This year, Cybersecurity Awareness Month has changed up its typical approach of weekly themes and is focusing on four behaviors that are most important to #BeCyberSmart and stay safe online. The behaviors focus on the “people” part of cybersecurity to ensure all individuals and organizations make smart decisions personally and professionally. The behaviors that will be highlighted during the month include:
The FBI and the Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency (CISA) have published a Public Service Announcement (PSA) assessing that any attempts by cyber actors to compromise election infrastructure are unlikely to result in largescale disruptions or prevent voting.
This week, the Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency (CISA), the FBI, and the National Security Agency (NSA) published a joint Cybersecurity Advisory (CSA) to highlight malicious cyber activity by advanced persistent threat (APT) actors observed on a Defense Industrial Base sector organization’s enterprise network. Most notably, the advisory highlights how threat actors continue to successfully maintain persistence in victim networks by leveraging legitimate account credentials.
Attention: Microsoft Exchange administrators are highly recommended to revisit and follow Microsoft’s updated guidance to protect vulnerable servers until a patch is made available.
Yesterday, the Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency (CISA) announced a new Binding Operational Directive (BOD) 23-01, Improving Asset Visibility and Vulnerability Detection on Federal Networks. The intent of the BOD is to help federal agencies strengthen their cyber defenses by gaining visibility into all the assets on their networks and improving vulnerability detection capabilities.
The Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency (CISA) is warning users to remain on alert for malicious cyber activity targeting potential disaster victims and charitable donors following Hurricane Ian. Fraudulent emails – often containing malicious links or attachments—are common after major natural disasters. Exercise caution in handling emails with hurricane-related subject lines, attachments, or hyperlinks. In addition, be wary of social media pleas, texts, or door-to-door solicitations relating to severe weather events.
The Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency (CISA) has published the following ICS vulnerability advisories, as well as alerts, updates, and bulletins:
ICS Vulnerability Advisories:
Overall malware detections have decreased from their record high in the first half of 2021, but there was an increase in encrypted malware and threats targeting Chrome and Microsoft Office, according to WatchGuard Threat Lab’s latest report.
Yesterday, the cybersecurity company Sophos released a new report, The State of Ransomware in State and Local Government 2022, which provides insights into ransomware attack trends, costs and recovery, and ransom payouts in state and local government organizations over the last year. To conduct the report, Sophos polled 5,600 IT professionals in mid-sized organizations across 31 countries, including 199 respondents from the state and local government sector. The study found that ransomware attacks against state and local governments are significantly increasing.
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