by Simon Kenin

MuddyWater, also known as Static Kitten and Mercury, is a cyber espionage group that’s most likely a subordinate element within Iran’s Ministry of Intelligence and Security (MOIS).

Since at least 2017 MuddyWater has targeted a range of government and private organizations across sectors, including telecommunications, local government, defense, and oil and natural gas organizations, in the Middle East, Asia, Africa, Europe, and North America.

MuddyWater has various campaigns that are entirely different from each other. In this post we will focus on the most recent changes and observations of their campaign which utilizes spearphishing with legitimate remote administration tools.

Read full article: https://www.deepinstinct.com/blog/new-muddywater-threat-old-kitten-new-tricks

Synopsys-sponsored CISQ report finds existing vulnerabilities, software supply chain complexities and growing impact of technical debt as key drivers of increased cyberattacks, cost

MOUNTAIN VIEW, Calif., December 6, 2022 – Synopsys, Inc. (Nasdaq: SNPS) today revealed that software quality issues may have held the U.S. economy back to the tune of $2.41 trillion in 2022. This statistic is unearthed in ‘The Cost of Poor Software Quality in the US: A 2022 Report’. The report’s findings reflect that as of 2022, the cost of poor software quality in the U.S.—which includes cyber-attacks due to existing vulnerabilities, complex issues involving the software supply chain, and the growing impact of rapidly accumulating technical debt—have led to a build-up of historic software deficiencies.

Co-sponsored by Synopsys, the report was produced by the Consortium for Information & Software Quality (CISQ), an organization developing international standards to automate software quality measurement and promoting the development and maintenance of secure, reliable, and trustworthy software.

“Cybercrime is predicted to cost the world $7 trillion in 2022,” said report author, Herb Krasner, retired Professor of Software Engineering, University of Texas at Austin,. “With that top of mind, The Cost of Poor Software Quality in the US: A 2022 Report offers practical advice and specific guidance for software engineers, project teams, and organizational leaders to proactively improve the quality of the software they use and build. Now is the time to turn our attention to recent developments and emerging solutions to help improve the poor software quality situation as it now exists and stabilize and reduce the growth rate of CPSQ in the near future.”

The report highlights several key areas of CPSQ growth, including:

• Cybercrime losses due to a rising number of software vulnerabilities. Losses rose 64% from 2020 to 2021, and are on track for a further 42% increase from 2021 to 2022. The quantity and cost of cybercrime incidents have been on the rise for over a decade, and now account for a sum equivalent to the world’s third largest economy after the U.S. and China.
• Software supply chain problems with underlying third-party components are up significantly. This year’s report shows that the number of failures due to weaknesses in open source software components accelerated by an alarming 650% from 2020 to 2021.
• Technical debt has become the largest obstacle to making changes in existing code bases. Technical debt refers to software development rework costs from the accumulation of deficiencies leaving data and systems potentially vulnerable. This year’s report illustrates that deficiencies aren’t being resolved, leading technical debt to increase to approximately $1.52 trillion.

“In today’s complex software supply chain, just because a newly-added open source component is secure today, does not mean that it will be secure tomorrow,” said Dr. Anita D’Amico, Synopsys Software Integrity Group VP of Cross-Portfolio Solutions and Strategy and CISQ Board Member. “Creating a software Bill of Materials (SBOM) allows organizations to proactively gather a comprehensive inventory of the components used to make up a piece of software. That means when a new vulnerability is identified in an existing component, organizations can quickly identify where it is in their software and take action to remedy it.”

The report also found that operational failures, primarily due to cyber-attacks and open source deficiencies, have risen alongside technical debt as deficiencies aren’t being resolved at a comparable rate. With these rises, developments in technologies and practices to remediate issues have also matured considerably in recent years. Using software quality standards in association with related tooling solutions, assessing and monitoring third party and open source components, and applying patches in a timely manner are all key strategies in reducing CPSQ.

To learn more, download a copy of The Cost of Poor Software Quality in the US: A 2022 Report or read our blog post highlighting the report’s key takeaways.

About the Synopsys Software Integrity Group

Synopsys Software Integrity Group provides integrated solutions that transform the way development teams build and deliver software, accelerating innovation while addressing business risk. Our industry-leading portfolio of software security products and services is the most comprehensive in the world and interoperates with third-party and open source tools, allowing organizations to leverage existing investments to build the security program that’s best for them. Only Synopsys offers everything you need to build trust in your software. Learn more at www.synopsys.com/software.

About Synopsys

Synopsys, Inc. (Nasdaq: SNPS) is the Silicon to Software™ partner for innovative companies developing the electronic products and software applications we rely on every day. As an S&P 500 company, Synopsys has a long history of being a global leader in electronic design automation (EDA) and semiconductor IP and offers the industry’s broadest portfolio of application security testing tools and services. Whether you’re a system-on-chip (SoC) designer creating advanced semiconductors, or a software developer writing more secure, high-quality code, Synopsys has the solutions needed to deliver innovative products. Learn more at www.synopsys.com.

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Here is something I didn’t know when I purchased Amazon Ring cameras and Amazon Echo Dots: there is a webpage where law enforcement can fill out a form, say there’s a life-threatening emergency, and get access to your data without your consent, a court order, or any kind of warrant. There’s nothing in the Terms of Service about this, and the company has maintained for years that it helps police get consent first, but it’s happening anyhow.

Over the past seven months alone, Amazon has provided private Ring videos to law enforcement 11 times, the company told Senator Ed Markey (D-MA) in a letter dated July 1st and provided to press this week.

https://www.theverge.com/2022/7/14/23219419/amazon-ring-law-enforcement-no-warrant-no-consent

In the frantic first weeks of Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, the U.S. tech companies that control the world’s largest information hubs sprang into action. Responding to pressure from Western governments, social media apps like Facebook, Instagram and YouTube banned or throttled Russian state media accounts, beefed up their fact-checking operations, curtailed ad sales in Russia and opened direct lines to Ukrainian officials, inviting them to flag Russian disinformation and propaganda to be taken down.

Full article

Full article: https://www.cnn.com/2022/07/13/politics/cia-employee-convicted-joshua-schulte-data-leak/index.html

It’s practically a holiday at this point: Amazon Prime Day. Two days of ridiculous deals and savings.

Here’s what else is associated with the day: Phishing.

Amazon is already a popular phishing target. We’ve written about it in the past, here, here, and here.

Amazon is one of the most impersonated brands out there. Now, with a major spending holiday around the corner, phishers are at it again, trying to steal credentials and money.

Starting in June 2022, Avanan researchers have seen an uptick in spoofed Amazon attacks, whereby hackers are trying to steal credentials in the hopes that users will think it’s the actual Amazon brand emailing. In this attack brief, Avanan will analyze how hackers are spoofing Amazon to steal credentials.

Read full article: https://www.avanan.com/blog/with-prime-day-around-the-corner-be-on-the-lookout-for-these-amazon-scams

A quiet partnership of the world’s biggest technology companies, U.S. and NATO intelligence agencies, and Ukraine’s own nimble army of hackers has pulled off one of the surprises of the war with Russia, largely foiling the Kremlin’s brazen internet hacking operations.

Read full article: https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/2022/06/21/russia-ukraine-cyberwar-intelligence-agencies-tech-companies/