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XWorm RAT
Browser Session Hijacking cyber espionage Cyber Security Threats Endpoint security malware Remote Access Trojan Surveillance Malware Webcam Spying XWorm RAT

XWorm RAT Evolves Into Advanced Surveillance Malware

Remote access trojan (RAT) XWorm has developed into an advanced surveillance threat whose capabilities extend beyond data theft and remote system control. According to cyber security researchers at Netskope Threat Labs, recent versions of this malware contain plugins for tracking the location of victims, capturing live audio, controlling webcams, and controlling active browser sessions. 

It was discovered in 2022 that XWorm facilitated the control of compromised systems by logging keystrokes, capturing screenshots, and executing remote payloads. The malware has been modified by its developers since its discovery, adding new features and releasing updated versions. According to Netskope, 1,236 detection events were recorded across 100 customer organisations during the third quarter of 2026, representing a fourfold increase from the same period in 2025. 

The malware's expansion has been accompanied by an expansion of its plugin collection. In July 2025, 35 plugins were supported, but by October 2026, 46 plugins were supported, which provided increased capabilities for monitoring and interacting with victims' devices. 

A cracking of the XWorm builder and subsequent release of the source code for version 6.4 in August 2025 resulted in the wider dissemination of the malware. Since then, researchers have identified multiple versions operating in the wild, including V6.4, V6.5, V7.2, and V7.4 The malware has been modified in several ways, including code protection, delivery methods, and the ability to evade security analysis. 

There are approximately 35% of affected customers that are affiliated with financial services companies, according to Netskope. The majority of reported incidents have occurred in the United States, India, Brazil, Italy, Panama, and Brazil. HBrowser plugins pose a significant security risk due to their ability to operate within existing browser sessions rather than relying on stolen passwords.

Command-and-control channels of the malware are encrypted using AES, allowing for remote mouse clicks, keyboard inputs, and other interactions with the active browser. By continuously taking screenshots, attackers can gain access to accounts already logged in and potentially gain access to sensitive information. By collecting device location data without a visible consent request, the Maps plugin adds another layer of surveillance. 

Netskope's analysis shows that it attempts to retrieve GPS coordinates, but when GPS coordinates are not available, it switches to IP-based geolocation. Microphone plugins allow for recording audio from selected recording devices and transmission to operators in encrypted, compressed data chunks. In addition to webcam recording, attackers may also monitor compromised devices without displaying obvious warnings to the user using these functions. 

Continued Development Raises Security Concerns 

As the malware has evolved, it has also undergone changes to make analysis and detection more challenging. Recent variants have introduced stronger code protection techniques, techniques for avoiding virtual analysis environments, and modifications to payload delivery and command-and-control communication. 

By expanding the plugin collection, operators have increased the range of options they have for tailoring attacks to meet their objectives. NetSkope anticipates continued development of XWorm following the public release of its builder and source code, with further development likely following that. The increasing surveillance capabilities of malware also highlight the limitations associated with multi-factor authentication alone. 

An attacker who controls an already authenticated browser session on an infected device may not be able to prevent access to open accounts even when additional login verification is performed. It is recommended that security teams strengthen endpoint monitoring, investigate unusual process and network activity, and restrict unauthorised outbound communications. 

Network segmentation will also allow you to limit the spread of malware across other connected systems. Detecting endpoints, monitoring traffic, and responding to incidents in a timely manner remain crucial for identifying suspicious activity and containing compromised devices before they can be exploited further by attackers.

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Xandr
Advertising Data Regulation European Union GDPR Grindr Microsoft Norway Privacy sensitive data Xandr

Microsoft's Xandr Handed Norway's Largest Privacy Fine for Funneling Grindr User Data to Thousands of Advertisers

 



Norway's data protection authority has issued its largest fine to date, hitting Microsoft-owned advertising company Xandr with a NOK 92 million ($9.6 million) penalty for passing sensitive personal data belonging to Norwegian Grindr users through automated advertising auctions without a legal basis. The decision, signed October 2 by Datatilsynet Director General Line Coll and Head of International Tobias Judin, targets one of the most contested privacy questions in digital advertising: whether ad intermediaries can claim ignorance of how consent was collected by the apps they serve.

Grindr is a location-based dating app primarily used by gay, bisexual, trans, and queer people. For nearly two years, from July 2018 to April 2020, Xandr sat at the center of the app's advertising infrastructure, operating on both the buying and selling sides of real-time bidding. The process works fast and invisibly. The moment a user opened Grindr, the app passed their data through Xandr to a pool of companies competing in a split-second auction for the right to show that person an ad. Datatilsynet found that this relay included at minimum each user's advertising ID, IP address, and the fact of their Grindr use. Under GDPR, that last detail matters enormously. The authority concluded that being identifiable as a Grindr user is itself information that indicates sexual orientation, a category that European data law places under strict protection and requires explicit consent to process.

Xandr's defense rested on the argument that it believed Grindr had already collected consent from its users. Datatilsynet rejected that reasoning on a straightforward legal basis: Xandr was not a passive conduit but a joint controller alongside Grindr. Under GDPR's joint controller framework, both parties carry independent obligations to confirm a lawful basis exists before processing sensitive data. Xandr never verified that any such basis was in place, and the authority ruled that the company had no right to treat consent as someone else's responsibility. "Xandr omitted to verify that the consents from Grindr were valid, and did not do anything to ensure they had a legal basis for their own processing," Coll stated in the decision.

The investigation turned up a complicating detail. Xandr had been notified of the probe by Datatilsynet in February 2020. Despite that, the company deleted documentation about its processing of Grindr users' data between July 2020 and February 2023, when the authority sent a second information order. Xandr told investigators the deletion had occurred as part of its routine data retention policies. Datatilsynet refused to let that explanation close the gap, noting that the company knew an active investigation was underway when the records were removed.

In setting the penalty at NOK 92 million, Datatilsynet cited the duration of the violations, the direct financial benefit Xandr drew from the unlawful sharing, and the fact that thousands of Norwegian users had their sensitive data exposed to potentially thousands of companies without their knowledge. Crucially, the fine was calculated against Xandr's own annual turnover and not Microsoft's. The authority noted that the violations took place before Microsoft completed its acquisition of Xandr in June 2022, after AT&T sold the unit it had rebranded from AppNexus in 2019.

A Microsoft spokesperson mentioned that the investigation "focused on conduct that predates Microsoft's acquisition of Xandr," adding that interpretations and applications of legal standards have continued to evolve since then. The company said it is reviewing the decision and assessing its options. Xandr, which now operates as Microsoft Advertising, has three weeks to appeal to Norway's Privacy Appeals Board.

The case has roots in January 2020, when the Norwegian Consumer Council filed complaints against Grindr and five ad tech companies: AppNexus, MoPub, OpenX, AdColony, and Smaato. Austrian privacy rights organization noyb joined the action and celebrated the outcome, calling the decision "a major blow to the online adtech industry." This week's fine against Xandr is the downstream enforcement of a broader probe that, on the Grindr side, produced a NOK 65 million penalty against the app itself in 2021. Norway's Borgarting Court of Appeal upheld that fine against Grindr in October 2025 after the company challenged it through two rounds of litigation.

Grindr's data-sharing history has had consequences beyond Norwegian borders as well. In September 2026, the dating app agreed to pay £26 million to settle a UK class action brought by roughly 12,000 users who alleged the platform had shared information including HIV status, sexual orientation, ethnicity, and location with third-party advertising firms before 2020. The London lawsuit, filed in April 2024 by law firm Austen Hays, alleged violations of UK data protection law during roughly the same period covered by the Norwegian proceedings.

The Datatilsynet decision marks one of the more pointed statements yet from a European privacy regulator on how far down an ad supply chain accountability can reach. By treating Xandr as a joint controller rather than an infrastructure provider, the authority made clear that operating the pipes through which sensitive data flows carries its own legal obligations, regardless of which company collected the data in the first place.




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TFG
Customer Data Cyber Attacks Fashion Retail IT Systems TFG

Hobbs and Whistles Owner Hit by Cyberattack

 

The owner of Hobbs, Phase Eight, and Whistles has become the latest major fashion retailer to be hit by a cyberattack. The Foschini Group (TFG) confirmed that its UK business, TFG London, discovered the incident on October 11, leaving several IT systems offline and disrupting customer orders across the three brands. 

Although physical stores remain open, the company said some website functions may be unavailable while its investigation continues. Customers have been warned that orders placed on or after Sunday could be delayed, and TFG has apologized for the disruption while promising further updates as appropriate. 

TFG says it activated its incident-response and business-continuity plans immediately, brought in external cybersecurity specialists, and notified UK authorities. The Information Commissioner’s Office confirmed it has received a breach report from TFG Brands (London) Limited and is assessing the information provided. 

There is some reassurance for shoppers: TFG London said payment processing is handled by a third party and that, based on its investigation so far, it has no reason to believe payment information is at risk. However, the company is still determining whether other personal or sensitive customer data has been compromised and says it will notify affected individuals or organizations if evidence of a breach emerges.

The company has not yet explained how attackers gained access, whether ransomware was involved, or when systems will be fully restored. TFG added that its White Stuff and Inside Story businesses, along with its African and Australian operations, are unaffected because they run on separate IT systems. 

The attack follows a difficult stretch for fashion retail. Last week, ASOS disclosed that an attacker impersonated a trusted contact to obtain an employee’s login credentials and access third-party platforms containing customer names and contact details. H&M is also reportedly investigating claims involving the ShinyHunters group, though it says it has found no indication that its systems were compromised. 

No evidence currently connects the TFG London, ASOS, and H&M incidents, and H&M has not confirmed a breach. Still, three prominent fashion businesses facing cyber trouble in just over a week suggests that retailers remain highly attractive targets for criminals seeking customer data, operational disruption, or leverage. For TFG, the immediate priority is restoring services and establishing the scope of the incident. For customers, the case is a reminder that even when payment details appear safe, retailers may hold substantial personal information whose exposure can take days or weeks to fully assess.
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Cyber Security
AI Model AI Security AI technology Anthropic AI Anthropic AI security Cyber Security

Anthropic Warns AI Worms Could Soon Spread Across IoT Devices

 

Small artificial intelligence models could soon be able to freely replicate across internet devices, forming botnets that do not require centralized computers to control them, according to an Anthropic Frontier Red Team paper. The paper’s authors explored if foundation models could be run on unknown cheap devices and execute the actions required to replicate across other interconnected devices. Anthropic bought 15 cheap Android TV boxes for $55 each to see how large an open-weight model could be before it could no longer be hosted on such devices. 

The team found that a model with 26 billion parameters could generate 0.39 tokens per second. They also found that a 9 billion parameter model could run on 8 out of 9 of the different hardware types they tried. The team then tried to see if a model could replicate across 8 emulated Android devices attached to a network. To make matters easier for the would-be-attackers, the researchers made the hacking process trivial; they only had to focus on the artificial intelligence processes. 

Only the GLM-5.2 among the open-weight models was able to fully complete the replication process, doing so on four out of five tries, and managed to infect all 8 devices on the network. Anthropic warned that the experiments should not be considered an accurate representation of how such an attack might unfold in the real world, but the results nevertheless show that attacks are becoming increasingly likely as models grow more capable. 

Models with over 30 billion parameters do not have the ability to fully perform all actions required to replicate, but they can manage single aspects of the process. If development proceeds at its historical rate, then models will be able to achieve the capability demonstrated by GLM-5.2 by 2026. Self-replicating AI models could follow soon after. The researchers also estimated the scale of such an attack. 

If there was a Kimwolf-class botnet that had already successfully infected over 2 million devices, using up all 15 of the TV boxes mentioned earlier would result in 133000 instances of the 26-billion-parameter model being created. This would amount to a combined performance of up to 40 Nvidia H100 GPUs, but it would take more than a day for all instances to be created. Such an attack surface is hard to prevent because there are no singular points of failure, but even if such a worm managed to successfully infect a network of devices, it would still be very visible to most network infrastructure. 

Large traffic volumes and unusual communications patterns between devices that would otherwise not communicate with each other will raise flags with most internet service providers. Anthropic also found that manufacturers could reduce the threat surface by replacing default passwords with more complex ones. Many previous botnets, including the infamous Mirai malware, were nearly impossible to stop because many IoT devices had default passwords that were too simple to guess. 

Anthropic warned that while a fully autonomous worm was not yet available, a continuing increase in model size and capability, along with the growing ability of models to apply knowledge between different model classes, will severely limit the time defenders have to fix vulnerabilities in Internet of Things devices.
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Technology
LG Root Access Security Flaws Smart TV Technology

Critical Flaws in LG Smart TVs Could Allow Hackers to Gain Root Access Over Local Networks


Three security vulnerabilities in LG's webOS operating system could allow attackers to gain complete control of certain LG smart TVs without authentication or any action from the owner. The flaws can be combined to obtain root access when an attacker is connected to the same local network as the television.

LG has released a firmware fix for the vulnerabilities, following their disclosure by SSD Secure Disclosure on October 12. Users are advised to check their devices for available software updates.

Models impacted

Researchers tested the vulnerability chain on two LG television models: the 32LQ636BPSA and the 27TQ600SW. Both devices were running webOS version 7.5.7-25 with firmware 04.54.40. It remains unclear whether other models or firmware versions are affected.

The attack begins by targeting a network service on port 3001, which is used by the LG ThinQ application to pair with televisions. Researchers found that an attacker could exploit a built-in application called sync-demo to bypass the normal pairing PIN requirement and obtain a privileged key.

Using this key, the attacker can launch another preinstalled application, known as cmp-client, and direct it to a webpage controlled by the attacker. The application does not properly restrict where it can navigate, allowing the malicious webpage to access an internal webOS interface called PalmServiceBridge.

This interface provides communication with system services. Researchers found that it could be used to reach pmlogd, a system logging service that operates with root privileges. Because the service does not properly validate certain input, an attacker can inject shell commands that are executed with the highest level of access on the television.

The combined vulnerabilities therefore allow an attacker to move from an unauthenticated network connection to root-level control without requiring the television owner to enter a PIN, approve a request or click a link.

What is at risk?

Root access can give attackers extensive control over an affected television. Depending on the device configuration and the attacker's actions, this could enable unauthorised software execution, system manipulation and potential exposure of information stored on the device.

The disclosure was demonstrated by an anonymous researcher who secured third place in the LG webOS category at the TyphoonPWN 2026 security competition in Seoul. No CVE identifiers have been assigned to these newly disclosed flaws, and no exploitation in the wild has been reported.

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TLS certificates Cyber Security
Certificate Renewal https Let’s Encrypt TLS certificates Cyber Security

Let’s Encrypt to Cut TLS Certificate Validity to 64 Days

 

Let’s Encrypt will reduce the default validity period of its TLS certificates from 90 days to 64 days starting February 10, 2027. The change will apply to all certificates issued or renewed after that date, while previously issued certificates will remain valid until they naturally expire. The nonprofit certificate authority says the move is the first step in a broader transition toward 45-day certificates, which it plans to introduce in 2028. 

The shorter certificate lifetime is intended to improve web security by limiting how long a compromised or misissued certificate can remain trusted. It should also make revocation more efficient, because certificates leave circulation sooner and attackers have a smaller window in which to exploit stolen credentials. Let’s Encrypt says the change follows the CA/Browser Forum Baseline Requirements and will eventually be adopted by all publicly trusted certificate authorities. 

Website owners and administrators will need to renew certificates more often, but the impact should be manageable for organizations that already use automated renewal. Let’s Encrypt is making 64-day certificates available in its staging environment this week so customers can test their systems before the production change. The organization recommends that all users carry out similar tests to identify renewal failures, outdated scripts, or configuration problems early.

Administrators using clients that support ACME Renewal Info, or ARI, should be prepared automatically because ARI allows Let’s Encrypt to notify the client when a renewal is due. However, organizations with renewal dates hardcoded from a certificate’s expiration date should adjust those settings to approximately two-thirds of the certificate lifetime. Let’s Encrypt says the update will not affect its ACME endpoints, issuance chains, or rate limits, reducing the likelihood of broader service disruption. 

The certificate authority will also shorten its authorization reuse period to 10 days next year and to seven hours in 2028. That change is intended to comply with a 2029 reduction in maximum validation reuse periods and to remove the need for CAA rechecking when validation data becomes outdated. With the final 90-day certificate expected to expire on May 11, 2027, businesses should use the transition period to strengthen certificate automation before the industry moves to even shorter lifetimes.
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WordPress
Anthropic API Claude Code CyberXero Data Breach IABs WordPress

Russian Hacker Weaponized Claude Code to Breach 429 WordPress Sites and Steal 628,000 Ukrainian Records

 




A financially motivated cybercriminal using Anthropic's Claude Code as an AI backbone has carried out a sweeping attack campaign that compromised 429 WordPress administration panels in a 61-second window and pulled more than 628,000 personal records from four Ukrainian organizations, according to findings published by threat intelligence firm SOCRadar last week.

The threat actor, tracked under the alias CyberXero, is described as a Russian-speaking initial access broker (IAB) whose infrastructure combines commodity offensive tools like Cobalt Strike with an AI orchestration layer powered by Claude Code. Initial access brokers are criminals who break into networks and sell that foothold to other buyers rather than monetizing it directly, and CyberXero has been active since at least July 2026.

The entire operation surfaced from a single configuration error: an exposed open directory at IP address 46.21.250.135 that served the threat actor's live working directory, including more than 90,000 files across 3,000 subdirectories: AI session logs, scripts with plaintext credentials, exploitation toolkits, reconnaissance output, and raw victim database exports. That OPSEC failure let SOCRadar researchers map eight distinct infrastructure nodes tied to the operation, spanning servers in Europe and Tencent Cloud in China.


Two Campaigns Running in Parallel

CyberXero's operation runs two pipelines simultaneously: a global, automated campaign targeting WordPress and e-commerce platforms for payment data and access sales, and a more selective, manual campaign directed at Ukrainian energy providers and critical infrastructure entities.

The automated arm relied on an internally developed Python tool called wp2shell, which abuses a desynchronization flaw in the WordPress REST API batch endpoint to inject SQL, create a rogue administrator account, and plant a web shell disguised as an active plugin. A single automated execution scanned 4,708 targets, confirmed access to 429 WordPress administration panels, and deployed 32 shells, all inside a 61-second window. Each successful compromise fired a real-time notification to a Telegram bot that let the operator monitor results without staying at a terminal.

The second pipeline was considerably more deliberate. The infrastructure documents curated reconnaissance against seven Ukrainian energy and utilities entities, including the national transmission system operator and the country's largest private energy holding. One target list alone contained 95 subdomains covering those two organizations' email infrastructure, VPN gateways, network dispatch systems, and data platforms. That depth of reconnaissance is not the work of an opportunist scanning for easy targets.

The most damaging confirmed breach was a district heating provider in Kharkiv, a city currently on an active war front. A hardcoded credential in the threat actor's own script gave direct access to the provider, and a multithreaded extractor pulled 564,073 subscriber records containing personal data, home addresses, and account numbers, along with 213,340 access-log entries with timestamps and IP addresses. Because those records identify civilians in a conflict zone, the dataset carries physical risk that goes beyond a conventional data breach.


The AI Layer

CyberXero deployed AI at two independent stages. The first ran Claude Code with a cluster of 51 specialized agents on the primary workstation, handling scanning, exploit chaining, reconnaissance, and post-exploitation tasks. The second connected PentAGI, an open-source autonomous penetration testing framework, to a Cobalt Strike Team Server through an AI provider API for payload generation and hands-on pentest execution.

The 51 agents were divided into functional roles. Offensive agents covered tasks like lateral movement and SCADA attacks. Reconnaissance agents handled subdomain mapping and credential testing. Post-exploitation agents managed data exfiltration. A recovered provider configuration file assigned AI models to these roles by reasoning complexity, with the payload-generation role receiving the highest token budget.

To work around the model's safety refusals, the threat actor used context-engineering and session-reset techniques, instructing the agent that it was running an "authorized pentest on my own infrastructure." That same claim appeared verbatim across four unrelated victim engagements, marking it as a rehearsed line rather than a genuine authorization.

Because model safety controls act on session context rather than model weights, a refusal in one session does not carry into the next. When an agent refused a task, the actor opened a fresh session with the authorization framing preloaded and tried again.

The refusals themselves are notable. Across four separate iterations, the model declined to install a backdoor, disable a firewall, move laterally, and deploy a web shell. In a separate episode it refused a scan four consecutive times and correctly rejected a forged ownership token.

The CyberXero case is not the first time Claude Code has appeared in a documented criminal operation. Anthropic's own threat intelligence report earlier this year described a separate actor who used Claude Code to automate reconnaissance, credential harvesting, and network penetration across at least 17 organizations in a single month, spanning government agencies, healthcare providers, and emergency services.

Anthropic has acknowledged that cybercriminals and state-sponsored actors alike have attempted to use its Claude models to automate cyberattacks, build offensive tools, and conduct mass surveillance operations. The gap between what a single attacker can now accomplish and what previously required a full team has narrowed substantially.

For defenders, SOCRadar's most actionable indicator is simple: any WordPress administrator account whose username follows the pattern "wp2_" followed by eight hexadecimal characters was placed there by wp2shell, not a legitimate user. Organizations running WordPress, Magento, PrestaShop, or internet-exposed Redis servers are advised to check for rogue admin accounts and unexpected entries in SSH authorized key files. CyberXero was still active at the time the SOCRadar report was published.


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Remote Code Execution
Cyber Attacks cybersecurity vulnerabilities Danfoss Refrigeration Systems French Supermarket Cyberattack industrial cybersecurity Operational Technology Security Remote Code Execution

Cyberattack Knocks Out Supermarket Refrigerators Across France


In a number of major French supermarket chains, refrigeration systems were disrupted by a cyberattack, forcing stores to remove fresh and frozen foods from their display units. It is estimated that 250 to 350 retail outlets, including Intermarché, Coopérative U, Carrefour Market, Monoprix, Leclerc, and Super U, were impacted by the incident. 

Several reports indicate that the attackers compromised older versions of Danfoss refrigeration controller software and remotely activated automatic defrosting functions. The process resulted in increased refrigerator temperatures, putting perishable food supplies at risk, resulting in financial losses and food waste. 

A cyberattack reportedly involving a service provider that manages refrigeration systems resulted in the inability to use some fresh and frozen food displays at Intermarché. According to the company, precautionary measures have been taken to remove products from affected units, although a complete list of the stores affected does not yet exist.

Several stores within the Coopérative U network have also experienced disruptions, according to Dominique Schelcher, president of Coopérative U. As part of its investigation into the circumstances surrounding the attack, the company's teams were working with refrigeration specialists to restore normal operations. 

As a result of the incident, concerns have been raised about the security of digital systems supporting essential food retail operations. A sense of urgency was conveyed by the European Union Agriculture and Food Commissioner Christophe Hansen, who emphasized the importance of not targeting equipment responsible for preserving food.


Vulnerabilities in Danfoss Systems Raise Security Concerns 

ANSSI (National Cybersecurity Agency of France) has been directed to assess the risks and determine whether other businesses could be affected by the incident, while French authorities are investigating it. It appears that refrigeration units reached temperatures as high as 50°C, which resulted in extensive food spoilage and fires at several locations. 

Approximately 150 stores in Intermarché's parent group have been disrupted, whereas 80 supermarkets in Carrefour have been affected. Due to previously revealed security vulnerabilities, Danfoss refrigeration management systems have been under scrutiny. It was discovered by Claroty's Team82 in August 2026 that there are flaws in the Danfoss AK-SM 800A platform, which allows operators to monitor and control refrigeration equipment remotely through a web-based interface. 

An authentication bypass vulnerability, CVE-2025-41450, and a command injection vulnerability, CVE-2025-41451, could allow remote code execution. There is also a third flaw, CVE-2025-41452, which could be used for denial of service attacks through the injection of Nginx configuration. To address these issues, Danfoss released firmware version R4.3.1. 

A number of Danfoss systems are accessible through the internet, which raises concerns about unauthorised access to equipment in supermarkets and other commercial establishments. The affected systems were equipped with outdated firmware, according to Danfoss, and customers had previously been advised to upgrade older equipment. Investigators have not yet confirmed whether any of the disclosed vulnerabilities were exploited in the attack at the French supermarket. Moreover, it is unclear how the refrigeration controllers were accessed. 

Connected Refrigeration Systems Present Cyber-Physical Risks

Security experts have stated that this incident illustrates the dangers associated with attacks against operational technology (OT) despite not targeting conventional information systems. It is possible for refrigerator controllers to make unauthorised changes that may disrupt the handling of food, pharmaceuticals, and other supply-chain functions in temperature-sensitive environments. 

Researchers at Claroty warn that security teams can be overlooking refrigeration controllers, particularly when remote maintenance interfaces are accessible via the public internet. Although remote access can assist technicians in maintaining equipment at multiple locations, poorly secured connections can provide attackers with opportunities. 

In order to ensure security, users should install the latest firmware, remove unnecessary internet exposure, restrict administrative access to trusted networks, and utilize virtual private networks to secure remote connections as well as network segmentation. Additionally, organizations should examine exposed devices and verify that appropriate access control measures have been implemented. It is unclear who is responsible for the attack, and the investigation continues. 

The incident emphasizes the importance of securing connected industrial equipment, particularly systems with the potential to affect public services, food safety, and crucial business functions directly. Despite the incident, the need for securing internet-connected operational technology is growing. Updates to firmware are imperative, as are restrictions on remote access and stronger network controls to prevent cyberattacks from disrupting critical business processes.
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data security
Cyber Security Cyber Security Ransomware Attacks Data Leaked Data Recovery data security

Paying a Ransom Does Not Guarantee Full Data Recovery or Security

 

Paying a ransomware demand does not always lead to the return of an organization's files, the prevention of data leaks, or the eradication of attackers from its network, according to digital forensics and incident response companies. Ransomware is a prevalent cybersecurity risk, and according to a 2025 CrowdStrike report, 78% of 1,100 global IT and cybersecurity leaders asked about attacks in the past year. 

In addition, according to a report by Proofpoint, which appeared in July, 54% of the 1,600 organizations surveyed worldwide said they had paid a ransom within the last year. Joe Hoosech, an executive at the cybersecurity insurance company Cowbell, estimates that paying the ransom retrieves data with no further leaks in 75 to 80% of cases. 

Some hackers do indeed honor their word to deter potential victims by building a reputation as reliable businesspeople, he adds. In addition, they sometimes provide documents describing how they penetrated the network, although experts say this information is often of little value. "Sometimes the decryptor doesn't work," Hosech cautions. "In my experience, maybe one out of four organizations finds that the decryption tool does not completely restore all the data." Andrew von Ramin Mapp of Cyber Centaurs has observed a similar challenge: "Sometimes there is some damage to the database, for example, because the encryption tool was run while the database was open, so the database needs to be fixed." 

Beyond restoring data, organizations must consider whetherransomware attackers have deleted evidence of the breach, experts say, citing an example. "I've had clients where the bad guys took the data, encrypted it, and then left," recalls Eric Taylor of Barricade Cyber Solutions. "The client paid the ransom, the bad guys promised to delete it, and then the client saw the data on the bad guys' website, including the files they had deleted." "Sometimes the bad guys take the data for themselves and sell it to others," Hoosech says. 

Initial access brokers can infiltrate networks and sell that access to other threat groups and stay in the network. "Therefore, just because one gang promises to protect you, it doesn't mean that those who purchased access to your network won't benefit from stealing your data," says Taylor. "Instead, companies should evaluate the value of the data to the organization and the impact on the business of losing or disclosing it," recommends von Ramin Mapp. He advises businesses that have decided to pay a ransom to "test the decryption key before handing over the ransom." 

However, the expert says there is no way for organizations to receive absolute guarantees that the data will be deleted. "By the way, I advise companies to keep their cyber insurance policies on paper and in a safe place," says von Ramin Mapp. "If an attacker accesses your computer system and finds where you keep the documents, he can calculate how much you might be willing to pay to stop them." Still, experts say that while the ransomware payment option does not completely eliminate the need to respond to the attack, organizations should continue to investigate and mitigate ongoing attacks.
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User Data
Daiichi Kosho Data data security malware User Data

Malware Incident at Karaoke Giant May Expose Data of 8,724,000 People


Daiichi Kosho, a major Japanese karaoke company known for operating the popular Big Echo chain, has disclosed a potential data breach that could affect approximately 8.7 million records. The incident involved malware discovered on a computer belonging to Nippon Columbia Group (NCG), an entertainment company that handles customer information on Daiichi Kosho’s behalf.

In a statement published on October 8, 2026, Daiichi Kosho said it could not rule out the possibility that personal information stored on the affected computer had been exposed to unauthorized parties. But the company has not confirmed that the data was actually stolen or leaked. 

“According to NCG, between October 1 and October 2, 2026, a malware infection was discovered on one of their employees' devices (a PC), and the device was isolated from the network on October 2. Following an investigation into the scope of the impact by NCG, we received a report from NCG on October 5,” read the statement.

Incident details

After an initial investigation, NCG informed Daiichi Kosho about the incident on October 5. The investigation revealed that information collected through outsourced business operations had been temporarily stored on the compromised computer.

NCG has reset affected passwords and is investigating how the malware entered the system, whether information was accessed by unauthorized individuals, and the overall scope of the incident. The available information does not identify the malware. 

What can be leaked?

Daiichi Kosho estimates that approximately 8.724 million records may have been affected. “Based on the information we currently have, approximately 8,724,000 customers who registered or made reservations at our stores may have had their names (registered names), genders, dates of birth, email addresses, and telephone numbers leaked to external parties,” the company warned.

The affected records are linked to customers who registered for membership or made reservations at the company’s establishments. The businesses include Big Echo, DK Dining, Mega Big, Karaoke Club DAM, Banana Club and B-Garage.

How to stay safe?

Daiichi Kosho has warned customers not to open unfamiliar links or attachments and to remain cautious when receiving unexpected emails, text messages or calls. The company has also clarified that passwords and credit card information are not included in the potentially exposed data. 

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User Privacy
Data Breach Data Leak Japan Skyticket User Privacy

Skyticket Breach Exposes Data of 14.6 Million Customers

 

Japanese travel booking platform Skyticket has disclosed a major data breach that may have exposed the personal information of approximately 14.64 million customers. Its operator, Adventure Inc., said attackers gained unauthorized access to internal servers and cloud storage between October 2 and October 4, 2026. The company publicly confirmed the incident on October 9 after blocking the access route and launching an investigation. The breach is among the largest recent cybersecurity incidents involving a Japanese travel company.

The compromised records reportedly include customers’ names, dates of birth, email addresses, phone numbers, postal codes, addresses, and names used for bank transfers. Adventure also said about 4.13 million records contained hashed login passwords. The company stated that passport numbers and credit card information were not leaked, although it temporarily disabled payments using saved credit cards as a precaution. 

Adventure identified additional unauthorized-access incidents beyond the main breach. It said attackers accessed its business management system on September 20, potentially compromising more than 17,000 customer records, including bank account details registered for refunds. A third incident involved bus booking confirmation pages that could be accessed without logging in; the company said it detected and fixed the issue on October 1. 

The company has reported the incidents to Japan’s Personal Information Protection Commission and said it is continuing to investigate. Adventure warned customers that they could receive fraudulent emails, text messages, phone calls, or letters pretending to be from Skyticket, banks, airlines, or bus companies. It urged users not to click links in suspicious messages or share passwords, credit card numbers, bank PINs, or online banking credentials. 

Skyticket members should change their passwords immediately through the official website or app and update the same password anywhere else it has been reused. Security experts generally recommend enabling multi-factor authentication where available and monitoring bank statements for unusual activity. The incident highlights the growing risk facing travel platforms, which hold large volumes of identity, contact, payment, and booking data attractive to cybercriminals.
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Malware Attack
Customer Data Data Breach Data Leak data security Digital Personal Data Protection Employee Data Breach Malware Attack

Nippon Columbia Malware Incident Puts 8.6 Million Customer Records at Risk

 

Japanese entertainment group Nippon Columbia hit with malware, affecting more than 8.7 million customers and employees' personal data, according to karaoke system maker Daiichi Kosho. The company asked its customers to be cautious, but it is still unclear if their personal information was stolen or leaked. 

Daiichi Kosho, Japan’s biggest karaoke company, owns 521 karaoke places and provides services for the well-known chain of Big Echo. They rely on Nippon Columbia Group (NCG) to provide customer information. NCG’s businesses range from music creation, video and game software development and distribution to artist management, making it an important supplier for the karaoke entertainment sector. 

The issue was raised when NCG notified Daiichi Kosho of the incident on October 5 when the malware was found on one of the staff member's computers, which was then isolated the next day. The company then proceeded to reset all the passwords and other authentication methods and investigate the incident to determine its scope and origin. 

According to Daiichi Kosho's statement, the affected information includes approximately 8,631,000 customers and 93,000 employees of the company, and it may include the full name, gender, date of birth, email address, and phone number of the affected individuals. BIG ECHO, MEGA BIG, Karaoke CLUB DAM, Banana Club, B-GARAGE and DK Dining entertainments' users should be particularly wary of the security breach, as it could affect their data the most. 

Daiichi Kosho reiterated that their information was not at risk and that the data contained in the breach does not include the passwords. Additionally, the company stated that there was no suspicion of unlawful interference with customer loyalty points. On the other hand, they are still not certain if the information was stolen or if it was leaked online. They are investigating the breach to find out if the data was shared, what the scope of the problem was, and if the information was shared. 

The latest statement did not mention anything else about the possible leak. Customers are advised to protect themselves from scams, deception, and unlawful access to their personal information. They should be wary of strange emails, text messages, and phone numbers and avoid providing any personal and financial information. If the crooks managed to collect and compile the data of these users, it would be easy for them to engage in phishing schemes and similar scams. 

BleepingComputer, as of the time of publishing this article, has not been able to find any official statement from Nippon Columbia Group about the incident. They mentioned that they contacted the company for an official comment, and they are still waiting for the response. Until an official statement is issued, the possible data theft remains an issue, as it raises several questions about the safety of the companies' data and the safety of customers' personal information.
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Venture Capital
AI Security Artificial Intelligence Cybersecurity Acquisitions Cybersecurity Investments Cybersecurity M&A data security Identity Security Technology Venture Capital

AI Race Fuels Surge in Cybersecurity M&A Deals


As companies strengthen their artificial intelligence capabilities, the cybersecurity industry is poised for another record merger and acquisition (M&A) year. Momentum Cyber reported 117 deals in the third quarter of 2026, which represents an increase from 117 deals in the prior year. This increased activity is a reflection of a shift in security companies' purchasing strategies in order to keep up with rapid advances in artificial intelligence. 

There is currently a strong demand for security solutions based on artificial intelligence and tools capable of protecting AI-powered systems, which is contributing to the current wave of acquisitions. Organizations are increasingly adopting agentic artificial intelligence, which can perform tasks with minimal human intervention. However, security has become an increasingly important concern as organizations adopt these systems. 

Among the key areas of investment are identity and access management, nonhuman identity, data security, agentic security, runtime protection, and operational technology security. In 2025, there are estimated to be 404 cybersecurity mergers and acquisitions. This year's activity also set a record in terms of deal value, with companies spending approximately $97 billion on startup acquisitions. 

It is expected that investment funding rounds will decrease slightly from last year's levels, but acquisitions have continued to gain momentum as established companies seek capabilities that would take a considerable amount of time to develop internally. 

Artificial intelligence models have advanced dramatically and automated cyberattacks have increased the urgency of this issue. As a result of these developments, companies are reviewing their security requirements, creating opportunities for startups that are developing AI-based products. In order to expand their capabilities, large corporations are acquiring established startups in emerging security categories and investing in early-stage companies in emerging security categories. 

AI-driven acquisitions have also become increasingly common among established technology companies. As of 2026, Palo Alto Networks acquired CyberArk for $25 billion, while other companies pursued specialized capabilities in identity security, data protection, and artificial intelligence infrastructures. These moves are a result of a wider effort to incorporate emerging technologies into existing security portfolios rather than solely relying on internal developments. 

A growing segment of the market is also emerging outside of traditional cybersecurity vendors. Software providers are seeking ways of securing AI agents within business applications, while organizations managing operational technology need to safeguard the systems and connected devices controlled by increasingly autonomous software. 

As concerns regarding the risks associated with artificial intelligence grow, cloud providers and advanced AI developers are emerging as potential buyers of security technologies. Although acquisitions have increased, Momentum Cyber's analysis indicates that venture capital and private equity firms are scrutinizing their funding decisions more carefully, making fewer deals but more substantial investments in selected companies. 

Investors are assessing which technologies will remain relevant in a rapidly evolving market, attracting attention to startups with proven leadership and specialized capabilities. During the first three quarters of 2026, Momentum Cyber announced 40 AI security acquisitions, up from 10 transactions throughout 2025. These figures indicate the rapid growth of this segment. 

AI is becoming increasingly integrated into a wider variety of cybersecurity products, making it increasingly difficult to distinguish between tools designed to protect AI systems from cyber threats and tools powered by AI. According to industry observers, hyperscale cloud providers and leading AI research companies will have a greater influence on acquisitions in the future. 

Increasing reliance on secure AI infrastructure may make specialised security capabilities more valuable, further affecting the cybersecurity market's competition. In light of the continued transformation of cybersecurity by artificial intelligence, acquisitions are expected to remain a key strategy for companies seeking specialized knowledge and faster innovation. 

As AI security, identity management, and automated threat protection become increasingly important to the security sector, it is expected that future investment decisions and competition will be influenced.

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supply chain
Anthropic API Keys AWS Azure cryptomining Data Breach Developers GhostAction GitHub GitLab OpenAI supply chain

GhostAction Returns: 772 GitHub Repos Hit as Supply Chain Campaign Picks Back Up

 



A GitHub Actions credential-theft campaign that researchers first flagged a year ago has returned with a fresh wave of attacks, hitting 772 public repositories between August 31 and September 30, 2026, and going after more than 2,500 developer secrets in the process.

The campaign, named GhostAction, was first reported in September 2025 after attackers compromised 817 public repositories across 327 GitHub user accounts and walked off with at least 3,325 secrets. It relied on injecting a malicious GitHub Actions workflow into victim repositories using what appeared to be stolen developer credentials. The 2026 wave uses the exact same method.

The attack injects a workflow file named `github_actions_security.yml` with the commit message "Add Github Actions Security workflow." Instead of dumping an entire environment, the attacker hardcodes into the workflow the specific secret names it already found referenced in the target's legitimate workflows, then sends those values in a single HTTP POST request to an attacker-controlled server.

The only meaningful change from 2025 is the exfiltration destination. This wave routes stolen data over plain HTTP to a bare IP address, `193.32.204.199`, replacing the named domains used previously. On September 7, a second variant appeared across seven repositories under the filename `security-check.yml`, posting secrets to a dedicated API endpoint on the same server with a unique identifier per injection. The tracking mechanism suggests the attacker now runs a backend that logs exactly which repository each stolen secret came from.


Three Bursts, 2,577 Targets

The injections rolled out in clusters. On August 31, 143 repositories were hit. Between September 2 and 5, roughly 400 more were targeted, with a single-day peak of 294 on September 5. On September 15, another 103 repositories were injected, with smaller activity continuing through the rest of the month.

Across all 772 repositories, the workflows targeted 2,577 secrets. SSH private keys and deployment server credentials were the most sought-after, appearing in 446 cases. Azure credentials followed at 218, with one organization alone exposing an Azure personal access token and an SSH key across 92 repositories. Container registry credentials for DockerHub and GHCR appeared 142 times; database credentials, 112; AWS access keys, 106; FTP credentials, 92; Google Cloud and Firebase credentials, 80; and GitHub tokens, 66. The list also included API keys for Telegram bots, Slack, Discord, npm, PyPI, and various AI providers.

GitHub's own approval mechanisms blunted much of the damage. Of 3,669 workflow runs tracked across 605 repositories, only 499 actually ran. A total of 336 completed successfully, exfiltrating 26 secrets from 13 repositories. Only 124 of the 772 affected repositories, roughly 16 percent, showed evidence of cleanup by October 5.


A Campaign That Never Stopped

Calling this a revival would be misleading. In 92 of the 2026 cases, the attacker did not add a new workflow at all. It modified one already sitting in the repository from an earlier injection, with the commit message "Update Github Actions Security workflow." Those updates simply pointed existing files at the new exfiltration IP, with the replaced endpoints including the original 2025 domains and a previously undocumented address, `170.39.218.2`.

The full timeline runs from September 2025 through the present: roughly 900 repositories in the initial wave, quieter activity across late 2025 and early 2026 under two different endpoints, then the August and September 2026 surge of 772.


A Cryptominer Hidden in DevOpsGPT

The new wave also produced an unexpected finding. A day and a half before the first August 31 injections, a commit labeled "fix(subtask): update the OpenAI version" was pushed to `kuafuai/DevOpsGPT`, an open-source project with roughly 6,000 stars. The commit embedded an XMRig 6.21.0 Monero miner into the project's Docker image, disguised as a routine worker process and set to run on a 45-second restart loop. The mining configuration was XOR-encrypted with the key `devops2024`, and the wallet pointed to `pool.supportxmr.com`.

The same compromised account was then used on September 15 to push the GhostAction workflow to four DevOpsGPT repositories. Whether the miner and the credential-theft campaign share the same operators remains unclear. The miner commit used a forged author email never seen on that account before, was crafted specifically for that project, and left no trace in any other repository, while GhostAction's payloads are generic and hit hundreds of repos within hours.


One Compromised Account, Multiple Attackers

Cross-referencing GhostAction victims against other malicious GitHub activity turned up 13 victim repositories that had also been exploited for cryptomining by at least four separate campaigns with distinct wallets, pools, and infrastructure. In some cases the miners arrived before the GhostAction workflow; in others they followed months later.

The most likely explanation is that the credentials GhostAction used were not exclusive to its operators. Stolen developer tokens circulate through infostealer logs and credential markets, where multiple actors can buy and reuse the same access independently.

That creates a specific gap in the standard remediation advice. Rotating the secrets stolen through the malicious workflow is necessary, but it is not enough. The underlying GitHub credential that allowed the injection in the first place also needs to be found and revoked, or whoever holds that token next will use it.

The campaign continued into October. On October 8, a new burst hit 346 repositories in two automated sweeps lasting only minutes. Two compromised maintainer accounts pushed the workflow to every repository they could write to, including kitao/pyxel, a Python retro game engine with over 18,400 stars, and uber/athenadriver. The exfiltration endpoint remained `193.32.204.199`. Unlike most of the September wave, which was blocked pending approval, these runs executed and exfiltration was confirmed. This variant also goes further than its predecessor: rather than targeting only named GitHub Actions secrets, it combs the full git commit history for cloud credentials, including AWS keys, GitHub and GitLab tokens, and API keys for services like OpenAI and Anthropic.


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Technology
Calendar Phishing Google Phishing Attacks Scams Technology

Calendar Phishing Scams Rise as Hackers Exploit Fake Meeting Invitations


Cybersecurity experts are warning about the growing threat of calendar phishing, a scam that uses scam meeting invitations, payment alerts and renewal reminders to trick people into sharing sensitive information. 

Unlike traditional phishing attacks that mainly rely on suspicious emails, calendar phishing places deceptive events directly into a user's calendar. Because these entries appear alongside genuine appointments, victims may be more likely to trust them.

How the scam works

The attack often begins when a user receives an email invitation that automatically appears in their digital calendar. The event may look like a routine business meeting, a voicemail notification, a payment confirmation or a warning about unusual activity on a PayPal account.

Some invitations claim that a payment is about to be processed or that a software subscription needs to be renewed. Others may imitate internal workplace meetings, complete with company names, logos and convincing descriptions.

The event usually contains a link or telephone number intended to persuade the recipient to take action. Clicking the link may open a scam login page that resembles Google, Microsoft or PayPal. If the victim enters their credentials, the attackers can capture the information.

In other cases, victims are encouraged to call a fake customer-support number to cancel a payment or resolve a supposed security problem. Threat actors may then attempt to obtain personal information, account credentials or financial details.

Why calendar phishing is difficult to stop

According to security professionals, calendar phishing has experienced sudden growth. Security teams face difficulties blocking these attacks because legitimate meeting invitations and malicious events can use the same calendar services.

Attackers may also exploit trusted platforms, including Zoom, to make invitations appear genuine. Automatically accepting invitations from unfamiliar senders can increase the chances that scam events will appear in a user's schedule.

Stolen credentials can be sold to other criminals or used to access workplace email accounts, impersonate employees and launch further attacks. However, simply receiving a suspicious calendar entry does not necessarily mean an account has been compromised. The main danger arises when victims follow the instructions and disclose information.

How to stay safe?

Experts recommend treating unexpected calendar invitations with the same caution as suspicious emails. Users should avoid clicking unfamiliar links, downloading unexpected files or calling numbers provided in questionable event descriptions.

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YMCO
Cyber Crime money laundering money mule russia YMCO

Ukrainian-Russian Dual National Behind 15,000-Mule Money Laundering Ring Pleads Guilty in North Carolina




A Ukrainian-Russian dual national who spent years overseeing one of the most operationally sophisticated money laundering rings in recent cybercrime history pleaded guilty last Thursday in a federal court in North Carolina, admitting to routing stolen funds through tens of thousands of ordinary Americans before shipping the cash to criminal operatives in Eastern Europe.

Oleg Korniev, 42, was a principal at Your Mule Cashout, or YMCO, a criminal outfit that ran from September 2007 through 2014 and maintained a network of more than 15,000 money mules across the United States. The plea came roughly a decade after a grand jury first indicted him, and about 10 months after U.S. authorities caught up with him and arrested him in North Carolina in December 2025.


Not a side player

Federal prosecutors did not describe Korniev as a peripheral figure. He managed YMCO's daily operations, hired and fired staff, and handed out rewards or penalties depending on performance. He also helped design the procedural framework that kept the organization functioning across multiple countries simultaneously.

YMCO's approach was simple in concept but deliberately layered in practice. The group posed as legitimate staffing or payment-processing companies and sent spam emails to Americans advertising open positions. What followed was a carefully staged recruitment process built to look real: job applicants went through an employment test, reviewed a contract, and were walked through what appeared to be standard company policy. They were then asked to upload their bank details to a fictitious company website and told their job was to receive payments into their personal accounts and wire the money to company accounts overseas.

The money they were receiving was stolen. Hackers had broken into U.S. bank accounts using malware, funneling the proceeds into the mules' accounts and relying on those individuals to move the funds out of the country before anything flagged.


How the cash moved

From the mules' accounts, the money traveled through Western Union and MoneyGram to what YMCO called "cash-out contractors" in Moldova, Ukraine, Russia, and Latvia. These operators received a cut of each transfer for their role and passed the remainder back to the organization. Running stolen money through a human relay network like this put distance between the hackers and the funds, making the trail harder to reconstruct.

According to court documents, YMCO processed more than $10 million drained from over 750 U.S. bank accounts across more than 35 financial institutions. The group also ran parallel schemes in Germany, Italy, the United Kingdom, and Australia. Korniev's plea agreement put total actual and intended losses to confirmed victims at more than $14.7 million. He personally admitted to laundering at least $7 million of the $9.7 million he received from cybercriminals as payment for YMCO's services.


A decade-long chase

Korniev was originally indicted alongside Serghei Ivanovich Tomuz, a Moldovan national who allegedly ran YMCO's cash-out operation inside his home country. Tomuz was reportedly detained at a Romanian border crossing in May 2022 and spent years fighting extradition to the United States. His case was ultimately terminated in U.S. federal court this past May.

Four other Ukrainians tied to YMCO were arrested abroad years earlier, extradited to the Western District of North Carolina, and pleaded guilty to conspiracy to commit money laundering. Sentenced in 2018, they received prison terms ranging from 37 to 63 months and were each ordered to pay more than $9.1 million in restitution to American victims.

Korniev now faces a minimum sentence of two years and a maximum of 50 years after pleading guilty to money laundering, aggravated identity theft, conspiracy to commit money laundering, conspiracy to commit computer fraud, and conspiracy to commit access device theft. His plea agreement includes a commitment to fully repay confirmed victims for their documented losses.


What prosecutors want criminals to understand

Assistant Attorney General A. Tysen Duva made the department's position on mule networks clear. "Money mules play crucial roles in cybercrime, so the Justice Department pursues mules and their recruiters wherever they operate and however long it takes," Duva said.

The case puts into focus how money mule operations function as the financial plumbing beneath large-scale cybercrime. Without them, proceeds from bank fraud and account takeovers would be far harder to extract without triggering detection.

That infrastructure is a recurring target for law enforcement. Five years ago, Europol announced that authorities from 27 countries had arrested 1,803 money mules out of 18,351 identified as part of a coordinated crackdown called the European Money Mule Action, or EMMA. Europol has consistently flagged that criminal groups recruit mules from vulnerable populations, specifically students, immigrants, and people facing economic pressure, using job ads on social media and employment sites that look entirely legitimate.

Many mules sign up without understanding what they are walking into. Others are coerced. In either scenario, courts have made clear that receiving and wiring stolen money is not a protected form of ignorance.



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Cyber Security
AI prompt injection attack API Keys AWS AWS security Cloud Credentials Cyber Security

AgentCorruption Exposes Security Risks in Amazon Bedrock AgentCore

 

A single prompt could have led to the exposure of conversations, source code, stored memories and cloud credentials across multiple AI agents in the same AWS account and region, according to Zenity Labs researchers. The so-called AgentCorruption attack chain targeted Amazon Bedrock AgentCore, which is AWS's managed service for building and running AI agents. 

The researchers' proof-of-concept involved an agent with a web-request tool that was prompted to call the local metadata endpoint at 169.254.169.254, which is where AWS workloads get temporary AWS credentials. Since the request came from inside the agent's Firecracker microVM, it returned credentials for the agent's execution role. 

This created a server-side request forgery (SSRF) vulnerability that was triggered by a prompt injection. "Exploitation didn't require a vulnerability in the chat interface; it required only that the agent have a tool to make the request and that the tool be permitted to call the metadata service," the researchers said. Zenity discovered that the broad permissions typically given to the default execution role allowed them to find agents, obtain container images, invoke other agents and access session events. 

They also discovered permissions that could be used to access conversations and implant false memories that would affect the agent's future responses. The researchers added that the latter capability could be used to implant "instructions" that would cause the agent to take specific actions. In addition, they found that these same permissions could be used to access API keys and secrets stored in AWS Secrets Manager, which could lead to lateral movement to other services and data. 

According to Zenity, metadata access was reported to AWS on Dec. 25, 2025, and excessive permissions in the execution role were reported on Jan. 12, 2026. AWS started the migration to Instance Metadata Service Version 2 in February 2026, and then made it mandatory. On Sept. 29, 2026, Zenity confirmed that AWS had removed the permissions that could be used to invoke other agents, chat with them or access the Secrets Manager. The researchers stated that the problems they reported had been addressed. 

AWS pushed back against the suggestion that this was a vulnerability, noting that it is normal for an agent to have access to its own execution role credentials via the metadata service. In addition, the company stated that cross-account access to agents is not possible without the appropriate permissions on the execution role and resources. 

Security teams should create their own IAM roles with limited permissions, block all outbound network connectivity except what is necessary, isolate agents that are accessible over the public internet and monitor logs in CloudTrail and CloudWatch for anything unusual, the researchers recommended. They also suggested that organizations ensure that the AgentCore Gateway cannot be bypassed to access agents directly. 

An AI agent's access to tools and permissions in the cloud can create security issues if not properly restricted, and this discovery shows why companies need to carefully control and monitor such access before actually launching an agent into production.
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Privileged Access Abuse
Bitcoin Ransom Demand Cyber Crime Cyber Extortion Daniel Rhyne industrial cybersecurity Insider Threat Network Sabotage Privileged Access Abuse

Engineer Jailed Over Insider Cyber Extortion Plot Against Industrial Firm


The former infrastructure engineer was sentenced to 32 months in federal prison for sabotage of his employer's computer network and for demanding a ransom of $750,000 in Bitcoin from his employer. 

According to the US Department of Justice (DOJ), Daniel Rhyne, 59, was convicted of extortion involving threats to damage protected computers and intentional damage to protected computers. Rhyne was previously employed as a core infrastructure engineer with a Somerset County, New Jersey industrial company. 

Providing services across various sectors, the company specializes in manufacturing, healthcare, biopharmaceuticals, electronics, energy and industrial processing. Rhyne is alleged to have prepared a coordinated disruption in November 2023 by using his privileged access and knowledge of the company's network. 

An alternative to conventional ransomware was used in this attack, which involved scheduled tasks that removed administrator accounts and changed passwords across the entire organization's systems and could have prevented employees from accessing critical information. 

Attack Disrupted Administrative Access

A court document indicates that Rhyne set up scheduled tasks on the domain controller to delete 13 domain administrator accounts and change the passwords of 301 domain users. Two additional tasks were also performed on November 25, 2023, to target two local administrator accounts related to 254 servers and two others affecting 3,284 workstations. 

Among the changes was a security threat that threatened the availability of a large number of devices across the network, as well as the locking of administrators and other employees out of company systems and data. Select employees received an email extortion request from an external address with the subject line "Your Network has been breached" approximately one hour after scheduled tasks had been executed. 

According to the message, administrator accounts were revoked, backups were removed, and administrator accounts had been deleted or locked out. Rhyne also threatened to shut down 40 servers randomly each day for ten days if the company did not meet its ransom demand. In this email, Rhyne demanded 20 Bitcoin, which was approximately $750,000 at the time. This incident demonstrated that access to administrative systems can be abused to disrupt an organization without the use of traditional file-encrypting malicious code. 

Due to the attacks targeting accounts, passwords, and server access, the company was unable to manage its own IT environment and maintain normal business operations as a result of the attacks. 

Investigation Leads to Arrest and Prison Sentence

In response to the discovery of suspicious network activity, the company launched an internal forensic investigation. Investigators analyzed system logs and compared them with physical access records in order to determine the source of the changes. As a result of the FBI investigation, the activity was traced to the residential IP address of Rhyne in Warren County, New Jersey, which was associated with Rhyne. 

A criminal complaint was filed on August 8, 2024 by FBI Special Agent Timothy Lee in response to the findings. Rhyne was arrested on August 27, 2024, in Kansas City, Missouri, following his relocation to the area. He pleaded guilty to the charges on April 1, 2026, in federal court in Trenton, New Jersey, before US District Judge Michael A. 

On September 28, 2026, Shipp delivered the 32-month prison sentence. An employee with extensive administrative privileges poses substantial security risks. While outsider attacks tend to exploit software vulnerabilities or steal credentials from external users, insider attacks are capable of exploiting legitimate access to disrupt a wide range of systems. 

Security teams may struggle to regain control of critical systems when mass password changes and administrator account deletions occur. By restricting access to privileged accounts, monitoring unusual account activity, and maintaining backups that are protected from production network access, similar incidents may be reduced. 

It is also crucial to review and revoke access as soon as your employment responsibilities change to minimize the risk of deliberate misuse. This case illustrates the risks associated with insider threats and improper use of privilege. A strong access control system, continuous monitoring, as well as secure backups are essential to safeguarding critical business systems from intentional attacks.

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Water Utilities
Critical Infrastructure Cyber Security Password Theft US Hacking Water Utilities

Stolen Passwords Expose 1,787 US Water Providers to Hackers

 

A new cybersecurity study has found that stolen passwords are exposing more than 1,700 American water and wastewater providers to potential hacking. Research by SpyCloud, shows that password-stealing malware has compromised credentials belonging to 1,787 organizations—nearly two in every ten providers examined. The findings highlight how basic credential theft, rather than advanced artificial intelligence or sophisticated exploits, can create a serious threat to critical infrastructure. 

SpyCloud analyzed a database of more than 66,000 publicly accessible systems registered with the US Environmental Protection Agency, covering roughly 10,000 water-related organizations. The researchers found that malware had stolen passwords and credentials from nearly 20% of these providers. More alarmingly, at least 250 organizations had exposed credentials that appeared to allow access to operational networks and remote-access systems used to control physical pumps and water flows. 

The danger is amplified by infostealer malware, which captures not only saved passwords but also active session tokens. These tokens can keep a user logged into a system, allowing attackers to impersonate legitimate employees and sometimes bypass multi-factor authentication. Stolen credentials are frequently traded or sold on underground marketplaces, giving hackers a ready-made way to enter specific organizations without needing to discover new vulnerabilities themselves. 

The study also revealed a supply-chain risk. Researchers identified an unnamed metering technology provider whose network contained an infected device. That single compromise exposed credentials for 167 US utility companies that relied on the provider’s technology. This shows how one weak link in a vendor’s security can potentially create access routes into hundreds of unrelated water systems, making third-party cybersecurity oversight essential. 

The report comes after a series of cyberattacks on US water providers, which the government has privately linked to Iran-backed hackers. However, SpyCloud said it found no evidence that those particular attacks used stolen passwords; instead, they involved issues such as default passwords on physical controllers and mechanical switches. The broader lesson is clear: water utilities must combine strong password practices, multi-factor authentication, session-security controls, vendor monitoring, and removal of default credentials to protect essential public services.
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