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Google says it has suspended the app for the Chinese e-commerce giant Pinduoduo after malware was found in versions of the software. The move comes just weeks after Chinese security researchers published an analysis suggesting the popular e-commerce app sought to seize total control over affected devices by exploiting multiple security vulnerabilities in a variety of Android-based smartphones.
In November 2022, researchers at Google’s Project Zero warned about active attacks on Samsung mobile phones which chained together three security vulnerabilities that Samsung patched in March 2021, and which would have allowed an app to add or read any files on the device.
Google said it believes the exploit chain for Samsung devices belonged to a “commercial surveillance vendor,” without elaborating further. The highly technical writeup also did not name the malicious app in question.
On Feb. 28, 2023, researchers at the Chinese security firm DarkNavy published a blog post purporting to show evidence that a major Chinese ecommerce company’s app was using this same three-exploit chain to read user data stored by other apps on the affected device, and to make its app nearly impossible to remove.
DarkNavy likewise did not name the app they said was responsible for the attacks. In fact, the researchers took care to redact the name of the app from multiple code screenshots published in their writeup. DarkNavy did not respond to requests for clarification.
“At present, a large number of end users have complained on multiple social platforms,” reads a translated version of the DarkNavy blog post. “The app has problems such as inexplicable installation, privacy leakage, and inability to uninstall.”
Update, March 27, 1:24 p.m. ET: Dan Goodin over at Ars Technica has an important update on this story that indicates the Pinduoduo code was exploiting a zero-day vulnerability in Android — not Samsung. From that piece:
“A preliminary analysis by Lookout found that at least two off-Play versions of Pinduoduo for Android exploited CVE-2023-20963, the tracking number for an Android vulnerability Google patched in updates that became available to end users two weeks ago. This privilege-escalation flaw, which was exploited prior to Google’s disclosure, allowed the app to perform operations with elevated privileges. The app used these privileges to download code from a developer-designated site and run it within a privileged environment.
“The malicious apps represent “a very sophisticated attack for an app-based malware,” Christoph Hebeisen, one of three Lookout researchers who analyzed the file, wrote in an email. “In recent years, exploits have not usually been seen in the context of mass-distributed apps. Given the extremely intrusive nature of such sophisticated app-based malware, this is an important threat mobile users need to protect against.”
On March 3, 2023, a denizen of the now-defunct cybercrime community BreachForums posted a thread which noted that a unique component of the malicious app code highlighted by DarkNavy also was found in the ecommerce application whose name was apparently redacted from the DarkNavy analysis: Pinduoduo.
A Mar. 3, 2023 post on BreachForums, comparing the redacted code from the DarkNavy analysis with the same function in the Pinduoduo app available for download at the time.
On March 4, 2023, e-commerce expert Liu Huafang posted on the Chinese social media network Weibo that Pinduoduo’s app was using security vulnerabilities to gain market share by stealing user data from its competitors. That Weibo post has since been deleted.
On March 7, the newly created Github account Davinci1010 published a technical analysis claiming that until recently Pinduoduo’s source code included a “backdoor,” a hacking term used to describe code that allows an adversary to remotely and secretly connect to a compromised system at will.
That analysis includes links to archived versions of Pinduoduo’s app released before March 5 (version 6.50 and lower), which is when Davinci1010 says a new version of the app removed the malicious code.
Pinduoduo has not yet responded to requests for comment. Pinduoduo parent company PDD Holdings told Reuters Google has not shared details about why it suspended the app.
The company told CNN that it strongly rejects “the speculation and accusation that Pinduoduo app is malicious just from a generic and non-conclusive response from Google,” and said there were “several apps that have been suspended from Google Play at the same time.”
Pinduoduo is among China’s most popular e-commerce platforms, boasting approximately 900 million monthly active users.
Most of the news coverage of Google’s move against Pinduoduo emphasizes that the malware was found in versions of the Pinduoduo app available outside of Google’s app store — Google Play.
“Off-Play versions of this app that have been found to contain malware have been enforced on via Google Play Protect,” a Google spokesperson said in a statement to Reuters, adding that the Play version of the app has been suspended for security concerns.
However, Google Play is not available to consumers in China. As a result, the app will still be available via other mobile app stores catering to the Chinese market — including those operated by Huawei, Oppo, Tencent and VIVO.
Google said its ban did not affect the PDD Holdings app Temu, which is an online shopping platform in the United States. According to The Washington Post, four of the Apple App Store’s 10 most-downloaded free apps are owned by Chinese companies, including Temu and the social media network TikTok.
The Pinduoduo suspension comes as lawmakers in Congress this week are gearing up to grill the CEO of TikTok over national security concerns. TikTok, which is owned by Beijing-based ByteDance, said last month that it now has roughly 150 million monthly active users in the United States.
A new cybersecurity strategy released earlier this month by the Biden administration singled out China as the greatest cyber threat to the U.S. and Western interests. The strategy says China now presents the “broadest, most active, and most persistent threat to both government and private sector networks,” and says China is “the only country with both the intent to reshape the international order and, increasingly, the economic, diplomatic, military, and technological power to do so.”
Safety has a feeling all its own, and that’s what’s at the heart of McAfee+.
We created McAfee+ so people can not only be safe but feel safe online, particularly in a time when there’s so much concern about identity theft and invasion of our online privacy.
And those concerns have merit. Last year, reported cases of identity theft and fraud in the U.S. shot up to 5.7 million, to the tune of $5.8 billion in losses, a 70% increase over the year prior. Meanwhile, online data brokers continue to buy and sell highly detailed personal profiles with the data cobbled together from websites, apps, smartphones, connected appliances, and more, all as part of a global data-gathering economy estimated at well over $200 billion a year.
Yet despite growing awareness of the ways personal information is collected, bought, sold, and even stolen, it remains a somewhat invisible problem. You simply don’t see it as it happens, let alone know who’s collecting what information about you and toward what ends—whether legal, illegal, or somewhere in between. A recent study we conducted showed that 74% of consumers are concerned about keeping their personal information private online. Yet, most of us have found out the hard way (when we search for our name on the internet) that there is a lot of information about us that has been made public. It is our belief that every individual should have the right to be private, yet we know too many individuals don’t know where to begin. It is this very worry that made us focus our new product line on empowering our users to take charge of their privacy and identity online.
McAfee+ gives you that control.
Now available in the U.S., McAfee+ provides all-in-one online protection for your identity, privacy, and security. With McAfee+, you’ll feel safer online because you’ll have the tools, guidance and support to take the steps to be safer online. Here’s how:
You can see the entire range of features that cover your identity, privacy, and security with a visit to our McAfee+ page.
McAfee+ Ultimate offers our most thorough protection, with which you can lock your credit with a click or put a comprehensive security freeze in place, both to thwart potential identity theft. You can keep tabs on your credit with daily credit monitoring and get an alert when there’s credit activity to spot any irregularities quickly.
You’ll also feel like someone has your back. Even with the most thorough measures in place, identity theft and ransomware attacks can still strike, which can throw your personal and financial life into a tailspin. What do you do? Where do you start? Here, we have you covered. We offer two kinds of coverage that can help you recover your time, money, and good name:
Starting today, customers in the U.S. can purchase McAfee+ online at McAfee.com in Premium, Advanced, and Ultimate plans, in addition to individual and family subscriptions. McAfee+ will also be available online in the U.K., Canada, and Australia in the coming weeks with additional regions coming in the months ahead (features may vary by region).
We are very excited about bringing these new protections to you and we hope you will be too.
The post The Feeling of Safety with McAfee+ appeared first on McAfee Blog.
It’s difficult to imagine what life was like before the internet. We log in daily to pay bills, shop, watch movies, and check out what friends and family are up to on social media. While the internet has made life easier, we may not consider how our online activities can make personal information — such as our Social Security numbers (SSNs) or bank account and credit card numbers — vulnerable to cybercriminals on the dark web.
Fortunately, you can find out if your information is on the dark web and keep tabs on your sensitive information with extensive dark web monitoring, offered through McAfee’s Identity Protection services.
This article explains what the dark web is, how to find out if personal details have reached the dark web, and how to protect your sensitive information.
Unlike the surface web we use for things like shopping and online banking, the dark web is part of the internet that’s not indexed by search engines. It can only be accessed with special web browsers. A few widely known networks include Tor, I2P, and Riffle.
Cybercriminals can browse, sell, or trade on dark websites with confidence and complete anonymity. Because of its highly layered encryption system, hackers can communicate without giving away their location, IP address, or identity.
Data can end up on the dark web in several ways, including through data breaches, using public Wi-Fi, visiting a nonsecure website, and leaving an offline paper trail.
A cybercriminal may hack into company databases and take personal data, such as email account addresses, passwords, and phone numbers. And while we all love to work at our favorite coffee shop, using an unsecured Wi-Fi network can leave our personal information in public view.
That’s why using a virtual private network (VPN) like McAfee Secure VPN, which comes with bank-grade encryption to scramble your data, can be a good idea. You’ll also only want to visit encrypted webpages when browsing online — keep an eye out for URLs beginning with HTTPS rather than HTTP. The “S” means added security for you. Lastly, shred paper containing your personal information or lock it away until you can.
With identity monitoring through McAfee Identity Protection, you’ll receive notifications if we find your personal information on the dark web. Our extensive monitoring service keeps tabs on up to 60 unique types of personal data and can notify you up to 10 months sooner than similar services. Plus, you get peace of mind with up to $1 million of ID theft coverage and hands-on restoration support to help reclaim your identity after identity theft.
While you can’t remove your information once it’s on the dark web, there are plenty of steps you can take to help protect yourself and prevent your data from falling into the wrong hands. You can:
No one wants their information to end up on the dark web. Fortunately, you can do a few things to minimize your risk of exposure. Here are some tips you can use to keep your data safe.
Identity protection software from McAfee can help keep your information out of the hands of cybercriminals. Some features of McAfee identity protection include expert security support, award-winning antivirus protection, a password manager, and firewall protection. Choose the plan that works best for you and keep tabs on your personal information.
This extra layer of security double-checks your identity when signing into an online account. You enter your password as usual and a unique six-digit, one-time code is sent to a trusted device via text. This added step can help improve the security of your personal information.
When creating or updating your account passwords, make sure to choose ones that are difficult to guess. Avoid using a pet’s name, your name, or other personal information that others can guess. It goes without saying, but don’t share any of your passwords.
Shared content can tell a lot about someone. Have you ever shared the make and model of your first car, your favorite movie or band, or your high school graduation year? This information helps unsavory characters figure out online passwords and security questions.
There are a lot of cool apps out there, and many are harmless. However, some may request access to your location, photos, contact list, and even microphone. Certain apps, especially those filled with malware, can then collect your data and share it with others. Fortunately, Android devices and Apple iPhones allow you to change your permission settings for apps.
With so many emails arriving in our inboxes, we may not always pay close attention to what we’re opening. However, scammers may use phishing emails in an attempt to access your personal information. Sometimes, these emails are obvious, but they can also look legit and appear as a trusted company, such as your bank or credit card company. If something seems amiss, such as a billing error or an invoice, log in through the company’s website rather than click links inside the email.
No one wants their information on the dark web. Thankfully, there are several things you can do to keep your personal information secure, including all-in-one protection from McAfee.
McAfee Total Protection comes with advanced identity monitoring, which provides faster and broader detection for your identity, plus premium antivirus software, safe browsing, and Secure VPN.
With easy setup and extensive monitoring, you can maintain your digital identity and gain peace of mind.
The post A Guide to Finding Out If Your Information Is on the Dark Web appeared first on McAfee Blog.
The internet has opened up wonderful new possibilities in our world, making life easier on many levels. You can pay your bills, schedule your next family vacation, and order groceries with the click of a button. While the internet offers many positive benefits, it also has some negatives. Although not entirely used for illicit purposes, the dark web is one part of the internet that can be used by criminals for illegal purposes, like selling stolen personal information.
But just what is the dark web? Basically, it’s a part of the internet that isn’t indexed by search engines. As an average internet user, you won’t come across the dark web since you need a special browser to access it. It’s certainly not something you need to stress about in your day-to-day browsing, and you shouldn’t let it scare you off the internet. Unless you actively seek it out, you’ll likely never have any contact with the dark web in your lifetime.
A better understanding of what the dark web is and the possible threats it contains can help you protect yourself, though. This guide provides the essential information you need, explaining the different levels of the web and revealing how you can stay safe. With this knowledge, you can continue to browse online with confidence. Find out more below.
The “dark web” refers to websites that aren’t indexed by search engines like Google and Bing. This might seem strange since most people want their websites to be found through specific searches. Practices like search engine optimization (SEO) are specifically implemented to help websites perform well and rank higher in search engine results.
So, why would someone not want their website to be picked up by a search engine? The primary purpose is to preserve privacy and anonymity. The individuals and organizations on the dark web often engage in illegal activities and want to keep their identities hidden — something that is difficult to do with an indexed website.
It’s important to note that the dark web should not be confused with the deep web, which is a part of the internet individuals access regularly. Although the terms are sometimes used interchangeably, they actually refer to different things. Deep web content — which isn’t picked up by search engines, either — includes pages that typically require additional credentials to access. Your online banking accounts and email accounts, for instance, are examples of deep web content.
The internet is home to billions of websites — an estimated 1.7 billion to be exact, although that number changes every day as new sites are made and others are deleted. Your daily internet activity likely falls within the publicly available and readily accessible portion of the internet (otherwise known as the surface web). However, there are additional “levels” of the internet beyond that top level. Read on to learn more.
The internet you use to search for more information is referred to as the surface web or open web. This is the readily visible part of the internet anyone can access with an internet connection and a normal web browser like Safari, Mozilla Firefox, or Google Chrome. Other terms for the surface web include the visible web, lightnet, or indexed web.
Examples of content you’ll find on the surface web include:
Basically, the sites you use daily — from your favorite news site to a local restaurant — are part of the surface web. What makes these websites part of the surface web is that they can be located via search queries and have recognizable endings like .com, .edu, .gov, or .org. You are able to find websites on the surface web because they are marked as “indexable,” meaning search engines can index and rank them. The sites are readily available on the search engine results pages (SERPs).
Interestingly, the surface web only makes up around 4% of the total internet, meaning the internet is a lot more than what you see on the surface. Think of it as an ocean — there’s the top layer of water you can see and then there’s the vast world beneath. The remainder of the internet is what’s below the surface.
The deep web refers to any page on the internet that isn’t indexed by search engines as described above. The deep web is the first level beneath the “surface” of the visible web — and it’s significantly larger than the surface web, accounting for an estimated 96% to 99% of the entire internet.
It’s important to note that just because this type of content isn’t on the surface doesn’t mean it’s nefarious or has ill intent. A lot of the time, this content isn’t indexed because it includes pages that are meant to be hidden to protect consumer privacy, such as those that require login credentials.
Here are some examples of content on the deep web:
Essentially, any webpage that requires a login is part of the deep web. That said, deep web content doesn’t necessarily have to fall into any of these categories. Any page that is non-indexable is technically also considered part of the deep web. It doesn’t have to require a login or contain sensitive data. Website creators and managers can mark pages as non-indexable if desired.
It’s worth noting that sometimes a single organization’s website will include elements of both the surface web and the deep web. Take a college or university website, for example. Most schools have a comprehensive website providing information about the school’s history, campus location, student body, available programs of study, extracurricular activities, and more.
However, many schools also have an intranet — sometimes linked from the main university page — that’s accessible only for students or staff. This is where students might sign up for classes and access their school email, for example. Since this is sensitive information and requires a unique login, it doesn’t need to be made publicly available via search engines.
In fact, it’s better in the interest of privacy that these pages aren’t readily visible. It helps to protect the user’s data. From this example, you can see that the “deep web” doesn’t have to be scary, illicit, or illegal. It serves a legitimate and useful purpose. You shouldn’t be afraid of the deep web. It’s further important to distinguish the deep web from the dark web — as the next section explains.
As mentioned, the deep web and the dark web sometimes get confused. However, they are distinct. Technically, the dark web is a niche or subsection within the deep web. It consists of websites that aren’t indexable and can’t be readily found online via web search engines. However, the dark web is a carefully concealed portion of the deep web that people go out of their way to keep hidden.
What makes the dark web distinct from the broader deep web is the fact that dark web content can only be accessed via a special browser. The Tor network is often used to access the dark web.
Additionally, the dark web has a unique registry operator and uses security tools like encryption and firewalls, further making it inaccessible via traditional web browsers. Plus, the dark web relies on randomized network infrastructure, creating virtual traffic tunnels. All of these technical details serve to promote anonymity and protect dark web users’ privacy.
The short answer is no, it’s not illegal to browse the dark web. In fact, there are instances where individuals can use it for good. Whistleblowers, for instance, can find the anonymity available through the dark web valuable when working with the FBI or another law enforcement organization.
That said, while it’s not illegal to browse the dark web, it’s also not completely void of criminal activity. Putting yourself in close proximity with illegal activities is rarely a good idea and could heighten your risk of being targeted by a criminal yourself. It’s often best to leave that part of the deep web alone.
There are also many technological threats on the dark web. Malicious software, also known as malware, is a critical concern and can affect unsuspecting users. Even simply browsing the dark web out of curiosity can expose you to such threats, like phishing malware or keyloggers. While an endpoint security program can identify such threats if they end up on your computer, it’s ideal to avoid them altogether.
Further, if you try to buy something on the dark web — even if it’s not illegal — there’s a chance you’ll be scammed. Dark web criminals use a variety of tricks to con people. For example, they may hold money in escrow but then shut down the e-commerce website and take off with the money. Due to the anonymous nature of the dark web, it’s very difficult for law enforcement to find such perpetrators.
Given its anonymous nature, the dark web clearly has an obvious appeal for cybercriminals. But just what do they use it for? The most obvious type of internet activity is the buying and selling of black market goods and services, from illegal drugs to illegal content. Cybercriminals may also run scams when selling such items, for example by taking a person’s money and not delivering the required product.
There are dark websites dedicated to the purchase and sale of illegal products or services (usually using untraceable cryptocurrencies like bitcoin) including:
Browsers like Tor, an open-source and free software, allow people to access dark websites where these goods are available, like a digital marketplace. These websites may look similar to any other surface or deep website you’d encounter. However, they differ in their domain suffix, ending in “.onion” instead of more obvious options like “.com” (Tor is actually short for The Onion Router, which is also where the term “onion routing” comes from — referring to anonymous communication on the dark web).
Onion sites often use scrambled names that make their URLs difficult to remember, minimizing the odds of being reported to authorities. It’s possible to search the dark web using specialized dark web search engines like Grams or link lists like The Hidden Wiki. However, these sources tend to be slow and unreliable, just like the dark web itself.
Some of this information can be extremely valuable on darknet forums. For example, while a Social Security number might go for $2, email credentials could sell for as much as $120,000. Hackers can make a lot of money and do so with less worry that they might get caught. Thanks to the Tor browser’s layers of encryption and IP scrambling, it’s difficult to track people down on this part of the web.
Again, although the dark web isn’t inherently bad, you should still be proactive in preventing your personal information from falling into the wrong hands. Here are a few ways you can help keep you and your family safe online:
The dark web might sound scary. The fact is, an everyday internet user like yourself likely won’t have any contact with this level of the internet. That said, it’s still important to take as many precautions as you can to keep your family and your technology safe.
McAfee provides everyday internet users with the tools they need to surf safely and confidently. Our award-winning antivirus software protects against threats like phishing, malware, and ransomware, and we also offer identity protection plans that come with a personalized Protection Score to check the health of your online information. Start browsing with confidence by using McAfee.
The post The Dark Web: A Definitive Guide appeared first on McAfee Blog.
You open up your laptop and check the daily news. You see a headline stating that one of your favorite online retailers was breached and that thousands of their customers’ passwords were exposed. Data breaches like this frequently appear in the news, but many consumers don’t realize the implications these breaches have on their personal privacy. When data breaches occur, oftentimes billions of these hacked login credentials become available on the dark web, neatly packaged for criminals to download.1
Let’s dive into the differences between the deep web and the dark web, how cybercriminals use the dark web, and what you can do to protect your data.
You’ve probably heard of the deep and dark web but may not be aware of their differences.2 First, let’s start by noting that the dark web is always part of the deep web, but the deep web is not always the dark web.
The deep web refers to the pages on the internet that are not indexed in search engines, meaning that you can’t find them by performing a simple Google search. To access these pages, you have to know the exact address to the site and access it with specific software. Most personalized and password-protected sites appear on the deep web because they contain information that is not meant to be accessed by the general public. These sites include a user’s Netflix home page, password-protected sites for banking, and the internal sites of companies, organizations, and schools. These are all examples of legitimate areas of the deep web.
On the other hand, the dark web is the disreputable extension of the deep web. Like the deep web, the dark web also houses sites that are not indexed by search engines, but it also hides a user’s identity and location. It consists mostly of illegal products or content that could be harmful to organizations or the general public. Some examples include stolen credit card numbers, fake IDs, drugs, and hacking tools. To access the dark web, a user needs to download darknet software, the most popular being Tor.
Tor, which stands for “the onion routing project,” was developed by the U.S. Navy for the government in the mid-1990s. It was open-sourced in 2004, and that’s when it went public. Today, Tor is the dark web browser that the majority of people use to surf the internet anonymously. To do this, Tor hides a user’s IP address (or the unique address that identifies an internet-connected device or network) by bouncing their search request to multiple different locations. These bounces also referred to as relays, make it much harder for people to find users on the dark web.
Because of its ability to provide anonymity, the dark web is often tied to the world of cybercrime. Scammers frequently use the dark web to find software that allows them to access other people’s computers, banking credentials, Social Insurance Numbers, and credit card information. You may be wondering how all this private information ended up on the dark web in the first place. Oftentimes when a company is breached and their customers’ data is exposed, the hackers behind the breach will upload the stolen database to the dark web. This allows other cybercriminals to purchase the stolen information and use it to target users with other scams. Say that a criminal finds a database on the dark web that contains a bunch of personal email addresses. They can purchase the database and target every email address with a phishing campaign that contains malicious links that spread malware or attempt to trick users into handing over their username and password combinations.
Incorporating cybersecurity best practices into your daily life can help protect your data from hackers looking to take advantage of the data found on the dark web. Follow these tips to bring yourself greater peace of mind:
The chances of a hacker accessing your data are higher if you use the same credentials across different accounts. That’s why it’s important to use a strong, unique password for each of your online profiles. This minimizes the potential damage that could be done if a hacker does gain access to one of your accounts. You can also use a password manager with a built-in generator to make it easier for you to access and manage passwords. Enabling multi-factor authentication will also ensure that hackers cannot access your information using only your login credentials.
If you receive an email asking you to take immediate action, stop and think. Criminals often convey urgency in their phishing scams in the hopes that an unsuspecting user will click on a malicious link or hand over their personal details without considering the legitimacy of the message. Examine suspicious emails carefully to check for telltale signs of phishing, such as poor grammar, grainy logos, or bogus links. If an email claims to be from a well-known company or brand and asks for your credentials, claims that you need to update your password, or sends you a “free offer,” go directly to the source. Contact customer service through the company’s website (not the email) and inquire about the urgent request.
Be on the lookout for breach notices from relevant companies since they are often the first to know about a data breach impacting their online customers. Create news alerts for companies that have access to your information to stay notified of the latest events.
Additionally, create notifications for your bank and other financial accounts to monitor suspicious activity, such as unauthorized transactions or a drop in credit score. You will be better prepared to mitigate any cybersecurity threats with the right security software and knowledge of the latest risks.
Use a comprehensive security solution like McAfee Total Protection, which includes dark web monitoring for up to 10 email addresses. This software actively monitors the dark web for data breaches and exposed information. Personal details include but are not limited to your date of birth, email addresses, credit card numbers, and personal identification numbers. It also provides steps for remediation after a data breach to help you regain control and the integrity of your data and privacy. With a security solution like this in place, you can continue to live your connected life confidently.
The post What is the Dark Web? Everything You Need to Know appeared first on McAfee Blog.
The gig economy has become more prevalent in today’s world with the appeal and necessity of flexible work opportunities. Many take advantage of short-term contracts, side jobs, and freelance work to retain more control over how they spend their day and earn their income. However, the proliferation of these flexible work opportunities has transcended into the dark web, allowing individuals to conduct nefarious activities. Rather than contracting handyman or moving services on the dark web, you can find hackers contracting their website hacking services or buyers placing ads looking for a hacker to hire. These acts pose significant risks to online users, given the amount of stolen personal information on dark websites. Take a look at the activities you can expect to find on the dark web and the steps you can take to safeguard your online privacy.
The dark web is part of the public internet that search engines do not index. In other words, what happens on the dark web, stays on the dark web with no traceable records. Most people don’t realize that the dark web is not illegal despite its association with criminal activities. However, the dark web has retained a criminal reputation since it is challenging to track what goes on. As a result, criminals will often frequent the dark web to conduct a variety of illegal transactions, including hacking services.
Researchers are discovering an uptick in activity on dark web forums that includes buying and selling black hat hacking services. 90% of the activity on these forums is from people looking to hire hackers to infiltrate websites and steal databases. Additionally, 4% of the people frequenting dark web forums requested hacking services related to website hacking and malicious code injection.
Another 7% of people on the dark web are hackers contracting out their services and tools. These services and tools include web shells, a file uploaded to a server that an attacker can use to execute operating system commands, as well as access to administrative website interfaces and ready-made exploits. Many of the services offered on these forums range in specialties such as site infiltration to data extraction. As a result, they often attract a variety of customers with numerous requests.
Further, many of the ads seeking hacking services are aimed at database hacking. Those targeting databases are often financially incentivized hackers and companies out to steal their competitor’s information. Databases remain a popular target for hackers since they contain a significant amount of personal information ranging from first and last names to credit card numbers. Cybercriminals can then use this information to commit numerous crimes such as monetary theft, unemployment and tax relief fraud, and identity theft.
For example, the Canada Revenue Agency (CRA) had to suspend approximately 800,000 accounts after discovering matching credentials for sale on the dark web. In a previous data breach, hackers used login credentials to access taxpayer accounts, apply for COVID-19 relief funds, and reroute the funds into their bank accounts. Taxpayers could not log in to their accounts without first taking the necessary steps to regain safe access.
Users must protect their online presence and information as these criminal activities continue to escalate in demand. Here are the five must-dos after discovering a data breach to retain your online security.
Be one of the first to know about a data breach by leveraging security software such as McAfee Total Protection. A comprehensive security solution that includes dark web monitoring actively monitors the dark web for data breaches and exposed information. This information includes but is not limited to your date of birth, email addresses, credit card numbers, and personal identification numbers. Robust security software also provides steps for remediation after a data breach to guide the user to regain control and integrity of their data and privacy.
Companies are required to notify their customers of a data breach under the PIPEDA legislature. Be on the lookout for breach notices from relevant companies since they are often the first to know about a data breach impacting their online customers.
Create news alerts for companies that have access to your information to stay notified of the latest events. Additionally, create notifications for your bank and other financial accounts to monitor for suspicious activity such as unauthorized transactions or a drop in credit score. You will be better prepared to mitigate any cybersecurity threats with the right security software and knowledge of the latest risks.
Looking back to the 800,00 taxpayers whose accounts were suspended, they could not regain access without first changing their login credentials. Changing your login credentials such as your usernames, passwords, and security questions is a critical first step to take after any data breach.
Changing your credentials prevents hackers from accessing your personal information and ensures that you regain control over your account security. The chances of a hacker accessing your data are exceptionally high if you use the same credentials across different accounts. Thus, it’s essential to change your usernames and passwords regularly to ensure your information remains secure.
Just as important as changing your password regularly is changing your password following best practices. Create stronger passwords by using a combination of the following:
Long passwords with a minimum of 12 characters are also more effective than shorter passwords since it makes it more difficult for a hacker to guess. In sum, ensure all passwords are long, complex, and only used once. Use a password manager with a built-in generator like the one included in McAfee’s Total Protection solution to make it easier to access and manage passwords.
If your credentials are exposed in a data breach, using multifactor authentication will ensure hackers cannot access your information using only your login credentials. So even if your username and password are exposed, there is still a layer of security that hackers will not be able to bypass. Block out unauthorized login attempts by enabling multifactor authentication wherever applicable.
The dark web continues to be a primary destination for cybercrime. Online users must remain cautious about the information they retain in their online accounts and the websites with access to their personal information. Your data security and privacy are not always a guarantee, but the more precautions you take with your online safety, the better protected you will be.
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 newsletter, listen to our podcast Hackable?, and ‘Like’ us on Facebook.
The post The Rise of the Dark Web Gig Economy appeared first on McAfee Blogs.
In the eyes of hackers, scammers, and thieves, your online privacy and identity look like a giant jigsaw puzzle. One that they don’t need every piece to solve. They only need a few bits to do their dirty work, which means protecting every piece you put out there—a sort of holistic view on your personal security. One that protects you, not just your devices.
Here’s what’s at stake: we create and share loads of personal information simply by going about our day online, where each bit of information makes up a piece of that giant jigsaw puzzle. Some pieces directly identify us, like our tax returns, bank account information, or driver’s licenses. Other pieces of information indirectly identify us, like the IP addresses assigned to our computers, tablets, and phones—or device ID numbers, location information, and browsing history. And bad actors only need a few key pieces to do you harm, such as committing identity crime in your name or selling your personal information on sketchy websites or the dark web.
While people show great concern about their personal information, who has it and what’s done with it, our research shows that 70% of people feel like they have little or no control over the data that’s collected about them. However, you have plenty of ways that you can indeed take control—ways that can prevent, detect, and correct attacks on your privacy and identity. That’s where holistic protection comes in.
You can think of holistic protection as layers of shields that protect you and the devices you use. It gives you three layers in all—a Prevention Layer, Detection Layer, and a Correction Layer.
A holistic and comprehensive security solution like McAfee+ combines those three layers in a way that protects your personal information and keep your identity private, showing you how it does it along the way, so you can see exactly how safe you are. Let’s take a quick look of some of the protections you’ll find in each layer …
In the Prevention Layer, you’ll see:
In the Detection Layer, you have …
In the Correction Layer, several other protections have your back …
These are just a few examples of the protections in each layer. And you’ll find our most comprehensive holistic protection in McAfee+ Ultimate, covering your privacy, identity, and devices.
While your online privacy and identity may look a jigsaw puzzle, protecting it shouldn’t be as complicated. With a holistic security solution for your personal protection, you can minimize your exposure with layers of security that do much of the work for you.
Antivirus on your PC is not enough. It has not been enough for many decades now. And this becomes more evident as we continue to spend more time online, with the average person spending 6 hours and 54 minutes online each day, leaving clouds of personal information in their wake.
While standalone apps like a password manager, a VPN app, and an identity solution from different vendors can be piecemealed together with your device security, these are difficult to keep track of and burdensome to maintain.
We have combined the important tools you need into a seamless and comprehensive experience because good security software is something that you use daily to feel safer online. This is why we are working on your behalf to redefine security, so you can enjoy your connected life with confidence.
The post True Security Requires a Holistic Approach appeared first on McAfee Blog.
How our new identity & privacy app can help
By this point in the year you may have already broken some of your New Year’s resolutions, but here’s one to keep: better protecting your online privacy.
After all, we are likely to continue to spend more time online in 2021, whether it be for working, learning, or shopping. This makes taking some preventative steps to shield our identity information more important than ever.
That’s why McAfee has been working on a new identity and privacy app for safeguarding your personal information, and we’d love for you to try it if you’re in the U.S.
Here’s a little bit about our approach. We looked at some of the key areas where users’ private information can be vulnerable, and designed a tool that offers easy-to-use, proactive protection for Windows, Android, and iOS devices, with consistent, familiar experiences regardless of the platform.
We know, for instance, that users are vulnerable when using unsecured networks, like public Wi-Fi. This is where a cybercriminal can potentially capture your login credentials and other personal information as it flows over the network, from your laptop to your bank’s website, for example.
So, we made sure to include a Virtual Private Network (VPN) to keep your information protected from prying eyes. It does this easily, and even automatically, by detecting when you’re on a public network and prompting you to turn on your VPN. The VPN then scrambles, or encrypts, your data as it flows over the network. Unlike some VPNs that require advanced settings to shield your data, our app offers seamless security.
Another area of high risk that we want to address is data breaches. Whether one of your personal accounts is hacked–or worse–another website somehow gets ahold of your data and subsequently gets breached, your data may end up on the dark web. This is where cybercriminals buy and sell information.
To detect these dangerous leaks, we included dark web monitoring, which alerts you if your login credentials have been exposed. It can even provide you with a link to the site that uses those credentials when the information is available. This allows you to swiftly reset your passwords, mitigating the risk.
Given that we saw a spike in corporate data breaches in 2020, where 58% of victims had their personal data compromised, I believe this kind of always-on monitoring of your private information is key.
Most importantly, we wanted to make this personal protection app easy to use and available across all your compatible devices. So, whether you’re out with just your phone, or home working at your PC, you have access to your protection, and can even pick up where you left off on a different device.
I know that organizing my digital life gives me one less thing to worry about, and I hope it’s the same for you. Give the app a try, and please let us know what you think since we are always open to your feedback.
Here’s to a happy and secure year!
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 Let’s Commit To Protect Our Privacy This Year appeared first on McAfee Blogs.
We’ve all been spending more of our time online since the crisis hit. Whether it’s ordering food for delivery, livestreaming concerts, holding virtual parties, or engaging in a little retail therapy, the digital interactions of many Americans are on the rise. This means we’re also sharing more of our personal and financial information online, with each other and the organizations we interact with. Unfortunately, as ever, there are bad guys around every digital corner looking for a piece of the action.
The bottom line is that personally identifiable information (PII) is the currency of internet crime. And cyber-criminals will do whatever they can to get their hands on it. When they commit identity theft with this data, it can be a messy business, potentially taking months for banks and businesses to investigate before you get your money and credit rating back. At a time of extreme financial hardship, this is the last thing anyone needs.
It therefore pays to be careful about how you use your data and how you protect it. Even more: it’s time to get proactive and monitor it—to try and spot early on if it has been stolen. Here’s what you need to know to protect your identity data.
How identity theft works
First, some data on the scope of the problem. In the second quarter of 2020 alone 349,641 identity theft reports were filed with the FTC. To put that in perspective, it’s over half of the number for the whole of 2019 (650,572), when consumers reported losing more than $1.9 billion to fraud. What’s driving this huge industry? A cybercrime economy estimated to be worth as much as $1.5 trillion annually.
Specialized online marketplaces and private forums provide a user-friendly way for cyber-criminals and fraudsters to easily buy and sell stolen identity data. Many are on the so-called dark web, which is hidden from search engines and requires a specialized anonymizing browser like Tor to access. However, plenty of this criminal activity also happens in plain sight, on social media sites and messaging platforms. This underground industry is an unstoppable force: as avenues are closed down by law enforcement or criminal in-fighting, other ones appear.
At-risk personal data could be anything from email and account log-ins to medical info, SSNs, card and bank details, insurance details and much more. It all has a value on the cybercrime underground and the price fraudsters are prepared to pay will depend on supply and demand, just like in the ‘real’ world.
There are various ways for attackers to get your data. The main ones are:
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The COVID-19 challenge
As if this weren’t enough, consumers are especially exposed to risk during the current pandemic. Hackers are using the COVID-19 threat as a lure to infect your PC or steal identity data via the phishing tactics described above. They often impersonate trustworthy institutions/officials and emails may claim to include new information on outbreaks, or vaccines. Clicking through or divulging your personal info will land you in trouble. Other fraud attempts will try to sell counterfeit or non-existent medical or other products to help combat infection, harvesting your card details in the process. In March, Interpol seized 34,000 counterfeit COVID goods like surgical masks and $14m worth of potentially dangerous pharmaceuticals.
Phone-based attacks are also on the rise, especially those impersonating government officials. The aim here is to steal your identity data and apply for government emergency stimulus funds in your name. Of the 349,641 identity theft reports filed with the FTC in Q2 2020, 77,684 were specific to government documents or benefits fraud.
What do cybercriminals do with my identity data?
Once your PII is stolen, it’s typically sold on the dark web to those who use it for malicious purposes. It could be used to:
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How do I protect my identity online?
The good news among all this bad is that if you remain skeptical about what you see online, are cautious about what you share, and follow some other simple rules, you’ll stand a greater chance of keeping your PII under lock and key. Best practices include:
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How Trend Micro can help
Trend Micro offers solutions that can help to protect your digital identity.
Trend Micro ID Security is the best way to get proactive about data protection. It works 24/7 to monitor dark web sites for your PII and will sound the alarm immediately if it finds any sign your accounts or personal data have been stolen. It features
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Trend Micro Password Manager enables you to manage all your website and app log-ins from one secure location. Because Password Manager remembers and recalls your credentials on-demand, you can create long, strong and unique passwords for each account. As you’re not sharing easy-to-remember passwords across multiple accounts, you’ll be protected from popular credential stuffing and similar attacks.
Finally, Trend Micro WiFi Protection will protect you if you’re out and about connecting to WiFi hotspots. It automatically detects when a WiFi connection isn’t secure and enables a VPN—making your connection safer and helping keep your identity data private.
In short, it’s time to take an active part in protecting your personal identity data—as if your digital life depended on it. In large part, it does.
The post Identity Fraud: How to Protect Your Identity Data, Accounts and Money During the Coronavirus Crisis appeared first on .
We’re all getting a little more worldly wise to the dangers that lurk around every corner of our digital lives. We know that the flipside of being able to shop, chat, bank and share online at the push of a button is the risk of data theft, ransomware and identity fraud. That’s why we protect our families’ PCs and mobile devices with security solutions from proven providers like Trend Micro, and take extra care each time we fire up the internet.
But what about the firms that we entrust to handle our data securely?
Unfortunately, many of these organizations still aren’t doing enough to protect our personal and financial information. It could be data we enter online to pay for an item or open an account. Or it could be payment card details that we’ve used at a local outlet which are subsequently stored online. These companies are big targets for the bad guys, who only have to get lucky once to crack open an Aladdin’s Cave of lucrative customer data.
What does this mean? That data breaches are the new normal. Last year in the US there were a reported 1,473 of these incidents, exposing nearly 165 million customer records. The latest affected customers of convenience store and gas station chain Wawa — and it could be one of the biggest ever, affecting 30 million cards.
Let’s take a look at what happened, and what consumers can do to steal a march on the bad guys.
What happened this time?
Wawa first notified its customers of a payment card breach in December 2019. But although the firm discovered malware on its payment processing servers that month, it had actually been sitting there since March, potentially siphoning card data silently from every single Wawa location. That’s more than 850 stores, across Pennsylvania, New Jersey, Delaware, Maryland, Virginia, Florida, and Washington DC.
The company itself has so far declined to put a number on how many customers have been affected. However, while cardholders were still wondering whether they’ve been impacted or not, something else happened. At the end of January, a hacker began to upload the stolen cards to a notorious dark web marketplace, known as Joker’s Stash.
They are claiming to have 30 million stolen cards in total, which if accurate could make this one of the biggest card breaches of its kind, placing it alongside other incidents at Home Depot (2014) and Target (2013).
How does it affect me?
Once the data goes on sale on a dark web market like this, it is usually bought by scammers, who use it in follow-on identity fraud attacks. In this case, the stolen data includes debit and credit card numbers, expiration dates and cardholder names, but not PINs or CVV records. That means they can’t be used at ATMs and fraudsters will find it hard to use the cards online, as most merchants require the CVV number.
However, if the cards are of the old magstripe type, they could be cloned for use in face-to-face transactions.
Although Wawa said it has informed the relevant card issuers and brands, the cardholders themselves must monitor their cards for unusual transactions and then report to their issuer “in a timely manner” if they want to be reimbursed for any fraudulent usage. This can be a distressing, time-consuming process.
What should I do next?
This is by no means the first and it won’t be the last breach of this kind. In the past, data stolen from customers of Hilton Hotels, supermarket chain Hy-Vee, retailer Bebe Stores, and restaurant chains including Krystal, Moe’s and Schlotzsky’s has turned up for sale on Joker’s Stash. It can be dispiriting for consumers to see their personal data time and again compromised in this way by cyber-criminals.
Too often in the aftermath of such incidents, the customers themselves are left in the dark. There is no information on whether they’ve definitively had their personal or card data stolen, just an ominous sense that something bad may be about to happen. If the company itself doesn’t even know how many cards have been affected, how can you act decisively?
Credit monitoring is often provided by breached firms, but this is a less-than-perfect solution. For one thing, such services only alert the user if a new line of credit is being opened in their name — not if a stolen card is being used. And second, they only raise the alarm after the incident, by which time the fraudsters may already have made a serious dent in your finances.
Monitoring your bank account for fraudulent transactions is arguably more useful in cases like the Wawa breach, but it’s still too reactive. Here’s a handy 2-step plan which could provide better results:
Step 1: Dark web monitoring works
To get more proactive, consumers need Dark Web monitoring. These tools typically scour dark web sites like Joker’s Stash to look for your personal information. The beauty of this approach is that it can raise the alarm after a breach has occurred, when the data is posted to the Dark Web, but before a fraudster has had time to monetize your stolen details. With this information, you can proactively request that your lender block a particular card and issue a new one.
This approach works for all personal data you may want to keep protected, including email addresses, driver’s license, passport numbers and passwords.
Step 2: Password protection
Once you’ve determined that your data has been part of a breach and is being sold on the dark web, one of the most important things you can do is to change your passwords to any stolen accounts, in order to minimize the potential damage that fraudsters can do.
This is where password manager tools can come in very handy. They allow users to store and recall long, strong and unique credentials for each of the websites and apps they use. This means that if one password is compromised, as in a breach scenario, your other accounts will remain secure. It also makes passwords harder for hackers to guess, which they may try to do with automated tools if they already have your email address.
Following a breach, it also makes sense to look out for follow-on phishing attacks which may try to trick you into handing over more information to the fraudsters. Here are a few tips:
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How Trend Micro can help
Fortunately, Trend Micro has several products that can help you, as a potential or actual victim of a data breach, to proactively mitigate the fallout from a serious security incident, or to foil the fraudsters:
Trend Micro ID Security: checks if your personal information has been uploaded to Dark Web sites by hackers. This highly secure service, available in apps for Android and iOS mobile devices, uses data hashing and an encrypted connected to keep your details safe, alerting when it has found a match on the Dark Web so you can take action. Use it to protect your emails, credit card numbers, passwords, bank accounts, passport details and more.
Trend Micro Password Manager: provides a secure place to store, manage and update your passwords. It remembers your log-ins, so you can create secure and unique credentials for each website/app you need to sign-in to. This means if one site is breached, hackers will not be able to use that password to open your other accounts. Password Manager is available for Windows, Mac, iOS, and Android, synchronizing your passwords across all four platforms.
Trend Micro Fraud Buster: is a free online service you can use to check suspicious emails It uses advanced machine learning technology to identify scam emails that don’t contain malicious URLs or attachments but still pose a risk to the user, because the email (which may be extortionist) reflects the fact that the fraudster probably got your email address from the Dark Web in the first place. Users can then decide to report the scam, get more details, or proceed as before.
Fraud Buster is also now integrated into Trend Micro Security for Windows, protecting Gmail and Outlook webmail in Internet Explorer, Chrome, and Firefox. It’s also integrated in Trend Micro Antivirus for Mac, where it does the same for Gmail webmail in Safari, Chrome and Firefox on the Mac.
In the end, only you can guard your identity credentials with vigilance.
The post The Wawa Breach: 30 Million Reasons to Try Dark Web Monitoring appeared first on .
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