Lifeboat Foundation

shoppingmode Microsoft has officially resumed blocking Visual Basic for Applications (VBA) macros by default across Office apps, weeks after temporarily announcing plans to roll back the change.

“Based on our review of customer feedback, we’ve made updates to both our end user and our IT admin documentation to make clearer what options you have for different scenarios,” the company said in an update on July 20.

Earlier this February, Microsoft publicized its plans to disable macros by default in Office applications such as Access, Excel, PowerPoint, Visio, and Word as a way to prevent threat actors from abusing the feature to deliver malware.

The U.S. Department of Justice seized roughly $500,000 in ransom payments that a medical center in Kansas paid to North Korean hackers last year, along with cryptocurrency used to launder the payments, Deputy Attorney General Lisa Monaco said Tuesday.

The hospital quickly paid the attackers, but also notified the FBI, “which was the right thing to do for both themselves and for future victims,” Monaco said in a speech at the International Conference on Cyber Security at Fordham University in New York City.

The notification enabled the FBI to trace the payment through the blockchain, an immutable public record of cryptocurrency transactions.

The Council of the European Union (EU) said today that Russian hackers and hacker groups increasingly attacking “essential” organizations worldwide could lead to spillover risks and potential escalation.

“This increase in malicious cyber activities, in the context of the war against Ukraine, creates unacceptable risks of spillover effects, misinterpretation and possible escalation,” the High Representative on behalf of the EU said Tuesday.

“The latest distributed denial-of-service (DDoS) attacks against several EU Member States and partners claimed by pro-Russian hacker groups are yet another example of the heightened and tense cyber threat landscape that EU and its Member States have observed.”

Google’s Threat Analysis Group (TAG), whose primary goal is to defend Google users from state-sponsored attacks, said today that Russian-backed threat groups are still focusing their attacks on Ukrainian organizations.

In a report regarding recent cyber activity in Eastern Europe, Google TAG security engineer Billy Leonard revealed that hackers part of the Turla Russian APT group have also been spotted deploying their first Android malware.

They camouflaged it as a DDoS attack tool and hosted it on cyberazov[.]com, a domain spoofing the Ukrainian Azov Regiment.

A new air-gap cyberattack technique has entered the frame. The researchers are referring to it as “SATAn” and it basically involves using ordinary SATA cables to transmit data wirelessly.

Researchers at Rice University have shown how they can hack the brains of fruit flies to make them remote controlled. The flies performed a specific action within a second of a command being sent to certain neurons in their brain.

The team started by genetically engineering the flies so that they expressed a certain heat-sensitive ion channel in some of their neurons. When this channel sensed heat, it would activate the neuron – in this case, that neuron caused the fly to spread its wings, which is a gesture they often use during mating.

Continue reading “Scientists hack fly brains to make them remote controlled” »

Flipkart-owned Cleartrip, a flight booking platform, said that it suffered a major data breach in its internal systems.

In an email to customers, the company stated, “This is to inform you that there has been a security anomaly that entailed illegal and unauthorised access to a part of Cleartrip’s internal systems.”

However, the travel company assured them that no sensitive information pertaining to a user’s account had been compromised due to this incident, apart from a few personal details.

Researchers have raised the alarm about a “sudden” spike in cyberattacks attempting to exploit an unpatched vulnerability in WordPress Plugin.

Pegasus spy software was used to hack into the devices of dozens of Thai pro-democracy activists as part of an extensive espionage operation.

Pegasus spy software was used to hack into the devices of dozens of Thai pro-democracy activists as part of an extensive espionage operation.