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Have you ever wondered what the financial incentive for cyber criminals is? Many experts are reporting a staggering $1 billion was taken in from ransomware alone in 2016 not counting the other options for cyber crime.
For years we have repeatedly seen stories in the media about shadowy criminals making purchases with your credit card online and the onus being put onto the financial institution to identify,block and refund these transactions. Today things have escalated drastically and the black market for information has a broad range of options from online reward point accounts, medical records, auction site accounts and tutorials for new people interested in cyber crime. This escalation also means that the responsibility for online security is shifting to the personal side instead of solely the vendor.
Below are a few examples of the many ways cyber criminals are making money online from your accounts and information. Whether they are taking a website down to stop trade, extorting hospitals with sensitive patient information, auctioning hacking tools and guides for new criminals or just use of your netflix subscription, there is a market for it and it is thriving.
Bank details
Selling credit card numbers has been a classic source of revenue for cyber criminals. Although the market is starting to lean towards more specific details like medical records for social engineering and fraud purposes, credit card information is still a strong source of revenue. As can be seen below from a 2016 McAfee report, full card and personal details for a little as $40.
“Everything is available. We see bank-to-bank transfers offered for sale, and the availability of banking login credentials.”
Bank credentials for a specific account to drain funds has a higher value which runs as a percentage of the account balance. Usually around 1% – 5% of the available balance.
DDoS Rental Services
A DDoS attack will overload a victims website causing it to crash and prevent access until the attack stops. A frozen website can cause an instant halt to sales and have ongoing reputational damage. In 2016, 84% of Australian small and medium businesses are online with that percentage expected to increase in 2017.
The average cost to the victim of a DDoS attack is around $500USD per minute, the mean cost to the attacker is only $66 per attack. The cost to launch a DDoS attack is so low that the barrier to entry for attackers is practically nil – and that means that any organization can potentially be the target of a DDoS attack. What is a DDoS attack?
Russian DDoS advertisement
Exploit kits
Exploit kits are designed to be a ready to launch hacking tool, with many different variations available online for the budding cyber criminal to purchase and start causing mischief. One case of a student in Virginia, USA is facing a 10 years prison sentence after creating a key logger tool which records keystrokes and ultimately account information on the victim’s system. The student offered the nefarious tool for sale at $35 USD and sold to around 3,000 people who, in turn, infected over 16,000 victims, the U.S. Attorney’s Office said.
Using those numbers, his personal incentive for the key logger tool was approximately $105,000 USD which is certainly an attractive figure for any would-be cyber criminal.
Ransomware is malicious software which once it has infected a system the software will encrypt important files rendering the operations frozen until the victim pays a ransom usually demanded in bitcoin. Multiple ransomware kits have been found for rent in online marketplaces for as little as $1,000USD a month or $100USD for 48 hours.
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Online rewards programs
Online rewards programs such as account information for airline points have also been found for sale on cyber crime marketplaces. According to the report 300,000 airline points for as low as $90USD which is very concerning after the recent reveal that 90% of airline booking systems are insecure.
“Flight bookings worldwide are managed by the so-called Global Distributed Systems (GDS) that connect travel agencies, online booking websites, airlines and passengers. Amadeus, Sabre, and Travelport, the three largest GDS networks, administer more than 90 percent of the bookings as well as numerous hotel, car, and other travel reservations, according to Security Research Labs (SR Labs), a Berlin-based hacking research collective.”
Compromised organisation & infrastructure access
Other types of data for sale include access to systems within organizations’ trusted networks. The types of entry vary, from very simple direct access (such as login credentials) to those that require a degree of technical competence to carry out (such as vulnerabilities). We can see the availability of vulnerabilities that allow potential buyers access to bank and airline systems located in Europe, Asia, and the United States.
A recent report by cyber crime expert Idan Aharoni suggests that the types of systems criminals sell access to now include critical infrastructure systems. In his article “SCADA Systems Offered for Sale in the Underground Economy,” Aharoni included one example in which a seller provided a screenshot that appears to be a French hydroelectric generator as evidence that the seller had access.
Stolen enterprise data is also for sale, we have seen sellers offering data stolen from a university.
Medical Records
One of the fastest growing areas of data theft is the medical industry. Client records have been shown to be extremely valuable in the black market community for a number of reasons. One reason is the level of detail which medical records hold. Most medical records hold sensitive information which financial institutions are not privy to for example full name, age, family history, government ID numbers and other details used for social engineering.
Another reason medical records have increased in value is their extortion value to the holding hospital or medical practitioner. “A breach happens at one of these companies. The hackers go direct to that company and say, ‘I have your data.’ The cost of keeping this a secret is X dollars and the companies make the problems go away that way,” said Greg Virgin, CEO of the security firm RedJack.
Online Subscription Services
Netflix, HBO, Spotify, etc are just a few of the online subscription services for digital content that are available to purchase for a low as $1 USD. High demand for these accounts can be seen from the widespread listings in the marketplace despite their seemingly low value.
video streaming services are in high demand. Even premium professional sports streaming services can be purchased for $15. We also found other online accounts being sold, including lifetime subscriptions to premium pornography accounts, as well as free referral links to the dark web market Agora.
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It is unclear how 2017 will unfold with reports already saying 123456 is still the world’s most popular password but if that is any indicator of the state of personal security, 2017 is going to be a very lucrative year for cyber criminals.
“Employees still remain the most cited source of compromise”
With each new report the cyber security expert consensus remains the same regarding internal culture to self mitigate. The below is an excerpt from the latest Australia Securities and Investment Commission (ASIC) Cyber Resilience Assessment Report: ASX Group and Chi-X Australia Pty Ltd.
“There is clear recognition that effective cyber resilience requires a strong ‘cultural’ focus driven by the board and reflected in organisation-wide programs for staff awareness, education and random testing, including of third parties.”
CERT Australia (the CERT) is the national computer emergency response team and are the point of contact in Government for cyber security issues affecting major Australian businesses. The CERT is part of the Federal Attorney-General’s Department, with offices in Canberra and Brisbane.
At least 85% of the targeted cyber intrusions that the Australian Signals Directorate (ASD) responds to could be prevented by following the Top 4 mitigation strategies listed in our Strategies to Mitigate Targeted Cyber Intrusions.
“This Cyber Security Strategy sets out my Government’s philosophy and program for meeting the dual challenges of the digital age—advancing and protecting our interests online.” Hon Malcolm Turnbull MP
CREST Australia New Zealand Ltd, a not for profit company, runs CREST Australia New Zealand on behalf of member companies and provides assessment, accreditation, certification, education and training in cyber and information security for individuals and corporate entities and promotes the provision of high quality, best practice information security services according to its company constitution.
MailGuard is one of Australia’s leading technological innovators and the world’s foremost cloud web and email security service, providing complete protection against web and email security threats like malware, ransomware, spyware, phishing, spear phishing, viruses, spam and similar malicious scams in 27 countries around the world.
“This comprehensive report is a must-have reference for C-suite executives, senior managers and anyone new to the information security management space.”
CSO provides news, analysis and research on a broad range of security and risk management topics. Areas of focus include information security, physical security, business continuity, identity and access management, loss prevention and more.
The SANS Institute was established in 1989 as a cooperative research and education organization. Its programs now reach more than 165,000 security professionals around the world. SANS is the most trusted and by far the largest source for information security training and security certification in the world.
“Everything you want to know about cyber security and are too tired to search for.” Whatever you may be interested in – from DEF CON to SANS – you will find on this page.
Conclusion
As the emphasis on employee exploitation tactics continues, the more important it is to educate all staff. Cyber Insurance Australia will continue to update this cyber security resource list as more valuable resources are discovered. For any additions please comment or message.
Cyber attack results show over 2.2 billion records stolen
It’s time to reflect on some of the most audacious, embarrassing and dangerous hacks, leaks and data breaches from the past year. 2016 is finished but and at this point there have been more than 2.2 billion records stolen in the past 12 months with a large number coming from historical breaches.
Yahoo – Yahoo has advised they have had at least an incredible 500 million accounts compromised. The intrusion actually happened in 2014 but was only picked up by the company in August of 2016 following an investigation into a separate breach. The August cyber attack turned out to be false but brought to light the extent of the 2014 intrusion. While Yahoo says the information taken was low-value data it did include security questions and answers which would make users vulnerable if used across multiple sites.
Linux Mint backdoor– The Linux operating system still remains one of the most popular Linux releases with approximately 6 million users despite a recent backdoor being announced. The malicious code was inserted into the legitimate version listed on the official Linux Mint forums. Hundreds of users downloaded the malicious build before detection.
“The hacked ISOs are hosted on 5.104.175.212 and the backdoor connects to absentvodka.com. Both lead to Sofia, Bulgaria, and the name of 3 people over there. We don’t know their roles in this, but if we ask for an investigation, this is where it will start.” said the official Mint statement.
SWIFT – SWIFT or Society for Worldwide Interbank Financial Telecommunication is a global organisation that operates a trusted and closed computer network for communication between member banks around the world. With 11,000 members and around 25 million financial messages sent per day SWIFT is a prime target for a cyber attack. On February 4, 2016 unknown hackers used Bangladeshi Bank employee SWIFT credentials to send approx $850 million to numerous accounts in the Philippines, Sri Lanka and other parts of Asia.
When Bank employees found the error $81 million had already been credited to multiple accounts—reportedly belonging to casinos in the Philippines—and all but $68,000 of it was withdrawn on February 5 and 9 before further withdrawals were halted. The hackers might have stolen much more if not for a typo in one of the money transfer requests that caught the eye of the Federal Reserve Bank in New York.
TRUMP – The president elect’s TRUMP hotel chain has been the victim of two cyber attacks since 2015 with the most recent in April 2016. According to some sources the organisation was using unpatched and insecure systems which were more than 10 years old. The April findings were only scratching the surface but it is likely the TRUMP organisation has been compromised much further.
Then, Trump’s presidential campaign leaked the resumes of prospective interns, including their names, addresses, and in some cases sensitive employment details. Let’s hope his cybersecurity strategy is better when he’s in office.
LinkedIn – The global professional networking company was first compromised in 2012. As with the same case as Yahoo, the scale of the historical 2012 breach was only understood this year when the number of stolen accounts exploded to almost 117 million. One reporter noted that the majority of stolen accounts had passwords found in the annual worst passwords list from SplashData.
Here’s how to check if your accounts have been compromised in a cyber attack, haveibeenpwned.com
Tumblr – It comes as no surprise that the Yahoo owned micro blogging and social networking website, Tumblr suffered a similar breach to their parent company in 2013 before the acquisition. Tumblr staff announced that it had been the victim of a security breach but refused to give details until investigative journalists discovered the stolen database had more than 65 million accounts.
MySpace – Formally the world’s largest social network, Myspace suffered their largest known exploit and brought them back into the headlines for the wrong reasons. The breach occurred on June 11th, 2013 but once again was only fully recognised earlier this year after further investigation.
“Each record may contain an email address, a username, one password and in some cases a second password.The methods MySpace used for storing passwords are not what internet standards propose and is very weak encryption or some would say it’s not encryption at all but it gets worse. We noticed that very few passwords were over 10 characters in length (in the thousands) and nearly none contained an upper case character which makes it much easier for people to decrypt.” said leaked data analysts at leakedsource.com.
US Political Attacks – The media had a field day surrounding the 2016 US election accusations from the White House that the Kremlin had committed politically motivated hacks on presidential candidates. Director of National Intelligence, James Clapper stated that “based on the scope and sensitivity of these efforts, that only Russia’s senior-most officials could have authorized” regarding the hacks. Russia has repeatedly denied the hacking allegations.
VK – The largest European online social networking service, based in Russia was the victim of 3 separate hacks in as many months. According to reports, the attack occurred in 2012 or 2013 and continues the historical hack trend which has dominated this list. An estimated 171 million accounts from VK.com and their parent company Mail.ru’s forums.
The hacker is now reported to be selling a portion of the database. 100 million accounts, which turns out to be a little over 17 gigabytes in size have been found on a dark web marketplace for 1 bitcoin.
NSA – The infamous National Security Agency which is an intelligence organization of the US government, responsible for global monitoring, collection, and processing of information and data for foreign intelligence and counterintelligence purposes has had their internal tools stolen and auctioned off by The Shadow Brokers.
The hacking tools which could break through Fortinet and Cisco firewalls was seen listed for auction through known exploit sites. With the wide range of Snowden Leaked files sources are able to confirm that the exploit tools belonged to the US government.
At the time of writing the auction has failed however, The Shadow Brokers have now appeared to have put up the NSA’s hacking tools and exploits for direct sale on an underground website.
NSA 2nd breach – To add to the public woes the NSA has been dealing with over the past three years,Harold Martin, former staffer stole approximately 50 terabytes of data from the the United States’ top security organisation. The majority of the information taken was considered classified and actually greatly eclipsed the previous breach by Edward Snowden.
Martin has been initially charged with mishandling information which has now been upgraded to espionage. While a lot of information was classified there is a large amount which is of greater public interest for which Martin has done a great service. Martin reportedly simply walked out the front door with the data over the course of his 20 year employment. This is case study number 1 for future employee breaches.
Oracle Point-of-Sale Terminals – Point of sale machines have become common place globally to assist all business’s process and retain important customer details. Micros, one of the largest terminal manufactures which was acquired by Oracle in 2014 for $5.3 billion reported that “hundreds of systems” at the company had been compromised.
The compromised systems had malware installed which was designed to remotely access usernames and passwords from systems located in retail outlets internationally.
Weebly – The web development and design giant put more than 43 million customers at risk earlier this year thanks to their own terrible internal security.
Weebly has openly admitted in a statement that the security gap and cyber attack was their own fault and they are taking appropriate measures for future security. The hacker reportedly took records which included usernames, passwords, IP addresses and email addresses.
AdultFriendFinder – The 2015 Ashley Madison breach which involved approx 37 million accounts has been made to look like a drop in the ocean after the 2016 AFF breach.
More than 400 million users were exposed in a targeted attack on the AdultFriendFinder network. The adult hook-up website has reportedly compromised an absolutely staggering 20 years of data from their initial set up in 1996. AdultFriendFinder describes itself as “one of the world’s largest sex hook-up” websites, with more than 40 million active users and a handful of similar adult oriented sites which were also compromised. In the cyber attack stolen data included usernames, browser information, date of the users last visit, purchasing patterns and more.
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Conclusion
Many more breaches have occurred which did not make the above list and with the enormity of the historical breaches now being brought to public attention it looks like 2017 is set for bigger and scarier reports to surface.
“I’m afraid we no longer live in a world where you can prevent breaches taking place, instead it is about how you manage them and what measures you have in place to protect your business and importantly, your customers. As recent events have shown, hard-earned reputations can be lost in a flash if you do not have the correct plans in place.” Inga Beale, Lloyd’s Chief Executive.
Cyber crime & security tips from experts you can apply to your business
As cyber crime becomes more pervasive in business life the importance for employee education and security procedures is paramount. Norton has compiled a list of basic information on how you can prevent online fraud.
1. Keep your computer current with the latest patches and updates
Applying patches and other software fixes as soon as they become available is one of the best ways to keep criminals away from your sensitive information. Software manufacturers regularly update versions to include newly found software vulnerabilities that attackers could otherwise exploit.
While staying up to date will not stop all attacks, it can make the process more difficult and potentially discourage attackers from accessing to your system.
Most recent versions of popular software can be configured to download and automatically update, giving you a great start toward keeping your business secure online.
2. Make sure your computer is configured securely
Ensuring your online applications such as web browser, antivirus and anti spyware, online storage and email software are configured correctly is one of the most important areas to focus on.
Choosing the right level of security and privacy for a business depends on many variables and is best reviewed by your IT department or an independent security analyst.
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3. Choose strong passwords and keep them safe
We use passwords frequently for everything from online banking, social media and shopping to logging into our favorite airline Web site. As a result, choosing a strong password that cannot easily be guessed has never been more important to prevent becoming another victim of cyber crime.
Typically a strong password will have 8 or more characters and use a combination of letters, numbers and symbols (e.g. #3%9&@6). Avoid using any passwords which use your login name, are based on personal information such as name or date of birth and avoid words in the dictionary. Keep your passwords in a safe place and make sure not to use the same password for multiple online services.
Resetting passwords regularly or at least every 90 days can also limit the damage caused by an attacker who has already gained access to your account.
4. Protect your computer with security software
Security software necessities include firewall and antivirus programs. A firewall is usually your computer’s first line of defense-it controls who and what can communicate with your computer online and isolates bad traffic such as attacks from ever reaching your system.
The next line of defense is more often than not, antivirus software. Most antivirus software is designed to monitor all online activities such as email messages and web browsing and protects an individual from viruses, worms, Trojan horse and other types of malicious attacks. Spyware and unwanted programs such as adware are usually picked up from a good antivirus package like Norton Antivirus, McAfee Antivirus 2017, Kaspersky 2017, Avast Pro Antivirus and Bitdefender total security.
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5. Protect your personal information
It is always prudent to exercise caution when sharing personal information online such as your name, address, contact number and email address. As more online services require your information for subscriptions, newsletters and shipping your purchases it is nearly impossible to transact online without divulging personal details.
Keep an eye out for suspicious or fraudulent email messages – Suspicious messages with misspellings, poor grammar, odd phrasings and website addresses with strange extensions
Don’t respond to email messages that request personal information – Legitimate companies will not use email messages to ask for your information. When in doubt, contact the company
Avoid fraudulent websites which are used to gather personal information – Fraudsters often forge malicious links to make them look convincing
Pay attention to privacy policies on websites and in software – It is important to understand how an organization might collect and use your personal information before you share it with them
Guard your email address – be careful when posting your email address online in newsgroups, blogs or online communities
6. Online offers that look too good to be true usually are
“Free” software and guides such as screen savers, investment tricks, emoticon packs, contests and instant millionaire guarantees are some of the alluring attention grabbing techniques these companies use. The software or guide usually comes packaged with hidden advertising or monitoring software that tracks your behavior and habits ultimately being given to another group without your knowledge.
Ultimately, the old saying “if it seems too good to be true, it usually is” is again accurate.
7. Review bank and credit card statements regularly
Identity theft and online scams can be greatly reduced if caught promptly after your data is stolen or when the first use of your details is attempted.
Reviewing your monthly statements and online banking transaction history regularly is one of the easiest ways to stay on top of and report any incidents to your bank and credit card providers. Many financial institutions use fraud prevention services to identify unusual purchases and prevent the transaction in real time before any funds are charged, these systems are not perfect though and some transactions are still approved.
If your bank catches the transaction they might call you to confirm the unusual order, don’t ignore these calls as they are a good sign something or someone is attempting to access your details which are now compromised.
The Australian federal government has successfully appointed Craig Davies as CEO for the new not-for-profit company Australian Cyber Security Growth Network Ltd in December 2016.
For the past 3 years Craig was previously the head of security for Australian enterprise software giant Atlassian. Mr Davies has over 25 years experience in the industry and has been a long time advisor for start-ups on security.
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Greg hunt, minister for innovation has stated “[The centre] will bring together industry, researchers and governments to create a national enterprise that will provide the foundation for the development of next generation products and services needed to live and work securely in our increasingly connected world,”
The new centre which was announced earlier this year as part of the national innovation and science agenda will cost $32 million and be positioned next to Data 61’s national cyber security centre in the Docklands.
Mr davies will be joined by Data61’s Adrian Turner and Doug Elix as the centre’s joint chairs.
