upstart writes in with an IRC submission:This hacking group is using previously unknown tools to target defence contractors:Hackers used previously unknown tools in a cyber-espionage campaign targeting defence and aerospace companies in a social engineering and phishing campaign that is more widely targeted than first thought.Researchers at McAfee first detailed Operation North Star earlier this year, but further analysis reveals additional tactics and techniques of the campaign that has almost identical elements to Hidden Cobra – AKA The Lazarus Group – a hacking operation which the US government and others say is working out of North Korea on behalf of the government in Pyongyang.[...] Initial reporting of the campaign detailed attacks against targets in the US, but those weren't the only ones hackers were looking to compromise – analysis of the attacks has revealed that defence and technology contractors in Israel, Russia, India and Australia have also been targeted by this campaign."The actors behind the campaign were more sophisticated than they initially appeared. They are focused and deliberate in what they meant to achieve and more disciplined and patient in executing to achieve their objective," said researchers.Original SubmissionRead more of this story at SoylentNews.
hubie writes:A Nature Scientific Reports paper looks at the dynamics of illicit web sites and finds that the ecosystem is very resilient. They found that when a web site is shuttered due to law enforcement activity or an exit scam, the closures mainly affected low activity users while high activity users migrate quickly to a new marketplace. The also found that two-thirds of the users who choose to move to a new dark site choose to follow each other to the new site: the marketplace that receives the largest number of migrating users tends to have the largest volume and the most users in common with the closed marketplace.
hubie writes:Money laundering comes in all shapes and sizes. Money can be handled domestically within the country where it was acquired, it can be moved internationally to a location deemed better suited to mask its origin, or a country could be an intermediary where money just flows though from Country A to Country B. These days there are inter-governmental efforts to monitor suspicious financial transactions to curb illicit money laundering, and key to these efforts are attempts to understand how ``dirty'' funds move around the world.Researchers from The Netherlands and Austria developed a model to understand how money moves around. Their model is based upon a gravity model, which is very commonly used in the social sciences for modeling complex flow interactions such as commuter and pedestrian traffic, drug cartel activity, and international trade. These models get their name and inspiration from Newton's Law of Gravity which has that the interaction strength between bodies is dependent upon the sizes of the bodies and inversely with the distance between them.
canopic jug writes:Let's Encrypt, the non-profit certificate authority which provides X.509 certificates for Transport Layer Security encryption at no charge, has an update on the progress towards universal acknowledgement of its root certificate in software and firmware. The cross signature which it has purchased will expire next September, so there is a hard deadline for finalization. There are only a few barriers remaining, one of which is the old versions of Android still in use.
Michigan Votes to Require Warrants for Police to Seize and Search Digital DevicesRunaway1956 writes in with an IRC submission:Michigan votes to require warrants for police to seize and search digital devices: