Weekly Intelligence Summary 13 November

The operators of the “RagnarLocker” ransomware began an advertising campaign on Facebook to further extort the victim of one of their recent attacks.

“CostaRicto” has become the fourth cyber-mercenary group to be discovered in 2020.

The developers of the infamous “Maze” ransomware claimed to have permanently ceased operations.

After a short hiatus, the “Ryuk” ransomware variant is back with upgrades, including the ability to fully encrypt data in just five hours.

A ruthless, ever-evolving cyber-threat group, “FIN11”, has been discovered deploying “Clop”: ransomware that encrypts and exfiltrates data.

Advanced persistent threat groups linked to China and Iran have conducted cyber espionage through front companies, under the guise of legitimate technology services.

The source code of several operating systems (OS) developed by Microsoft has been published online, sparking public concerns about security.

Ransomware encrypted and disabled the systems of Universal Health Services (UHS) hospitals in the US this week, in yet another example of threat actors targeting the healthcare sector.

Ransomware attacks are increasingly targeting UK educational establishments, according to the UK’s National Cyber Security Centre (NCSC).

Three state-linked threat groups have reportedly conducted cyber attacks aimed at the US Democratic and Republican presidential campaigns.

An operations security (OpSec) failure by the threat group “FIN7” led to an unintentional exposure of their new tools, campaigns, and underground affiliations.

A wave of extortion attacks has interrupted operations in the financial services and retail sectors with threats of distributed denial of service (DDoS) if ransom is not paid.

Remote workers have been falling victim to a voice-phishing (vishing) campaign that involves phone calls and custom phishing pages intended to solicit virtual private network (VPN) credentials.

Global technology firm Intel Corporation (Intel) confirmed a data leak after 20GB of its confidential proprietary data was made available online.

Since its first appearance, WastedLocker has been a successful tool for extorting millions of dollars from companies in a series of targeted attacks.

“Lazarus Group” has reportedly used their newly identified “MATA” malware framework and newly created “VHD” ransomware to target high-profile victims.

After exposing more than 300 million user records in May 2020, the “ShinyHunters” threat group has allegedly returned with a second stage of data leaks.

On 15 July 2020 threat actors compromised 130 Twitter accounts to promote a cryptocurrency scam, which reportedly garnered at least USD 121,000.

A cybercriminal-forum user claims to have accessed and exfiltrated 15 billion records pertaining to multiple companies by compromising Data Viper, a cyber-security firm that holds breached data.

Ransomware appeared on the horizon long before 2020, but has arguably taken the cyber-threat landscape by storm over the past six months.