ANCHOR CYBER FEED

Do you believe your organization has an effective and comprehensive cyber security plan? Don’t bet on it. Eight in 10 small-businesses with less than 250 workers don’t have a basic cyber-attack incident response plan, even though a majority was hit by cyber crimes. With today’s technology making information highly convenient and accessible, smart organizations are taking a big picture approach to their cyber security and preparing for a multitude of worse-case scenarios so they are able to quickly detect and mitigate a breach when it occurs. ​ Many small companies don’t think that they are a target for a cyber breach, as they feel that they do not have the sensitive information a hacker would be interested in. What they fail to realize is they have become an easy target to cyber hackers. http://www.foxbusiness.com/features/2016/04/27/cyber-attacks-on-small-businesses-on-rise.html https://www.entrepreneur.com/article/252138

Numbers or pictures? Smiley face or thumbs up? Hackers have learned to adapt to the ways that online users create their passwords. Using common words, phrases, and numerical strings is clearly not secure enough these days. Ideally, a strong password is totally random; however, the stronger the password the harder they are to remember. This often leads to a weak password or the replication of the same password for every login. Enter the emojis as an potential alternative. The beauty of an emoji password system is that the picture is translated into characters by the log-in system, and each emoji may be comprised of a number of characters resulting in a lengthy password. The addition of emojis to our passwords would make it visually easier for the user while adding knock-out security due to the large number of characters for hackers to decipher. http://www.marketwatch.com/story/the-new-password-emojis-2015-12-29 http://www.npr.org/sections/alltechconsidered/2015/06/15/414742418/e...

"RansomWhere?" Tool Released to Detect and Halt Ransomware on Mac Computers Patrick Wardle, a leading researcher in Apple Mac vulnerabilities and security measures, released a tool called "RansomWhere?" last week to halt ransomware infections on Mac computers. Though ransomware has not been a widespread issue on Macs to this point, the tool's operational concept is interesting. It watches users' home folders (and their sub-folders), where the vast majority of documents are stored locally, for rapid write operations being performed on many files and suspends the responsible process. To avoid false positives, RansomWhere? catalogs all the programs running at the time it is installed, and it will never alert on actions taken by those programs; for this reason it is not effective if installed on a computer with ransomware already present. The technique is not insurmountable, but a similar tool on Windows PCs would likely stop the majority of existing ransom...

Most businesses have experienced, or will experience, a cyber security breach. Don't be exposed. General Liability Insurance may not offer you the resources to mitigate a breach, recover your data and repair your brand. Your existing security controls may not manage all of your risk, and a cyber insurance policy can supplement weaknesses in your controls. HOWEVER, also be sure to understand the coverage you will receive with your cyber insurance policy and what cyber risks you are outsourcing. ​​ http://www.technewsworld.com/story/Insurance-Industry-Buzzes-Over-Data-Breach-Ruling-83403.html https://databreachinsurancequote.com/cyber-insurance/does-commercial-general-liability-insurance-cgl-cover-a-data-breach/ https://databreachinsurancequote.com/cyber-insurance/how-cyber-insurance-may-or-may-not-cover-a-ransom-attack/

Recent research shows that a cyber attacker can launch an attack from up to 500 feet away. The attacker is able to take control of the target computer without physically being in front of it. The attacker can then type arbitrary text or send scripted commands at 1000 words per minute, making it possible to rapidly perform malicious activities without being detected. ​ http://www.securityweek.com/mousejack-vulnerability-affects-80-percent-organizations-survey​

Microsoft "Patch Tuesday" Includes Six Critical Updates Last Tuesday, on their regular monthly day to issue patches, Microsoft released thirteen security bulletins, six of them rated as "critical." Two of these (MS16-037 and MS16-038) are for Microsoft's browsers, Internet Explorer and Edge, respectively. MS-039 and MS16-040 are for core components of Windows, and affect nearly every supported version of the operating system for both servers and workstations. MS16-042 is for Microsoft Office, and affects every currently-supported version (even those for Mac). This is a particularly urged update to install, given that malicious documents attached to email are a common source of malicious software infections. Organizations are urged to test and install these updates as soon as possible. http://www.symantec.com/connect/blogs/microsoft-patch-tuesday-april-2016 https://technet.microsoft.com/library/security/ms16-apr?f=255&MSPPError=-2147217396 High Risk...

Microsoft SQL Server is one of the most widely-used database management systems (DBMS) in businesses today, particularly with smaller organizations and more modest requirements. This Tuesday (April 12th), SQL Server 2005 hit the end of its extended support period. This means that Microsoft will no longer be providing updates to resolve any security issues with the software. The presence of outdated and unsupported software on an organization's systems is one of the most severe issues commonly seen during security assessments. Database software is one of the most difficult types of software to deal with, as it generally serves as a "back-end" behind some other application or website, and compatibility issues are common. What to do about this: Verify the versions of SQL Server on all your systems. If you are running SQL Server 2005, identify all applications that depend on that server. Check with any application vendors regarding compatibility with newer SQL Server ver...