After Surge in 2nd Half, 1,802 Breach Notifications Issued in 2022; Over 440 Million Individuals Affected After a slow start, likely due to geopolitical factors, 2022 was another bumper year for data breaches in the United States. U.S. organizations issued 1,802 data breach notifications in 2022, affecting more than 400 million individuals, the Identity Theft Resource Center reports. That figure is just 60 breaches shy of the 1,862 breaches in...

Bad news for ransomware groups: Experts find that getting a payday is harder as the world fortifies against the onslaught of criminal malware. The good news is that more would-be victims are getting robust defenses in place, including well-rehearsed incident response plans, which make executing a successful attack harder. Also good news, law enforcement agencies mobilize earlier to assist victims, and by doing so, they’re learning better...

Both Ransomware Groups Pose Serious Concerns to Sector, Warns HHS HC3 The U.S. government is warning that Healthcare entities should be on high alert for signs of the new BlackCat and Royal ransomware-as-a-service groups. On January 12th, the Department of Health and Human Services’ Health Sector Cybersecurity Coordination Center issued a threat brief that warns that BlackCat conducts triple extortion, meaning it doesn’t just...

Trojan Impersonates More Than 400 Financial and Crypto Exchange Apps The Godfather banking Trojan is causing serious issues in the financial sector due to its ability to mimic the appearance of more than 400 applications, including leading financial and crypto exchange applications. So far, it has targeted institutions in 16 countries. Research from security intelligence firm Group-IB says the Godfather Trojan reappeared in September with...

The number of successful ransomware attacks has doubled in the last 4 years. But there are concrete steps a healthcare organization can take to avoid costly — and potentially deadly — downtime and better protect themselves against an attack. 1. Move from on-premises servers and backups to the cloud. Doing so outsources availability, uptime, and security to the SaaS vendor and also facilitates better backup and recovery if something does happen....

QBot Backdoor Opens Systems to Loading Cobalt Strike, Ransomware and Other Malware Researchers say the Black Basta group is dropping QBot malware — also called QakBot — in a widespread ransomware campaign targeting mostly U.S.-based companies. QBot malware is a banking Trojan primarily designed to steal banking data, including browser information, keystrokes and credentials. Its previous targets include JPMorgan Chase, Citibank, Bank of...

Targeting of Providers, Plans and Partners Since 2009, healthcare breaches have affected the personal information of 370 million people. Quick math says that’s more than the entire U.S. population, and that’s only counting the major breaches affecting 500 people or more. The situation is growing worse. In just the last three years, the volume and frequency of breaches have nearly doubled, from 368 in 2018 to 715 in 2021. And the nation is on...

Red-Teaming Tool Poses Ongoing Risks When Used by Hackers, HHS Warns The Department of Health and Human Services’ Office of Information Security’s HC3 unit says attackers are weaponizing legitimate security tools. Russian hackers deployed Cobalt Strike’s command-and-control function during their attack against SolarWinds’ network management software. Hackers who earlier this year got into Cisco corporate IT...

Cyberweapon-Grade Hacking Tools Pose Danger for Financial Sector Cyberthieves traditionally on the lower rung of hacking abilities now have access to nation-state-class malicious software, warn close observers of the criminal dark web. The appearance on criminal forums of tools capable of infecting a computer’s boot firmware or malware that evades antivirus detection is a consequence of years of state-sponsored development of cyber...

Use of Social Engineering, Phishing to Divert Payments Cybercriminals are stealing multimillion-dollar payouts from healthcare payment processors by compromising user login credentials, the FBI warns the healthcare industry. In a recent alert, federal agents say they’ve received multiple reports of cybercriminals redirecting healthcare payments into their pockets. According to the FBI, cybercriminals used employees’ publicly...