Adobe Flash Player has been an online giant for over a decade now. You’ve most likely used it several times even without noticing. Adobe Flash is a staple plugin in most browsers from Chrome to Internet Edge and Firefox.
But what happens now that Adobe has stopped supporting it? Can outdated plugins be a threat to your online security?
Adobe Flash Player is a piece of software…
DDoS extortion is back…
ANALYSIS A growth in ransom-related DDoS (RDDoS) attacks has accompanied a growing sophistication and diversity in attack vectors over the last year, according to a range of security vendors quizzed by The Daily Swig.
Types of distributed denial-of-service (DDoS) attacks can include volumetric, protocol-based, and application-based assaults. Many are slung from so-called botnets of compromised computers, mobiles, or IoT devices.
The most common motives for launching a DDoS and jamming an adversary/competitor’s web performance include extorting victims for financial gain or to serve as a decoy tactic for another cyber-attack.
Bindu Sundaresan, director at AT&T Cybersecurity, told The Daily Swig: “Motives today can include an interest in obtaining a financial reward, making an ideological statement, creating a geopolitical advantage, or exacting revenge for particular government action, corporate campaign, or policy stance.”
David Elmaleh, senior product manager of edge services at cloud and network appliance security vendor Imperva, told The Daily Swig that RDDoS campaigns motivated by financial gain saw a considerable increase in 2020.
“We saw RDDoS threats targeting thousands of large commercial organizations globally, not least the financial services industry,” Elmaleh explained.
“Of the RDDoS we’ve monitored, the extortionists leverage the names of well-known threat actor groups in their ransom messages to demand payment in bitcoin currency to prevent a DDoS attack on their target’s network.”
Read more of the latest DDoS attack news
For example, Imperva reports that one group using the name ‘Lazarus’ threatened to launch a DDoS attack against an entire network if a ransom was not paid within six days.
“Once the attack has started, a payment of 30 bitcoin (approximately $328,000) will stop it, with an additional 10 bitcoin ($110,000) demanded for each day the ransom remains unpaid,” according to Imperva’s Elmaleh.
“The extortionist also threatened to begin a small DDoS attack on the company’s main IP…
I had a few emails from readers asking about the end of Adobe Flash and what they should do about it.
© Dreamstime/Dreamstime/TNS
Adobe Flash is a piece of software that web developers used to place animations, audio and video on websites.
In case you don’t know, Adobe Flash is a piece of software that web developers used to place animations, audio and video on websites.
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It was great at first, but then it was found to be a big security hole for hackers to exploit.
Adobe kept issuing patches to keep the bad guys out, but ultimately it was determined that Flash was not worth the risk, so big companies like Apple and Google said they would no longer support it.
Finally, Adobe just threw in the towel and turned off Flash on Dec. 31.
So, what do you have to do?
There’s really not much from a content standpoint to do.
Website developers knew this was coming and they’ve (hopefully) removed Flash from their websites.
What you do need to do is make sure Flash is removed from your computers.
Hopefully it is already gone, but in case you still have it installed, here are some instructions to remove it.
WINDOWS USERS
If you have a Windows PC, you should download the Flash Uninstaller from Adobe, then quit all your browsers and any other programs that use Flash.
Other apps that use Flash might include AOL Instant Messenger or Yahoo! Messenger.
Basically, quit all your programs and then run the Flash Uninstaller.
You can find the full instructions at helpx.adobe.com/flash-player/kb/uninstall-flash-player-windows.html.
MAC USERS
If you have a Mac, you have a bit more to do to remove Flash.
You’ll need to determine which version of MacOS you are using, then download the appropriate Flash Uninstaller from Adobe.
There are separate uninstallers for Mac OS 10.1 to 10.3 and for Mac OS X 10.4 to current.
You can download the uninstallers here: https://helpx.adobe.com/flash-player/kb/uninstall-flash-player-mac-os.html
After the uninstaller finishes, you still need to delete two folders on your Mac.
They are:
/Library/Preferences/Macromedia/Flash 1/4 Player /Library/Caches/Adobe/Flash 1/4 Player
You can find these folders inside your home directory in the Library…
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