Most of us try to keep our fingers on the pulse of the cyber industry, but it’s impossible to read every news item. We’ve compiled the top stories of the week here to make it easier for you to keep up to date.
Industry Perspectives
In Case You Missed it: The FireEye Top Five Stories of the Week
1. France TV5Monde: Russian hackers we
know as APT28 may have posed as ISIS Cypher Caliphate to shut down
France TV5Monde for 18 hours on April 8. They posted pro-ISIS
propaganda via social media during the attack. FireEye manager of
threat intelligence Jen Weeden was interviewed by BuzzFeed
News regarding the attack. FireEye has covered APT28 extensively,
including a full
report and blog
post in October 2014.
2. Duqu 2.0 malware: FireEye was not
affected by the successful use of the Duqu 2.0 malware tool on a
security firm. The nation-state cyber espionage group’s target reveals
a dramatic new shift in the cyber landscape – one in which cyberspies
infiltrate security companies to get intelligence on the latest
technology meant to deter them.
3. OPM latest: FireEye Chief Security
Strategist Richard
Bejtlich’s blog about the Office of Personnel Management breach,
in which 4 million federal employee’s personal records were leaked,
was featured in Dark
Reading. He points out that part of the issue is a
misunderstanding of how the Continuous Diagnostic and Mitigation (CDM)
program works, likening it to locking the doors and windows when the
intruder is already inside a house. CNN interviewed
Bryce Boland on why China might be trying to gather this type of intelligence.
4. NY Times on smaller targets: The NY
Times reports that smaller retailers and businesses feel a false
sense of security when it comes to thinking they’d be targeted by
hackers. The article includes opinions from FireEye Threat
Intelligence Analyst Nart Villanueve, who points out that cyber
criminals often focus on smaller companies. A common approach is to
send malicious emails in hopes that embedded malware can infect the
network and compromise point-of-sale logon credentials.
5. Gartner Event: FireEye participated
in this week’s Gartner Security and Risk Management Summit 2015 in
Washington, D.C. We prepared three sessions during the program:
Demystifying Threat Intelligence with Jen Weedon; The
FireEye Security Architecture with David Anderson; and Don’t
Get Smacked By a Board with CTO Dave Merkel.
