LinkedIn Announces LinkedIn Games

Posted in Commentary with tags on May 2, 2024 by itnerd

LinkedIn has announced the launch of the brand-new LinkedIn games,  a daily lineup of three new thinking-oriented games, for the company’s more than 1 billion users worldwide (23.7 million users in Canada). There’s no question puzzle based games are popular and LinkedIn’s new Pinpoint, Queens and Crossclimb aremeant to encourage people to take a quick break and exercise their minds.  The games create moments of camaraderie that help professionals find common ground, break the ice, and spark conversations.

More details are available from LinkedIn Editor in Chief, Dan Roth and Lakshman Somasundaram, Director of Product Management at LinkedIn who both announced the launch on LinkedIn. 

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Sharp HealthCare Partners with AHEAD for Cloud Transformation

Posted in Commentary with tags on May 2, 2024 by itnerd

 AHEAD, a leading national provider of cloud, data, and digital engineering solutions, announces that it is engaged with Sharp HealthCare, a not-for-profit integrated health system based in Southern California, to define and implement a cloud strategy together with Amazon Web Services (AWS).

The AHEAD team was tasked with creating a 10-year total cost of ownership (TCO) / return on investment (ROI) of cloud services, including Compute, Storage, Backup, Disaster Recovery, Networking, and additional costs to provide Sharp HealthCare with a comparison to their pre-existing on-premises and co-location operating costs.

AHEAD then initiated the setup of an AWS cloud environment to extract data from a cloud-hosted Epic database to an AWS account and then load into Snowflake. Completing this rapid environment design and setup in six weeks led Sharp to choose AHEAD for the next phase of the project, which involved completing the build-out of their AWS landing zone.

Key benefits of the work completed by AHEAD include:

  • A better understanding of the economics of Sharp’s cloud journey, creating the foundation on which targeted initiatives could be planned and executed.
  • Technical guidance and mentoring that enabled Sharp’s development team to learn from AHEAD experts.
  • The ability for Sharp to leverage the power of AWS without compromising on security, compliance, or operational efficiency.

Through AHEAD’s guidance and training, they have put Sharp HealthCare in an advantageous position to leverage the full spectrum of AWS services, including networking, governance, security, automation, and infrastructure as code (IaC). This enablement of Sharp’s engineering and development teams will pave the way for future innovation while delivering consistent value to their patients and stakeholders on AWS.

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Cyware Announces Cyware Quarterback

Posted in Commentary with tags on May 2, 2024 by itnerd

Cyware, a leading provider of threat intelligence management, security orchestration and automation, and cyber fusion solutions, today introduced Cyware Quarterback, a simple-to-use AI-powered interface which will provide its enterprise customers and network members (ISACs, ISAOs, CERTs, MSSPs) a new way to efficiently perform actions on their security infrastructure. 

Cyware Quarterback aims to democratize AI by adding an artificial intelligence layer on any organization’s set of disparate cybersecurity tools to assist in complex decision-making and effectiveness.

It’s understood to be the only AI platform in the cybersecurity industry and AI ecosystem that’s designed to scale, optimize, and accelerate an organization’s security team’s effectiveness to reduce risks.

Cyware Quarterback can perform actions such as investigation and hunting, policy management, threat quarantine, case escalation, and more across 400+ cybersecurity and IT tools in reusable and composable playbooks, reducing overall mean time to respond (MTTR) and increasing threat-hunting productivity. It is purpose-built to empower analysts to make faster, more informed decisions, automating incident response by connecting applications, systems, and people as well as turning threat intel into intelligent actions. 

Investigating large volumes of incidents with specialized custom interfaces of different products is tedious, time consuming, and replete with complex manual processes to locate and distribute pertinent intelligence – creating delays that degrade an organization’s security posture. 

Cyware Quarterback gives security teams another team player that works with security analysts to elevate their capabilities and aid in complex threat response, saving time and effort while keeping them (humans) in control.

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Horizon3.ai Announces Matt Hartley As CRO

Posted in Commentary with tags on May 2, 2024 by itnerd

Horizon3.ai today announced the appointment of Matt Hartley as Chief Revenue Officer (CRO), effective immediately. With a robust background in sales and cybersecurity, he joins at a crucial phase to help drive the company’s global expansion and reinforce its market leadership in autonomous security solutions.

Hartley brings over 20 years of sales and operations excellence with a proven track record of building go-to-market (GTM) teams that achieve rapid scale and predictability across the revenue lifecycle. He is passionate about helping customers leverage technology to generate demonstrable business value, and his experience in cybersecurity and managing sales organizations in mid-stage companies is unmatched.

Matt joins Horizon3.ai during a period of rapid expansion, driven by its pioneering role as the premier provider of autonomous penetration testing solutions. This innovation empowers IT, cybersecurity, and Managed Security Service Providers (MSSPs) to minimize security risks effortlessly and continuously. NodeZero™ assists in identifying exploitable vulnerabilities, provides precise recommendations for prioritizing and addressing these issues, and facilitates immediate validation of the effectiveness of their remedies.

Driven by its consistent revenue growth, Horizon3.ai is actively increasing its workforce in all areas, including additional key leadership roles. The company expressed sincere thanks to Bob Cariddi, the former CRO, who led all GTM initiatives through this tremendous growth period before moving on to a key advisory role within the company.

Hartley’s appointment continues his role in leading key growth aspects for companies with solutions that are widely adopted by Fortune 1000 organizations and targeted sectors. Prior to joining Horizon3.ai, Matt served as the Chief Revenue Officer at HYPR, a leader in phishing-resistant authentication, and at iboss, a company focused on SASE/SSE. Before iboss, he was a sales leader at Forescout, where he built their US Federal unit and later scaled the business as the VP of Americas Sales. Earlier, he was General Manager at Optio Labs, head of Federal sales at MobileIron, and held regional sales positions at various technology companies.

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Today Is World Password Day

Posted in Commentary with tags , , on May 2, 2024 by itnerd

World Password Day is today. It started as a sort of Valentine’s Day (i.e., a completely made-up day) to remind everyone to pay extra close attention to log-ins so as not to fall prey to bad actors. Nowadays, the day just seems like more of a reminder of how hackable we all are.

Below are the thoughts of some industry experts on World Password Day:

Ted Miracco, CEO, Approov

https://www.linkedin.com/in/tedmiracco

“Despite the availability of more secure methods, too many systems still rely solely on passwords for protection. This makes them vulnerable to textbook attacks such as phishing, keylogging, and credential stuffing. Combining mobile attestation with token-based API access presents a more robust and user-friendly alternative to traditional password-based authentication, particularly in mobile environments. By shifting the security focus from something the user knows (password) to something the user has (a secure device) and something the user can access (a token), the security model becomes inherently multi-factor, without the added friction typically associated with 2FA methods. This approach effectively addresses both security and usability, which are critical for mobile device interactions and the protection of sensitive data in mobile applications.”

Craig Harber, Security Evangelist: Open Systems

https://www.linkedin.com/in/craig-harber-531883188/

“Strong passwords are essential but cannot be a standalone defense mechanism to deter threat actors. The optimal length for a password depends on various factors, but security experts generally agree that a longer password is more secure. However, if the passwords are too long and too complex, users will write them down, defeating the purpose. Strong passwords must be paired with Multi-Factor Authentication (MFA) to provide a significant hurdle to stop threat actors. 

“So, as we celebrate another World Password Day, it’s important to remember that without a unique, random, and complex password acting as the first line of defense, the additional protection of MFA is weakened.”

Albert Martinek, cyber threat intelligence analyst, Horizon3.ai
https://www.linkedin.com/in/albert-martinek-6267aa227/

“As the trend remains from last year, cyber threat actors don’t typically use sophisticated hacking tools and techniques like zero-day exploits to gain access to a network; they simply log in with legitimate user credentials. Once they gain initial access, threat actors then appear as legitimate users and can move laterally within a network to gain further access and establish persistence, steal sensitive data, bring down systems, and/or hold the organization hostage through ransomware.

“To help harden organizational systems and networks, as well as your personal accounts, implementing strong password policies are key. This includes sophistication and length requirements as described in the latest recommendations from NIST Special Publication 800-63B to include: 12 characters or more; no passwords matching the list of known breached passwords, no passwords derived from dictionary terms, contextual terms (company name, products name, etc.), or user information (first name, username, DOB, etc.); and uniqueness.” 

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Verizon Data Breach Investigations Report For 2024 Is Out

Posted in Commentary with tags on May 2, 2024 by itnerd

Verizon has released the 2024 Data Breach Investigations Report (DBIR). The report, as always has a wealth of great statistics to choose from. Here’s the key takeaways:

  • Vulnerability exploitation surged by nearly 3X (180%) last year.
  • Ransomware and the meteoric rise of extortion techniques accounted for a third (32%) of all breaches.
  • More than two-thirds (68%) of breaches involve a non-malicious human element.
  • 30,458 security incidents and 10,626 confirmed breaches were analyzed in 2023—a two-fold increase over 2022.
  • Verizon security by the numbers: 4,200+ networks managed globally, 34 trillion raw logs processed/year, and 9 security operation centers around the globe.

Ted Miracco, CEO, Approov Mobile Security:

   “The fact that it takes 55 days for organizations to remediate 50% of critical vulnerabilities listed in the CISA’s KEV catalog after patches are available points to a significant gap, that presents a critical window of opportunity for attackers to exploit known vulnerabilities. it is crucial for organizations to streamline their vulnerability scanning and patching procedures to outpace malicious activities. Without timely and comprehensive vulnerability information, organizations are at an extreme disadvantage in securing their systems against known exploits.”

I would register to get this report and spend some time reading it in detail. It will give you a roadmap as to secure your organization from the ever growing threats that seem to be everywhere these days.

UPDATE: Darren Williams, CEO and Founder, BlackFog adds this comment:

     “Mirroring BlackFog’s own data this report shows a significant increase in attacks over previous years. While this report indicates 32% of all breaches involved extortion, BlackFog’s own data shows that 92% of all ransomware involves extortion, an important distinction in this subset. It is also important to point out once the data is stolen it can, and is often used to target multiple victims from the original source down to the individual themselves. This data is also used to target other victims months or years into the future and highlights the importance of preventing data exfiltration.”

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Token Advances Next-Generation MFA with New Token Ring Featuring BioTouch Secure

Posted in Commentary with tags on May 1, 2024 by itnerd

Token today announced the new Token Ring with BioTouch Securetm, a simple, fast, and user friendly way to protect organizations against phishing and ransomware cyberattacks. The new Token Ring features a high-resolution 508 DPI capacitive fingerprint sensor, a large capacity secure element, a capacitive-touch bezel, and NFC and Bluetooth communications. BioTouch Secure integrates fingerprint biometrics, the most secure form of user authentication, into an attractive wearable device for convenience and to prevent the loss or theft of authentication devices. The new Token Ring will be available starting in late Q2. The company will be demonstrating the new Token Ring at RSAC 2024 in the Token Booth, NXT-1 in the Next-Stage Expo.

The Ransomware Epidemic

Losses from ransomware attacks and data breaches are reaching new highs every year and will set another record in 2024. In numerous surveys of CISOs, the threat of ransomware attacks and data breaches is reported as the greatest cybersecurity risk to the organization. This year has already witnessed the first billion-dollar-plus ransomware loss, something unthinkable just a short time ago. Organizations of all types and sizes have become attractive targets for cybercriminals because most are using 20-year-old legacy MFA technology as their primary defense. The Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency (CISA), an operational component of the Department of Homeland Security (DHS), reports that 90% of successful cyberattacks start with a phishing email. The easy availability of non-technical tools on the dark web, including Ransomware-as-a-Service and Fraud GPT, have democratized cyberattacks and removed the technical barrier previously limiting the number of attacks.

The Benefits of Next-Generation MFA

The sophistication of cyberattacks and the technology integrated into modern cybersecurity solutions has advanced at an incredible pace while human skills have not kept pace. User vulnerabilities are the number one risk factor. The adoption of generative AI by cybercriminals means that phishing emails are becoming increasingly difficult for even the best trained user to detect. According to Rob Joyce, the Director of Cybersecurity at the National Security Agency (NSA), cybercriminals are using generative Artificial Intelligence (AI) Large Language Models such as ChatGPT to make their attacks appear more legitimate to native English speakers. The advent of deep fakes compounds the risk. Organizations that rely on 20-year-old MFA technology are at significant risk of credential theft, MFA prompt bombing, BYOD compromise, Adversary-in-the-Middle (AitM/MitM), and other common attack methods. Next-generation MFA eliminates all these vulnerabilities by removing user vulnerabilities from the process.

A Market in Desperate Need of a Solution to Ransomware

First introduced in 2023, Token Ring has received a tremendous response from the market. It offers security that stops phishing and ransomware attacks, has very fast implementation, integrates easily with every IAM, SSO, and PAM solution available, and is easy for users to adopt. The growing list of organizations awaiting evaluation (Proof of Concept) rings and engaged with Token includes:

  • 5 of the top 10 US financial institutions
  • 3 of the top 5 consulting firms
  • 3 of the top 5 US wireless providers
  • 2 of the largest healthcare providers
  • Major retailers, insurance providers, automakers, and businesses

Organizations have invested countless millions of dollars and innumerable hours of lost productivity training every user to be an expert at identifying phishing attacks and ways to avoid falling victim to attacks on MFA. Increasingly, these efforts are failing because outdated legacy MFA has not kept pace with modern cyberattacks.

Resources for more information about Token and Token Ring 

Token and Microsoft webcast:
Generative AI: A Game Changer for Infrastructure Security and Hacker Strategy
https://www.tokenring.com/blog/cybersecurity-generative-ai

Token and Cisco webcast:
Prioritize Your 2024 Cybersecurity To-Do List: Strategies and Insights for the Year Ahead
https://www.tokenring.com/blog/2024-cybersecurity-to-do-list

Token and Okta webcast:
The Increasing Importance of Identity Security in the Era of The Mega-Breach and Gen AI
https://www.tokenring.com/blog/2024-importance-of-identity-security

Token website: www.tokenring.com

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TikTok Is Trying To Dodge Apple App Store Fees

Posted in Commentary with tags on May 1, 2024 by itnerd

If TikTok isn’t in enough trouble as it is, you can add angering Apple to the list. TechCrunch is reporting that it appears that the beleaguered social network appears to be trying to dodge App Store fees:

TikTok may be routing around the App Store to save money on commissions. According to new findings, the ByteDance-owned social video app is presenting some of its users with a link to a website for purchasing the coins used for tipping digital creators. Typically, these coins are bought via in-app purchase, which requires a 30% commission paid to Apple.

The feature may be hidden from most users, either by design or because it’s only shown to users in a specific group, like testers or high spenders. In any event, those who do have access to the new option are seeing a screen that encourages them to “recharge” — that is, buy more coins — via tiktok.com. Although these screenshots were discovered within the iOS app by TechCrunch tipster David Tesler, it’s not clear how many TikTok users are seeing them or when or how they’re being shown.

Tesler says the option to purchase via the web was displayed to an account that had previously purchased a large amount of coins.

In some cases, users are shown a screen that includes a message such as “Try recharging on tiktok.com to avoid in-app service fees” followed by a “Try now” link. Other times, they may get a pop-up that says “Try recharging on tiktok.com” with another message about the potential savings. This one reads, “You can save the service fee and get access to popular payment methods,” and is followed by a big, red “Try now” button or a less prominent option that says “Don’t show again.”

That honestly is exactly the sort of thing that Epic Games tried to do which led to it being punted off the App Store, not to mention the Google Play store. If TikTok is truly that stupid to try this, I expect the same result. Which means that they won’t have to worry about the US Government shutting them down. Instead they will have to worry about Apple and presumably Google taking them out globally.

This should be fun to watch.

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Elon Caught Hyping Up Tesla’s Self Driving Claims To The Determent Of Having Safe Roads For All

Posted in Commentary with tags on May 1, 2024 by itnerd

Boy oh boy does Elon have a lot of issues at the moment. On top of sacking 10% of Tesla staff because sales have plummeted, then yesterday sacking the team behind the Supercharger network, which has to scare you if you have a Tesla or another EV with an NACS plug, the self driving capabilities of Tesla have come under scrutiny. An organization called The Dawn Project conducted tests on Tesla’s self driving capabilities, and the results were not good. In fact, if Tesla’s full self driving were to take a driving test, it would fail. To make matters worse, according to The Dawn Project, Tesla has not fixed any of these issues, but they also tried to silence them.

Classy Elon. Really Classy.

But we’re not done. The NTHSA has looked in this and said the following:

A comparison of Tesla’s design choices to those of L2 peers identified Tesla as an industry outlier in its approach to L2 technology by mismatching a weak driver engagement system with Autopilot’s permissive operating capabilities.

Translation: Tesla’s self-driving software lacks the necessary safeguards to protect people.

The NTHSA also said this:

Notably, the term “Autopilot” does not imply an L2 assistance feature, but rather elicits the idea of drivers not being in control. This terminology may lead drivers to believe that the automation has greater capabilities than it does and invite drivers to overly trust the automation. Peer vehicles generally use more conservative terminology like “assist,” “sense,” or “team” to imply that the driver and automation are intended to work together, with the driver supervising the automation.

Translation: Tesla’s marketing is kind of playing fast and loose with the term “Autopilot” giving consumers the perception that it is more capable than it really is.

The net result is that the NTHSA is taking another look into Tesla and self driving. And you can bet that this look is going to be far more involved than the last look that the government agency did. Which is a good thing because we all deserve to be safe on the roads. And if you have a company that might be throwing caution to the wind in order to sell cars, that company needs to be held accountable. That likely explains why Tesla cut the price on full self driving and gave away a free one month trial recently. Elon knows that accountability is coming, and it’s coming very soon.

Sucks to be you Elon.

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Appdome Announces Agentless Endpoint Detection Response

Posted in Commentary with tags on May 1, 2024 by itnerd

 Appdome today announced Appdome MobileEDR™, a new enterprise mobile app protection service that consolidates Mobile Threat Defense (MTD) and Endpoint Detection & Response (EDR) capabilities into a single agentless product offering. MobileEDR leverages the 300+ defenses of the Appdome platform and provides real-time mobile threat and attack detection, deep mobile device inspection and anywhere enforcement to keep enterprise networks and resources safe from malware, supply chain and other attacks.

Legacy MTD and mobile EDR solutions have failed to adequately protect against the growing proliferation of mobile threats. To work, these early offerings required user-dependent software agents, such as separate mobile apps or profiles, to be installed on the user’s mobile device(s). These added agents, apps and profiles raised privacy concerns among employees, slowed adoption and could be disabled by the mobile end user, leaving gaps in device inspection and mobile threat detection.  Likewise, these early offerings often impose a manual implementation burden and complex SDKs on resource constrained mobile development teams, leading most teams to shelve or abandon MTD and mobile EDR deployment. Appdome is eliminating this friction and delivering the world’s first agentless, no code, no server solution for enterprise mobile apps to ensure maximum enterprise adoption and protection.

The Appdome MobileEDR is an in-app mobile EDR and MTD solution coded into enterprise mobile applications by Appdome’s patented no-code, unified mobile app defense platform. By delivering the needed device inspection, threat detection and telemetry capabilities in the mobile app itself, Appdome provides continuous and comprehensive monitoring of Android and iOS devices, including mobile smartphones, embedded apps, VR apps, and wearable apps. All mobile threat inspections are performed throughout the lifecycle of use for each mobile app, without any server, server call outs or other external attestation. This ensures full runtime protection, improves stability and responsiveness, and eliminates signal spoofing common with server attestation services. 

Key features of Appdome MobileEDR solution include:

  • In-App Enterprise Delivery: Appdome MobileEDR is the only solution that can be deployed in both internally developed and 3rd party mobile applications without any code, coding, SDKs or servers. All mobile EDR/MTD capability is added in the enterprise application and hardened against reverse engineering and attacks by design.
  • In-Use Mobile Threat Inspection:  Once embedded in an enterprise mobile app, Appdome’s Threat-EKG feature functions as a persistent mobile EDR/MTD solution during the lifecycle of use for each mobile application. That means, it operates when the enterprise mobile application is in use (and does not operate when it’s not in use). This eliminates any privacy concerns and allows the mobile EDR/MTD to detects mobile threats relevant to the enterprise business in real time.
  • Broadest Mobile Threat Detection: Appdome packs 300+ mobile app security, anti-malware, anti-spyware, anti-vishing, anti-fraud, social engineering, geo-compliance, and anti-bot defenses into MobileEDR to offer enterprises the most comprehensive mobile device inspection, EDR and MTD on the market. 
  • Anywhere Enforcement: The Appdome MobileEDR’s Anywhere Enforcement™ model allows enterprises to use mobile threat detection and defense data across the entire enterprise infrastructure, including the mobile app, mobile app server, IAM service layer, UEM/MAM/MDM, or firewall/WAF. This ensures that enterprises can get the full benefit of deep device inspection on managed and unmanaged mobile devices.
  • Adaptive Mobile Trust: Appdome MobileEDR is the only mobile threat detection and defense system that empowers the enterprise to set the level of trust to use in evaluating on-device mobile threats. Enterprises can use either Zero-Trust, to ensure the device is free of any specific threat before allowing connection, login or activity in the mobile app. Or, Enterprises can use Dynamic Trust which evaluates the device state dynamically throughout the lifecycle of mobile app use.
  • Appdome ThreatSource™: Appdome MobileEDR comes ready to use with application userID or sessionID to give enterprises even deeper investigation and telemetry on threats and attacks impacting their users and network.
  • Appdome ThreatScope™ Mobile XDR: Telemetry data is visualized in ThreatScope, which provides instant visibility and rapid, agile response to any threat or attack against Android & iOS apps.

Appdome will be demonstrating the new Appdome MobileEDR solution at the RSA Conference 2024 in San FranciscoMay 6-9, 2024 in booth #2339. For more information about Appdome MobileEDR, please visit our web site at https://www.appdome.com/enterprise-mobile-app-security/mobile-endpoint-detection-and-response/.  

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