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Don't ditch PowerShell to improve security, say infosec agencies from UK, US, and NZ

Use it sensibly instead – which means turning on the useful bits Microsoft doesn't enable by default

Simon Sharwood, APAC Editor Thu 23 Jun 2022 // 07:58 UTC

Windows PowerShell is enormously useful, extremely prevalent, and often targeted by crooks because it offers an express route into the heart of Windows servers and networks.
Some have therefore suggested the tool is a liability that should be disabled in the interest of improved security.
But on Wednesday national cybersecurity agencies from the US, UK, and New Zealand decided that's a bit drastic. Instead, the agencies recommend securing PowerShell prudently.

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US cyber chiefs: Moving to Shields Down isn't gonna happen

Promises new alert notices but warn 'we can sometimes predict thunderstorms but not lightning strikes'

Jessica Lyons Hardcastle Wed 8 Jun 2022 // 06:58 UTC

RSA Conference A heightened state of defensive cyber security posture is the new normal, according to federal cyber security chiefs speaking at the RSA Conference on Tuesday. This requires greater transparency and threat intel sharing between the government and private sector, they added.
"There'll never be a time when we don't defend ourselves –— especially in cyberspace," National Cyber Director Chris Inglis said, referencing an opinion piece that he and CISA director Jen Easterly published earlier this week that described CISA's Shields Up initiative as the new normal.
"Now, we all know that we can't sustain the highest level of alert for an extensive period of time, which is why we're thinking about, number one, what's that relationship that government needs to have with the private sector," Easterly said on the RSA Conference panel with Inglis and National Security Agency (NSA) cybersecurity director Rob Joyce.

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Beijing-backed baddies target unpatched networking kit to attack telcos

NSA, FBI and CISA issue joint advisory that suggests China hardly has to work for this – flaws revealed in 2017 are among their entry points

Simon Sharwood, APAC Editor Wed 8 Jun 2022 // 07:56 UTC

State-sponsored Chinese attackers are actively exploiting old vulnerabilities to "establish a broad network of compromised infrastructure" then using it to attack telcos and network services providers.
So say the United States National Security Agency (NSA), Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency (CISA), and Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI), which took the unusual step of issuing a joint advisory that warns allied governments, critical infrastructure operators, and private industry organizations to hurry up and fix their IT estates.
The advisory states that network devices are the target of this campaign and lists 16 flaws – some dating back to 2017 and none more recent than April 2021 – that the three agencies rate as the most frequently exploited.

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False-flag cyberattacks a red line for nation-states, says Mandiant boss

NSA director says he doesn't know of a 'big one' that was successful

Jessica Lyons Hardcastle Sat 7 May 2022 // 08:53 UTC

False-flag cyberattacks represent a red line that even nation states like Russia and China don't want to cross, according to Mandiant CEO Kevin Mandia.
"It's one of the last rules of the playground that a modern nation may not want to break because they don't want everyone doing false flags," he said, speaking on a panel this week at Vanderbilt University's Summit on Modern Conflict and Emerging Threats.

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US Cyber Command shored up nine nations' defenses last year

'Hunt forward' operations push US capabilities across borders

Jessica Lyons Hardcastle Wed 4 May 2022 // 23:52 UTC

US Cyber Command chief General Paul Nakasone has revealed the agency he leads conducted nine "hunt forward" operations last year, sending teams to different counties to help them improve their defensive security posture and hunt for cyberthreats.
These missions provide "security for our nation in cyberspace," said Nakasone, who is also director of the National Security Agency, during a Summit on Modern Conflict and Emerging Threats at Vanderbilt University. "It provides an inoculation of these threats, and it provides a partnership with a nation that has asked us for assistance."
Such missions are a win-win for both participating governments, he said. The foreign countries benefit from US cybersecurity tools and threat intel, and US Cyber Command gets to put sensors on these nation's networks, which gives the military better visibility into threats beyond America's border.

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Five Eyes nations reveal 2021's fifteen most-exploited flaws

Malicious cyber actors go after 2021's biggest misses, spend less time on the classics

Jessica Lyons Hardcastle Thu 28 Apr 2022 // 01:46 UTC

Security flaws in Log4j, Microsoft Exchange, and Atlassian's workspace collaboration software were among the bugs most frequently exploited by "malicious cyber actors" in 2021 , according to a joint advisory by the Five Eyes nations' cybersecurity and law enforcement agencies.
It's worth noting that 11 of the 15 flaws on the list were disclosed in 2021, as previous years' lists often found miscreants exploiting the older vulns for which patches had been available for years.
Of course, the US Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency (CISA) and friends note that malicious cyber actors have not stopped trying to exploit older flaws – but reckon those efforts are happening to a "lesser extent" than in the past.

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National Security Agency employee indicted for 'leaking top secret info'

Managed to send material from his private email address, it is claimed

Simon Sharwood, APAC Editor Fri 1 Apr 2022 // 05:33 UTC

The United States Department of Justice (DoJ) has accused an NSA employee of sharing top-secret national security information with an unnamed person who worked in the private sector.
According to a DoJ announcement and the indictment, an NSA staffer named Mark Unkenholz "held a TOP SECRET/Sensitive Compartmented Information (SCI) clearance and had lawful access to classified information relating to the national defense."
The indictment alleges that on 13 occasions between 2018 and 2020, Unkenholz shared some of that information with a woman identified only as "RF" who was not entitled to see it. Unkenholz did so despite allegedly having "reason to believe [the info] could be used to the injury of the United States or to the advantage of any foreign nation."

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China thrilled it captured already-leaked NSA cyber-weapon

Not now with your mischief, Beijing

Jessica Lyons Hardcastle Mon 14 Mar 2022 // 19:28 UTC

China claims it has obtained malware used by the NSA to steal files, monitor and redirect network traffic, and remotely control computers to spy on foreign targets.
The software nasty, dubbed NOPEN, is built to commandeer selected Unix and Linux systems, according to Chinese Communist Party tabloid Global Times, which today cited a report it got exclusively from China's National Computer Virus Emergency Response Center.
Trouble is, NOPEN was among the files publicly leaked in 2016 by the Shadow Brokers. If you can recall back that far, the Shadow Brokers stole and dumped online malware developed by the NSA's Equation Group.

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Anatomy of suspected top-tier decade-hidden NSA backdoor

Bvp47 of yore said to have used BPF to conceal comms in network traffic

Thomas Claburn in San Francisco Wed 23 Feb 2022 // 20:23 UTC

Pangu Lab has identified what it claims is a sophisticated backdoor that was used by the NSA to subvert highly targeted Linux systems around the world for more than a decade.
The China-based computer-security outfit says it first spotted the backdoor code, or advanced persistent threat (APT), in 2013 when conducting a forensic investigation on a host in "a key domestic department" – presumably a Chinese company or government agency.
To us it seems whoever created the code would compromise or infect a selected Linux system and then install the backdoor on it. This backdoor, which Pangu has now described, would do its best to hide from administrators and users, and covertly communicate over networks with the outside world.

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NSA: We 'don't know when or even if' a quantum computer will ever be able to break today's public-key encryption

Then again, it would say that

Gareth Corfield Wed 1 Sep 2021 // 18:21 UTC

America's National Security Agency has published an FAQ about quantum cryptography, saying it does not know "when or even if" a quantum computer will ever exist to "exploit" public-key cryptography.
In the document, titled Quantum Computing and Post-Quantum Cryptography, the NSA said it "has to produce requirements today for systems that will be used for many decades in the future." With that in mind, the agency came up with some predictions [PDF] for the near future of quantum computing and their impact on encryption.
Is the NSA worried about the threat posed by a "cryptographically relevant quantum computer" (CRQC)? Apparently not too much.

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