SPYWARE USED TO TARGET JOURNALISTS AND RANSOMWARE RUNNING RAMPANT

Term of the month: Spyware

Spyware is software that can be used for legitimate purposes by law enforcement or for malicious purposes by third parties. The main goal of the software is to gather information on the targeted machine and send it to a third party. The software is usually installed with out the end user's knowledge and can send back all the data on the phone, computer or tablet.

---

The biggest news this month has been regarding the revelation that NSO Groups Pegasus phone spyware was and still is used by authoritarian governments to spy on journalists, human rights advocates, religious leaders, business elites,

politicians etc. Since the gravity of the findings is so large companies have developed software to scan phones and inform you if you are one of the targeted victims.

Over the 4th or July weekend Kaseya was the victim of a massive ransomware attack targeting their customers and the resulting fallout is still experienced with teams using the third party decryptor to help affected customers. The culprits behind the attack disappeared from the web possibly due to the law enforcement attention the attack bought onto them but left a considerable amount of ransoms uncollected and the victims stranded with locked machines.

Microsoft's Digital Crimes Unit has struck a blow against cyber criminals by taking down the infrastructure used to conduct a sophisticated business e-mail compromise campaign against the companies customers.

Apple computer users were warned that Xloader malware is targeting Mac computers with the ability to steal credentials, log keystrokes and screen record with the possibility of serious damage.

---

•Pegasus: Report finds spyware used to target journalists, activists

•How To Check If Your Smartphone Is Infected With Pegasus Spyware

•Up to 1,500 businesses compromised by latest ransomware attack, Kaseya CEO says

•Kaseya mysteriously obtains master REvil decryptor from ‘third party’

•Malware developers turn to 'exotic' programming languages to thwart researchers

•Why remote working leaves us vulnerable to cyber-attacks

•Mac Users Warned To Check For New Xloader Malware

•When Ransomware Group REvil Vanished, Its Victims Were Stranded

•Microsoft cracks down on sophisticated BEC scam campaign