Security News Bites for February 21, 2025
Is Russia Reining-In Ransomware?
Historically, if you are a ransomware hacker you are in heaven in Russia as long as you don’t attack targets favored by the Kremlin. Putin has arrested, unexpectedly, Mikhail Pavlovich Matveev, a famous Russian hacker who was indicted in the U.S. He paid a fine and had to give Putin a bunch of his stolen crypto, but he is now free waiting for the next steps in the legal process. He is one of hundreds that were arrested late last year. It may be a way for Putin to signal to the US that he is willing to make a deal. Credit: Data Breach Today
Meta Confirms ‘Project Waterworth’ – Global Undersea Cable
Meta has confirmed that it will be building the world’s longest subsea cable, which will connect the US, Brazil, India, South Africa and other ‘key regions’. The cable will be laid as deep as 7,000 meters or around 20,000 feet below the surface. It will use new burial techniques, partly to solve the problem of Russia and China intentionally breaking the cables. Meta is already the part owner of 16 existing networks. By comparison, Google has a stake in 33 different networks. If you consume as much bandwidth as they do, you better own it. Credit: Tech Crunch
80% of Kids Under 13 Bypass Social Media Platform Restrictions
A study shows that more than 80% of kids under 13 are regularly bypassing age restriction policies on social media platforms. Half of 8 to 12 year olds surveyed said they had accessed social media using their parent’s accounts. That means that all of the laws in the world will have zero effect on stopping kids from accessing social media. Just saying. Credit: Cybernews
Musk Has to Work on His ChatBot Grok
A researcher asked Grok to analyze the last 1,000 posts Musk had posted for truth and veracity. Grok said that more than half of his posts were “false or misleading”. Specifically, it said 48% were true (mostly updates about his companies), 22% were false and 30% were misleading. Someone is likely to get fired. Credit: MSN
Cisco Says no Zero-Days Used in Largest Telecom Attack (Salt Typhoon)
The Chinese cyber attack that compromised at least 9 mega phone and Internet providers and compromised the government’s wiretap system was done the old fashioned way. They did use one known bug but that only worked because the company didn’t install known patches. For the rest of the attacks – they just used compromised employee credentials to get in. All the more reason to monitor for that. Credit: Data Breach Today
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