News

IT security

• February 07, 2024 07 Feb'24

  Dozens of surveillance companies are supplying spyware to governments, says Google

  Google’s Threat Analysis Group has identified 40 companies involved in selling and supplying security exploits and spyware services to governments

• February 07, 2024 07 Feb'24

  How Iranian cyber ops pivoted to target Israel after 7 October attacks

  Microsoft has shared new intelligence on how Iranian government-aligned threat actors have turned their fire on Israel over the past four months

• February 07, 2024 07 Feb'24

  South Staffs Water faces group action over Clop ransomware attack

  South Staffordshire Plc, the parent company of South Staffordshire and Cambridge Water, is facing legal action from customers whose data was compromised in a 2022 Clop ransomware attack

• February 07, 2024 07 Feb'24

  AI ID specialist Onfido in talks to be bought by Entrust

  UK-based cyber unicorn Onfido agrees to enter talks to be acquired by Entrust

• February 06, 2024 06 Feb'24

  UK’s McPartland Cyber Review to probe trust in technology

  The UK government has launched a cyber security review that will investigate how best to give businesses the confidence they need to use new technologies

• February 06, 2024 06 Feb'24

  Inquiry to explore cyber risk to Sunak-Starmer showdown

  The UK’s Joint Committee on National Security Strategy is opening an inquiry into securing the democratic process ahead of the next general election

• February 06, 2024 06 Feb'24

  UK and France push for international agreement on spyware

  The UK and France are hosting diplomats, big tech companies and civil society groups, in a two-day conference in London targeting the proliferation of spyware tools and ‘hackers for hire’

• February 05, 2024 05 Feb'24

  Blackbaud blasted for failing to prevent customer breaches

  A supply chain attack at software supplier Blackbaud in 2020 saw data on multiple UK organisations compromised. The US authorities are now taking steps to ensure it can’t happen again

• February 05, 2024 05 Feb'24

  US sanctions Iranians behind CNI cyber attacks

  US government issues new sanctions against six Iranians suspected of being behind a series of cyber attacks targeting critical national infrastructure, notably water supply systems

• February 01, 2024 01 Feb'24

  AI: House of Lords focuses on copyright and transparency

  Large language models promise to boost UK productivity, but the tech needs greater scrutiny and questions remain over intellectual property

• February 01, 2024 01 Feb'24

  US government disrupts Chinese botnet containing hundreds of end-of-life Cisco and Netgear routers

  The US government has succeeded in halting a botnet comprised of hundreds of end-of-life routers that posed a threat to critical national infrastructure (CNI) organisations in multiple countries

• February 01, 2024 01 Feb'24

  Welsh workers’ AI experiences shaped by uneven power dynamics

  Workers in Wales are being negatively affected by the unregulated introduction of artificial intelligence into workplaces due to asymmetric power dynamics

• February 01, 2024 01 Feb'24

  Defra legacy IT: 180 applications refreshed, over 1,500 remain

  The Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs has a 10-year plan to update technology. So far, 180 have been replaced or updated

• January 30, 2024 30 Jan'24

  We need backup! Pennsylvania police data loss shows why

  Police evidence systems data was lost during ‘routine maintenance’, with human error blamed – the case clearly illustrates why data protection can’t be left to chance

• January 29, 2024 29 Jan'24

  Lords question legality of police facial recognition

  Lords committee ‘deeply concerned’ about the rapid expansion of live facial recognition by UK police, which it says is progressing without any real oversight or accountability

• January 26, 2024 26 Jan'24

  GenAI tools ‘could not exist’ if firms are made to pay copyright

  AI firm Anthropic hits out at copyright lawsuit filed by music publishers, claiming the content ingested into its models falls under ‘fair use’ and that any licensing regime would be too complex and costly

• January 26, 2024 26 Jan'24

  Akira ransomware gang claims Lush cyber attack

  The Akira ransomware gang claims to have stolen over 100GB of data from cosmetics manufacturer and retailer Lush

• January 26, 2024 26 Jan'24

  UK government consults on age verification tech in alcohol sales

  The government has said it wants to allow the use of digital identities and various age-verification technologies in alcohol sales

• January 25, 2024 25 Jan'24

  Bugcrowd sees surge in vulnerability submissions, led by public sector

  Crowdsourced vulnerability disclosure and bug bounty platform Bugcrowd says it saw a 151% uptick in submissions related to government and public sector organisations in 2023

• January 24, 2024 24 Jan'24

  WebKit vulnerability sparks Apple’s first major security update of 2024

  A zero-day in the open source WebKit browser engine that powers Safari has sparked Apple’s first major patch roll-out of the new year

• January 24, 2024 24 Jan'24

  Southern Water confirms cyber attack after Black Basta claims

  Southern Water, which supplies millions of customers in southeast England, has confirmed it has fallen victim to a cyber attack, although its services appear to be running normally

• January 24, 2024 24 Jan'24

  Inside Cisco’s security platform strategy

  Raj Chopra, senior vice-president of Cisco’s security business, outlines the company’s security platform strategy and how it brought different products together into a single platform

• January 24, 2024 24 Jan'24

  Critical vulnerability exposes Fortra GoAnywhere users

  Fortra GoAnywhere MFT users must take steps to address a newly disclosed zero-day vulnerability without delay

• January 24, 2024 24 Jan'24

  AI will heighten global ransomware threat, says NCSC

  The benefits of artificial intelligence to cyber criminals being well-known, the NCSC now assesses it’s likely AI will soon be widely used to enhance ransomware attacks

• January 24, 2024 24 Jan'24

  Salesforce’s bug bounty programme paid out $3m in 2023

  Ethical hackers disclosed more than 4,000 vulnerabilities to Salesforce last year through its bug bounty programme, and received over $3m in rewards

• January 24, 2024 24 Jan'24

  Cato claims world’s first SASE-based XDR

  Generative AI, detection and response, endpoint protection and new incident response tools headline expansion of core secure access service edge platform beyond networking, threat prevention and data protection

• January 23, 2024 23 Jan'24

  Treat cyber risk like financial or legal issue, says UK government

  UK government and NCSC launch proposed code of practice on cyber security governance to help directors and business leaders toughen their defences

• January 23, 2024 23 Jan'24

  Leak of 26 billion records may prove to be ‘mother of all breaches’

  The discovery of a dataset comprising 26 billion stolen records may prove to be record-breaking in both its size and the danger it poses to ordinary people

• January 23, 2024 23 Jan'24

  SEC bitcoin hack was result of SIM-swapping

  A cyber attack on the US financial regulator earlier in January 2024 occurred after hackers took over one of its mobile phone accounts in a so-called SIM-swapping attack

• January 22, 2024 22 Jan'24

  SolarWinds hackers attack Microsoft in apparent recon mission

  Russian-backed threat actor behind infamous 2020 SolarWinds Sunburst intrusion hacked into Microsoft’s systems, apparently in an attempt to get hold of intel on themselves

• January 22, 2024 22 Jan'24

  PAC calls on MoD to fix inventory management IT

  The Public Accounts Committee is concerned that the ageing and fragmented IT systems used in the MoD’s inventory management puts front-line forces at significant risk

• January 22, 2024 22 Jan'24

  Chat control: Tech companies warn ministers over EU encryption plans

  Tech companies have written to EU ministers to urge them to back the European Parliament, rather than the European Commission, over proposed regulations to police child abuse

• January 19, 2024 19 Jan'24

  ICO prompts confusion over police cloud legality

  The UK data regulator has suggested that, despite major data protection concerns, it is likely to greenlight police cloud deployments because of an information-sharing agreement with the US government

• January 19, 2024 19 Jan'24

  Neighbouring Kent councils hit by simultaneous cyber attacks

  Canterbury, Dover and Thanet Councils in Kent have all been struck by simultaneous cyber attacks knocking systems offline, with indications of a link between all three

• January 18, 2024 18 Jan'24

  Cyber non-profit enlists ex-NCSC head as technical chair

  Founding NCSC chief exec Ciaran Martin is to join the newly launched Cyber Monitoring Centre non-profit as chair of its technical committee

• January 17, 2024 17 Jan'24

  NCSC invites security pros to join the big leagues

  The NCSC is inviting security pros from across the UK to sign up to work with its experts on an intelligence-sharing initiative

• January 17, 2024 17 Jan'24

  The Security Interviews: Rebecca Taylor, SecureWorks Counter Threat Unit

  In October 2023, Rebecca Taylor of the SecureWorks Counter Threat Unit was recognised at the annual Security Serious Unsung Heroes Awards for her work. Computer Weekly caught up with her to talk mentoring, cyber career development and diversity

• January 17, 2024 17 Jan'24

  Victims of 2023 Capita data breaches head to High Court

  More than 5,000 people impacted by data breaches arising from two cyber incidents affecting outsourcer Capita have joined a group action lawsuit

• January 17, 2024 17 Jan'24

  Singapore proposes governance framework for generative AI

  AI Verify Foundation and Infocomm Media Development Authority have proposed a governance framework for generative AI to address the risks and concerns about the emerging technology

• January 16, 2024 16 Jan'24

  Kaspersky shares Pegasus spyware-hunting tool

  Kaspersky has developed a way of easily exposing the presence of Pegasus spyware on iOS devices and believes its methodology may also help users identify other such surveillance malware

• January 16, 2024 16 Jan'24

  Republic of Ireland publishes progress update on digital strategy

  Update reveals 2.3 million people in Ireland now have MyGovID accounts, and the Irish government plans to launch a new digital portal for businesses, as well as establishing an AI advisory council imminently

• January 15, 2024 15 Jan'24

  British Library catalogues back online after ransomware attack

  The British Library has restored online access to its main catalogue of nearly 40 million items on a limited basis as it continues the long and arduous process of recovering from a ransomware attack

• January 15, 2024 15 Jan'24

  Cosmetics retailer Lush dealing with mystery cyber incident

  Cosmetics retailer Lush confirms it’s investigating a cyber attack of an undisclosed nature, but key public-facing systems appear to be unaffected

• January 15, 2024 15 Jan'24

  Russia hacked ex-MI6 chief’s emails – what they reveal is more Dad’s Army than deep state

  A Russian hacking group that published emails of ex-MI6 chief Richard Dearlove claimed to have uncovered a conspiracy, but it was more Dad’s Army than the ‘deep state’, Computer Weekly and Byline Times reveal

• January 15, 2024 15 Jan'24

  How legal disclosure failures disrupted the Post Office Horizon inquiry

  From overly narrow search terms, overzealous deduplication of documents and failed email migrations, poor management of legal discovery has delayed justice for postmasters in the Horizon inquiry  

• January 15, 2024 15 Jan'24

  EU amendment changes open source definition

  The EU Cyber Resilience Act has the potential to cause confusion among open source developers, with questions remaining over open development

• January 15, 2024 15 Jan'24

  IT failure caused weekend chaos at Sussex hospitals

  The critical incident at University Hospitals Sussex NHS Foundation Trust, caused by IT issues on Sunday night, has now been resolved

• January 15, 2024 15 Jan'24

  NCA director sacked after WhatsApp and email security breaches

  Nikki Holland, former director of investigations at the NCA, was sacked for “misconduct” after sending sensitive NCA information over personal email and WhatsApp

• January 12, 2024 12 Jan'24

  UK government seeks public views on impacts of AI-generated porn

  The government’s Pornography Review will look in part at the use of AI throughout the industry to generate sexually explicit content without people’s consent

• January 11, 2024 11 Jan'24

  Cisco fixes high-impact flaw in unified comms platform

  Cisco unified comms customers are urged to patch a critical vulnerability in Unity Connection, a messaging and voicemail product