IRS Breach Shows What Happens to PII After it is Sold on the Black Market

By | May 29th, 2015|Breach, Uncategorized|

IRS BreachThe IRS experienced a breach that is changing the way businesses and consumers think about personal information. Reporters attribute the IRS breach to a crime syndicate in Russia, who used personal information obtained elsewhere to exploit the Get Transcript feature on the IRS website. They successfully exploited 104,000 individuals and filed nearly $50 million in fraudulent tax funds.

“This breach is not just about what this single group is going to do with the information, but what happens when this information gets sold on the black market,” said cybersecurity author Peter Warren Singer to The New York Times. “It’s rare for the actual attackers to turn the information directly into money. They’re stealing the data and selling it off to other people.”

As Singer points out, this breach demonstrates how cyber criminals can take stolen data and exploit an online system to pick the pockets of thousands of consumers. Major data breaches thus far have proven that cyber criminals have the know-how to exploit major retailers’ security systems; this breach proves these criminals have more sophisticated schemes in their back pocket to cash in on the information they’ve stolen without having to find a vulnerability in an organization’s security system.

This is costly to businesses as it highlights the limited control they have on security breaches. Maintaining a healthy, secure system helps businesses avoid data breaches, but cyber criminals are working around secure systems by taking advantage of customers’ personal information. Gizmodo reporter Kate Knibbs calls this a “domino effect.” The way it works is that cyber criminals hack into a business’ system and steal customer data. Using that customer data, which includes name, address, email credentials and Social Security number, cyber criminals can log in to another business to make purchases or otherwise financially exploit a business. The result? A business is hijacked without its security system ever being hacked into. Cyber criminals are finding these workarounds, making their schemes more sophisticated and harder to identify from the outside.

So what exactly can we do to mitigate the risk of these types of breaches? Businesses and consumers must develop better habits and methods to protect their identities online. Password reuse is one of the most damaging habits of consumers. In fact, six out of 10 admit to reusing passwords across multiple sites. Convenience typically wins over security when it comes to interacting online. Businesses must innovate convenient options for consumers to better protect their digital identities. In the meantime, monitoring customer and employee credentials is a business’ best bet for protecting their assets.

How does this breach affect the way businesses handle security? How can businesses and consumers prioritize security over convenience when it comes to protecting digital identities? Let us know what you think on Facebook, Twitter and LinkedIn.

Digital Wallets in the Crosshairs

By | May 15th, 2015|Uncategorized|

Digital WalletsDigital wallets have been a hot topic for us lately. Their use is growing and like all things when it comes to cyber security, online criminals always follow the money. Kaspersky Labs said it best:

“Enthusiasm over this new payment platform (Apple Pay) is going to drive adoption through the roof and that inevitably attracts many cyber criminals looking to reap the rewards of these transactions.”

This “follow the money” mentality was exhibited this week after news came to light of a brute force attack against individual Starbucks mobile wallet accounts. Thieves have been taking advantage of two things to hack in to Starbucks app accounts: consumers’ bad password habits and the ability to try different passwords on the Starbucks app without being locked out. Thieves have been purchasing email addresses and passwords on the underground black market and then using programs to try out these passwords on high-value sites like the Starbucks app. These programs can try hundreds of login combinations in a matter of seconds, and they only need one consumer that has reused credentials to cash in.

We saw a similar process happen to Jomoco – a fictitious small business we created to see just how quickly a small business can be brought down by hackers. Fictional Jomoco employee, Rachel, was guilty of reusing email addresses and passwords across multiple accounts. When we leaked her email address and password for her personal email account on the online black market one of the first things the hackers did was try it out on other sites. They quickly discovered that they could also access her business email account, which happened to host sensitive business information. Long story short, Jomoco was compromised in every way possible in less than an hour – all because Rachel reused passwords. You can read more about Jomoco on our website.

If you use a mobile wallet – whether it’s the Starbucks app or Apple Pay – always use a unique, secure password and turn on two-factor authentication if it is offered. Similar to how we saw a rise in POS breaches in 2013 and 2014, we fully expect to see a growing number of incidents and breaches involving mobile wallets in 2015, especially as consumers and businesses continue to figure out best security practices for this new technology.

Are you hesitant to use digital wallets? How do you combat reusing passwords across multiple sites? Let us know what you think on Facebook, Twitter and LinkedIn!

Cyber Criminals Shut Down an SMB in One Hour

By | May 11th, 2015|Uncategorized|

JomocoThere’s a huge misconception among small businesses that cyber criminals are only interested in stealing data from big names like Target, Home Depot and Neiman Marcus. This misleading mindset may cause a small business (SMB) to inadequately invest in security measures and improperly enforce security policies at work. In fact, only 2 in 5 SMBs have a social media policy in place and only 2 in 10 SMBs plan to increase security spending this year. The truth of the matter is that cyber criminals are looking for the path of least resistance that will get them the most information as fast as possible.

With the growth of startup culture across the nation, we decided to test just how easy it is for cyber criminals to infiltrate a budding business. Thanks to the ingenuity of the sales and marketing team and some dark web help from our cyber team, Jomoco was brought to life. Jomoco is a fictitious coconut water company with a groovy coconut mascot and two fabricated employee personas. We set up Jomoco like any other startup would – with a company website, server, employee personal and work email addresses, a credit card and some employee social media accounts. CSID also ensured that Jomoco’s fictional employees made common mistakes when protecting their professional and personal data online, including sharing sensitive information via email and reusing passwords across multiple sites. The real cyber criminals took it from there.

Within one hour, Jomoco was taken over by cyber criminals. The website was defaced, the credit card had been used and employees were locked out of work emails and social media sites.

Interested in finding out how cyber criminals took down this business so fast? Download our case study to get the complete story, including pictures of the defaced website and the dark web forums where Jomoco’s credit card information was shared. If you’re an SMB looking to better protect your data, here are tips from the National Cyber Security Alliance on how to make your business more secure.

How can SMBs better protect their assets? What are some ways employees can protect business data? Please share your thoughts with us on Facebook, Twitter and LinkedIn! We’d love to hear what you have to say.

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