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A new dark web service is marketing to cybercriminals who are curious to see how their various cryptocurrency holdings and transactions may be linked to known criminal activity. Dubbed “Antinalysis,” the service purports to offer a glimpse into how one’s payment activity might be flagged by law enforcement agencies and private companies that try to link suspicious cryptocurrency transactions to real people. Sample provided by Antinalysis. “Worried about dirty funds in your BTC address? Come check out Antinalysis, the new address risk analyzer,” reads the service’s announcement, pointing to a link only accessible via ToR. “This service is dedicated to individuals that have the need to possess complete privacy on the blockchain, offering a perspective from the opponent’s point of view in order for the user to comprehend the possibility…

Posted by Mike Maraya, Google Open Source Security Team As an active member of the open source software (OSS) community, Google recognizes the growing threat of software supply chain attacks against OSS we use and develop. Building on our efforts to improve OSS security with an end-to-end framework (SLSA), metrics (Scorecards), and coordinated vulnerability disclosure (guide), we are excited to announce Allstar. Allstar is a GitHub app that continuously enforces security policy settings through selectable automated enforcement actions. Allstar is already filing and closing security issues for Envoy and GoogleContainerTools, with more organizations and repositories lined up. See the OpenSSF announcement for more information on Allstar.

Microsoft today released software updates to plug at least 44 security vulnerabilities in its Windows operating systems and related products. The software giant warned that attackers already are pouncing on one of the flaws, which ironically enough involves an easy-to-exploit bug in the software component responsible for patching Windows 10 PCs and Windows Server 2019 machines. Microsoft said attackers have seized upon CVE-2021-36948, which is a weakness in the Windows Update Medic service. Update Medic is a new service that lets users repair Windows Update components from a damaged state so that the device can continue to receive updates. Redmond says while CVE-2021-36948 is being actively exploited, it is not aware of exploit code publicly available. The flaw is an “elevation of privilege” vulnerability that affects Windows 10 and Windows…

Posted by Christiaan Brand, Product Manager, Google CloudToday we are excited to announce some changes to our lineup of Titan Security Keys on the Google Store which provide a simpler experience and make choosing the right security key for you even easier. We will now offer only two types of Titan Security Keys: a USB-A and a USB-C version. Both of these keys have Near Field Communication (NFC) functionality, which allows you to use it with most mobile devices by simply tapping it on the back of your mobile device in order to sign in securely.In 2018, Google introduced the Titan Security Key as a direct defense against credential phishing. Phishing occurs when an attacker tries to trick you into giving them your username and password, and it remains one…

I was preparing to knock off work for the week on a recent Friday evening when a curious and annoying email came in via the contact form on this site: “Hello I go by the username Nuclear27 on your site Briansclub[.]com,” wrote “Mitch,” confusing me with the proprietor of perhaps the underground’s largest bazaar for stolen credit and identity data. “I made a deposit to my wallet on the site but nothing has shown up yet and I would like to know why.” The real BriansClub login page. Several things stood out in Mitch’s message. For starters, that is not the actual domain for BriansClub. And it’s easy to see why Mitch got snookered: The real BriansClub site is currently not at the top of search results when one queries…

It’s nice when ransomware gangs have their bitcoin stolen, malware servers shut down, or are otherwise forced to disband. We hang on to these occasional victories because history tells us that most ransomware moneymaking collectives don’t go away so much as reinvent themselves under a new name, with new rules, targets and weaponry. Indeed, some of the most destructive and costly ransomware groups are now in their third incarnation. A rough timeline of major ransomware operations and their reputed links over time. Reinvention is a basic survival skill in the cybercrime business. Among the oldest tricks in the book is to fake one’s demise or retirement and invent a new identity. A key goal of such subterfuge is to throw investigators off the scent or to temporarily direct their attention…

Posted by Kees Cook, Software Engineer, Google Open Source Security TeamTo borrow from an excellent analogy between the modern computer ecosystem and the US automotive industry of the 1960s, the Linux kernel runs well: when driving down the highway, you're not sprayed in the face with oil and gasoline, and you quickly get where you want to go. However, in the face of failure, the car may end up on fire, flying off a cliff.As we approach its 30th Anniversary, Linux still remains the largest collaborative development project in the history of computing. The huge community surrounding Linux allows it to do amazing things and run smoothly. What's still missing, though, is sufficient focus to make sure that Linux fails well too. There's a strong link between code robustness and…

Every time there is another data breach, we are asked to change our password at the breached entity. But the reality is that in most cases by the time the victim organization discloses an incident publicly the information has already been harvested many times over by profit-seeking cybercriminals. Here’s a closer look at what typically transpires in the weeks or months before an organization notifies its users about a breached database. Our continued reliance on passwords for authentication has contributed to one toxic data spill or hack after another. One might even say passwords are the fossil fuels powering most IT modernization: They’re ubiquitous because they are cheap and easy to use, but that means they also come with significant trade-offs — such as polluting the Internet with weaponized data…

Posted by Jan Keller, Technical Program Manager, Google VRP A little over 10 years ago, we launched our Vulnerability Rewards Program (VRP). Our goal was to establish a channel for security researchers to report bugs to Google and offer an efficient way for us to thank them for helping make Google, our users, and the Internet a safer place. To recap our progress on these goals, here is a snapshot of what VRP has accomplished with the community over the past 10 years:Total bugs rewarded: 11,055Number of rewarded researchers: 2,022Representing 84 different countriesTotal rewards: $29,357,516To celebrate our anniversary and ensure the next 10 years are just as (or even more) successful and collaborative, we are excited to announce the launch of our new platform, bughunters.google.com.This new site brings all of our…

Joseph “PlugwalkJoe” O’Connor, in a photo from a paid press release on Sept. 02, 2020, pitching him as a trustworthy cryptocurrency expert and advisor. One day after last summer’s mass-hack of Twitter, KrebsOnSecurity wrote that 22-year-old British citizen Joseph “PlugwalkJoe” O’Connor appeared to have been involved in the incident. When the U.S. Justice Department last week announced O’Connor’s arrest and indictment, his alleged role in the Twitter compromise was well covered in the media. But most of the coverage seems to have overlooked the far more sinister criminal charges in the indictment, which involve an underground scene wherein young men turn to extortion, sextortion, SIM swapping, death threats and physical attacks — all in a frenzied effort to seize control over social media accounts. Skim the government’s indictment and you…