Cryptojacking: The high cost of free money
If I offered you free money, what would your first response be? For those of us in the security industry, the first thought is probably what the catch is. In the case of cryptojacking, the catch is that all the costs are covered by someone else.
Cloud infrastructure deployments are the bedrock below many companies today. However, that same infrastructure is getting targeted by threat actors that can spot opportunities to earn cash for themselves. Based on the activities of one threat actor, Team TNT, we can now estimate just how much that free money really costs.
Cryptojacking malware sees a 230 percent increase in 2022
Crypto mining has become incredibly popular with cybercriminals over the past year, growing by 230 percent. It's not hard to see why as it's expensive in terms of machinery and energy consumption, so if you can cryptojack someone else's machine to do it there are healthy profits to be made.
New research from Kaspersky shows that despite the 'crypto winter' which has seen the value of cryptocurrencies drop significantly and the cryptocurrency industry facing a liquidity crisis, criminal activity targeting the crypto industry doesn’t seem to be slowing down.
Cryptojacking costs victims over 50-times what the attacker makes
According to a new report from Sysdig, the unified container and cloud security company, it costs $430,000 in cloud bills for an attacker to generate $8,100 in cryptocurrency revenue. This works out at a $53 cost to the victim for every $1 the cryptojacker makes.
The report takes an extensive look at TeamTNT, a notorious cloud-targeting threat actor that generates the majority of its criminal profits through cryptojacking. TeamTNT is best known for its crypto‐jacking worm activity, which began in 2019, exploiting vulnerable instances of popular key‐value store Redis.
Linux-based systems targeted with ransomware and cryptojacking
Thanks to its use on many cloud servers, Linux is a core part of the digital infrastructure. It's not surprising therefore that it's increasingly being targeted by attacks.
A new report from the Threat Analysis Unit at VMware finds malware targeting Linux-based operating systems is increasing in both volume and complexity amid a rapidly changing threat landscape,
The top attack trends businesses need to address this year
2021 saw supply chain and ransomware attacks dominate the security landscape. But will this pattern continue this year?
Managed detection and response provider Expel has launched a new report which provides insights on the biggest cybersecurity threats, practical recommendations on how to handle them, and predictions on what to expect in the year ahead.
Google cloud hacks mostly used for illegal cryptomining
New data from AtlasVPN shows that 86 percent of hacked Google Cloud accounts are used for illegal cryptomining.
Besides cryptojacking, other uses of compromised accounts include conducting port scanning of other targets on the Internet, occurring 10 percent of the time after a Google Cloud compromise.
Is your business being targeted by cryptojackers?
Thanks in no small part to Tesla CEO Elon Musk, Bitcoin, Dogecoin and other cryptocurrencies have become much more widely known, but not necessarily understood.
Recent booms and burst bubbles have exposed how volatile, speculative and easy to manipulate those cryptocurrencies are, not to mention the environmental concerns attached to how they are mined. Nevertheless, cryptocurrency mining can be hard to resist when there is potential for massive payouts to successful miners. To try and gain an edge, miners have formed blockchain mining farms and invested in high-end computing systems.
Is your business being targeted by cryptojackers?
Thanks in no small part to Tesla CEO Elon Musk, Bitcoin, Dogecoin and other cryptocurrencies have become much more widely known, but not necessarily understood.
Recent booms and burst bubbles have exposed how volatile, speculative and easy to manipulate those cryptocurrencies are, not to mention the environmental concerns attached to how they are mined.
Cryptojacking malware increases as Bitcoin hits new highs
Researchers from Avira Protection Labs have recorded a 53 percent increase in coinminer malware attacks in Q4 2020 compared to the previous quarter.
With the Bitcoin price reaching a new all-time high earlier this month, this points to a connection between the rapid price rise and increased coinminer malware activity as criminals seek to cash in.
Ransomware sees a revival in 2019's worst cybersecurity threats
Cybersecurity company Webroot has released its third annual Nastiest Malware list which shows ransomware making a comeback in addition to other threats.
Phishing and botnets are still popular attack methods and threats across the board are also becoming more sophisticated and harder to detect.
Norman the Cryptominer uses sophisticated techniques to avoid discovery
Researchers at Varonis have released information on a new cryptominer variant, which the team has dubbed 'Norman', that uses various techniques to hide and avoid discovery.
Norman was discovered during investigations of an ongoing cryptomining infection that had spread to nearly every device at a midsize company.
Cyber incidents cost $45 billion in 2018
Cybercriminals are getting better at monetizing their activities, with more than two million cyber incidents in 2018 resulting in over $45 billion in losses, with actual numbers expected to be much higher as many cyber incidents are never reported.
The Internet Society's Online Trust Alliance (OTA) has released a report which finds the financial impact of ransomware rose by 60 percent last year, and losses from business email compromise doubled, despite the fact that overall breaches and exposed records were down.
Coinhive dominates malware charts before being shut down
Coinhive continued to hold the top spot in Check Point Research's February Global Threat Index, impacting 10 percent of organizations worldwide, even though its services were shut down on March 8th.
In February, the two most prevalent malware variants were cryptominers, followed by the Emotet banking Trojan. Coinhive has seen a downward trend in its global impact, from 18 percent of organizations in October 2018 to 12 percent in January 2019 and with a further two percent drop in February.
Home endpoints twice as likely to be infected as businesses
Despite the fact that in recent months we've seen cybercriminals focusing their efforts on businesses, 68 percent of infections are seen on consumer endpoints, compared to 32 percent on business endpoints.
This is one of the findings of the latest Webroot Threat Report, which also shows that legitimate websites are frequently compromised to host malicious content, with 40 percent of malicious URLs hosted on good domains.
Cybercriminals earn over $3 billion a year from social platforms
Social media-enabled cybercrimes are generating at least $3.25 billion in global revenue annually according to a new report.
The study released by virtualization-based security company Bromium and researched and written by Dr Mike McGuire, senior lecturer in criminology at the University of Surrey, looks at the range of techniques used by cybercriminals to exploit trust and enable rapid infection across social media.
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