Frank Herberg

SWITCH Security Report July/August 2022

Dear Reader

The latest issue of our bi-monthly SWITCH Security Report is available. The main topics of the current report are:

Disaster for DeFi protocol: Nomad loses USD 190 million
Certificate withdrawal for Hermit: Google and Apple respond to analysis of the Italian government trojan
Track the tracker: AirTags hit the headlines
Who is lord of the Rings? Dubious new TV show exploits footage from Amazon Ring security cameras

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The January/February 2021 issue of our SWITCH Security Report is available!

Dear Reader!

A new issue of our bi-monthly SWITCH Security Report is available!

The topics covered in this report are:

Dependency confusion – when trust is too good to be true
Water hacking – not a new trendy sport, but a serious threat
Emotet: the king is dead – let there be no successor!
Rumours of its death are greatly exaggerated: how phishing mailers trick cutting-edge security filters with good old Morse code

The Security Report is available in both English and German.

»» Download the English report. »» Download the German report.

The November/December 2020 issue of our SWITCH Security Report is available!

Dear Reader!

A new issue of our bi-monthly SWITCH Security Report is available!

The topics covered in this report are:

Choose your team carefully – hackers use fake MS Teams updates to attack networks, especially those of educational institutions
Audacious coronavirus relief phishing delivers an extra malware ‘bonus’ on request and creates a challenge for BEC
Stopping the attempt to stop online hate speech?
Close the gates before it’s too late: what Sneakers and the Internet of Things have in common

The Security Report is available in both English and German.

»» Download the English report. »» Download the German report.

The July/August 2020 issue of our SWITCH Security Report is available!

Dear Reader!

A new issue of our bi-monthly SWITCH Security Report is available!

The topics covered in this report are:

Aimless navigation – Garmin scrambling to regain its bearings after hacking incident
Hacking with a heavy hand: German intelligence is making a push to install hardware directly with internet providers and reroute internet traffic
A protection shield minus the protection – ECJ declares Privacy Shield unlawful
A night(mare) of celebrities – The ‘biggest Twitter hack of all times’ raises questions about the security of the network

The Security Report is available in both English and German.

»» Download the English report. »» Download the German report.

The Jan/Feb 2020 issue of our SWITCH Security Report is available!

Dear Reader!

A new issue of our bi-monthly SWITCH Security Report is available!

The topics covered in this report are:

When backdoors become trapdoors: ‘Crypto Leaks’ hits Switzerland, Crypto Valley – and the entire ecosystem
I, Robot, ZigBee and IoT
Sure, it’s secure! Are you sure?
A different kind of virus: China launches its Close Contact Detector app for smartphones

The Security Report is available in both English and German.

»» Download the English report. »» Download the German report.

The July/August 2019 issue of our SWITCH Security Report is available!

Dear Reader!

A new issue of our bi-monthly SWITCH Security Report is available!

The topics covered in this report are:

Attacks on PGP key server: is pretty good still good enough?
We need to talk! About how virtual assistants are listening in. Privacy at Facebook, part two: when the lawyer contradicts the boss
Breaking Binance: the world’s largest Bitcoin trading platform is hacked and blackmailed

The Security Report is available in both English and German.

»» Download the English report. »» Download the German report.

The March/April 2019 issue of our SWITCH Security Report is available!

Dear Reader!

A new issue of our bi-monthly SWITCH Security Report is available!

The topics covered in this report are:

Lenin and the detectives: Mobiispy stalkerware can make highly personal data collected while monitoring children and partners publicly accessible
Ransomware trojan LockerGoga brings companies to their knees
Straight talk at Facebook: when tech giants fail to meet even minimal security requirements
Malware straight from the factory: when Shadow Hammer strikes the supply chain

The Security Report is available in both English and German.

»» Download the English report. »» Download the German report.

Did you miss our previous Security Report? Click here to go to the archive.

The January/February 2019 issue of our SWITCH Security Report is available!

Dear Reader!

A new issue of our bi-monthly SWITCH Security Report is available!

The topics covered in this report are:

Company networks at serious risk: recent waves of malspam have been spreading the multifunctional trojan Emotet, targeting Windows devices in particular
Phishing, porn, data theft: rogue apps appearing as a new and harmful type of ‘non-sellers’ on Google Play and other app stores
Spy Time now also available for Apple devices – Serious security vulnerabilities allow outsiders to eavesdrop on FaceTime conversations and steal passwords from Keychain in MacOS
Alexa home alone, nuclear attack via Nest and a new password law in California – what happens when IoT gadgets run amok?

The Security Report is available in both English and German.

»» Download the english report . »» Download the german report.

Did you miss our previous Security Report? Click here to go to the archive.

The Sep/Oct 2018 issue of our SWITCH Security Report is available!

Dear Reader!

A new issue of our SWITCH Security Report has just been released.

The topics covered in this report are:

Turning Good instead of Breaking Bad? Hacking to fend off other hackers
What do a firefighter and Google Chrome 69 have in common?
15 months later: new attacks, same old vulnerability
Peekaboo exploits vulnerability in surveillance cameras in a major way

The Security Report is available in both English and German.

»» Download the english report. »» Download the german report.

Did you miss our previous Security Report? Click here to go to the archive.

The March/April 2018 issue of our SWITCH Security Report is available!

Dear Reader!

A new issue of our bi-monthly SWITCH Security Report has just been released.

The topics covered in this report are:

The dark side of the Data Force: Facebook, Cambridge Analytica, and the pressing question of who is using whose data for what
News from the world of state trojans: Microsoft’s analysis of FinFisher
Russian APT28 hackers’ month-long infiltration of the computer network of Germany’s federal government
Bitcoin bounty or close encounter: bizarre side-effects of cryptomining

The Security Report is available in both English and German.

»» Download the english report. »» Download the german report.

Did you miss our previous Security Report? Click here to go to the archive.

A new issue of our SWITCH Security Report is available!

Dear Reader!

A new issue of our bi-monthly SWITCH Security Report is available!

The topics covered in this report are:

Attack of the digital dolphins: hacking Alexa, Siri and their friends via ultrasound
The anti-antivirus programme: US government bans agencies from installing Kaspersky software on their computers
A hack of ‘epic proportions’ at Equifax
Science fiction 4.0 – how to hack a computer with a drop of saliva

The Security Report is available in both English and German.

»» Download the english report. »» Download the german report.

Did you miss our previous Security Report? Click here to go to the archive.

Money for Nothing and Coins for Free

written by Antoine Neuenschwander

Beginning in mid-September 2017, we started seeing a new abuse scheme on .ch and .li domains. The websites in question were running on outdated software and inevitably, hackers exploited some well-known vulnerability in order to inject malicious code. At this point we would usually expect an exploit kit in the website’s content with the purpose of infecting the victim’s machine with malware. In these cases however, the Javascript inject often looked somewhat like the following:

This code is designed to run in the background of the victim’s browser and immediately starts an endless loop of intensive computations at full pace, effectively turning the browser into a hash-crunching mule for the sake of distributed mining of cryptocoins, with profits going directly to the hacker.

Continue reading “Money for Nothing and Coins for Free”

11th October 2017, DNSSEC key rollover of the root zone, be ready the key is here!

On the 27th September, ICANN announced the postponement for the KSK rollover. More information can be found here.

written by Yves Bovard

No, this is not a kind of secret message nor a new ice-cream. On 11th October 2017 the root zone will be signed with a new key. Ladies and gentlemen, update your DNS resolver. As of July 11th, the new key is published in the root zone and your resolver should start updating its trust anchors automatically!

Continue reading “11th October 2017, DNSSEC key rollover of the root zone, be ready the key is here!”