News

IT security

• March 28, 2023 28 Mar'23

  Ransomware attacks up 45% in February, LockBit responsible

  NCC Group says it observed a surge in ransomware attacks in February, with LockBit, BlackCat and BianLian all highly active

• March 27, 2023 27 Mar'23

  France latest to ban TikTok on government devices

  Following bans in the UK and US, France has moved to enact restrictions on TikTok, and other social media apps, on government devices

• March 27, 2023 27 Mar'23

  JP Morgan pilots palm and face-recognition technology in US

  JP Morgan is testing out its biometric payment technology in selected retailer stores and at the upcoming Formula 1 Grand Prix in Miami

• March 24, 2023 24 Mar'23

  National Crime Agency sting operation infiltrates cyber crime market

  The UK National Crime Agency has tricked thousands of potential cyber criminals into registering with a fake website pretending to offer tools for creating DDoS attacks

• March 24, 2023 24 Mar'23

  Aryaka expands SD-WAN, SASE offer to SMEs

  Having deployed its services to large enterprises and Fortune 100 companies for over a decade, software-defined networking technology focuses on small to medium-sized enterprises for secure access and wide area networks

• March 22, 2023 22 Mar'23

  Why Veeam thinks ransomware warranty payouts are unlikely

  Veeam Data Platform v12 offers a financial guarantee to customers that can’t restore after ransomware attacks, but the backup supplier is convinced it won’t be making many payouts

• March 22, 2023 22 Mar'23

  Government launches seven-year NHS cyber strategy

  The new Cyber Security Strategy for Health and Adult Social Care lays out a plan for promoting cyber resilience in the sector by 2030 to protect services and patients alike

• March 21, 2023 21 Mar'23

  Nordics move towards common cyber defence strategy

  Nordic countries agree to work together to improve their cyber defences amid increasing threat

• March 21, 2023 21 Mar'23

  How Mimecast thinks differently about email security

  Mimecast CEO Peter Bauer believes the company’s comprehensive approach towards email security has enabled it to remain relevant to customers for two decades

• March 21, 2023 21 Mar'23

  Hitachi Energy emerges as victim of Clop gang’s Fortra attack

  The power and energy division of Japanese conglomerate Hitachi has disclosed that it has fallen victim to a Clop cyber attack, but insists customer data is safe

• March 21, 2023 21 Mar'23

  GDS signs £24m worth of contracts for One Login

  As the Government Digital Service (GDS) prepares for the official end of Gov.uk Verify, it signs three new contracts for its successor programme, One Login

• March 21, 2023 21 Mar'23

  Ferrari rejects ransom demand after cyber attack

  Italian carmaker Ferrari says it will refuse to pay a ransom after an unspecified threat actor broke into its IT systems and stole customer data

• March 21, 2023 21 Mar'23

  Ransomware gangs harass victims to ‘bypass’ backups

  Analysis reveals how cyber criminal gangs are turning to extensive, targeted harassment campaigns to force victims to pay up, even if their backups are in good order

• March 20, 2023 20 Mar'23

  NCSC launches cyber check-up tools for SMEs

  The NCSC has launched two new security services aimed at SMEs that lack the resources to address cyber issues, and may underestimate their vulnerability to attack

• March 20, 2023 20 Mar'23

  NatWest announces ID service for its customers

  The identities of NatWest customers engaging with businesses online can be confirmed by the bank's ID service in seconds

• March 20, 2023 20 Mar'23

  BBC cracks down on TikTok after review

  The BBC is asking staff not to install TikTok on corporate-owned devices without a justified business purpose, although its use will still be allowed to share media content with its audiences

• March 17, 2023 17 Mar'23

  UK TikTok ban gives us all cause to consider social media security

  The UK government’s ban on TikTok should give all organisations cause to look into what information social media platforms are collecting on us, and what they are using it for

• March 17, 2023 17 Mar'23

  UK government to create code of practice for generative AI firms

  The code will look to strike a balance between copyright holders and generative AI firms so that both parties can benefit from the use of copyrighted material in training data

• March 16, 2023 16 Mar'23

  BEC attacks doubled in 2022, outstripping ransomware

  Massive growth in the volume of Business Email Compromise or BEC attacks was linked to a surge in successful phishing campaigns, according to data from Secureworks

• March 16, 2023 16 Mar'23

  TikTok banned on UK government devices

  The UK government has followed in the footsteps of its US and European counterparts and banned the use of Chinese social media app TikTok on official devices

• March 16, 2023 16 Mar'23

  Rubrik customer, partner data exposed in possible Clop attack

  Rubrik was supposedly compromised by the Clop ransomware gang via a zero-day vulnerability in a managed file transfer software package it uses

• March 16, 2023 16 Mar'23

  Mandiant: Dangerous MS Outlook zero-day widely used against Ukraine

  A zero-day vulnerability in Microsoft Outlook that was fixed in the March Patch Tuesday update has likely been actively exploited by Russian actors for a year or more, and its use will now spread rapidly

• March 15, 2023 15 Mar'23

  Chinese Silkloader cyber attack tool falls into Russian hands

  A loader tool used by Chinese cyber criminals seems to have been enthusiastically taken up in recent weeks by Russian ransomware operators

• March 15, 2023 15 Mar'23

  Microsoft patches Outlook zero-day for March Patch Tuesday

  A highly dangerous privilege escalation bug in Outlook is among 80 different vulnerabilities patched in Microsoft’s March Patch Tuesday update

• March 14, 2023 14 Mar'23

  NatWest introduces limits on crypto trading to prevent fraud

  UK bank says its retail customers will benefit from daily and monthly limits on the amount they can pay into cryptocurrency exchanges

• March 14, 2023 14 Mar'23

  NCSC warns over AI language models but rejects cyber alarmism

  The UK's NCSC has issued advice for those using the technology underpinning AI tools such as ChatGPT, but says some of the security doomsday scenarios being proposed right now are not necessarily realistic

• March 14, 2023 14 Mar'23

  AI interview: Elke Schwarz, professor of political theory

  Elke Schwarz speaks with Computer Weekly about the ethics of military artificial intelligence and the dangers of allowing governments and corporations to push forward without oversight or scrutiny

• March 13, 2023 13 Mar'23

  MI5 to oversee new National Protective Security Authority

  The new National Protective Security Authority will address various national security threats including state-sponsored cyber espionage against UK targets

• March 13, 2023 13 Mar'23

  HSBC buys Silicon Valley Bank UK arm for £1 following collapse

  UK tech ecosystem welcomes government intervention to facilitate HSBC purchase after the collapse of SVB left many UK startups unable to access their deposits

• March 10, 2023 10 Mar'23

  Technology minister Michelle Donelan defends data reforms

  Secretary of state Michelle Donelan has defended the government’s new data reforms as providing certainty for businesses while simultaneously retaining high standards of data protection, but industry figures are having mixed reactions

• March 08, 2023 08 Mar'23

  UK government introduces revised data reform bill to Parliament

  Designed in close collaboration with technology businesses, the UK government is re-introducing an updated version of its Data Protection and Digital Information Bill to Parliament, which civil society groups say upends key safeguards

• March 08, 2023 08 Mar'23

  How ForgeRock is tackling identity management

  ForgeRock CEO Fran Rosch has set the identity and access management software supplier on a path to deliver a frictionless identity experience without compromising security or privacy

• March 07, 2023 07 Mar'23

  Nine in 10 enterprises fell victim to successful phishing in 2022

  Egress annual email security risk report breaks down impacts of email-based phishing attacks and data loss, and the effect these can have on organisations in terms of staff retention and morale

• March 07, 2023 07 Mar'23

  Dutch hospitals underestimate impact of cyber attack

  IT failures in acute care organisations in the Netherlands have increased considerably since 2010, affecting patient care and stressing the need to improve IT security in hospitals

• March 07, 2023 07 Mar'23

  Taking back control: Could a distributed model breed a better AI?

  AI tools such as ChatGPT are trained on datasets scraped from the web, but you don’t have much say if your data is used. Technologist Bruce Schneier says it’s time to give control of AI training data back to the people

• March 07, 2023 07 Mar'23

  APAC IT leaders bullish on tech spending

  Over half of respondents in this year’s IT Priorities study have bigger IT budgets as they continue to make strategic investments in cyber security, cloud and automation, among other areas

• March 03, 2023 03 Mar'23

  White House unveils National Cybersecurity Strategy

  The strategy will focus on ensuring closer collaboration on cyber security between government and industry, while giving software and other tech companies a bigger role in combatting threats due to their resources and expertise

• March 02, 2023 02 Mar'23

  AI interview: Michael Osborne, professor of machine learning

  Artificial intelligence researcher speaks with Computer Weekly about the implications of a market-driven AI arms race and the overwhelming dominance of the private sector over the technology

• March 02, 2023 02 Mar'23

  Uber introduces dynamic pricing algorithm in London

  The dynamic pricing algorithm will allow Uber to set variable pay and pricing levels, but drivers are concerned about how their personal data will be used and the impact the algorithm will have on their livelihoods

• March 02, 2023 02 Mar'23

  WH Smith staff data accessed in cyber attack

  The retailer has said that customer data has not been affected by the incident as it is held in different systems, and that investigations into the attack are ongoing

• March 02, 2023 02 Mar'23

  Salt Labs identifies OAuth security flaw within Booking.com

  Security flaw in Booking.com OAuth implementation could be used to launch account takeovers, but researchers discovered and flagged the issue before it could be exploited in the wild

• March 01, 2023 01 Mar'23

  Data breaches in Australia on the rise, says OAIC

  Cyber security incidents were the cause of most data breaches, which rose by 26% in the second half of 2022, according to the Office of the Australian Information Commissioner

• February 28, 2023 28 Feb'23

  LastPass attack saw employee’s home computer hacked

  The ongoing investigation into a series of linked security incidents at LastPass has found that the attacker was successfully able to compromise a developer’s home PC using a vulnerability in a media software package

• February 27, 2023 27 Feb'23

  Advanced digital resiliency can save organisations millions

  Businesses that build out their digital resiliency are not only more secure, they also have more opportunities to innovate with IT

• February 27, 2023 27 Feb'23

  Scotland launches data strategy for health and social care

  The five-year strategy aims to make it easier for people to access their own health and social care data, improve data flows between organisations, and transform the way data is used to enhance services

• February 27, 2023 27 Feb'23

  How Dell is future-proofing its business

  Dell Technologies is building a more resilient supply chain, investing in growth areas like edge and multicloud, and responding to shifts in consumption models to position itself for long-term growth

• February 24, 2023 24 Feb'23

  UK police have ‘culture of retention’ around biometric data

  A culture of retention around biometric data in UK policing is damaging public trust, says UK biometrics commissioner, who is calling for clear regulation to govern police use of biometric technologies

• February 24, 2023 24 Feb'23

  Royal Mail stands firm as LockBit leaks data and renews ransom demand

  The LockBit ransomware gang has made good on its threat to leak data exfiltrated from Royal Mail’s systems, but the postal service is not entertaining the possibility of giving in

• February 23, 2023 23 Feb'23

  WithSecure proposes ‘undo’ button for ransomware

  WithSecure’s Activity Monitor technology supposedly overcomes the shortcomings of sandbox test environments, and may be able to stop ransomware attacks from ever happening

• February 23, 2023 23 Feb'23

  ANZ CIOs flag priorities amid inflation concerns

  CIOs in Australia and New Zealand are concerned about inflation and plan to adjust their technology priorities to optimise resources and combat cyber threats