Towerwall's InfoSec Blog

When an international law enforcement action earlier this month knocked out theGameover botnet, one happy consequence was the takedown of the servers that the CryptoLocker ransomware needed in order to do its dirty work. Well, any celebration over CryptoLocker’s demise is certainly premature - encrypting ransomware is alive and well. With many victims paying up, ransomware is a lucrative business for the crooks, and CryptoLocker has inspired copycats who want in on the loot.

A new ransomware program, known as Cryptolocker, was identified recently. Ransomware can freeze your computer and ask you to pay a fee, but this malicious ransomware does more than just that. (You can use a anti-virus tool to remove the virus.) Cryptolocker is different from other ransomware due to the fact that it allows your computer and software to run while your personal files, such as documents, spreadsheets, and images, are encrypted. The only copy of the decryption key is then saved ontofalse

GameOver Zeus P2P Malware Original release date: June 02, 2014 Systems Affected Microsoft Windows 95, 98, Me, 2000, XP, Vista, 7, and 8 Microsoft Server 2003, Server 2008, Server 2008 R2, and Server 2012 Overview GameOver Zeus (GOZ), a peer-to-peer (P2P) variant of the Zeus family of bank credential-stealing malware identified in September 2011, [1] uses a decentralized network infrastructure of compromised personal computers and web servers to execute command-and-control. The United Statesfalse

My clients often confuse scanning and penetration testing. Organisations should be conducting both external vulnerability scans and penetration tests. If you are storing or transmitting data on the Internet, particularly sensitive data such as credit card details, then quarterly scanning is required to validate your PCI compliance. You also need to conduct a penetration test at least once a year. These are the minimum requirements to remain compliant; it is prudent to scan and test more often.false

The cloud computing revolution is well underway and there are lots of benefits to be realized. According to Awesome Cloud research the industry will be worth more than $150 billion this year, compared to $46 billion just six years ago. Mirroring the general trend for SaaS solutions, cloud-based IT security systems can be an ideal fit for smaller businesses, freeing them from internal IT overhead, cutting complexity, and providing scalability. Here are five reasons that switching to afalse

Criminals are evolving with their techniques for hacking and breaching corporate assets, so security managers need to as well. Here are some ways companies are going beyond standard pen testing in order to increase awareness By Maria Korolov Security professionals have long been running penetration tests against their firewalls and other security systems to find weaknesses that need to be addressed. The Common Vulnerability Scoring System is an industry standard, but has been around for afalse

Personal and business relationships rely on trust to function, but blind trust in the digital world is downright dangerous. We’re asked to trust companies all the time. We trust them with personal details and they promise to keep them safe. It’s the same story in the enterprise. One company will entrust another to backup and store data, keeping it accessible for employees, but shutting out criminals and spies. Sometimes that trust proves to be misplaced, with disastrous results. On a personalfalse

Good Afternoon: The IT infrastructure your organization may use for day-to-day business may be vulnerable because of the Heartbleed vulnerability. Sophos a Towerwall partner has prepared a podcast of the Heartbleed vulnerability, which addresses who is likely affected, workarounds and an offer to help determine if you are vulnerable. http://nakedsecurity.sophos.com/2014/04/10/sscc-142-heartbleed-explained-patches-evaluated-apple-chastised-podcast/ If you think you may be affected and don't knowfalse

Cisco Security Notice Cisco WebEx Business Suite HTTP GET Parameters Include Sensitive Information

by Paul Ducklin on March 12, 2014 We already wrote about Microsoft's March 2014 patches, noting that, as usually happens, there was an All-Points Bulletin for Internet Explorer coming up. Microsoft doesn't call them APBs, of course - they are Cumulative Security Updates, with one bulletin covering all the numerous versions, bitnesses and CPU flavors of Redmond's IE browser. What we weren't able to tell you in advance was whether the widely-publicized (but fortunately not widely-exploited) false