ESET Threat Blog

A few months ago I wrote a fairly short comment piece for Virus Bulletin on how some popular posts to Facebook that invite you to make use of your personal data might be useful to scammers and others as part of some sort of data aggregation attack. An example I included was a popular posting … Read More…

 Here are some further thoughts arising from the ACPO National Cyber Crime Conference held recently in the UK*.

DAC Janet Williams, ACPO’s e-Crime lead, summarized the current initiatives along these lines (apologies if I’ve introduced too many of my own preconceptions):

The UK intends to tackle cybercrime and make this one of the safest places to do … Read More…

I have a theory that says improving information system security–the security of our operating systems, network connections, and applications–just means the bad guys will focus more attention on our endpoints, the digital devices we use to access the information and systems we need to do our work.
Furthermore, as we improve endpoint security technology, the people … Read More…

Kelly Jackson Higgins in a Dark Reading article tells us that Malware Attacks Decline In SCADA, Industrial Control Systems, quoting a report published by the Security Incidents Organization drawing on its Repository of Industrial Security Incidents (RISI) database.
One aspect that's attracted attention on specialist lists is the mention of a large US power company that … Read More…

Added 5th March 2011 to the Stuxnet resources page at http://blog.eset.com/?p=5945.

Myriam Dunn Cavelty at Parliamentary Brief Online (29 October 2010): The real cyberwar is about beating the crooks and the spooks
Myriam Dunn Cavelty and Oliver Rolofs for Munich Security Conference: MSC Booklet Paper: From Cyberwar to Cybersecurity: Proportionality of Fear and Countermeasures

Hat tip to @vmyths, … Read More…

Added to the Stuxnet resources page at http://blog.eset.com/2011/01/23/stuxnet-information-and-resources-3 on 4th March 2011:
Ralph Langner at the TED Conference, as summarized by the BBC: US and Israel were behind Stuxnet claims researcher.
As previously mentioned at http://blog.eset.com/2011/03/03/nice-stuxnet-commentary-and-hype-deflation. (Hat tip to Mikko Hypponen. Again!)
David Harley CITP FBCS CISSP
ESET Senior Research Fellow
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Some extra resources:

J. Oquendo takes a cold, clear look on Infosec Island at some of the hype that surrounds the Stuxnet story: Cyberterrorism – As Seen On TV
While Visible Risk, while by no means entirely negative about the Vanity Fair Stuxnet story (see http://blog.eset.com/2011/03/02/more-on-stuxnet), makes an entirely reasonable point about Irresponsible Sensationalism. I have to … Read More…

A few more developments in the Never-Ending Story:

Michael Joseph Gross on A Declaration of Cyber War in Vanity Fair. Despite a somewhat breathless tone in the introduction – "the world’s top software-security experts were panicked by the discovery of a drone-like computer virus" (where's my Valium?!) – actually a comprehensive and largely accurate account. It even … Read More…

Links added today to the Stuxnet resources page at http://blog.eset.com/?p=5945:

Eric Byres, Andrew Ginter, Joel Langill: How Stuxnet Spreads – A Study of Infection Paths in Best Practice Systems. I haven't read this yet, as it requires registration and approval which hasn't yet come through, but it looks likely to be worth the wait. Joel Langill also … Read More…

[Update: The Reuters article flagged on 6th February 2011 refers to a statement by the Russian ambassador to NATO claiming that Stuxnet could have caused "another Chernobyl": more info at http://www.csoonline.com/article/659165/stuxnet-could-have-caused-new-chernobyl-russian-ambassador-says?source=rss_data_protection. Hat tip to @FSecure.]
Tip of the hat to Gary Mauvais for alerting me to an article by Nima Bagheri, CEO of U0vd: The Art of … Read More…