Tag: Sales | SpinSafe

Ransomware attack delaying Jackson County, Missouri home sales

April 9, 2024/in Internet Security

INDEPENDENCE, Mo. — She fought for our country. But now a ransomware attack reportedly carried out by Russians has a local veteran whose disabled fighting to be able to sell her home.

It’s the latest effect from a cyber security breach in Jackson County last week.

Jackson County’s website says offices will remain closed at the Historic Truman Courthouse in Independence Wednesday.

A ransomware attack last Tuesday has closed the Jackson County Recorder of Deeds, Assessment and Collections Office. The county said Monday its making progress on restoration and system recovery. But for some that progress can’t come soon enough.

“It’s had a huge impact on our buyers and sellers in particular,” United Real Estate Kansas City Broker Marta Grace said.

The buyer of Jae Ramsey’s Independence home was hoping for an early closing.

“They told me to get out by April 1st, so I said OK, I did,” she said.

She hired movers with closing originally set for April 4, two days after that ransomware attack.

“They had like ten people in my house taking everything. I have no idea what I even have anymore,” Ramsey said.

Now she’s living with a relative waiting for proceeds from the sale of her home now set to close Thursday. But there’s no indication whether the Recorder of Deeds will open by then or how quickly they’ll get through at least a weeks worth of work missed.

“They are unable to close so the lenders won’t fund. They won’t lend you the money if they cannot record it with the county,” Grace explained.

“Primarily it’s we don’t know when they are going to get to close that’s caused the confusion and kind of a catastrophe,” TG Homes in the Heartland Owner Tina Groumoutis said.

Contracts to sell homes have expiration dates to close by. In Ramsey’s case that deadline is quickly approaching.

“He could very well get cold feet and say I don’t know what’s going on over there, but I’m good I’ll find something else,” Groumoutis said of the…

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Ads for Zero-Day Exploit Sales Surge 70% Annually

February 28, 2024/in Internet Security

Security researchers have warned that threat actors are increasingly turning to zero-day exploits to increase the success rate of advanced targeted attacks.

Group-IB noted in its Hi-Tech Crime Trends Report 2023/2024 that it observed a 70% increase in public ads selling zero-day exploits between 2022 and 2023.

In some cases, such as the CVE-2023-38831 zero-day vulnerability in the ZIP file format, the threat actors that discover a bug provide access to clients for a subscription fee – in this case, $1000 per month.

Such threats are popular with advanced cybercrime groups and nation states, especially for cyber-espionage activities where threat actors need to establish persistence and spy on their victims for prolonged periods without discovery, the report claimed.

Elsewhere, Group-IB warned of a growing interest in ChatGPT credentials on the cybercrime underground, as a way to reach sensitive corporate date.

That’s because public LLM models automatically save chat logs with the AI model, but accounts are often not protected by multi-factor authentication (MFA).

“When using AI systems, users often enter all sorts of data, including confidential information such as internal source code, financial information, and trade secrets. Users sometimes even enter data intended for authentication in internal systems,” Group-IB explained.

That means any threat actor with access to a corporate user’s account could gain a direct pathway to a huge volume of sensitive information.

“This gives them access to logs with the communication history between employees and systems, which they can use to search for confidential information (for espionage purposes), details about internal infrastructure, authentication data (for conducting even more damaging attacks), and information about application source code (to analyze it and identify potential vulnerabilities that could be exploited),” the report noted.

Group-IB said it detected more than 225,000 infostealer logs up for sale on the dark web containing compromised ChatGPT credentials between January and October 2023.

As corporates invest…

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Baby formula milk companies ‘exploit’ parents’ fears to boost sales, analysis alleges

February 12, 2023/in Internet Security

Many baby formula milk companies allegedly exploit parents’ emotions and “manipulate” scientific data to boost sales, according to a major new analysis published in The Lancet.

The analysis, led by Professor Nigel Rollins of the World Health Organization, said urgent clampdowns are needed to address misleading claims made by the industry.

It comes on the heels of the formula crisis in the U.S. last year, which saw parents struggling to find formula due to global supply chain issues exacerbated by a large recall of Abbott baby formula after two infants died.

“Part of what we’re exploring in The Lancet breastfeeding series is that the system of influence that commercial formula companies are engaged in is much, much more pervasive and much more influential than maybe previously thought.” study co-author Dr. Cecília Tomori, a breastfeeding expert and associate professor at Johns Hopkins School of Nursing, told ABC News.

Scientific evidence overwhelmingly supports breastfeeding newborns, if possible and desired. Breastfeeding has well-documented health benefits for both the parent and the baby.

According to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, babies who are breastfed are at lower risk of illnesses and diseases including asthma, obesity, type 1 diabetes and sudden infant death syndrome.

PHOTO: Hand spooning baby food. — Hand spooning baby food.

STOCK PHOTO/Getty Images

Babies can also receive antibodies from the mother’s breast milk, which boosts their immune systems and helps protect them from disease.

Meanwhile, mothers who breastfeed lower their risk of breast and ovarian cancer, type 2 diabetes and high blood pressure.

The authors say while many new parents breastfeed, many choose not to, and all choices should be supported.

According to the analysis, formula milk companies use exploitative tactics to sell products such as preying on parents’ fears about their children’s health and development.

For example, companies have said it’s important to introduce formula to help settle the behaviors of babies, such as disrupted sleep and persistent crying, implying that breast milk alone is not enough.

“The formula milk industry uses poor science to suggest, with little supporting evidence, that their products are…

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