Tag Archive for: bring

I was FBI’s most wanted hacker ‘Mafiaboy’ – I’m now terrified cyber attacks can bring down entire CITIES

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A BORED teenager “broke the internet” in one of the most infamous hacking attacks of all time – turning him overnight into one of the world’s most wanted men.

Michael Calce was just 15 when he brought down the biggest sites on the web, became the target of an FBI manhunt, and landed himself in prison.

Michael Calce was the infamous hacker known as 'Mafiaboy'

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Michael Calce was the infamous hacker known as ‘Mafiaboy’Credit: MICHAEL CALCE
As a 15-year-old he masterminded one of the worst cyberattacks America had ever seen

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As a 15-year-old he masterminded one of the worst cyberattacks America had ever seenCredit: Getty

The teenager managed to temporarily topple some of the world’s largest websites, including Amazon, eBay and Yahoo!

Now 39-years-old, Michael told The Sun Online how since breaking the internet, he’s spent the rest of his life trying to protect it.

The former hacker turned cybersecurity chief warned the world is not ready for a new terrifying frontier in cyber-warfare, which “scares the living daylights” out of him.

The need for protection of online services is greater than ever, with so many critical services and systems dependent on the tech.

I was a hacker raided by FBI - US is going to throw the book at Pentagon leaker
Inside the internet underworld where nerds are paid thousands to become hackers

He warned that hackers now have the power to weaponize infrastructure against whole populations – something as simple as hacking into a water treatment centre could poison thousands.

“The shock factor of a missile hitting a power grid has an immediate effect,” Calce explains. “A hacker sitting behind a computer and shutting down the grid doesn’t have the same effect, but the reality is the same.”

These current threats, he says, are far more serious than his own “internet breaking” onslaught back in 2000.

Michael’s hack attack caused an estimated $1.2billion worth of damage and landed him in a youth prison for eight months.

But havoc-causing aside, he exposed just how weak and vulnerable those early years of the internet were.

In a little less than a few minutes, a talented kid playing around on his computer had sent America spiralling with the knowledge that a new frontier of warfare had arrived – cyberattacks. 

“Imagine you’re 15 years old, and the president of the United States is talking about you and saying that they’re looking for you,” he tells The Sun Online.

Michael, who went by the online alias of Mafiaboy, had become public enemy number one in North…

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Lookout Extends Partnership With Verizon to Bring Data-Centric Cloud Security to Business Customers

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The Lookout Cloud Security Platform enables organizations to safeguard data across the web, cloud and private apps; reduces complexity, costs and management overhead

SAN FRANCISCO, Sept. 21, 2022 /PRNewswire/ — Lookout, Inc., a leading provider of endpoint and cloud security solutions, today announced the expansion of its partnership with Verizon to deliver the Lookout Cloud Security Platform to Verizon business customers. The Lookout Cloud Security Platform helps safeguard an organizations’ data, identify and mitigate threats and facilitates secure access to the web, private apps and cloud services (SaaS) deployed in a multi-cloud environment.

The Lookout Cloud Security Platform Safeguards Data Everywhere It Goes

While cloud connectivity has boosted productivity and collaboration, it has also amplified security gaps as customers continue to use on-premises, appliance-based security solutions. To prevent data leakage and cover security gaps in this work-from-anywhere environment, organizations need a unified cloud-delivered platform that protects users, devices, access and data across all apps and devices from any modern day cyber threats. The Lookout Cloud Security Platform delivers SSE solution combines Cloud Access Security Broker (CASB), Zero Trust Network Access (ZTNA) and Secure Web Gateway (SWG) natively in a single platform, significantly reducing the complexity, costs and number of security vendors and point solutions an IT department has to manage. It also provides the agility and scalability to keep pace with evolving, increasingly sophisticated threats.

According to Gartner®, “By 2025, 80% of organizations seeking to procure SSE-related security services will purchase a consolidated SSE solution rather than stand-alone CASB, SSE, and ZTNA offerings, up from 15% in 2021.” Earlier this year, Gartner released its 2022 Gartner® Magic Quadrant™ for Security Service Edge in which Lookout has been recognized in the Visionary quadrant.1 The companion 2022 Gartner Critical Capabilities for SSE report ranked Lookout in the top three for all vendors across four predefined Use Cases.2

More Than 1.9 Million Licenses and Counting

Verizon and Lookout have been providing…

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Hidden Weakness: Cyberwarfare Can Bring Down Xi Jinping

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Domestic resistance to Chinese president Xi Jinping is currently manifesting in a wave of sensitive data leaks from within China. This is decisive for two reasons. First, it reveals a sharp value divergence between the policies and practices of the Communist Chinese regime and the rapidly changing political culture of the Chinese people. If this critical vulnerability is escalated by agents within or outside of China, it could lead to a crisis of legitimacy in Beijing. Second, these data leaks reveal China’s asymmetric susceptibility to cyber warfare. Beijing’s hyper-sensitivity to attacks on its legitimacy, both historically and with the current government, provide a powerful retaliatory instrument against hybrid Chinese aggression, as well as China’s cyber espionage and public diplomacy campaigns.

A recent spate of classified file leaks from China is a strong indicator that there is a factional struggle in the lead-up to the crucial 20th National Congress of the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) that will determine whether President Xi Jinping will secure an indefinite appointment as General Secretary. Xi Jinping, whose support base is narrow within the party but benefits from strong popular support, faces those targeted by his successive anti-corruption campaigns, including the business-oriented Shanghai Gang of Jiang Zemin. For example, Jiang Zemin’s grandson, Jiang Zhicheng (Alvin Jiang), and Jack Ma’s relationship can be traced back to 2012 given Alibaba’s close affiliation with the Jiang faction. In April 2022, a book entitled China Duel, authored by a princeling with the pseudonym Yang Xiang, revealed extensive details on the Jiang faction’s attempt to have Xi demoted and dismissed at the end of Hu Jintao’s tenure in 2012.

In early 2022, well-connected British journalist John Sudworth, who has nearly ten years of experience reporting from mainland China, obtained highly classified documents known as the Xinjiang Police Files from a database containing more than five thousand photographs of Uighur detainees from between January and July 2018. Although some allege the files were hacked by an external actor, the prevailing evidence suggests that it was released…

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Hackers can now bring cargo ships and planes to a grinding halt

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Container cargo ships sit off shore from the Long Beach/Los Angeles port complex in Long Beach, CA, on Wednesday, October 6, 2021.

Jeff Gritchen | MediaNews Group | Getty Images

Armed with little more than a computer, hackers are increasingly setting their sights on some of the biggest things that humans can build.

Vast container ships and chunky freight planes — essential in today’s global economy — can now be brought to a halt by a new generation of code warriors.

“The reality is that an aeroplane or vessel, like any digital system, can be hacked,” David Emm, a principal security researcher at cyber firm Kaspersky, told CNBC.

Indeed, this was proven by the U.S. government during a “pen-test” exercise on a Boeing aircraft in 2019.

Hacking logistics

Often it’s easier, however, to hack the companies that operate in ports and airports than it is to access an actual aircraft or vessel.

In December, German firm Hellmann Worldwide Logistics said its operations had been impacted by a phishing attack. Phishing attacks involve sending spoof messages designed to trick people into handing over sensitive information or downloading harmful software.

The company, which offers airfreight, sea freight, road and rail, and contract logistics services, was forced to stop taking new bookings for several days. It’s unclear exactly how much it lost in revenue as a result.

Hellmann’s Chief Information Officer Sami Awad-Hartmann told CNBC that the firm immediately tried to “stop the spread” when it realized it had fallen victim to a cyberattack.

“You need to stop it to ensure that it’s not going further into your [computing] infrastructure,” he said.

Hellmann, a global company, disconnected its data centers around the world and shut down some of its systems to limit the spread.

“One of the drastic decisions we then made when we saw that we had some systems infected is we disconnected from the internet,” Awad-Hartmann said. “As soon as you make this step, you stop. You’re not working anymore.”

Everything had to be done manually and business continuity plans kicked in, Awad-Hartmann said, adding that some parts of the business were able to handle this better than others.

Awad-Hartmann said the hackers had two main…

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