The hotel Romantik Seehotel Jaegerwirt, a 4 star hotel in the Austrian Alps, decided to pay a ransom of 1,500 Euros in bitcoin after hackers broke into the hotel’s systems and locked all the guests out of their rooms. Kind of a downside of the Internet of Things. If you can unlock your hotel room […]
Continue reading → [DISPLAY_ACURAX_ICONS]For Financial Service firms, the message is clear. Both FINRA and the SEC are looking over your shoulder to make sure that you are taking cyber security seriously. And the fines are not small. From hundreds of thousands to millions of dollars, firms big and small are getting whacked with fines. In 2014, the SEC […]
Continue reading → [DISPLAY_ACURAX_ICONS]I generally stay away from politics in this blog, but this item is an interesting intersection of security and politics. And, it is pretty unique. Most non-public sector businesses don’t have to worry about this. While they may or may not let employees use their business email for personal reasons, there are no laws or […]
Continue reading → [DISPLAY_ACURAX_ICONS]The St. Louis Public Library system was hit with a ransomware attack last week. All 17 branches; around 700 systems. The attackers asked for $35,000 to decrypt the 700 computers that were infected – translating to around $50 a computer. However the library told them to pound sand – or something like that, possibly, something […]
Continue reading → [DISPLAY_ACURAX_ICONS]Symantec, who is already on probation for issuing inappropriate SSL certificates, issued more than a hundred additional “illegit” certificates. SSL certificates – more technically TLS certificates – are the bits of technology required to make those “secure” web sites work. Certificates are issued by certificate authorities (CAs) – organizations who have supposedly set up processes […]
Continue reading → [DISPLAY_ACURAX_ICONS]When cyber criminals steal credit cards or buy stolen credit cards, they are buying somewhat of an unknown. Small time crooks test small numbers of cards by trying to use them at self service gas pumps in the middle of the night, but that doesn’t scale up and you run the risk of getting caught. […]
Continue reading → [DISPLAY_ACURAX_ICONS]