The massive computer outage over the weekend was not a cyber attack, and I’m not sure why we have to keep saying that
Summary: Cisco Talos stated that the widespread CrowdStrike/Microsoft outage on Friday was caused by a faulty CrowdStrike Falcon update, not a cyber attack, despite social media users and media headlines framing it as a hack. The same newsletter reported that business email compromise and ransomware accounted for 60 percent of Cisco Talos Incident Response engagements in the second quarter of 2024, and that U.K. police arrested a 17-year-old suspected of belonging to Scattered Spider and involvement in the MGM ransomware attack.
Why it matters: Threat actors used the outage's confusion to spread malware in real attacks, so a false 'hack' narrative is not harmless when adversaries are actively capitalizing on it. Separately, BEC and ransomware made up 60 percent of Talos IR engagements last quarter, and a 17-year-old suspect was arrested in connection with the MGM attack that led to a multi-million dollar ransom payment.
Read the original at Cisco Talos ↗
- Topics
- Phishing & Social Engineering
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