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Published Wednesday, February 13, 2013 12:30 AM by Bob Hansmann
The 2013 Threat Report from the Websense® Security Labs (WSL) is now available. The report details mobile, social, email and web-based threats, and while it is full of ominous data points, it is a very interesting read. The report is designed to help...

Published Wednesday, February 06, 2013 1:00 PM by Lamont Orange
Last week, we all woke to the New York Times announcing they were victims of an ongoing attack by Chinese hackers, resulting in the accounts of several reporters being compromised. The article went on to describe details of the breach including four months...

Published Monday, October 29, 2012 10:38 AM by Jason Woo
Every week I hear cyber security teams say they’re worried about spear-phishing . They’re struggling to defend against them with their current technology. But to exacerbate matters, their users also struggle to understand how to spot a malicious...

Published Wednesday, October 24, 2012 3:00 PM by Fiaaz Walji
Last week, the Canadian federal government announced its plans to create a secure, stable and resilient digital infrastructure in Canada. To help improve incident response and stop cyber-threats, the Government of Canada is investing $155M in our cybersecurity...

Published Tuesday, October 09, 2012 4:58 AM by Patrik Runald
Spear-phishing is a huge concern for today’s government and enterprises. While high profile attacks like last week’s spear-phishing attack against the White House and last year’s attack against Oak Ridge National Laboratory underscore...

Published Tuesday, September 18, 2012 1:14 PM by Jason Clark

I recently hosted a Websense customer round-table discussion with 20 CSOs from top U.S. companies. We swapped war stories, hashed out the security challenges they face every day and they shared how they’ve been successful. These CSOs work in a variety of industries, including federal, finance and healthcare. Recently, there have been a number of highly public targeted attacks, which led to a lengthy discussion on spear-phishing. I found their insights very valuable and I wanted to share some key points...

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Published Monday, September 10, 2012 7:59 AM by Spencer Parker
The seven stages hackers follow to steal data have been exposed! Traditional URL and AV defences are no longer effective in blocking targeted attacks. Cloud apps, mobility and remote users have all contributed to a growth in SSL traffic, which is a major...

Published Tuesday, August 28, 2012 9:54 AM by Jason Woo
Leading analyst firm Gartner just released the 2012 Magic Quadrant for Secure Email Gateways (SEG) * and noted an uptick in targeted phishing attacks. The report states "Phishing attacks continue to oscillate, while more targeted phishing attacks...

Published Monday, August 06, 2012 10:18 PM by Tom Clare

Every day, organizations worldwide are targeted by data-stealing attacks. While these attacks have evolved in frequency and sophistication, many security defenses have failed to adapt. Old techniques don’t address containment against data theft and cybercrime call-home communications. The growing prevalence of cloud apps, along with increases in SSL traffic, mobility and remote users are also adding more blind spots to traditional defenses.

It’s imperative that we continue to stay up-to-date on the latest tactics and tricks. Join me this Wednesday, August 8, 2012 from 10 a.m. - 11 a.m. PT for a webinar on the seven stages of data theft. We’ll be covering each of these steps:

Reconnaissance - Targeted attackers access credentials and research online profiles, email IDs, org. chart information, hobbies and interests from social profiles to gain insight on their victims.

Lures - Designed to prey on human curiosity, web lures often link to videos or breaking news, while email lures are more business-focused on transaction and fake delivery notices.


Redirects - Users are usually directed to a survey, rogue anti virus offer or a fake web page where an exploit kit is waiting. Traditional redirects are injection attacks, while newer ones focus on social networking wall postings, fake plug-ins, fake certificates and heavily obfuscated java script.


Exploit Kits - The exploit kit objective is like that of a sniper: take the shot with a malware dropper file only when an open door for tested vulnerabilities is found.


Dropper Files - This stage is what most people consider the focus of their forward-facing defenses: analyze every file that comes into the network for malware. The problem is dropper files use dynamic packers, so known signatures and patterns are not available.


Call-Home - This stage involves calling home for malware downloads and tools, and for sending back information, standard procedure for any successful online attack. The problem is that most defenses are only forward-facing and do not analyze the outbound traffic from infected systems.


Data Theft - This is what they are after. The ability to contain an attack and stop data theft raises many questions that we will address. Can your defenses detect password files leaving your network or the use of custom encryption on outbound files?

In addition, we’ll be covering: why current defenses are failing; today’s new security requirements; and the newest, bleeding edge advanced threat and data theft defenses to emerge thus far.

We look forward to having you join the webinar. Bring your questions and be ready to talk threats!

 

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Published Thursday, June 07, 2012 8:29 PM by Jason Clark
Yesterday’s LinkedIn breach made headlines, but I want to go deeper and provide practical advice for organizations on how they can anticipate any DLP consequences and tighten their network security. As the world’s largest professional social...

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