E-Business

Sophisticated Cyberattacks Drive Innovation Btw Adversaries & Defenders- Cisco

Published

11 years ago

July 29, 2015

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Both the attackers and defenders in the cyber world are innovating. The Cisco® 2015 Midyear Security Report released on Tuesday, tell us how.

The report which analyzes threat intelligence and cybersecurity trends, reveals the critical need for organizations to reduce time to detection (TTD) in order to remediate against sophisticated attacks by highly motivated threat actors.

The Angler Exploit Kit represents the types of common threats that will challenge organizations as the digital economy and the Internet of Everything (IoE) create new attack vectors and monetization opportunities for adversaries.

The report shows that new risks associated with Flash, the evolution of ransomware, and the Dridex mutating malware campaign, reinforce the need for reduced time to detection.

With the digitization of business and the IoE, malware and threats become even more pervasive, which shines a light on the security industry’s estimates of 100 to 200 days for TTD.

In contrast, the average TTD for Cisco Advanced Malware Protection (AMP), with its retrospective analysis of attacks that make it past existing defenses, is 46 hours.

The findings also underscore the need for businesses to deploy integrated solutions vs. point products, work with trustworthy vendors, and enlist security services providers for guidance and assessment.

Further, geopolitical experts have declared that a global cyber governance framework is needed to sustain economic growth.

Other key findings from the study include the following:

Angler: Adversaries Darting in the Shadows Angler is currently one of the most sophisticated and widely used exploit kits because of its innovative use of Flash, Java, Internet Explorer, and Silverlight vulnerabilities.

It also excels at attempting to evade detection by employing domain shadowing, as one of its techniques, accounting for the lion’s share of domain shadowing activity.

Flash is Back – Exploits of Adobe Flash vulnerabilities, which are integrated into Angler and Nuclear exploit kits, are on the rise.

This is due to lack of automated patching, as well as consumers who fail to update immediately.

In the first half of 2015, there has been a 66 percent increase in the number of Adobe Flash Player vulnerabilities reported by the Common Vulnerabilities and Exposure (CVE) system over all of 2014.

At this rate, Flash is on pace to set an all-time record for the number of CVEs reported in 2015.

The Evolution of Ransomware – Ransomware remains highly lucrative for hackers as they continue to release new variants.

Ransomware operations have matured to the point that they are completely automated and carried out through the dark web.

To conceal payment transactions from law enforcement, ransoms are paid in cryptocurrencies, such as bitcoin.

Dridex: Campaigns on the Fly – The creators of these quickly mutating campaigns have a sophisticated understanding of evading security measures.

As part of their evasion tactics, attackers rapidly change the emails’ content, user agents, attachments, or referrers and launch new campaigns, forcing traditional antivirus systems to detect them anew.

A Call to Arms

The innovation race between adversaries and security vendors is accelerating, placing end users and organizations at increasing risk.

Vendors must be vigilant in developing integrated security solutions that help organizations be proactive and align the right people, processes, and technology.

Integrated Threat Defense – Organizations face significant challenges with point product solutions and need to consider an integrated threat defense architecture that embeds security everywhere, and will enforce at any control point.

Services Fill the Gap – As the security industry addresses increased fragmentation, a dynamic threat landscape, and how to cope with a rising shortfall of skilled talent, businesses must invest in effective, sustainable and trusted security solutions and professional services.

Global Cyber Governance Framework – Global cyber governance is not prepared to handle the emerging threat landscape or geopolitical challenges.

The question of boundaries — how governments collect data about citizens and businesses and share among jurisdictions — is a significant hurdle to achieving cohesive cyber governance as worldwide cooperation is limited.

A collaborative, multi-stakeholder cyber governance framework is required to sustain business innovation and economic growth on a global stage.

Trustworthy Vendors – Organizations should demand that their technology vendors are transparent about and able to demonstrate the security they build into their products in order to be considered trustworthy.

These organizations must carry this understanding across all aspects of product development starting with the supply chain and through the deployed life of their products.

They must ask vendors to contractually back up their claims and demand better security.

Speaking on the report, John N. Stewart, senior vice president, chief security and trust officer, Cisco, said, “Organizations cannot just accept that compromise is inevitable, even if it feels like it today. The technology industry must up the game and provide reliable and resilient products and services, and the security industry must provide vastly improved, yet meaningfully simplified, capabilities for detecting, preventing, and recovering from attacks. This is where we are leading.

“We are regularly told that business strategy and security strategy are the top two issues for our customers, and they want trusted partnerships with us. Trust is tightly linked to security, and transparency is key so industry-leading technology is only half the battle. We’re committed to providing both: industry-defining security capabilities and trustworthy solutions across all product lines.”

Also, Jason Brvenik, principal engineer, Security Business Group, Cisco, said, “Hackers, being unencumbered, have the upper hand in agility, innovation and brazenness. We see this time and again, whether it is nation state actors, malware, exploit kits or ransomware. A purely preventive approach has proven ineffective, and we are simply too far down the road to accept a time to detection measured in hundreds of days.

“The question of ‘what do you do when you are compromised’ highlights the need for organizations to invest in integrated technologies that work in concert to reduce time to detection and remediation to a matter of hours; and then they should demand their vendors help them to reduce this metric to minutes.”

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E-Business

Firm Discovered a New Corporate Phishing Technique using a Popular AI Web Development Platform

Published

1 day ago

June 11, 2026

Chike Onwuegbuchi

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Kaspersky has discovered that attackers have begun exploiting another legitimate service for malicious purposes – this time it is Tencent EdgeOne Pages, a platform for creating and hosting web applications.

Attackers are misusing its capabilities to generate phishing emails targeting corporate users. Previously Kaspersky has described similar attacks leveraging Google services and web applications generated by Bubble, an AI-powered app builder, to hunt for corporate credentials.

Employees across multiple industries including the industrial sector, sales, and government are among the targets. The goal of the attack is to steal login credentials for corporate resources. Over the past 30 days, the company’s experts have detected more than 8,000 phishing emails using this tactic, including messages in English, Korean, and Russian.

The Tencent EdgeOne Pages service is positioned as a platform for quickly creating and deploying web applications using AI. Scammers misuse it to generate and publish phishing pages in minutes with virtually no web development skills.

Attackers host phishing pages on EdgeOne’s legitimate cloud infrastructure and use trusted domains. As a result, such sites appear to be established and secure to many protective solutions, complicating the detection of such attacks.

How the attack begins

The user receives an email from the alleged “corporate email support team”. The message states that the account login credentials will expire in 48 hours, and that failure to update them may result in problems receiving or sending emails.

To avoid restrictions, the user is prompted to click a link and enter relevant information. Phishing emails are not limited to this narrative, and could deliver any corporate message, such as a message from the HR department or a notification of a received document that should be downloaded.

Clicking the link in the email opens a page with a form for entering the victim’s name, email address, and password. It is a simple design, with virtually no additional elements.

After the user enters their login and password, the data is transferred to a server controlled by the attackers.

“We are seeing a continuation of the trend in which attackers use AI and no-code platforms as part of their phishing infrastructure. We’ve previously observed a similar scheme using the Bubble platform, and here we have yet another example.

“While the communication used in these phishing attacks is typical and has been used before multiple times, the attack technique itself significantly lowers the barrier to entry for attackers and accelerates the creation of phishing resources.

“Previously this required at least basic web development skills, but now an infrastructure for fraudulent emails can be created in minutes,” comments Roman Dedenok, Anti-Spam Expert at Kaspersky.

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E-Business

Kaspersky Report Shows Early 2026 Witnessed an Increase in Cyberattacks on the Manufacturing Sector

Published

2 days ago

June 10, 2026

Chike Onwuegbuchi

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According to a new Kaspersky ICS CERT report, in Q1 2026 the percentage of industrial control systems (ICS) on which malicious objects were blocked reached 19.6% globally. Kaspersky security solutions blocked malware from 10,052 different malware families of various categories on industrial automation systems.

Regionally, the share of ICS computers that were attacked ranged from 27.4% in Africa to 9.1% in Northern Europe. Compared to the previous quarter, attacks on the manufacturing sector in Q1 increased in multiple regions, including in Europe and Asia.

Regional split

In terms of overall numbers across all industry sectors, five regions saw an increase in the share of attacked ICS computers in Q1 2026 compared to the previous quarter. These were Southern Europe, Russia, Northern Europe, Canada and Africa.

Industries

In Q1, biometric systems traditionally placed first in terms of the share of ICS computers on which malicious objects were blocked, at 26.4%. These systems commonly have Internet access, are used for email, and, in many cases, have minimal cybersecurity controls within the organisations that use these systems.

Regionally, Southern Europe leads the ranking based on the percentage figures for biometric systems, at 35.15%. Africa follows at 29.58%, and Central Asia comes in third at 28.53%.

In the manufacturing industry, Southeast Asia ranks first among regions in terms of the percentage of ICS computers attacked (23.21%), followed by Africa (21.36%) and South Asia (20.13%).

In 2025, Kaspersky and VDC Research estimated that in just the first three quarters of 2025 cyberattacks on manufacturing organisations via ransomware could have generated over $18 billion globally in losses. Actual business losses could have been even higher when factoring in supply-chain disruptions, reputational damage, and recovery expenses.

“Legacy operational technology systems remain deeply embedded in manufacturing environments, which makes them vulnerable. Supply chain complexity and branching of the trusted partner network expands the attack surface beyond the network perimeter.

Attackers are realising that targeting OT assets of an industrial enterprise is not rocket science, which is why factory shutdowns bring massive financial losses,” commented Evgeny Goncharov, Head of Kaspersky ICS CERT.

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E-Business

NDPC, Meta Launch 2-Year M-SIDP after Regulatory Settlement

Published

3 days ago

June 9, 2026

Ebere Melum-Nwogbo

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Nigeria Data Protection Commission (NDPC) has launched the Meta-Supported Initiatives for Data Protection (M-SIDP), a strategic programme aimed at strengthening data privacy awareness, regulatory compliance and institutional capacity across Nigeria’s digital ecosystem.

NDPC, Meta Launch 2-Year M-SIDP after Regulatory Settlement

The initiative follows the conclusion of regulatory proceedings involving Meta Platforms Inc., the parent company of Facebook, Instagram and WhatsApp, over concerns relating to the processing of personal data belonging to Nigerian users. The matter was resolved in 2025 through a court-approved settlement.

Under the agreement, Meta committed to supporting a two-year programme of public-facing data protection measures designed to advance the objectives of the Nigeria Data Protection Act (NDP Act) 2023, the General Application and Implementation Directive (GAID), and the NDPC Strategic Roadmap and Action Plan (SRAP) 2023–2027.

Announcing the initiative, the Commission said the programme would strengthen safeguards for data subjects while promoting responsible data processing practices among organisations operating in Nigeria.

According to a statement signed by Itunu Dosekun, head of the NDPC Media Unit, the programme will focus on governance, research and development, safety and sustainability mechanisms for technology ecosystems, capacity building for Data Protection Officers (DPOs) and Data Protection Compliance Organisations (DPCOs), as well as public awareness campaigns targeted at vulnerable groups.

The Commission stated, “As part of the settlement, Meta committed to supporting a two-year programme of public-facing data protection measures that aligns with the objectives of the Nigeria Data Protection Act, 2023 (NDP Act), the NDP Act General Application and Implementation Directive (GAID) and the NDPC Strategic Roadmap and Action Plan (SRAP) 2023–2027.”

The NDPC stressed that the settlement does not limit its regulatory authority.

“Nothing in this settlement limits the Commission’s independent statutory powers as we continue to exercise our regulatory mandate in relation to data processing activities in Nigeria, in accordance with the NDP Act and other applicable laws,” it stated.

The development comes amid rising global scrutiny of technology companies over data privacy practices, with regulators in regions including the European Union and the United States tightening enforcement against breaches and non-compliance.

Nigeria has also intensified efforts to strengthen its privacy framework following the enactment of the Nigeria Data Protection Act in 2023, which established the NDPC as an independent regulator empowered to monitor compliance, investigate violations and impose sanctions.

Industry experts warn that increasing digital adoption across banking, telecommunications, e-commerce, healthcare and public services has heightened risks of identity theft, cybercrime and unauthorised data sharing.

The NDPC has in recent years stepped up enforcement actions against organisations that violate data protection rules, while also expanding accreditation for Data Protection Compliance Organisations and training for privacy professionals.

The Meta-supported initiative is expected to address gaps in public awareness and technical capacity, while also supporting research and policy development on emerging issues such as artificial intelligence, cross-border data transfers and platform governance.

The Commission said it would provide periodic updates on the implementation of the programme and called on stakeholders to support efforts to build a secure, transparent and accountable privacy ecosystem in Nigeria.

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