The CyberWire Daily Briefing for 1.10.2014
Target's data breach proves almost twice as bad as hitherto believed. The retailer, after investigation, now discloses that the names, email addresses, and telephone numbers of up to 70M customers were stolen.
Ransomware remains a dangerous threat in the hands of aggressive criminals, and no enterprise should fail to protect itself through, among other measures, effective data backup. New ransomware variants may be expected to appear, but security managers should proceed with circumspection before they jump into expensive countermeasures specifically tailored to criminal forum chatter.
The underground marketplace shows signs of trending toward accounting data boutiques selling information culled by do-it-yourself crimeware services.
The Internet Storm Center sniffs the rise of an unknown botnet in "pretty massive" PHP RFI scans.
With backing from a Palantir co-founder, Radius Intelligence positions itself to compete with Dun and Bradstreet in the (small) business intelligence market.
OWASP cancels its co-marketing agreement with RSA. Allegations of RSA collusion in weak crypto (denied by RSA) continue to affect its upcoming conference: eleven speakers, panelists, or trainers have withdrawn. (But note: this hasn't necessarily translated to an exhibitor boycott.)
Dell says it's open to layoffs. IBM creates a unit to monetize Watson. Intel discusses the McAfee brand's retirement.
US President Obama meets Congressional leaders and suggests he's open to unspecified changes in NSA surveillance. NSA's deputy director says the agency would welcome a public advocate in FISA court.
The US GAO finds inconsistency in federal agency breach reports (and questions the utility of the one-hour reporting rule).
Notes.
Today's issue includes events affecting Brazil, European Union, Germany, Russia, Taiwan, United Kingdom, and United States..
For a complete running list of events, please visit the Event Tracker.
Upcoming Events
Cyber Security 2014 (, Jan 1, 1970) The threats and the opportunities conference brings together over 150 business leaders, senior decision makers, business development managers and IT professionals from across the whole defence and security supply chain, from Prime Contractors, through tier 1 and tier 2 suppliers, SMEs and those at the front of R&D and the development of new and innovative products and services. The event will provide a unique opportunity for those within the whole supply chain to understand both the current and future threat of Cyber Security on the supply chain and what action will need to be taken to mitigate these and ensure we are fit to compete in the future — both as businesses and as a country. Organisations who have confirmed their attendance include: RBS, Finmeccanica Selex, Thales, MOD, Scottish Government, Lockheed Martin UK, BAE Systems and others.
FloCon2014 (Charleston, South Carolina, USA, Jan 13 - 16, 2014) FloCon 2014, a network security conference, takes place at the Francis Marion Hotel in Charleston, South Carolina, on January 13–16, 2014. This open conference provides a forum for operational network analysts, tool developers, researchers, and other parties interested in the analysis of large volumes of traffic to showcase the next generation of flow-based analysis techniques.
NASA Langley Cyber Expo (Hampton, Virginia, USA, Jan 14, 2014) The 2013 NASA Langley Cyber Expo is an annual event dedicated to Cyber Security and Information Technology at this secure facility. As the Cyber Expo hosts, the Office of the Chief Information Officer will be recruiting top federal speakers to provide informational sessions on relevant Cyber issues. Industry exhibitors may sit in on the sessions.This event will be promoted to all NASA Cyber and IT-focused personnel, as well as the entire workforce at this location.
Federal Intel Summit (, Jan 1, 1970) The Potomac Officers Club is proud to host the 2014 Federal Intel Summit featuring Congressman Mike Rogers and leadership from across the Federal Agencies focused on protecting our national interests.
cybergamut Tech Tuesday: Malware Reverse Engineering — An Introduction to the Tools, Workflows, and Tricks of the Trade to Attack Sophisticated Malware (, Jan 1, 1970) Reverse engineering malware can be an integral part of every security team's calculus. This session provides a technical review of the tools, workflows, and advanced analytic insight a senior reverse engineer brings to the fight. It will help demystify the process and illustrate the value-proposition associated with deep analytics of malware. Moreover, understanding the detail available through reverse engineering gives the security professional deeper insight into the tactics and techniques the attackers use to circumvent their defensive solutions. The session empowers cyber security professionals at every level to make better-informed judgments on how to improve their response and remediation protocols.
Federal Mobile Computing Summit (, Jan 1, 1970) The Federal Mobile Computing Summit: Digital Government Strategy II will feature government leaders who played an instrumental role in the development of the DGS and worked on the resulting deliverables. These IT thought leaders will examine the mobile landscape over the next 18 months — and beyond.
Cybertech — Cyber Security Conference and Exhibition (Tel Aviv, Israel, Jan 27 - 29, 2014) Cybertech Israel, the first event of its kind, will present world-leading companies in the field of cyber defense alongside young companies that offer unique solutions to advance the discipline of cyber security. The conference will focus on commercial problem-solving strategies and solutions for cyber infrastructure experts across multiple sectors: energy, utilities, finance, defense, R&D, manufacturing, service sectors, health, government, telecommunications, transportation and more.
U.S. Census Data Protection & Privacy Day (Suitland, Maryland, USA, Jan 28, 2014) The Census Bureau's Privacy Compliance Branch of the Policy Coordination Office is hosting a Data Protection and Privacy Day on January 28. This event is intended to provide a forum for Census employees and contractors to discuss current data protection and privacy policy and to generate ideas to help evolve the current policies . The event will feature various participants from the U.S. Census Bureau as well as other government agencies and industry.
2014 Cybersecurity Innovation Forum (Baltimore, Maryland, USA, Jan 28 - 30, 2014) The 2014 Cybersecurity Innovation Forum (CIF) is a three-day event, sponsored by the National Cybersecurity Center of Excellence (NCCoE) with DHS, NIST, and NSA as primary participating organizations. The CIF will cover the existing threat landscape and provide presentations and keynotes on current and emerging practices, technologies and standards. The 2014 CIF will provide action-oriented outputs to fuel voluntary principle-driven consensus-based standards efforts, create opportunities for industry growth and drive research activities, and define use cases for subsequent exploration, which in turn will feed back into the subsequent CIF's, continually evolving the state of the art.