Vulnerabilities and exploits

The year 2016 started with a quite a number of security incidents related to hacks of hospitals and medical equipment. They include a ransomware attack on a Los Angeles hospital, the same in two German hospitals, an attack on a Melbourne hospital and so on – in just two months of 2016!

Microsoft releases thirteen bulletins this month, patching a total of 44 vulnerabilities. More than half of the critical vulnerabilities fixed this month support the web browsers, Internet Explorer and Microsoft Edge. Vulnerabilities rated critical also exist in Opentype font parsing kernel components, Windows Media Player, and the Windows PDF library.

Yesterday a blog post on “The Linux Mint Blog” caught our attention. Apparently criminals managed to compromise a vulnerable instance of Wordpress which the project used to run their website. The attackers modified download links pointing to backdoored ISO files of Linux Mint 17.3 Cinnamon edition.

Kaspersky Lab security researchers Santiago Pontirol and Roberto Martinez explain how ATM malware works in Latin America and why it’s difficult to discover ‘jackpotting’ malware.

The hacking of Hacking Team was widely discussed in the media from many different points of view, such as the legality of selling spyware to oppressive governments, the quality of the tools and leaked email spools displaying the company’s business practices. One of these stories attracted our attention.

с новым годом! Microsoft rings in the New Year with a new set of ten security bulletins MS16-001 through MS16-010, patching 24 CVE detailed vulnerabilities.

Software vulnerabilities are one of those problems that potentially affect all users. A vulnerability is a fault in a program’s implementation that can be used by attackers to gain unauthorized access to data, inject malicious code or put a system out of operation.

In 2015, virus writers demonstrated a particular interest in exploits for Adobe Flash Player. The proportion of relatively simple programs used in mass attacks was growing. Attackers have mastered non-Windows platforms – Android and Linux: almost all types of malicious programs are created and used for these platforms.

The data collected from Kaspersky Lab products shows that the tools used to attack businesses differ from those used against home users. Let’s have a look back at the major incidents of 2015 and at the new trends we have observed in information security within the business environment.

The end of the year is traditionally a time for reflection – for taking stock of our lives before considering what lies ahead. We’d like to offer our customary retrospective of the key events that have shaped the threat landscape in 2015.

Be careful when selecting apps and when it comes to your much-loved devices.

As the year comes to an end, we have an opportunity to take stock of how the industry has evolved and to cast our predictions for the coming years. The outlook for our rapidly evolving field of study is quite thought-provoking and will continue to present us with interesting challenges.

Microsoft posted four critical bulletins today, along with another eight rated Important and lesser. Microsoft’s summary is at its site. All in all, the software maker is patching a large number of vulnerabilities this month, with 37 CVE listed vulnerabilities being fixed with the four critical Bulletins alone.

A secure system – especially a system that is used to provide security – has to be trusted. But what underpins that trust? What proof do we have that the main components of our trusted system are implemented properly and won’t fail at a critical moment?

Kaspersky Lab researchers have discovered coffeemakers that expose Wi-Fi network passwords, baby monitors that let hackers spy on you, and smartphone-controlled home security systems that can be fooled with a magnet.