding competition in the market to as many players as possible.

            The means to get there are varied, and Europe is rightly seeking to build infrastructure, expand the pool of skilled experts and facilitate market entry. The EU and member states are also putting in place measures to eliminate obvious security risks in supply chains that demand an extra layer of vigilance, such as critical infrastructure, which is in the interest of national security.

            But the notion that homegrown European solutions are automatically better than non-European ones – sometimes backed by measures that give European vendors and suppliers undue advantage, or which place additional hurdles for companies that handle customer data outside the EU – is misguided.

            In the cybersecurity domain, in particular, limiting interoperability and vendor choice will only reduce Europe’s resilience against cyberattacks, which is a crucial element to ensuring Europe’s digital sovereignty and strategic autonomy. This is as true now as it always has been, in a sector innovating at break neck speed to meet the challenges set by our adversaries.

            In this competitive market, best-in-class providers at the cutting edge of security are the ones that will make Europe more cyber-secure, irrespective of where they happen to have their headquarters or data centers.  Irrational decisions guided by protectionism should have no place in this debate. Indeed policies or practices requiring forced data localisation can often limit the benefits generated by scale and global reach, and negatively impact cyber security’s operational effectiveness.

            A recent seminar organised by ECIS, the European Committee for Interoperable Systems, set out some clear principles that should guide Europe’s quest for digital sovereignty. Ensuring that the market operates as effectively as possible, supplier choice is as broad as possible, and interoperability and ability to switch suppliers is safeguarded, on the basis of clear standards, will be paramount.

            That is not to say that all measures being considered are misguided. An industrial policy that improves Europe’s digital infrastructures will boost Europe’s supply of home-grown digital services and products. Countries also have legitimate reasons to safeguard their national security and are well within their rights to set criteria to this end. The real danger lies in confusing protectionism with digital sovereignty.

            The post Restricting Supplier Choice Isn’t an Option to Enhance Digital Sovereignty appeared first on McAfee Blogs.

            What is Roblox and is It Safe for Kids?

            By Toni Birdsong

            If you have a tween or teen, you’ve likely heard a lot of excited chatter about Roblox. With a reported 150 million users, there’s a good chance your child has the Roblox site on their phone, tablet, PC, or Xbox. In fact, in 2020, Roblox estimated that over half of kids in the U.S. under 16 had used the forum. However, as with all digital destinations, the fun of Roblox is not without some safety concerns.  

            Why do kids love Roblox? 

            Roblox is an online gaming forum (not an app or game as one might assume) where users can create and share games or just play games. Kids can play Roblox games with friends they know or join games with unknown players. Roblox hosts an infinite number of games (about 20 million), which makes it a fun place to build and share creations, chat, and make friends. Game creators can also make significant money if their games take off.  

            A huge component of Roblox is its social network element that allows users to chat and have meetups. During quarantine, Roblox added its own private space for users to host virtual private birthday parties and social gatherings. 

            Is Roblox safe for kids? 

            Like any site or app, Roblox is safe if you take the time to optimize parental controls (both in-forum and personal software), monitor your child’s use, and taking basic precautions you’re your child starts using the forum. Especially with kids drawn to gaming communities, it’s important to monitor conversations they can be having with anyone, anywhere.  

            Potential Safety Issues  

            • Connections with strangers. Like other popular apps and sites, users have reported predators on Roblox and there’s a concern about the forum’s easily accessible chat feature bad actors may use to target their victims. Too, there’s a “Chat & Party” window on nearly every page of the site that any user can access.  

            Roblox security tip: Adjust settings to prohibit strangers’ from friending an account. Consider watching your child play a few games and how he or she interacts or wanders through the app. Pay close attention to the chat feature. Keep the conversation open, so your child feels comfortable sharing online concerns with you.

            • Potential cyberbullying. Users can join almost any game at any time, which opens the door to possible cyberbullying. Roblox security tip: Adjust settings to block mature games and talk with kids about handling inappropriate chats, live conversations, and comments. Also, know where to report bullying or any other rule violation on the forum.  
               
            • Inappropriate content. Because Roblox game content is user-generated, game content can range from harmless and cute to games containing violent and sexual storylines or characters, according to reports. Roblox security tip: Adjust settings to block mature games. Commit to constant monitoring to ensure settings are intact. Ask your child about their favorite games and evaluate the content yourself. 
               
            • In-app currency. Robux is the platform’s in-app currency kids can use to purchase accessories games such as pets, clothes, and weapons for different. As we’ve noted in the past, kids can rack up some hefty charges when in-app currency is allowed. Roblox Security Tip: Set limits with kids on purchases or adjust Roblox settings to prohibit in-app purchases.  

            Additional Roblox Security

            If you have your child’s login information, you can easily view their activity history in a few vulnerable areas including private and group chats, friends list, games played, games created, and items purchased. It’s also a good idea to make sure their birthdate is correct since Roblox automatically filters chats and game content for users under 13. Roblox has a separate login for parents of younger kids that allows you to go in and view all activities.  

            As always, the best way to keep your child safe on Roblox or any other site or app is to take every opportunity for open, honest conversation about personal choices and potential risks online. Oh, and sitting down to play their favorite games with them — is always the best seat in the house.  

            The post What is Roblox and is It Safe for Kids? appeared first on McAfee Blogs.

            Time to Batten the Cyber-Hatches

            By Scott Howitt

            We all like to think we’d know what to do if an emergency should occur. In split seconds, we try to recall the ratio of chest compressions to breaths of air learned in bygone health classes or that summer spent lifeguarding. We recognize the importance of a “to go” bag those final few days of pregnant pauses and false alarms before a baby arrives. We have seen enough television shows and cooking competitions to know Gordon Ramsey or Guy Fieri will be the first to scold us if we try to put out an erupted kitchen grease fire with anything other than salt and smothering.  

            We pick up a fair amount of knowledge and traits along the way to employ should disaster strike – and we absolutely take necessary precautions if we are knowingly in harm’s way. For example, those that live within a fault line’s reach are apt to prefer housing with stronger foundations and reinforced windowpanes. If you choose to live close to the warm waters of the Atlantic Ocean’s “hurricane alley,” you most likely know the fastest route to a causeway. An underground storm shelter to escape a tornado’s wily path can certainly come in handy.  

            We are taught that “hindsight is 20/20,” and that harboring regret is top on the list of feelings to avoid most throughout life. We obey the mantra many scouts learn in youth – being prepared – to the best of our ability. While earth’s natural disasters may never be preventable, it is clear preparation and readiness to face the inevitable can be a key differentiator when it comes to damage that can be incurred.  

            So far in 2021, we have witnessed major infrastructure impairments, interrupted supply chains, and havoc wreaked on local and federal economies.  

            This did not happen due to volcanic eruptions, tsunamis, nor mudslides, but rather through security breaches and attacks. And despite headlines shouting and nearly every security vendor urging enterprises the world over that cyberattacks are posed to continue to increase both in frequency and sophistication, especially ransomware threats, organizations have more often than not found themselves on the receiving end of hindsight and regret when it comes to these man-made, modern-day disasters.  

            So, the question begs to be asked, if the damages mentioned above could have been lessened or avoided through preparation and readiness, why is it still so difficult for CISOs to convince the c-suite that it’s better to be prepared for cyber-disaster, than sorry? 

            Coulda, Woulda, Shoulda 

            Staying safe and secure is the main goal in any disaster or emergency, but another less-talked-about goal is obviously to avoid what could have been prevented. The phrase, “I told you so,” will never land softly or kindly, especially when you are left surveying the ravaged ruins of what is left in the aftermath.  

            Many CISOs and SOC workers have encountered this situation recently, mentally kicking themselves or expressing frustration analyzing and evaluating breaches or attacks after they have occurred. Of course, the vulnerabilities are crystal clear when security experts look back on what happened, but muddy and missed when they play out in real time.  

            Scientists will inform us when a volcanic eruption may be imminent; a tornado will be prefaced with a loud siren meant to be heard throughout the county or immediate area; we often see tropical storms gain momentum and destructive qualities far before they transition to hurricanes and make landfall. This is to say, when it comes to natural disasters, they’re going to happen regardless, but damage prevention is dependent on prediction and experience.  

            Carefully measured and monitored gaseous pressure under the earth’s surface will indicate when a volcano may be imminent. Because of this, volcanologists can attempt to forewarn residents to vacate an area before disaster hits. This outcome is expected, and systems and processes are in place to thwart damage as much as possible. I imagine along with scientists; we’d be quite surprised if a volcano suddenly started spewing mass quantities of water instead of magma and ash. 

            We rely on patterns from previous incidents when it comes to geological acts of nature, but in the cybersecurity industry, disasters are man-made, and progressively more dangerous – created with motive, intent, and intelligence. 

            With cybercriminals, attacks have been unpredictable and indiscriminate. They are infiltrating via multiple attack vectors; sitting unknowingly across networks and systems, leeching data from an organization; and altering entire courses of business as resources are used to bring systems back online, determine causes, and quickly implement solutions. In short, cybercriminals are serving up water when we expect magma nearly every single time and enterprises are struggling to keep up.   

            XDR Is a Must for Readiness Kits 

            The rulebook of what can be planned for and prevented has narrowed. Enterprises need to adopt an updated mindset, knowing that like a natural disaster, damage prevention from a cyber-disaster is dependent on prediction and experience.  

            We are going to continue to get water when we expect magma, flames when we’re on the lookout for floods, and harsh winds when we anticipate rumbles. Powered by human intelligence, cybercriminals will continue to evolve threats, it will just be a matter of who can stay one step ahead – the good guys or the bad guys. The only constant isn’t a matter of if an attack will happen, but when.  

            A movement toward proactivity instead of reactivity when addressing a breach or attack after it occurs is crucial against today’s cybercriminals. Organizations must recognize that no industry is immune to cybercriminals and get a better handle on SOC functions and processes, and control over where data travels and lies.  

            This can mean a massive overhaul of a security stack to streamline solutions and expose manual or siloed processes that can lead to hidden vulnerabilities, evaluating security staff and talent to create better efficiencies, or embracing AI-guided tactics to automate activities and provide quick, actionable next steps should a breach occur.  

            Early adopters of extended detection and response (XDR) technology are already seeing the benefits this proactivity can hold. The simple, unified visualization XDR provides is a strong vantage point for enterprises seeking greater situational awareness, enhanced insights, and faster time to remediate threats across all vectors from endpoint, network, and the cloud.  

            Today, the warning siren that disaster is forthcoming has been sounding for a while. Enterprises need to take heed of the alarm to thwart as much damage as possible, as like natural disasters, a cyber-disaster can lead to massive destruction and upheaval.  

            Want to learn more about McAfee’s XDR technology? Check out McAfee MVISION XDR.  

            The post Time to Batten the Cyber-Hatches appeared first on McAfee Blogs.

            3 Tips to Protect Yourself From XLoader Malware

            By Vishnu Varadaraj

            Picture this: you open your MacBook and see an email claiming to be from your favorite online store. In the email, there is an attachment with “important information regarding your recent purchase.” Out of curiosity, you open the attachment without checking the recipient’s email address. The next thing you know, your device is riddled with malware.  

            Unfortunately, this story is not far from reality. Contrary to popular belief, Apple computers can get viruses, and XLoader has Mac users in their sights.  

            Let’s break down XLoader’s ‘s origins and how this malware works.  

            Where Did XLoader Come From? 

            XLoader originated from FormBook, which has been active for at least five years and is among the most common types of malware. Designed as a malicious tool to steal credentials from different web browsers, collect screenshots, monitor and log keystrokes, and more, FormBook allowed criminals to spread online misfortune on a budget. Its developer, referred to as ng-Coder, charged $49, a relatively cheap price to use the malware, making it easily accessible to cybercriminals.  

            Although ng-Coder stopped selling FormBook in 2018, this did not stop cybercriminals from using it. Those who had bought the malware to host on their own servers continued to use it, and in turn, quickly noticed that FormBook had untapped potential. In February 2020, FormBook rebranded to XLoader. XLoader can now target Windows systems and macOS devices.  

            How XLoader Works  

            Typically, XLoader is spread via fraudulent emails that trick recipients into downloading a malicious file, such as a Microsoft Office document. Once the malware is on the person’s device, an attacker can eavesdrop on the user’s keystrokes and monitors. Once a criminal has collected enough valuable data, they can make fake accounts in the victim’s name, hack their online profiles, and even access their financial information.  

            Minimize Your Risk of macOS Malware Attacks 

            According to recent data, Apple sold 20 million Mac and MacBook devices in 2020. With macOS’s growing popularity, it is no surprise that cybercriminals have set their sights on targeting Mac users. Check out these tips to safeguard your devices and online data from XLoader and similar hacks:  

            1. Avoid suspicious emails and text messages  

            Hackers often use phishing emails or text messages to distribute and disguise their malicious code. Do not open suspicious or irrelevant messages, as this can result in malware infection. If the message claims to be from a business or someone you know, reach out to the source directly instead of responding to the message to confirm the sender’s legitimacy.   

            2. Avoid sketchy websites.  

            Hackers tend to hide malicious code behind the guise of fake websites. Before clicking on an unfamiliar hyperlink, hover over it with your cursor. This will show a preview of the web address. If something seems off (there are strange characters, misspellings, grammatical errors, etc.) do not click the link.  

            3. Recruit the help of a comprehensive security solution 

            Use a solution like McAfee Total Protection, which can help protect devices against malware, phishing attacks, and other threats. It also includes McAfee WebAdvisor — a tool that identifies malicious websites.  

            Regardless of whether you use a PC or a Mac, it is important to realize that both systems are susceptible to cyberthreats that are constantly changing. Do your research on prevalent threats and software bugs to put you in a great position to protect your online safety.   

             Put Your Mind at Ease With Security Best Practices 

            XLoader is just the latest example of how the gap between the prevalence of PC versus macOS malware is steadily closing. To better anticipate what threats could be around the corner and how to best combat them, stay updated on all of the latest online safety trends and practice great security habits. This will not only help protect your devices and online accounts but also bring you greater peace of mind.  

            The post 3 Tips to Protect Yourself From XLoader Malware appeared first on McAfee Blogs.

            S3 Ep56: Cryptotrading rodent, ransomware hackback, and a Docusign phish [Podcast]

            By Paul Ducklin
            Latest episode - listen now! Serious security explained with personality in plain English.

            ns-1200-logo-podcast-with-mic-and-rodent-emoji

            Teen Slang and Texting Acronyms Parents Should Know

            By Toni Birdsong

            If you pick up your teen’s phone on any given day, chances are the next stop you make will be Google. That’s because, if you’re like most parents, you’re beyond baffled by texting language kids use.  

            It’s okay, you are not alone if you feel out of the loop. As parents, we’re not invited to the party—and that’s okay. Slag belongs to the generation that coined it. And few of us are aching to use words like “sus” and “simp,” right? The goal of these updates isn’t to decode or invade.  It’s digital parenting 101. The more we know about what’s going on in our child’s world, the better we can parent. It’s our job to know.  

            So once a year we do our best to decipher some of the more common terms you may hear or see your kids use. Keep in mind: Slang isn’t universal. It changes from city to city and culture to culture. Terms and meanings may vary. Many of the words are fun and harmless, while others are specifically meant to mask risky behavior.  Remember, McAfee frees you to live your connected life safe from threats like viruses, malware, phishing, and more. Download award-winning antivirus that protects your data and devices today.

            Here are a sampling of terms, acronyms, and phrases we came across this year*. 

            Terms, Phrases & Acronyms

            A real one. A person who is being authentic, genuine, trusted. 

            And I oop. A phrase used after a funny mistake or accident.  

            Awks. Short for awkward.  

            Baddie. Name for an independent female who is tough and beautiful. 

            Bands. Refers to bands around cash or a wealthy person. No doubt, the dude’s got bands.  

            Bet. A willingness to do something; means “yes” or “okay.”  

            Big yikes. When you see something, that is a huge embarrassment.  

            Booed up. To be in a romantic relationship. 

            Bop. A really good song. That song is such a bop! 

            Bread or Cheddar. Terms that refer to money.  

            Breadcrumbing. Sending flirtatious text messages to another person to get their attention but remain non-committal. 

            Bussin. Something is awesome. Her new hair color is bussin’. 

            Cake. When someone’s body looks good. The girl in my science class has cake.  

            Cancel. Reject or stop supporting a group or idea.  

            Cap. A term that means “lie” or “false.” He said we were a couple. Cap! 

            No cap. A phrase that means “no lie” or “for real” emphasizes telling the truth. I just saw him eat a bug. No cap! 

            CEO. A term used to describe something that you’re very good at, making you the CEO of it. I’m the CEO of being late to class.  

            Cheug. This term describes a person, idea, or situation that is outdated or inauthentic.  

            Clout. A term that relates to a person’s follower count, fame, or influencer status. Sometimes an expression for an extravagant way of living.  

            Chasing Clout. A term that describes a person who does and says things for the sole purpose of becoming more popular. 

            Curve. To reject someone romantically. 

            Cuffing. Wanting to date or cuff yourself to someone temporarily—at least until summer break.  

            Do it for the gram. A phrase that describes someone doing something for the sole purpose of posting online. 

            Drip. A term that describes someone’s style as sexy or cool. Zayne has some serious drip.  

            Facts. When you agree with someone.  

            Finsta. A second Instagram account used for sharing with a smaller circle of friends and followers.  

            Fish. Fishing for compliments. 

            Fit. Short for outfit. 

            Flex. To show off or show something off.  

            Get after it. Start with something with intensity. 

            Ghost. Suddenly stop all contact with someone online and in person. 

            Hundo P. Being 100% certain.  

            Hypebeast. A term that describes someone who cares too much about popular things rather than being self-aware and genuine. 

            I’m dead. Describes how you feel when something is hilarious. 

            I’m weak. Like, dead, describes how you feel when something is hilarious. 

            I can’t even. An expression used when you’ve had enough of someone or a situation.  

            Keep it 100. Stay true to yourself and stick to your values. 

            Lewk. Look.  

            Left on read. When someone does not respond to your text. He left me on read! 

            Lit. Cool or awesome. 

            Mood. A term used to express a relatable feeling or experience. Seeing that kid by himself kicking a can is such a mood. 

            Mutuals. People who follow and support one another on social media.  

            Oof. An expression used when something bad happens, and you don’t know how to respond.  

            Periodt. A term used to emphasize what you just said.  

            Purr. Expressing approval. I’ve got nothing but purr for my friends.  

            Receipts. Evidence to prove someone is either lying. Often in the form of screenshots, videos, or images.  

            Savage. A cool person or someone overly direct or candid. 

            Sketch. A sketchy or ominous situation, place, or person.  

            Skrrt. To leave quickly or get away from someone (the sound a car makes).   

            Ship. Short for relationship.  

            Simp. Used to describe a guy who is seen as being too attentive and submissive to a girl.  

            Sheesh. A term used to compliment someone when they look good or do something good.  

            Suh. A combination of “sup” and “huh” used as a greeting. 

            Sus. Short for suspect describing a situation, a person, or a claim. That guy is sus. Let’s get out of here.  

            Shawty. An attractive female. Sometimes a short, attractive female.  

            Sheee. An expression of disappointment, annoyance, or surprise. 

            Slaps. A term used when something is awesome. The DJ slaps. 

            Snatched. Describing a person or a thing that looks great. I’m jealous her makeup is so snatched.  

            Stan. A combination of “stalker” and “fan” refers to an overly obsessed fan of a celebrity.  

            Straight Fire or Fire. Describes something amazing. His new truck is straight fire. 

            Thumpin’. Word to describe someone going very. I didn’t even see him leave. He was thumpin’. 

            Vaguebooking. The act of posting vague Facebook or other social status updates for attention or as a cry for help. Wondering what the point of it all is anyway. 

            Whip. A word that means car. Have you seen his new whip? 

            Wig. When something has you so excited, your wig might come off; mind-blowing. The new Adele song!! WIIIIGGG! 

            Yeet. Throwing something out of rage. Also used as an exclamation for being excited.  

            NGL. Not Gonna Lie. 

            NMH. Nodding My Head; an expression of agreement.  

            NSA. No Strings Attached.  

            HWU. Hey, what’s up? 

            IYKWIM. If You Know What I Mean.  

            RLY. Really? 

            OG.Short for Original Gangster;a compliment for someone who is exceptional or authentic. 

            ORLY. Oh really?

            SMH. Shaking My Head. 

            TFW. That Feeling When 

            TT2T. Too Tired to Talk.  

            L. Short for loose or loss. 

            V. Short for very. 

            W. Short for win. Their loss is our w.   

            WYA. Where are you at? 

            WYD. What are you doing? 

            YK. You’re Kidding.

            YKTS. You Know the Score. 

            YKTV. You know the vibe.
             

            (Potentially) Risky Terms & Acronyms

            Addy/Study Buddy. Terms used in place of the medication Adderal.

            Break Green. A term that means to share marijuana with others. 

            Crashy. Combo of “crazy” and “trashy.”  

            Daddy. An attractive man, usually older, who conveys a sense of power and dominance.

            Faded/Cooked. Terms used to describe being high on drugs.  

            Lit/Turnt Up. It can mean party or get drunk.  

            MOS/POS. Mom Over Shoulder; Parent Over Shoulder.

            Kush/Flower/Gas. Terms used in place of marijuana. 

            Smash. To hook up for casual sex. Is he a smash or a pass? 

            Thirsty. Adjective for a person desperate for attention or sex. 

            Xan/Xans. Terms short for Xanax, a sedative used to treat anxiety. Also called xanny, beans, bars, and footballs. 

            ASL. Age/sex/location. 

            CD9. Can’t talk parents are here. 

            CU46. See You For Sex. 

            GALMA. Go Away Leave Me Alone.  

            GOMB. Get Off My Back.  

            GSW. Get Some Weed.  

            LMIRL. Let’s meet in Real Life. 

            KMS/KYS. Kill myself, Kill Yourself. 

            ONG. On God; a term that implies a person is serious enough to swear “on god.” 

            ONS. One Night Stand. 

            Spice or K2. Code for synthetic marijuana, which can be more harmful than actual cannabis.  

            URAL. You’re A Loser. 

            WWTP. Want to Trade Pics? 

            X or E. Letters that stand for ecstasy, otherwise known as “molly” or MDMA.  

            Zaddy. A well-dressed, attractive man of any age. 

            Zerg. A term that originated in the gaming community for gamers using the many against one strategy to win a game. A Zerg is a person who employs the same bullying tactics in real life. Stay away from him. He’s such a Zerg! Or Stay off that site. There’s too much zerging.  

            Protect your connected life today with McAfee Total Protection

            *Content collected from various sources, including NetLingo.com, slangit.com, cyberdefinitions.com, UrbanDictionary.com, webopedia.com, and conversations on TikTok, Reddit, and YouTube.  

            The post Teen Slang and Texting Acronyms Parents Should Know appeared first on McAfee Blog.

            Samba update patches plaintext password plundering problem

            By Paul Ducklin
            When Microsoft itself says STOP USING X, where X is one of its own protocols... we think you should listen.

            Apple’s Mail Privacy Protection feature – watch out if you have a Watch!

            By Paul Ducklin
            Apple's "Protect Mail Activity" is a handy privacy enhancement for your messaging habits. As long as you know its limitations...

            Github cookie leakage – thousands of Firefox cookie files uploaded by mistake

            By Paul Ducklin
            Be aware before you share! That's a good rule for developers and techies, just as much as it is for social media addicts.

            Check your patches – public exploit now out for critical Exchange bug

            By Paul Ducklin
            It was a zero-day bug until Patch Tuesday, now there's an anyone-can-use-it exploit. Don't be the one who hasn't patched.

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