Unit 42 explores key peak shopping season retail cyber threats, from ransomware to AI attacks, and shares how to defend operations and customer trust. The post Unwrapping Retail Peak Season Cyber Threats appeared first on Unit 42.
A Ukrainian man who carried out ransomware attacks for both the Nefilim and Hive gangs, including attacks on law firms and a healthcare provider during the COVID-19 pandemic, has been sentenced to 70 months in a US prison. Read more in my article on the Hot for Security blog.
Artem Stryzhak was sentenced to 70 months in prison after pleading guilty to using Nefilim ransomware in attacks. The post Ukrainian Hive and Nefilim Ransomware Affiliate Gets 70 Months in US Prison appeared first on SecurityWeek.
Explore the latest tactics, techniques, and procedures (TTPs) our incident response (IR) experts are actively facing in the quarterly TTP Briefing, a report built on frontline threat intelligence from our global incident response investigations across LevelBlue during Q3 2026. Download the full report Register for the Global Webinar Register for EMEA Webinar A Unified View of the Threat Landscape This TTP Briefing is…
A Ukrainian national who participated in ransomware attacks targeting hospitals, government entities, law firms, and other businesses was sentenced to five years and 10 months in prison. Artem Stryzhak, 36, pleaded guilty in December 2025 to two counts of conspiracy to commit fraud, extortion, and related activity in connection with computers. He was arrested in Spain in June 2024 and extradited to the United States…
Imagine arriving at work on a Monday morning to find employees cannot log in, customer service is unavailable, and critical business applications have stopped working. Security alerts are flashing. The IT team is investigating. Business leaders want to know when operations will resume. Then comes the question everyone hopes they never have to ask: Can we recover safely, and how long will it take? Most organizations h…
Attackers are starting to exploit AI systems to mount attacks in the same way they once relied on built-in enterprise tools such as PowerShell. Instead of relying on malware, cybercriminals are increasingly abusing AI tools enterprises depend on — a trend some experts describe as “living off the AI land.” The expanded abuse of AI ecosystems features a growing array of tactics, including poisoned models, compromised M…
Artem Stryzhak participated in a series of ransomware attacks on hospitals, government entities and law firms from the middle of 2018 to late 2021. The post Prolific Hive and Nefilim ransomware affiliate sentenced to 70 months in prison appeared first on CyberScoop.
Like the water sector initiative, the six-month pilot program will connect rural hospitals with industry for free services. The post National cyber director rolls out latest pilot in South Carolina, this time for rural hospitals appeared first on CyberScoop.
The major cyber attacks of September 2026 hit federal law enforcement, a rival cybercrime gang, and the companies that verify identities. ShinyHunters hijacked the Clop ransomware gang’s Dark Web leak site and, four days later, claimed a breach of the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI). Identity data drove the month’s biggest numbers, led by adata […]
Flashpoint's new guide examines how modern ransomware attacks unfold, from initial access to recovery, and the intelligence security teams need to disrupt attacks at every stage. The post Ransomware in the Age of AI: How Defenders Can Break the Attack Chain appeared first on Flashpoint.
AI is widening the attack surface of the critical infrastructure facilities and services that state, local, and education (SLED) organizations run. In the final post of our Cybersecurity Awareness Month series, we explain how a whole-of-state security approach can help SLED agencies protect their critical infrastructure.Key takeawaysBecause cyber attackers prey on under-resourced targets, they often go after SLED org…
Australia’s cyber security authority responded to 1,524 cyber security incidents in the 2025-26 financial year, a 20% increase from the previous year and a 36% rise over five years. The latest Annual Cyber Threat Report shows that phishing, compromised accounts, unpatched systems, ransomware and data theft remain the main operational pressures. Artificial intelligence is increasing […]
A China-linked ransomware crew disabled the security tools at a critical infrastructure operator before it launched the encryptor. Most security budgets never priced that in. The post What happens when security tools go dark before the ransomware appeared first on CyberScoop.
The median blast radius of data breaches has increased year-on-year at the same time cybercriminals have begun using AI to mine stolen datasets for damaging information that enables follow-on fraud and cyberattacks. In 2026, the median breach exposed 542 organizations beyond the initially breached victim, according to a study by exposed data intelligence platform Lab 1. This compares to the median blast radius of a b…
Tammy Harper, Senior Threat Intelligence Researcher Walking around Strasbourg during Underground Economy, I found myself thinking about the businesses as much as the buildings. Behind every restaurant storefront, there is work the customer never sees: someone supplies it, someone pays for it, and the business survives on whatever is left over. It made me wonder […] The post Who Pays When AI Makes Cybercrime Cheaper?…
Cybersecurity researchers are calling attention to what they say is a "recurring social engineering pattern" across hundreds of cases in which threat actors use Microsoft Teams' external chat creation feature to conduct impersonation scams or to deliver malware. "A consistent pattern of attacker behavior has emerged across these incidents: the use of the same throwaway tenants, the same 'IT
Cybercriminals don’t need AI to compromise an organization, but AI is making its way into classic attack methods and changing how quickly such attacks can progress. Tasks that once required attackers to manually sift through information and piece together how an organization operates can be accelerated by AI, reducing the time defenders have to detect and intervene. A recent example of this is EvilTokens, a phishing-…
Cybersecurity researchers have discovered an artificial intelligence (AI)-driven intrusion ecosystem run by affiliates of the INC and The Gentlemen ransomware groups. Central to the operation is an "Autonomous Red Team Kill Chain Framework" referred to as Phantom. The threat actor is assessed to be Russian-speaking and functions both as an intrusion and data-extortion operator, as well as an
Noteworthy stories that might have slipped under the radar: Russia’s APT28 hit NATO defense firms, PingCAP source code stolen, ShinyHunters negotiator probe. The post In Other News: Tor Exit Relays Hijacked, Banks Spot Rogue AI Agents, Self-Rebuilding macOS Ransomware appeared first on SecurityWeek.
A decade-old flaw in the language behind much of the web, found by AI and serious enough to take Wikipedia offline. Driving licenses sold for AED 10,000 to people who never sat for a test. A police sweep across 21 African countries that ended in more than 1,400 arrests. This weekly roundup covers stories where the weak point was not always a firewall, but the trust built into code libraries, license agreements, and t…
A cybercrime crackdown spanning 21 countries has led to 1,462 arrests, the disruption of 10,909 malicious networks and the recovery of more than USD 105 million in illicit funds, making Operation Serengeti III one of the largest cybercrime enforcement operations Africa has seen. Coordinated by INTERPOL between 29 June and 31 August 2026, the operation targeted cyber-enabled fraud, ransomware, business email compromis…
Two critical PHP vulnerabilities sent criminal forum operators scrambling to protect their own infrastructure, revealing that threat actors face the same exposure management challenges as the organizations they target.Key takeawaysThe adversary economy operates on the same fundamental principles as the legitimate economy. Forum self-evacuations: Criminal forums including BreachForums initiated emergency infrastructur…
The FBI, CISA and international partners have issued a warning about SafePay ransomware, a group that has impacted at least 600 victims across multiple critical infrastructure sectors since August 2024. Published on October 20, 2026, the joint cybersecurity advisory describes SafePay as among the most active ransomware groups in 2026, with operations affecting organizations in North America, South America, Europe and…