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Symantec Named Leader- The Forrester Wave™: Unstructured Data Security Platforms, Q2 2021
Continuing to provide the best in security
It is with great pleasure that we share that Symantec, as a division of Broadcom, has been recognized as a Leader in The Forrester Wave™: Unstructured Data Security Platforms, Q2 2021. We believe this independent validation acknowledges what many of our customers already know regarding the strength of our current offering and our strategic focus.
Forrester used 26-criterion when making their careful evaluation of vendors in the data protection market; before selecting the eleven most significant companies to be included in The Wave. This broad evaluation considered the technology, scale, strategy and future direction of each vendor, and was informed using customer feedback.
Broadcom’s breadth brings a strong platform for enabling Zero Trust network access - The Forrester Wave™: Unstructured Data Security Platforms, Q2 2021
Symantec has long engaged in a mission to protect data everywhere, and this mission remains a high area of focus as we concentrate on supporting customers with their data-centric SASE and Zero Trust needs. Our portfolio provides the solution that our customers can rely on. We know the complexities involved in finding data in different formats, under different regulatory rules and help in multiple locations. Our strength is the accurate discovery of sensitive data across on-premises, cloud and hybrid environments, without being constrained to a particular operating environment or cloud platform. This independence, coupled with a single policy framework, gives customers an operationally efficient and effective way to protect data - even when being accessed by remote, unmanaged devices.
Over the last year we have made significant improvements in our solution with the release of Symantec Data Loss Protection (DLP) 15.8, Mirror Gateway CloudSOC and the simpler packaging of our solution into DLP Core and DLP Cloud bundles.
Being recognized as a Leader is, in our opinion, a reflection of the continued commitment and choice customers make in using Broadcom technology to secure their data. It is also a measure of the dedication and focus of the Broadcom team. To all of you, we say a heartfelt “Thank you”.
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Symantec Named the Best Cross-Platform Endpoint Protection of 2020
AV-TEST independent lab also places Symantec in the coveted top spot for the Endurance Award
The prestigious AV-TEST Institute recognized Symantec Endpoint Security (SES) as the Best Protection available for cross platform endpoint protection in 2020. Symantec, as a division of Broadcom, was the only vendor to place at the top of the protection tests across all platforms: Windows, macOS, and mobile.
AV-TEST Institute also developed a new test which puts products through rigorous real-world-testing to measure their endurance in a demanding enterprise environment. This test measures products across three important categories: Protection, Performance, and Usability. Symantec earned perfect scores for each of the three categories.
16 Security Solutions for Corporate Users – in a 6-Month Endurance Test
Results
Andreas Marx, CEO of AV-TEST, explained, "Symantec clearly demonstrates what outstanding protection for corporate products should look like. Regardless of whether the enterprise uses Windows, MacOS, or mobile, with 'Symantec Endpoint Security Complete' companies can rely on security packages that received top scores across OSs. Symantec also has perfect scores on all three categories of the 6 month Enterprise Endurance test which measures products across Protection, Performance, and Usability."
We, at Symantec, are very proud of these results, and are pleased to help our customers during what has been a very difficult economic period in 2020. The past year was very challenging for companies all over the world, bringing large disruptions to the normal flow of business. The shift to remote work accelerated many trends we’ve seen in modern enterprises, including the growth of other OSs like macOS and the proliferation of mobile devices being used for work. Our customers often cite these changes as some of their main areas of concern, and we are proud to provide protection for any OS and win the best cross-platform award.
Symantec is committed to providing the best protection and performance regardless of which devices our customers use. We participate in rigorous 3rd party assessments like the ones conducted by AV-TEST to gather continuous feedback on how to further improve our products and to help our customers cut through the clutter when evaluating the efficacy of competitive solutions. While many vendors claim they offer cross-platform protection, these very same vendors refuse to participate in 3rd party testing of their products.
Symantec is committed to providing the best protection and performance regardless of which devices our customers use.
While it’s easy to claim protection parity, 3rd party testing helps confirm that there are large gaps between competitors and Symantec. For example, when looking at the Enterprise Endurance tests, McAfee suffered in performance while VMware Carbon Black saw hits across all three categories. In regards to Multi-Platform coverage, neither company participated in all three OS tests. Other players like CrowdStrike were notable in their absence across all of the tests.
Broadcom’s multi-billion-dollar annual R&D investment speaks volumes about the strong foundation that underlies Symantec’s ability to innovate technologically. Symantec solutions continue to stay one step ahead of threats and ensure our customers are protected. With this powerful backing, we are able to build upon our cloud analytics, expert machine learning and customer focus to remain on top of the changing threat landscape. We are more than pleased that AV-TEST recognizes our passion, our security expertise and our competence.
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Symantec Named Top Player in Radicati Group’s APT Protection and Corporate Web Security
Innovation and advanced technologies to protect the enterprise against ransomware, and all known, and unknown threats
Symantec, by Broadcom Software, is pleased to receive Top Player recognition in the newest market ranking conducted by The Radicati Group in the critical areas of Advanced Persistent Threat (APT) and Corporate Web Security. Top Player is Radicati’s highest and most exclusive honor.
Adding even greater significance, these evaluations recognize Symantec solutions for the 8th consecutive time as Top Player in Radicati‘s annual comparison of APT protection vendors, and for the 15th consecutive year in Corporate Web Security.
Against the background of a year marked by uncertainty due to the shifting surges of a global pandemic, Symantec teams remained committed to helping customers embrace cloud transformation both safely and efficiently. Symantec rolled out new tools to help users deal more effectively with new threats and the rising tide of ransomware attacks. All the while, the team also worked relentlessly to deliver new products, innovations, and technologies to protect the enterprise in a constantly changing threat landscape.
What’s more, we added new Application Visibility and Control features, Localization Zones worldwide, new SSL inspection capabilities, and partnered with Google Cloud to improve and make delivery of leading security solutions even easier and more efficient for customers. Continued innovation with new subscription-based licensing helps customers quickly adapt to new threats and scale to shifts in the marketplace or user needs.
Setting the Pace in APT Protection
Symantec, by Broadcom Software, maintained its position as Top Player in Radicati’s Market Quadrant for the comprehensive, breadth, scale, and excellence of solutions.
Radicati specifically recognized how Symantec teams have built on already industry-leading, integrated threat protection to safeguard against advanced persistent threats and targeted attacks, detect and prevent both known and unknown attacks -- including novel ransomware and zero-day threats -- and automate their remediation. Radicati emphasized solution strengths including our proxy-based Secure Web Gateway (SWG), customized sandboxing, EDR, ZTNA, CASB, threat intelligence and reporting, forensic analysis, and other advanced security analytics.
The integrated product portfolio was acknowledged for providing the finest defense across all threat vectors, including endpoint, network, web, email, mobile, and cloud applications. Symantec stood apart for providing multi-layered network, endpoint, web, and email security solutions, including real-time visibility into attacks, for advanced threat protection against advanced persistent threats and targeted attacks, and automating their containment and remediation.
* Radicati Market QuadrantSM is copyrighted March 2022 by The Radicati Group, Inc. This report has been licensed for distribution. Only licensee may post/distribute. Vendors and products depicted in Radicati Market QuadrantsSM should not be considered an endorsement, but rather a measure of The Radicati Group’s opinion, based on product reviews, primary research studies, vendor interviews, historical data, and other metrics. The Radicati Group intends its Market Quadrants to be one of many information sources that readers use to form opinions and make decisions. Radicati Market QuadrantsSM are time sensitive, designed to depict the landscape of a particular market at a given point in time. The Radicati Group disclaims all warranties as to the accuracy or completeness of such information. The Radicati Group shall have no liability for errors, omissions, or inadequacies in the information contained herein or for interpretations thereof.
Top Player in Web Security
Symantec, by Broadcom Software, was equally honored for its top player position at the apex of the Radicati Corporate Web Security Market Quadrant for the ability to protect customers and their networks from web-based malware. Radicati cited such Symantec tools and technologies as advanced web application controls, sandboxing, URL filtering, data loss protection (DLP), remote browser isolation, and real-time, interactive reporting capabilities.
Symantec was also recognized for its comprehensive deployment options, and specifically for our ability to deliver our web security solutions on-premises, in cloud, or hybrid. Radicati called out the strengths of Symantec’s proxy-based web security architecture, numerous advanced security components, and the ease of its availability to organizations as a single, user-based subscription. And we were cited for the strength of our Global Intelligence Network (GIN), which backs up our great technology with real-time threat intelligence, URL filtering and protection from malware.
No other security vendor comes close to matching these capabilities.
* Radicati Market QuadrantSM is copyrighted March 2022 by The Radicati Group, Inc. This report has been licensed for distribution. Only licensee may post/distribute. Vendors and products depicted in Radicati Market QuadrantsSM should not be considered an endorsement, but rather a measure of The Radicati Group’s opinion, based on product reviews, primary research studies, vendor interviews, historical data, and other metrics. The Radicati Group intends its Market Quadrants to be one of many information sources that readers use to form opinions and make decisions. Radicati Market QuadrantsSM are time sensitive, designed to depict the landscape of a particular market at a given point in time. The Radicati Group disclaims all warranties as to the accuracy or completeness of such information. The Radicati Group shall have no liability for errors, omissions, or inadequacies in the information contained herein or for interpretations thereof.
Symantec is honored to once again be named Top Players in each of these markets. It reflects a continuing commitment to customer safety and success. It recognizes the hard work put in - year after year - the innovations and product advancements, a strong strategic vision, and a focus on anticipating and meeting customer needs.
Symantec, by Broadcom Software, greatly appreciates its customers, and their continued investment in our partnership. Looking forward to the rest of 2022 and beyond, enterprises will continue to face security threats both known and unknown. We are committed to be there every step of the way. You can count on it.
To find out more how we can help you protect your enterprise against ransomware, and all known, and unknown threats - contact us here.
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Symantec Named Top Player in Radicati Group’s APT Protection and Web Sec Industry Report
Technology and innovation to protect the enterprise
Symantec, a division of Broadcom, is pleased to announce that we have again received Top Player honors in the newest product ranking conducted by The Radicati Group in the areas of Advanced Persistent Threat (APT) Protection and Web Security.
The Radicati Market Quadrant reports measure the strength of our product offerings compared with the other companies in enterprise security. For Symantec, this latest high ranking offers further testament to the strength of our position in enterprise protection as well as the focused innovation that has kept our company at the forefront of security technology.
These awards take on added significance in that it marks the 7th time that Symantec has emerged as Top Player in Radicati’s annual comparison of APT Protection vendors and the 14th year it was named Top Player when it came to Web Security.
Symantec, a division of Broadcom, is pleased to announce that we have again received Top Player honors in the newest product ranking conducted by The Radicati Group in the areas of Advanced Persistent Threat (APT) Protection and Web Security.
Indeed, despite a tumultuous year marked by a global pandemic, our teams remained focused on finding new ways to make it easier for customers to securely make the move to the cloud. The cloud transition was already underway but it went into turbo drive as the world shifted seemingly overnight to work-at-home routines. That’s when Symantec lived up to its legacy and again demonstrated our ability to protect enterprises with robust tools to keep them safe in a fast-changing threat landscape.
At the same time, we kept our ears to the ground to make sure that we were doing whatever possible to help them navigate this shift in the marketplace. That’s why we rolled out new subscription-based licensing models to help organizations with their digital transformation and get the best-possible web protection suite for their data without needing to incur major capital expenses.
Winning in APT Protection
In determining our APT Protection leadership, Radicati evaluated us on the comparative functionality of our solutions, particularly when it came to the detection, prevention and possible remediation of zero-day threats and persistent malicious attacks. They measured different categories such as sandboxing, EDR, CASB, reputation networks, threat intelligence management and reporting, forensic analysis, among others, where Symantec was stacked up against other leading vendors.
Our integrated product portfolio was evaluated on how well it defended against threats across all vectors, including endpoint, network, web, email, mobile, cloud applications, and more. Long story, short, we excelled. Radicati recognized that Symantec provided network, endpoint and email security solutions for advanced threat protection to safeguard against advanced persistent threats and targeted attacks, detecting both known and unknown malware, and automating the containment and resolution of incidents.
Radicati Market QuadrantSM is copyrighted March 2021 by The Radicati Group, Inc. Reproduction in whole or in part is prohibited without expressed written permission of the Radicati Group. Vendors and products depicted in Radicati Market QuadrantsSM should not be considered an endorsement, but rather a measure of The Radicati Group’s opinion, based on product reviews, primary research studies, vendor interviews, historical data, and other metrics. The Radicati Group intends its Market Quadrants to be one of many information sources that readers use to form opinions and make decisions. Radicati Market QuadrantsSM are time sensitive, designed to depict the landscape of a particular market at a given point in time. The Radicati Group disclaims all warranties as to the accuracy or completeness of such information. The Radicati Group shall have no liability for errors, omissions, or inadequacies in the information contained herein or for interpretations thereof.
Winning in Web Security
Similarly, our strong position at the top of Radicati’s Corporate Web Security leadership quadrant was a testament to our ability to protect corporate users and networks from web-based malware as well as for how we help organizations maintain web compliance and prevent data loss.
Our Web Security portfolio is powered by great technology and is backed by the Symantec Global Intelligence Network (GIN), which offers real-time protection from malware in real-time URL filtering. Symantec GIN taps into data gathered from:
175,000,000 endpoints
80,000,000 web proxies users
126,000,000+ attack sensors
500+ security experts working non-stop
Needless to say, no other security vendor has anything that matches this capability.
Radicati Market QuadrantSM is copyrighted March 2021 by The Radicati Group, Inc. Reproduction in whole or in part is prohibited without expressed written permission of the Radicati Group. Vendors and products depicted in Radicati Market QuadrantsSM should not be considered an endorsement, but rather a measure of The Radicati Group’s opinion, based on product reviews, primary research studies, vendor interviews, historical data, and other metrics. The Radicati Group intends its Market Quadrants to be one of many information sources that readers use to form opinions and make decisions. Radicati Market QuadrantsSM are time sensitive, designed to depict the landscape of a particular market at a given point in time. The Radicati Group disclaims all warranties as to the accuracy or completeness of such information. The Radicati Group shall have no liability for errors, omissions, or inadequacies in the information contained herein or for interpretations thereof.
We’re honored to be positioned as Top Players in each of these markets, which reflects the hard work we’ve put in over the years, our strategic vision and our understanding of customer needs. And we’re not taking our feet off the pedal. As enterprise businesses look out over the rest of 2021 and beyond, they are still facing an uncertain world with new security threats as they try to manage a return to normalcy. And we will be beside them each step of the way, providing them with the best security offerings in the industry to help them manage that journey.
Protecting our customers: It’s what we do at Symantec.
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Symantec Participates in Latest MITRE ATT&CK® Evaluation
Detection and prevention are crucial for confronting advanced threats
In order to enable customers to get an independent evaluation of our product’s effectiveness, we’re pleased to announce our participation in MITRE’s new evaluation program that assesses cyber security products, using APT29 as an example adversary. The program aims to provide organizations with a third-party, analytical look at a product’s capabilities and visibility into hacker techniques. While we’ve worked over the years to develop the most advanced products for endpoint security, we believe that well thought out and performed third-party evaluations are key to helping validate our technology and prove our effectiveness in the face of modern threats.
These measurements are difficult for any company to do on their own. And yet understanding a product’s strength in detection and prevention has never been more critical. Starting in 2018 (According to Symantec’s Internet Security Threat Report) half of new targeted attack groups Symantec exposed were uncovered through their use of living off the land tools. There was also a 25% increase in the number of groups using destructive malware. And today Targeted Ransomware has become one of the biggest cyber crime challenges facing enterprises, resulting in loss of business and millions of dollars in damage.
The program aims to provide organizations with a third-party, analytical look at a product’s capabilities and visibility into hacker techniques.
To help cyber defenders better understand what they’re up against, the MITRE ATT&CK® framework was developed to collect and categorize the tactics and techniques cyber attackers use to infiltrate organizations. The framework has become something of a standard used by cyber security professionals for insight into adversary behavior, providing a common language for the security industry to use. All the information is publicly available, and provides a valuable tool to help both organizations and vendors identify gaps in capabilities. At Symantec, we’ve relied on ATT&CK® as a guiding framework for our Endpoint Security solution. Our approach focuses on both detection and prevention across the entire ATT&CK® chain, with our capabilities mapped to every stage of the chain so that we can deliver the best protection throughout, and as early as possible in, an attack.
Tried and tested
MITRE’s ATT&CK® Evaluations program is the latest third-party testing we’ve collaborated with, but Symantec has a long history of participating in such testing. For nearly 10 years, we’ve ranked consistently high on AV-TEST’s evaluation of antivirus and security software. Similarly, Symantec has tested with AV-Comparatives since 2004, from the very beginning of its operations. And just last year, SE Labs conducted an in-depth evaluation of Symantec Endpoint Security Complete for breach security, looking across the entire attack chain. The results showed that we were effective against a variety of exploits, fileless attacks and malware, “comprising the widest range of threats in any currently available public test.” We understand the importance of such evaluations in understanding the strengths of our products, but because they can show us areas for improvement and blind spots in our detection and prevention.
Why an ATT&CK® Evaluation
The strength of the ATT&CK® Evaluation lies in its emulation of actual adversary behavior for testing. In Round 2 of testing, MITRE tested products based on techniques used by APT29, also known as Cozy Bear or The Dukes, a hacker group believed to be linked to the Russian government. The group has been tied to cyber attacks on the Pentagon, other Western governments, organizations and agencies around the world, but it has become most infamous for its hack on the Democratic National Committee in the run-up to the 2016 US Presidential elections. According to MITRE, APT 29 was chosen as the attacker group to emulate because it uses more sophisticated implementations of tactics and Living-off-the-Land methods, such as PowerShell commands. The group’s attacks can be difficult to detect and defend against, making it a good example for assessing how organizations measure up against an advanced adversary. Additionally, APT29’s international reach makes this example particularly relevant for governments and organizations.
ATT&CK® Evaluations used a simulation of APT29 to identify the strengths and weaknesses of each vendor’s defense approach and visibility into adversary techniques. We particularly appreciate that ATT&CK® Evaluations involved close collaboration with each vendor to identify their capabilities, using the common lexicon of the ATT&CK® framework. According to MITRE, evaluations are measurable and repeatable allowing participants to make continual improvements and better focus their future defense investments.
The strength of the ATT&CK® Evaluation lies in its emulation of actual adversary behavior for testing.
In Round 2 of testing, MITRE tested dozens of Enterprise Windows ATT&CK® techniques across 10 ATT&CK® stages, excluding the “Initial Access” and “Impact” stages which were beyond the scope of the test. These techniques have been found to be used by APT29 in previous breaches.
Compared to other third-party evaluations which tend to focus on prevention capabilities, MITRE measures the number and types of detections. The logic behind this makes sense as, ultimately, you can’t prevent or respond to what you can’t see. Therefore, visibility is the name of the game in the ATT&CK® Evaluations. High visibility contributes to an increased chance of detecting stealthy attackers before they have fully breached an organization. Low visibility, by contrast, increases the time it takes to detect attackers and leads to a greater chance of breach.
Detection and prevention – across the attack chain
In reality, both detection and prevention are crucial for confronting advanced threats. There is no Protection without Detection. Detection can stop threats from getting on the machine in the first place. And lessons from Detection can be converted into prevention rules to prevent future breaches. Without Detection threats can’t be found, the attack surface can not be reduced. Symantec Endpoint Security focuses on providing protection not only across the entire MITRE ATT&CK® chain, but beyond it, at the pre-attack and post-breach stages – with detection, prevention and remediation as early as possible.
Usually a vendor waits till they see the results of a test to decide if they want to talk about it. But we feel this test is important. We want to be publicly benchmarked. And we look forward to sharing our thoughts on the final testing. We’ll be back soon to share the results.
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Symantec Partners with Google Cloud to Improve Zero Trust Cloud Access
With enterprises migrating to the cloud, the traditional network-based perimeter model might not be sufficient for some workloads. A new approach is needed to ensure more secure access to cloud resources
The way we do business has undergone an incredible transformation thanks to the cloud. Few other technologies have had as big an impact on productivity, allowing people to easily access enterprise applications from anywhere and at any time, while facilitating better collaboration, scalability and decision-making. More and more organizations are reaping these benefits by migrating their core infrastructure and apps to a cloud platform.
But with the benefits inevitably come challenges, not least of which is managing access to enterprise resources which are located outside of an organization’s internal network perimeter. Traditional network security solutions were designed to protect data and devices located within the corporate perimeter. However, as employees are increasingly demanding the flexibility to work from anywhere and on a variety of devices, including mobile devices, and as valuable corporate data is no longer located in just one place, the idea of a network security perimeter is losing steam. One of the main drawbacks of this paradigm is that if hackers manage to breach the perimeter, they have free reign within an organization’s restricted network.
A Fading Perimeter Calls for a New Approach
To keep up with challenges arising from an increasingly mobile workforce and dynamic and dispersed cloud environments, security professionals must rethink traditional enterprise security. Symantec, alongside Google Cloud, is taking a significant step forward in this direction, working to provide a new, Zero Trust approach to managing access to corporate resources and apps. Symantec is proud to partner with Google Cloud and join the BeyondCorp Alliance working together to keep customer data more secure and help security teams make better access decisions by leveraging user identity attributes and device security posture.
Device-Level Security Signals for Smarter Access Management
Here’s how our integrated endpoint security solution with Google Cloud works. Symantec Endpoint Protection (SEP) and Symantec Endpoint Protection Mobile (SEP Mobile) report on the security posture of an organization’s traditional and mobile endpoints, including both managed and unmanaged devices. We provide signals on indications of compromise, operating system configuration risks, app risks, anomalous network behavior, and more. These device-level signals are passed to Google Cloud’s context-aware access engine and combined with information on user identity and context of the request to determine if a user should be granted access to corporate resources and services.
Essentially, Symantec’s signals act as the device security layer for Google Cloud’s context-aware access solution. Until now, Google Cloud looked at user identity data and contextual information, such as location, IP addresses, and essential device security status, to authenticate users. With the integration of Symantec’s market-leading technology, customers can now gain enhanced visibility over a device’s risk posture, augmenting what they know about the device and the context in which access is being requested.
Customers can leverage Symantec’s endpoint signals to create more granular and customized access policies for G Suite, web apps, and Google Cloud infrastructure. Granular controls make it easier for admins to grant context-aware access to resources, or to take more drastic measures if needed. For example, access can be blocked if Symantec reports that a device is exposed to risk, or app data can be completely wiped from the device if it is found to be compromised.
In addition, Symantec reports on the health of its agent on the device – an important signal which can also be used to define access policy. If the agent is not properly installed or activated, access to resources can be blocked. This input also provides admins the vital ability to enforce the proper installation and activation of Symantec agents on endpoints across the organization, particularly on unmanaged devices.
Strengthening Zero Trust with Symantec Integrated Cyber Defense
Google Cloud’s context-aware access, in partnership with Symantec, allows employees to more securely access corporate resources from any device, and any location, without needing a traditional VPN. The solution is part of Google’s BeyondCorp security model, founded in 2011 to strengthen Zero Trust networks at Google and improve access management. The idea behind this model is that users should not be restricted from accessing certain resources and services based on the network on which they are connected. Instead, access to resources should be conditional on user identity, device risk, and other contextual attributes. In a Zero Trust security model, access should be authenticated and encrypted regardless of whether it is within the network security perimeter.
Google Cloud and Symantec are leading the way in improving enterprise security without compromising on employee productivity.
Symantec is a recognized force in Zero Trust solutions, recently being named a Leader in "The Forrester Wave™: Zero Trust eXtended (ZTX) Ecosystem Providers, Q4 2018," a report published by Forrester Research, Inc. On the heels of this Zero Trust leadership recognition for the Symantec Integrated Cyber Defense Platform, Symantec announced the acquisition of Luminate, a Software Defined Perimeter (SDP) and Zero Trust innovator whose Secure Access Cloud service delivers private secure application access to all users, regardless of device, location or infrastructure. The Secure Access Cloud’s existing integration with Google Cloud allows enterprises to use Google’s Cloud Identity as their Identity Provider when authenticating and authorizing users attempting to access resources, apps, and workloads through the service.
Now, as one of the first companies to join Google Cloud’s BeyondCorpAlliance – a new initiative through which Google Cloud and select partners are working together to deliver better security solutions – Symantec is again strengthening its commitment to Zero Trust security architectures. By leveraging robust data to more accurately determine the identity of users, and the risk posture of devices attempting to access corporate services, Google Cloud and Symantec are leading the way in improving enterprise security without compromising on employee productivity.
To better improve employee access to corporate resources, several mutual Google Cloud and Symantec customers, among them global banking group BBVA, have already expressed interest in the integration. "BBVA provides financial and non-financial products and services around the world to 75 million customers supported by our 125,000 person workforce,” said a representative at BBVA. “To help keep our data protected, we are excited to see the Google Cloud and Symantec solutions we use today working together to enforce more granular access control while allowing our employees to work from any device, anywhere."
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Symantec POV on Third Party Testing
Symantec is committed to the highest levels of open and standard testing
Symantec is committed to the highest levels of integrity and security on behalf of our customers, employees, and partners. We rely upon testing from third-party organizations for an unbiased view of the effectiveness of our products. We also believe that ethical, fair and transparent testing methodologies across all vendors is fundamental to provide consumers with accurate and unbiased evaluations. Organizations such as AMTSO help provide consistency and a standard of excellence for testing within the industry for the benefit of end users.
Much of the security community has expressed concern and frustration with both the methodology and lack of transparency associated with the testing performed by NSS Labs. In our own experience we have felt concern regarding both their technical capability, as well as the practice of the NSS Labs “pay to play” model in relation to public tests.
We believe that testing, when done with appropriate technical rigor and without bias, is vital to ensure the ongoing improvement of our products and those of our competitors, resulting in a more competitive marketplace that benefits both consumers and enterprises with more effective protection against constantly evolving cyber threats. We are highly supportive of the testing organizations that adhere to the highest ethical standards, including those recommended by the AMTSO.
We are aware of the lawsuit filed by NSS Labs and we believe that their claims against us are entirely baseless. While it’s understandable that NSS Labs’ desire for profits may be inherently at odds with a non-profit, standards-based organization such as AMTSO, the integrity of the testing process should be of utmost importance, starting with transparency and equity for all participants. We welcome the opportunity to bring the discussion of fair and open testing further into the public conversation, while also shining a light on certain business practices within the testing industry.
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Symantec POV: The Threat Horizon
How our cyber warriors outpace the exponential growth and sophistication of attacks
“Bigger, bolder and faster.”
That is how Samir Kapuria, Senior Vice President and General Manager of Symantec’s Cyber Security Business, characterized the latest round of cyber attacks.
That was back in 2015.
Stuxnet and the Ukrainian power grid hack were still fresh and shocking. The world had yet to experience 2016 and election email hacks and tampering, the latter’s extent which is still not fully known. Then 2017 came and along with it, the WannaCry ransomware attack followed by Petya/NotPetya, finally, Equifax, whose impacts will be suffered by a majority of Americans for years to come.
Sadly, these will inevitably be overshadowed tomorrow by something even more damaging that reaches even more deeply into our lives. Cyber attacks against us and our previously trusted institutions are growing, the violations becoming more and more dangerous as the attackers strengthen their techniques and increase their daring.
“They are going after much bigger targets,” says Adam Bromwich, Senior Vice President, Security Technology and Response (STAR) Division, “They are locking your machine and asking for a sizable ransom. They're not just trying to steal data or trick you with a scam. They're going after bigger and bigger payouts.”
Just a few short years ago, Symantec investigators saw approximately 150,000 threats per day. Currently they see close to a million and a half—10 times that volume—coming into their labs every single day for analysis. An enormous increase, obviously, but worse is that the threats are better at morphing themselves. The attackers are learning, and the game is constantly changing. Essentially every time a threat lands, it might be subtly different, or have been altered into something entirely new and even more damaging.
Stephen Trilling on current threats.
Yet Symantec continues to fight back. For every high-profile attack, thousands upon thousands are stopped.
And as the criminals and bad actors advance, so are cyber security techniques and solutions.
One example was the cold stop of ‘Bayrob’, a Romanian cyber criminal gang that made its first appearance selling non-existent cars through fake online auctions, then moved on to credit card theft, Trojan delivery and botnet building, all the while hiding behind sophisticated encryption and layers of proxies (a well-documented Symantec blog fully details their misdeeds here).
For over a decade, Symantec investigators tracked the Bayrob gang, all the while issuing antivirus and intrusion prevention updates to protect Symantec customers as they patiently built a criminal case against the thieves. It was cat-and-mouse on an international scale. At one point, the investigators went a full year and a half having to simply wait for the gang to make a mistake—any mistake—so they could intercept their communication and get a fresh glimpse at what the gang had been doing. It was an agonizing test of knowledge, patience, and sheer will.
Finally, in 2016, with Symantec’s compiled evidence in hand, the F.B.I. agreed to move on the case and arrested three key operatives in Romania, extraditing them to the U.S. for trial.
Case closed.
Clearly that kind of boots-on-the-ground cyber crime fighting is a notable effort on Symantec’s part, but what is happening in our homes and businesses demands even more focused attention.
Our entire infrastructure is going online, much of it not properly protected, if at all, and the result is we are potentially putting our very lives on the line.
With ever-more devices being connected to the internet and made ‘smart,’ the mostly-unsecured Internet of Things is becoming the new Wild West. IoT as it is currently taking shape is, to put it mildly, vulnerable. Add in positive-sounding-but-potentially-problematic concepts like ‘ambient intelligence’ (where electronic environments respond to the presence of people) and ‘autonomous control’ (where the devices control themselves) and the IoT quickly could become very wild indeed.
Look at your car. If yours is not an autonomously controlled vehicle (and few of us have those yet), but simply a more recent model, the engine, door locks, hood, and trunk releases, temperature controls, dashboard and even the brakes are all likely connected to the internet and potentially hackable. Someone with bad intentions and the right malware could do some real damage there.
“It's very clear that, as we move towards a truly autonomous vehicle, the bestselling car will be the most secure,” says Darren Thompson, Vice President of Symantec Technology Services, “That will be the reason people will buy that car above other cars. To me, as a security strategist, that is very exciting.”
Even closer to home, in terms of health and safety, are reports detailing how researchers have demonstrated the ability to remotely access implanted pacemakers without authority, and how hackers have managed to take remote control of insulin pumps without the patient’s consent. It requires only a tiny leap of imagination to see the potential power of ransomware suddenly raised to a nearly unthinkable level.
Our entire infrastructure is going online, much of it not properly protected, if at all, and the result is we are potentially putting our very lives on the line.
However, there are solutions, and Symantec is leading the way, not only deploying a massive protective army of advanced researchers to help our customers thwart attacks, but using deep research techniques around artificial intelligence, advanced machine learning, deception and psychological responses to outmaneuver, outpace, and outsmart criminals and bad actors.
Symantec envisions a world where that internet-connected light bulb you just bought still has its whiz-bang capabilities, but is also safe and not part of some zombie botnet. They also envision a world where you can store your data wherever you see fit without having to worry about whether or not it is secure. It will be.
And the company’s efforts are not just limited to its traditional strengths. In 2017, Norton released the Norton Core Secure Router, to protect people and devices in their own homes, and not only traditional devices like PCs, mobile phones and tablets, but also IoT devices like lighting/temperature control and baby monitors.
Still, the adversaries constantly up their game. They are increasingly professional and well organized, and yet, strangely enough, even an amateur can now play. According to Bruce McCorkendale, VP of Technology for the Norton Group, these days a bad actor can simply be “some guy with an idea. He can subcontract all the people and he doesn’t need any expertise in cyber crime whatsoever. He just needs to have an evil plan and he can execute it.”
And the threats today are ever more financially motivated. Attackers are going after bigger and more lucrative ransomware objectives, like international SWIFT banking transactions. A recent attack involved an attempt to steal a billion dollars: You read that right, with a ‘b.’
But what truly keeps Adam Bromwich ‘up at night’ is the potential for sabotage. “Attackers have started going after infrastructure. There are many, many weak points in our infrastructure. Nation states have started to go after that. And I always fear that other people will start to go after that, too. It's an area of great vulnerability.”
Adam Bromwich on infrastructure’s ‘Achilles heel.’
Naturally, there is always more to be done, and yes, things are changing very rapidly, in both the home and office, for Symantec’s personal as well as business and government customers. Eric Chien, Distinguished Engineer and Technical Director of Symantec’s Security Technology and Response (STAR) Division, has been fighting this fight for over 20 years, doing his job ‘the Symantec Way’. He knows what is required—constant innovation—and so he will get the last word.
“Every single day when I come into Symantec it's like a brand-new job, it's a brand-new challenge. And we never back down from those challenges. We never give up and we just keep moving ensuring that we're protecting not only peoples' computers but their lives.”
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Symantec Proxy SG Operating System (SGOS) Overcomes the Fear of Missed Intelligence
Why you should update now
When we miss going out with friends, we joke about #FOMO on social media. But in the high-stakes world of network security, where intrusions undermine reputations, the fear of missed intelligence feels altogether different.
How does this happen when all of us feel so connected? It turns out there’s way too much happening on our networks for any one person or discrete database to track. With 28% of employees unknowingly engaging in some form of risky behavior while accessing websites or cloud-based apps, according to our mid-2019 study, there’s every reason to categorize risk and take proactive steps to eliminate threats.
When something works like clockwork, you don’t always give it a second thought.
A viable cyber security strategy must be adaptable to change, but it doesn’t have to be complicated. For example upgrading your ProxySG's operating system to the latest version, while tedious, can have a dramatic payoff in the form of new functionality that can improve your cyber defenses. We think of it as an important building block to securing your workers and their intellectual property.
While you may focus on your Symantec ProxySG appliances, which provides on-demand cloud intelligence and real-time web content ratings to protect your enterprise from the latest threats, you may not have thought much about its underlying operating system and what version you are running. When something works like clockwork, you don’t always give it a second thought. Yet, upgrading SGOS allows you to move from the older Symantec WebFilter to the new, feature-rich Intelligence Services, of which are described in more detail below:
Establishing Threat Risk Levels. Perhaps the most compelling reason to update your ProxySG server OS is to take advantage of Threat Risk Levels. Categories, while critical to any security policy, are often misused in an effort to plug security vulnerabilities. Threat Risk Levels are based on the underlying metadata of a URL. Unlike categories, every URL can be given a Threat Risk Level regardless of the URL. Moreover, Threat Risk Levels can be used in combination with categories to easily create a policy that is customizable for your IT needs. This gives greater protection for “one-day wonders’ or sites that are short-lived, specifically designed to bypass content categories and carry out an attack.
A more performant intelligence feed database. Low latency is vital to the success of a cloud-enabled enterprise. Recognizing this, we have designed our proxy servers to process all web-bound traffic in real-time. Symantec Intelligence Services can preemptively stop zero-day attacks, preventing spyware and even botnet-infected systems, and detect phishing and malvertising threats. Intelligence Services categorizes the web pages requested on-proxy in fewer than eight milliseconds. Indeed, Symantec’s proxy architecture becomes even more highly performant when you update to the latest SGOS.
CASB integration. Protecting against threats to cloud services and cloud-delivered apps is no longer a nice-to-have option. By updating your SGOS, you have the ability to integrate with CASB (Cloud Access Security Broker) and tap into our knowledge of tens of thousands of applications. You need to understand both the apps’ attributes and most of all the risk it may pose to your organization. And with CASB integration, you gain real-time visibility into—and the capability to block—unsanctioned cloud use, establish governance over cloud application data, and intercede against threats targeting cloud accounts. Once these capabilities are established, you can automatically protect regulated data with integrated encryption and multi-factor user authentication.
Geo-IP intelligence. Enterprises increasingly desire geolocation information and rely upon geo-IP intelligence to provide and assign risk ratings to millions of websites, particularly those in high-risk regions. One reason those services are becoming a necessity is because malicious actors love to launch “one-day wonders”—sites that exist for as few as 24 hours—to perpetrate attacks.
With the latest version of SGOS, you can enable geo-IP intelligence delivered through Symantec Intelligence Services Advanced Web Bundle, and then implement country-specific or region-specific policies to manage network traffic flows. It’s the best way to ensure compliance with location-based policies.
Next Steps
By now it’s clear that ProxySG consolidates a broad feature-set that protects your enterprise from the ever-increasing sophistication and volume of threats in your web traffic. By updating SGOS, you’re opening a gateway to powerful additional services in the Symantec ecosystem. You’ll never have to fear missing out on valuable intelligence.
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Symantec Secure Web Gateway - Product Update
A fireside chat with Symantec Product Management
Symantec, a division of Broadcom Software, recently beefed up its Secure Web Gateway (SWG) lineup with a new all-in-one SWG solution (Web Protection Suite) as well as a new hardware appliance to help enterprises better protect their networks, users and data from an onslaught of malicious website traffic on the internet and in the cloud.
In support of our new Web Protection Suite, we transformed our HW appliances, separating the hardware purchase from the software purchase with enterprise subscription licensing. For customers, that means greater flexibility and cost savings when it comes to deployment. They can choose how to deploy the Symantec SWG solution – as a SaaS hosted service, in their own private cloud, as a virtual appliance or on dedicated hardware. We sat down with the Product Management Team for Symantec Secure Web Gateway to learn more.
Q: What options do you offer to customers for Symantec’s Proxy-based SWG solution?
A: We offer customers a cloud-based solution and an on-prem solution, with our new subscription licensing, which gives customers a lot of flexibility.
But as we better understand our customers, we see that most want to go to the cloud but have developed many custom, on-premises integrations. To support them we have introduced a new offering called Symantec Web Protection Suite or WPS, which allows customers to have a license to run SWG anywhere, whether it's Symantec’s SaaS SWG service, a SWG appliance deployed on our S210 or S410 hardware or in a virtual environment or in the public cloud.
The new WPS license gives the customers the flexibility to run them where they are today, but migrate to the cloud tomorrow, or even next year – all in one single offering. We think of it now as a single SWG offering from Symantec, not as a set of discrete products, which makes it much easier for customers to transition at their own pace in terms of how they want to deploy our leading SWG solution.
Q: Symantec just announced an addition to its SWG appliance mix. Can you offer a refresher on what Symantec announced last year and also talk about the significance of this new appliance?
A: Sure, the S210 is a lower end version of the S410, which we announced last year. The S210 is meant to essentially complete the appliance line, starting with the S210 being able to support smaller regional or branch office deployments all the way up to high end data centers with multi-gigabit capacity using the S410. Both the S210 and the S410 support our new services framework that allows us to support multiple applications on these new hardware platforms. So, with all the work that's been developed for the S410, all those features are now available on the S210.
You can use the proxy to understand all the traffic you see for URL categorization, threat risk scoring or cloud application usage.
Q: They essentially have the same set of capabilities across the entire hardware platform line?
A: Yes, that’s right. The benefit of the new S210/S410 ecosystem is that it allows you massive flexibility in adapting your workloads to the traffic profiles you have now, and then changing the mix around if you add new locations, add new users or have different workloads and policy for analyzing traffic. The new platform allows all that flexibility to essentially shrink, grow, resize, move or add new applications across our new hardware or in your own virtual environments (on-premises or cloud).
Specifically those capabilities include the ability to run high-capacity proxy applications in either discrete segmented workloads or as larger instances. You can essentially use the platforms to divide up your proxy workload. And more significantly, you can also add an advanced threat protection module with Symantec Content Analysis and pair that with proxies, if you want the most advanced protection for all your web security traffic.
Q: Given the changes in the threat landscape what do you think modern SWGs need now?
A: I think there are four key things that a modern SWG must be able to handle:
First, there's been a significant adoption of cloud-based applications that changes the traffic profile that a SWG needs to be able to handle. You're going from traditional, general, internet-based browsing, to a rise in traffic from cloud applications that some users may live in throughout the workday like Salesforce. A modern SWG must be able to handle that growth in cloud traffic and provide the same level of inspection and protection that customers are used to.
Next, an effective SWG solution must provide comprehensive coverage and easy-to-deploy flexibility so an organization can scale, migrate, move or adjust their deployment as needed. For fixed users this could include on-premises deployments on high-performing hardware, like we introduced last year and are adding to today, to virtual deployments or in a customer's own cloud environment, and our SaaS SWG service when users are roaming. No customer is alike and cookie cutter SWGs won't cut it.
Adding to that flexibility, a customer needs to be able to manage their intricate SWG policy across all their deployment. Basically a “create once, use broadly” policy mechanism. That's what our UPE or Universal Policy Enforcement allows. Craft the policy that is right for your organization, industry vertical or meets your internal compliance and security standards and apply it at HQ, branch offices, remote locations or roaming users.
Finally, an effective modern SWG must integrate with other technologies to align with SASE framework recommendations. It's more than just the basic proxy you deployed years ago...that proxy is still critical, it's the foundation that provides traffic decryption, full content analysis and deep file inspection. But it goes beyond that and includes dynamic sandboxing, remote browser isolation, DLP, and zero trust network access, along with other SASE components. The modern SWG has to be that foundation, and we’ve already completed the majority of these capabilities into our SWG to be SASE ready. That's what sets Symantec apart.
Q: How does the transition to the cloud increase potential vulnerability for enterprise users?
A: With the transition to cloud applications, if you look at every client application, they have to support an encrypted HTTPs session by default. Obviously, you wouldn't want to transfer plain text data over the Internet. And so, all of these modern SWGs have to handle newer TLS sessions. TLS 1.3 is the newest version that all browsers have adopted to provide end-to-end encryption to ensure that data in flight is fully protected between the user and the service that they're going to.
However, because it is encrypted, that's essentially where malware is going to hide since if you can't inspect the contents of that, you're blind to the threat, the malicious payload. And so modern SWGs need to be able to support the full range of TLS versions that cloud applications are using without security downgrade and continue to still inspect the TLS session to look for advanced threats. Symantec has been supporting TLS 1.3 for some time now.
Q: You mentioned that with the introduction of the new S410 a year ago, Symantec also introduced subscription licensing for those core components. What flexibility does that software licensing give to a customer when it comes to deployment options?
A: Subscription licensing provides not just the flexibility of being able to deploy the SWG capability wherever you want it, but you can manage it in all these environments: ESX, KVM, Azure, AWS, GCP - all with the same single license. So you're not limited to just the hardware delivery form factor; essentially you can use your SWG anywhere you need to deploy and consume it.
Q: With new licensing, this provides some additional benefits to the customer. What are those?
A: We've consolidated our license in two different ways. The first is that in the past, if you bought a Symantec SWG product, there were additional features that could be added on after the fact. And they had separate configurations to entitle that feature and to manage it. We simplified all of that to make it simpler to deploy.
We wanted to provide those features as core features so that customers wouldn't have to manage different pools or different instances. We included all the capabilities into the subscription for:
decrypting encrypted traffic
content filtering and threat protection
threat categories
risk levels
You also have the benefit of having that follow wherever you deploy the instance, rather than managing separate elements. That was one significant change in the transition to subscription licensing.
The second consolidation with our license is that the framework collapsed the notion of managing individual discrete appliance instances into an aggregate capacity pool. So instead of buying, for example, 10 appliances or 10 virtual appliances, you just buy the capacity of 10 virtual appliances under a single license. This gives you the flexibility of deploying the equivalent of 10 new appliances, or wrapping that up into one large instance. The new license allows you to manage and resize your total computing needs – small or large – rather than managing an individual appliance. That's the flexibility of the subscription license.
Q: How do you charge for the solution?
A: We wanted to make this available in many different environments and have it be simple for the customer. We took the license and modeled it where your licensing is calculated by how much compute capacity you need to handle your SWG workload.
Q: You mentioned that there are some solutions now available as part of your subscription license that were separate before?
A: The most important add on is the content and threat protection services on top of a proxy available through Content Analysis that delivers Symantec AV and advanced Machine Learning, and all the malware detection engines it includes. Two of the primary applications that run on the framework are Symantec Proxy and Content Analysis. With the proxy application we took all the threat and content feeds that are consumed by the proxy and allowed the proxy to automatically consume all those data services including:
the content categories
the security categories
the reputation and risk level feeds
the location feeds
CASB application discovery feeds
You can use the proxy to understand all the traffic you see for URL categorization, threat risk scoring or cloud application usage. All those data services are a part of the subscription and are delivered directly to the proxy with no additional add-on costs. And all of the data that feeds it is automatically maintained, available and always up to date.
On the Content Analysis side, we did the same thing by including the Symantec malware detection engines as part of the base content application. Every customer has the benefit of consuming all the malware patterns and the engine updates directly onto the Content Analysis application without the need for a separate add on. One of the newer technologies on Content Analysis is the advanced machine learning that can do static policy analysis of content as well.
To learn more about our Secure Web Gateway (SWG) lineup with a new all-in-one SWG solution (Web Protection Suite) please contact us here. At Symantec, we continue to focus on helping enterprises better protect their networks, users and data from an onslaught of malicious website traffic on the internet and in the cloud with our industry leading solutions. Make sure you are protected with the best.
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Symantec Secure Web Gateway Security: Bet on a Winning Hand
What you need to know to keep your environment secure
If you work in security long enough, you’ll hear it all, especially when you’ve spent years as the market share leader as we have with our Secure Web Gateway business. But when you have a winning poker hand, it’s often wise to remain confident, and let others bluff because in the end the cards will play out and results will be the same.
The most recent bluff that many “new” cloud security vendors attempt is to make an asynchronous comparison of their entire portfolio against a single component of our comprehensive Secure Web Gateway solution. Comparing our fixed location proxies to their cloud solution is a common game they play but also dishonest in that they fail to recognize that our solution supports a full SaaS solution (Web Security Service), as well as on-premises proxies, virtual appliance proxies and private cloud proxies in major public clouds such as AWS and Azure.
It’s like comparing their High Card 10 hand to our Full House of Kings and Queens. We could let it go if they didn’t know that their top card isn’t better, or didn’t know the rules of the game. But in fact, they do understand and are intentionally dealing from the bottom of the deck. It’s time to put our cards on the table and call.
Important Facts:
Most vendors are not equipped to offer a comprehensive, standalone, enterprise security program, they require–and are dependent upon--multiple other vendors to handle what they can’t tackle on their own.
Symantec Has the Most Flexible and Capable Secure Web Gateway
Symantec, as a division of Broadcom, is the world’s leading provider of comprehensive, integrated cyber defense. We are the only major cyber defense vendor that builds solutions to support all infrastructures: entirely on-premises, entirely in the cloud, or a mix of the two.
But you don’t have to take our word for it. Industry analysts across the globe have named Symantec a global leader in Endpoint Security, Web Security, Information Security, Email Security, and Identity Security.
Symantec Platform is Designed for Working from Home or on the Road
The Symantec Secure Web Gateway solution is designed for all users, on-premises or, of course, work from home (WFH) users. It includes a broad set of integrated cloud-delivered capabilities focused on securing remote users.
Symantec Integrated Cyber Defense (ICD) strategy’s seamless integrations provides enterprises deep packet inspection of actions that are unique to each application and closes the blind spots that inevitably result at the fault lines of differing security vendor solutions.
API integration with software-as-a-service (SaaS) apps is just as significant as owning that integration and allows the data to be normalized so enterprise security teams can properly write policies for “at rest” and “in motion,” as well as perform user behavior analytics and risk evaluation. Not owning these integrations--and having to rely on a third-party for this work--means organizations lose a lot of the telemetry that can be the critical difference between preventing a cyber attack or falling victim to a breach or ransomware.
Symantec Secure Web Gateway (SWG) Solutions are Built for Speed
Point-product solution vendors need to build home-grown network management tools that inevitably result in limited peering points to inspect network data traffic.
Our SWG delivery over Google Cloud Platform (GCP) gives enterprises speed, scale and resilience like no other. The benefits of not relying on co-located data centers eliminates often congested public routes while adding hundreds of powerful network peering points. You may see the claim, but nobody has infinite scale. But Symantec Web Proxy delivered over the Google Cloud is the closest you can get given it leverages Google’s network and systems.
Symantec, as a division of Broadcom, is the world’s leading provider of comprehensive, integrated cyber defense.
Symantec Performs HTTPS Decryption at Scale
Symantec decryption and encryption capabilities have been the envy of the security industry for more than a decade. Symantec protects the biggest banks in the U.S. These institutions keep us perennially on our toes with the top cypher suites. This same decrypting and encrypting in the cloud with its strong processing capability has moved to GCP.
Symantec SWG Offers Central Management and Reporting for All Users
Symantec’s holistic approach to enterprise security, and specifically, users working from home, protects the enterprise while simplifying the process. Symantec’s Cloud Reporting infrastructure collects full log detail regardless of location. We report on remote users the same way as those behind the firewall. We initially designed this for consultants and it has full relevance and applicability for all remote users. It allows the enterprise to follow users wherever they are to maintain visibility and coverage.
Symantec SWG is The Full House - A Complete Solution
Too many point-product solutions leave security teams with the unenviable task of constantly racing to keep up with the complexity of their own security infrastructures.
Introducing more than one data loss protection (DLP) solution also means managing policies in more than one place, managing incidents in more than one place, and limited portability between those two DLP solutions. Enterprises must double their efforts and resources to operate any attempt at an effective DLP program.
Beyond DLP, Symantec SWG can also extend leading Remote Browser Isolation, Content Analysis, Sandboxing, Cloud Firewall, CASB, and Zero Trust Network Access capabilities - all powered by the world’s largest civilian threat intelligence network.
We are all-in because it is a winning hand. Don’t let any jokers tell you otherwise.
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Symantec Security Solutions Get the Nod from Radicati
Paving the way for the future
Symantec’s vision for a holistic approach to enterprise security got yet another nod of approval with The Radicati Group being the latest market research firm to call out its Integrated Cyber Defense (ICD) portfolio as leading in two top categories: Advanced Persistent Threat (APT) Protection and Corporate Web Security.
The Radicati Market Quadrant 2020 report gave the Symantec portfolio particularly high marks for completeness of solution, designating the portfolio as a top player in both the APT Protection and Corporate Web Security categories. According to the Radicati scale, top players shape their markets and lead with product lines offering breadth and depth of functionality along with a solid vision for the future.
Symantec, now part of Broadcom, also has a leg up given the combined company’s annual $4.7 billion commitment to research and development, paving the way for significant investment in product enhancements.
In the categories where Symantec took top honors, its enterprise security portfolio demonstrated a breadth of integrated capabilities buttressed by the quality and quantity of its Global Threat Intelligence. The result is a powerful combination that keeps a fully-featured ICD platform perennially up-to-date and well positioned to remediate risk in an ever-changing and increasingly complex threat landscape.
Symantec, now part of Broadcom, also has a leg up given the combined company’s annual $4.7 billion commitment to research and development, paving the way for significant investment in product enhancements. In addition, acquisitions like the Computer Associates deal have expanded Symantec’s ICD portfolio with leading identity management functionality, which helps to fortify its play in Corporate Web Security solutions.
Corporate Web Security
Radicati defines Corporate Web Security as any software, appliance, or cloud-based service that protects corporate users and networks from Web-based malware, helps control employee behavior on the Internet, and prevents data loss. There is a host of criteria Radicati employs to rank the players, including deployment options, malware controls, sandboxing and URL filtering, Web application controls, directory integration, data loss prevention, mobile device protection, and social networking and bandwidth controls. Cloud Access Security Brokers (CASBs), threat intelligence networks, and reporting and administrative functionality were other noted features used to evaluate the field.
When it comes to meeting requirements for Corporate Web Security, Radicati considered a variety of products as part of Symantec’s ICD foundation. Symantec’s Web Security Service (WSS), which provides options for deployment in the cloud or as part of a hybrid solution, was noted for providing a secure Web browsing experience for users, powered by the Global Intelligence Network along with comprehensive malware inspection techniques. The ability for WSS to be extended with integrated DLP, Web isolation, and mobile device security was also viewed as a plus as was the firm’s malware analysis (sandboxing) service.
Symantec ProxySG, also available in different deployment configurations, was also flagged as a standout on-premises secure web gateway solution for aiding in analysis and blocking of critical threats. The integrated nature of the ICD portfolio means these appliances can be complemented with Symantec Intelligence Services for blocking malware and filtering out suspicious and compromised URLs; Web Isolation to isolate potentially malicious threats away from the browser for a safe experience; and DLP for creating policies for analyzing and flagging content along with sources and destination. Radicati says the Symantec Global Intelligence Network completes the picture, providing insights on traffic patterns, behavior, server and site DNA as well as content and reputational analysis gathered from the entire Symantec user community.
APT Protection
Symantec was also cited as a top player in Radicati’s APT Protection Market Quadrant report, defined as a set of integrated solutions that detect, prevent, and potentially remediate zero-day threats and persistent malicious attacks. Once again, Symantec’s breadth of functionality earned accolades, with Radicati specifically citing an integrated portfolio--available as on-premises, cloud, or hybrid options--that defends against threats across all vectors, including endpoint, network, web, email, mobile, and cloud applications.
The Symantec ICD portfolio was also commended for bringing an array of technologies to bear to deliver multi-layered protection, including heuristics scanning, file and URL reputation and behavioral analysis, dynamic code analysis, machine learning, exploit prevention, web isolation, mobile protection, CASB, and application control, among others. Symantec’s DLP solution, which integrates across endpoints, gateways, and cloud applications, further helps prevent data leaks while facilitating in regulatory compliance.
Symantec’s Identify and Access Management and Privileged Access Management (added through CA acquisition) was also mentioned in the Market Quadrant report as a way for customers to easily gain the benefits of integrated identify protection and management. Dedicated mobile device protection and analysis of mobile device traffic was viewed as another upside to Symantec APT Protection given that so many users remain at risk when they are working off the corporate network.
Experts like Radicati agree that an integrated approach is the best defense for combating the on-going complexities of enterprise cyber security. See below to download the full reports.
File Attachments
Download the Radicati APT Protection Market Quadrant 2020 ReportPDF464.13 KB
Download the Radicati Corporate Web Security Market Quadrant 2020 ReportPDF475.4 KB
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Symantec Security Summary #2
News across the industry
So much for ransomware being relegated to the status of a nuisance threat. Big corporate and government targets are still under attack from ransomware attackers - and the threats are mounting.
The latest: A large foreign currency exchange was forced to suspend service for a couple of weeks following a malware infection on December 31. More recently, an aerospace manufacturing company got hit in a data exfiltrating ransomware attack where some stolen files were published by the group behind the attack. And a Canadian government entity was attacked, leading to the posting of internal documents.
Why it matters: The newest round of attacks should dispel any notion the danger has passed. Ransomware grabbed big headlines in 2016 and 2017 but then the pace of attacks fell off in what turned out to be a false lull. The FBI’s warning last fall turned out to be prescient; at the time, the agency said it expected an uptick in ransomware attacks against "health care organizations, industrial companies, and the transportation sector as criminals look to pull off bigger heists by targeting larger corporate targets.
A new NIST ransomware draft framework is ready for review. Companies in need of guidance can take a look at the latest recommendations issued by the National Institute of Standards and Technology - NIST’s Special Publication 1800-25 and Special Publication 1800-26, which address how organizations can protect their assets and respond in case of a ransomware attack. The final framework is expected to be issued later in the year.
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If you ever wanted to come up with a fitting name for the “bad guy” in a James Bond film, you'd be hard-pressed to do better than “Evil Corp.” That’s the moniker for the infamous Russian hacker group, which is believed to have ripped off online banking victims to the tune of $100 million plus over the last decade. Their preferred MO is to use email phishing campaigns to inject the Dridex malware that can use a variety of techniques to steal passwords, or create phony banking pages to fool a target into entering their credentials.
Evil Corp. has since been sanctioned by the U.S. Treasury Department.
But Evil Corp. isn’t the only worry for the financial sector. Banks and financial services companies are also being targeted by a group known as TA505, which has reportedly been targeting multiple banks and insurance organizations around the globe. Over the years, TA505 has carried out malicious spam campaigns distributing instances of the Dridex banking Trojan, Locky ransomware, Jaff ransomware, The Trick banking Trojan, and several others. In its latest burst of activity, TA505 has been identified as using HTML redirectors to deliver malicious Excel documents. Further, the group has demonstrated its adaptability, shifting tactics to carry out its felonious activities. One best practice to follow that can help mitigate your risk: Be extra-careful about clicking on Excel spreadsheets you didn’t ask for and don’t enable content on any document that’s not trusted.
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New questions remain around election security. Super Tuesday came and went and foreign actors didn’t hack the elections. That’s the good news. But if this was a warmup for November, celebrations are not in order.
Voting glitches in Los Angeles resulted in frustrated voters left to complain that their voting machines weren’t working. In Minnesota, voters searching online to find their polling locations were temporarily redirected to a partisan website. And in Texas, technology problems with voting machines contributed to longer-than-usual lines. (What’s more, robocalls targeted Texas voters, instructing Republicans and independents to show up at the polls while telling Democrats to vote the next day.) As complaints around the nation mounted, the Department of Homeland Security felt compelled to hold a conference call with reporters and dispel concerns that malign foreign interference factored into the problems.
The takeaway: Yet again, technology turned out to be the culprit. In the aftermath of the voting debacle in Iowa, where a myriad number of technical problems delayed the release of the results by hours, the latest glitches now raise concerns that 2020 may be remembered as a year of electoral malfunctions.
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The HIPPA Journal has pulled together data breach statistics from 2009 when the Department of Health and Human Services’ Office for Civil Rights first began publishing summaries of healthcare data breaches. Needless to say, this revealing look at the state of cyber security in the healthcare industry doesn’t make for a pretty picture.
Key stats: More than 3,054 healthcare data breaches between 2009 and 2019 involving more than 500 records resulted in the loss, theft, exposure, or impermissible disclosure of 230,954,151 healthcare records. Also, the report notes an overall upward increase in the number of records exposed each year, with 2015 being the worst year on record for breached healthcare records with more than 113.27 million records compromised
No easy fixes in sight: The report underscores the fact that when it comes to healthcare, cyber security remains a proverbial work in progress. Despite increases in budgets and staffing, breaches and security incidents continue to climb with 2019 seeing more reported data breaches than any other year since records first started being published, with healthcare data breaches reported at a rate of 1.4 per day. Separately, a recent Ponemon study flagged healthcare as having highest the costs associated with data breaches at $6.45 million – over 60 percent more than the global average of all industries. And that’s for the 9th consecutive year.
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Symantec Security Summary #3
News Across the Industry
In a near instant, the impact of the COVID-19 virus is reverberating across the globe. Companies are scrambling to rethink how they operate in a business climate besieged by the effects of a fast-moving pandemic. Enterprises are turning on a dime to accommodate the needs of a new work-from-home workplace. And always top of mind is how to fast track resiliency planning to ensure far flung employees are operating responsibly without opening up the enterprise to undue cyber security risks.
It’s tall order. Already there are numerous reports of cyber criminals trying to capitalize on growing fears and general anxiety surrounding the new normal. The latest report points to a group affiliated with China as being behind some of the early malicious online activity, which includes phishing emails as well as planting malware. Much of the activity kicked off in Asia, where the virus first originated, following its path through Europe and likely heading to the United States.
The takeaway: U.S. security experts are already warning of a new wave of cyber attacks that will explicitly target Americans working from home during the period when there aren’t sufficient safeguards in place on par with secure office environments. The Cyber Security and Infrastructure Security Agency (CISA), the cyber arm of the Department of Homeland Security, issued a recent alert that called out specific cyber vulnerabilities related to working at home. Of particular concern were attacks on virtual private networks (VPNs) and suspicious emails that prey on employees’ Coronavirus fears to get them to click and download dangerous computer viruses.
The Cyber Security and Infrastructure Security Agency (CISA), the cyber arm of the Department of Homeland Security, issued a recent alert that called out specific cyber vulnerabilities related to working at home.
Even the government was not immune to cyber security infections caused by COVID-19. There were reports that the U.S. Health and Human Services Department suffered an attack on its computer system intended to invoke disruption and disinformation that would undermine response to the pandemic. While the HHS network wasn’t penetrated, reporting indicates it was subjected to a distributed denial-of-service (DDoS) attack intended to slow the agency’s response. HHS officials said the attack was not successful and that networks are running normally.
The latest: There’s a lot to take in and everyone is on overload. This link provides a round-up on current COVID-19-related cyber security news and challenges.
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The 2020 election is another mounting source of cyber security-related frustration and concern. In February, 57% of a 100-plus cyber security expert panel said Americans shouldn’t be confident about the security of the 2020 election. Experts asked said every part of the voting process is vulnerable, including voter registration, voting itself, vote tabulation, and the results reporting system.
Public fears about COVID-19 are also fanning the flames, initially with the spread of disinformation to discourage voters from turning out and more recently, with government-mandated restrictions that could serve as a reason to stay home and skip a primary vote. In addition, several states, including Georgia, Kentucky, Louisiana, and Ohio, have pushed back primaries due to fears of further virus spread.
The Government response: The independent Election Assistance Commission, which certifies the voting systems, recently published a list of resources and best practices to help state election officials deal with impact of COVID-19, everything from guidance on cleaning machines to how to handle mail-in ballots.
At the same time, officials from U.S. Cyber Command recently testified that election security is a “top priority.” General Paul Nakasone told a House Armed Services sub-committee that the capabilities to defend the U.S. voting infrastructure have improved significantly since the 2016 presidential election. As reported in The Hill, a senior official at the Cyber Security and Infrastructure Security Agency (CISA) said there was no “malicious cyber activity” observed during Super Tuesday’s primary voting in 14 states.
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How about a Cyber Space Force: In another example of ill-preparedness, a year-long effort by a bipartisan group of lawmakers found the U.S. government is not prepared to act with the speed and agility necessary to defend the country in cyber space against the likes of attacks from Russia, North Korea, and Iran. The 122-page report calls for more military personnel trained for cyber operations, more Congressional committees dedicated to the cause, and the need for both the public and private sectors to improve their safeguards with a layered approach to cyber security.
“We must get faster and smarter, improving the government’s ability to organize concurrent, continuous, and collaborative efforts to build resilience, respond to cyber threats, and preserve military options that signal a capability and willingness to impose costs on adversaries,” the report concluded.
A recent study classified the United States as one of six countries that have failed to improve its cyber security stance from last year. In fact, the study found the United States dropped from its previous ranking of 5th to the 17th most cyber-secure country.
A recent study classified the United States as one of six countries that have failed to improve its cyber security stance from last year.
FBI Director Christopher Wray reiterated that the pace of cyber intrusions and attacks are unrelenting. At a recent Cyber Security Conference at Boston College, Wray said cyber tools are capable of paralyzing entire hospitals and police departments, and cautioned that the defense industry is not the only target of bad actors. He said American adversaries have also taken aim at companies with such products as proprietary rice seeds, software for wind turbines, and high-end medical devices. In response, the FBI’s Cyber Action Team, in collaboration with various task forces, are working to establish coalitions with like-minded countries as well as set up alliances with universities and the business sector to deal with the mounting problem.
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Symantec Security Summary #4
News across the industry
Weeks into the Corona Virus pandemic and life has been dramatically altered, for the foreseeable future. As families adjust to the new realities of a work-at-home, school-at-home, and socialize-at-home culture, digital life has never been more critical to our day-to-day routines. It also means cyber security has never been a greater risk.
Everywhere you turn, malicious actors are pouncing on the chaos created by COVID-19. Take videoconferencing platforms, which has fast become a staple for the work-from-home workforce as well as for families and friends trying to stay in touch. Hackers are targeting platforms with malware attacks to exploit this rise in popularity as a communications lifeline during the pandemic.
As families adjust to the new realities of a work-at-home, school-at-home, and socialize-at-home culture, digital life has never been more critical to our day-to-day routines.
In just the last few weeks, cyber criminals behind the Ginp banking Trojan attempted to steal visitors’ credit card numbers by dangling an offer to provide the exact location of Coronavirus-infected persons in close proximity in exchange for a small fee. Emails purporting to come from the leader of the World Health Organization (WHO) were circulated in a phishing campaign designed to plant a variation of the HawkEye malware on systems for keylogging and credentials stealing. And in another doozy, false messages posted on social media and in text messages invited recipients to click on a link to claim free Netflix passes to pass time during COVID-19-induced isolation—an offer the entertainment giant claims is bogus. That’s just the tip of the iceberg, caution experts who are warning of a prolonged period of cyber security red alerts.
The response: The government, in recognition of heightened cyber security risks, has made public overtures that it won’t put up with any COVID-19-related bad actor actions. Just last week, the U.S. Department of Justice said it will prioritize the investigation and prosecution of coronavirus-related crimes. It has also instructed US Attorneys to appoint local Coronavirus Fraud Coordinators to field reports and investigations aimed at keeping the latest opportunists at bay. In a semi-related move, the White House Office of Management and Budget (OMB) encouraged its own federal agencies to consider alternative methods of authentication to ensure the cyber safety of government employees suddenly thrust into telework scenarios and at increased risk of being hacked.
If the experts are right - and it looks like they are – the lesson is clear: stay vigilant. We are at the very beginning of what’s likely to be a long and dangerous wave of cyber security crime.
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While COVID-19 shines a spotlight on the super heroes in our healthcare sector, it’s also showcasing some pretty impressive manpower doing battle on the cyber security front. Meet Cyber Volunteers 19 (CV19), for example, a volunteer organization of information security professionals set up to provide cyber support post COVID-19 specifically to health care service providers in the U.K. and Europe, which are under attack during this crisis. The group, with more than 3,000 volunteers, is lending its skills in areas such as incident response, research, risk management, and training. There is also the COVID-19 CTI League, a group of 400 cyber security volunteers from more than 40 countries coming together to fight coronavirus-related attacks.
While COVID-19 shines a spotlight on the super heroes in our healthcare sector, it’s also showcasing some pretty impressive manpower doing battle on the cyber security front.
Even cyber security providers are getting in on the act. Cyber Risk Aware, a cyber security awareness training company in Ireland, announced it would provide free COVID-19 phishing tests for businesses, essentially providing a simulation that teaches staffers how to avoid falling for traps. DarkReading has compiled a list of limited-time free offers that security professionals can tap as they retool for COVID-19.
The Surprise Twist: There’s even new resources to give kids a crash course in cyber security. With children of all ages home due to Coronavirus-related school closures, one enterprising couple came up with the idea of the virtual Cyber School, which will host free 45-minute livestreams on topics as far ranging as intro to coding and algorithms along with ethical hacking and social engineering.
Symantec Network Security: Innovation and Strategy for Your Success
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Unmasking technology. File this tidbit away under the heading very interesting or very scary—it all depends on your perspective. In the midst of the COVID-19 pandemic, a Chinese company claims to have developed the country’s first facial recognition technology that can identify people even when they are wearing masks. The firm, Hanwang technology Ltd., or its English name Hanvon, said it used core technology it built over the last decade, along with a database of 6 million unmasked faces and a smaller collection of masked faces, to come up with the system.
China, of course, is associated with some of the most sophisticated electronic surveillance programs, including facial recognition. It’s unclear how this technology will be deployed, and even more uncertain how it will register with the broader population in China and around the world.
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Symantec Security Summary #5
News across the industry
As the competing political parties get ready for the November elections, they’ll need to figure out the security implications of running for office in the era of social distancing. Apart from pandemic-related news, the upcoming 2020 presidential election remains the other big story that’s raising significant security-related concerns. As the political campaigns shift their operations online - a result of coronavirus stay-at-home orders - they are preparing for a barrage of cyber attacks, disinformation, and pranks all designed to undermine the election process. While increased online activity provides more opportunity for hacking, there are also more would-be perpetrators sidelined from the workforce who see election interference as a fun distraction.
Clearly, the coronavirus also complicates the question of election security. Anyone working in a campaign must assume they are targets. But with voter contact shifting to digital and phones, reports suggest that the campaigns aren't fully using a security protocol that prevents hackers from sending emails pretending to be from their campaign website domains.
That extends to using popular videoconferencing services. Zoom, a videoconferencing service that was relatively obscure pre-pandemic, is now the go-to option for many organizations using it to hold conference calls. And given its meteoric rise, there is no surprise that Zoom is now a popular target for cyber security malfeasance. In April alone, the service and its burgeoning community of users have been subjected to an array of security and privacy events, including online harassment, spying, and unapproved data sharing with Facebook. So it’s hardly a surprise that the FBI issued a warning advising Zoom users to keep their meetings private and use participant-screening features. That’s probably sage advice for the major political parties as the campaigns learn lessons – sometimes the hard way – about digital town halls.
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Pandemic funding. Amidst the industry bailouts, small business loans, and unemployment expansion designed to deliver stimulus and economic relief during the COVID-19-induced tsunami, leading tech industry groups are lobbying Congress for their own funding. The Internet Association, CompTIA, the Cybersecurity Coalition, the Alliance for Digital Innovation, the Center for Procurement Advocacy, and the Information Technology Industry Council sent a letter to congressional leaders making the case that the next Coronavirus stimulus package should include funding for IT modernization and cyber security. They argue that additional IT investment is required to ensure the nation can effectively respond to the crisis. The initial $2 trillion stimulus package included $200 million allocated to boost telehealth services and for the Department of Homeland Security’s cyber security agency.
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Even before the coronavirus outbreak, hospitals and health-care providers remained among the top targets of ransomware attackers. But as the public health crisis rages, cyber attacks and digital scams targeting healthcare infrastructure here and abroad are surging. In a couple of the more high-profile cases, hackers shut down the computer systems of a healthcare business in Illinois until they paid up $300,000 in ransomware. Meanwhile, computer systems at two regional hospitals in the Czech Republic also came under attack.
This is a depressingly familiar narrative. Hospitals are particularly vulnerable to ransomware. Not only can’t they afford downtime but they are often ill-prepared to handle cyber security attacks. It’s also why they’re a favorite target of ransomware attackers. Indeed, after the latest attacks, the Department of Homeland Security and Interpol warned hospitals around the globe to be on guard against a significant increase.
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No “digital cease fire” in the offing: Researchers investigating potential treatments for the coronavirus may become targets of cyber attacks, warned the FBI. Speaking recently at a panel hosted by the Aspen Institute, the agency’s Deputy Assistant Director Tonya Ugoretz said that nation-backed hackers are trying to steal information from companies that are researching coronavirus treatments. “We have certainly seen reconnaissance activity and some intrusions into some of those institutions, especially those that have publicly identified themselves as working on COVID-related research,” she said. Without getting more specific, she said that state-backed hackers had often targeted the biopharmaceutical industry but added that “it’s certainly heightened during this crisis.” You may recall that United Nations Secretary General António Guterres called in March for a stop to all conflicts during the pandemic. His under-secretary followed up a few weeks later with an op-ed appealing for an immediate digital cease-fire.
Not only is the message not getting through but the attacks against the Czech Republic’s health sector sparked particular concerns because of the link to the COVID-19 pandemic. Any cyber attack that claimed the lives of coronavirus patients would likely prompt serious retaliation and could draw countries into a military conflict. It remains unclear who was behind the latest round of attacks in the Czech Republic – the country’s airport was also victimized by a cyber attack – but the incidents stoked fears that a nation-state may be involved. Without naming names, the country's cyber security watchdog warned of a wave of expected cyber attacks on the country's critical infrastructure. The incidents meanwhile drew a warning from US Secretary of State Mike Pompeo that “anybody engaged in such activity should expect consequences."
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In reaction to the COVID-19 outbreak, the business world has let its employees work from home to reduce their potential exposure to contagion. But that shift led U.S. security experts to warn about the growing threat of cyber attacks that target Americans working from home where there aren’t sufficient safeguards in place on par with secure office environments. Their concerns have proved well-founded with researchers reporting a surge in the number of infected enterprises around the world due to organizations unknowingly sending their employees to work from home (WFH) with already infected computers during the COVID-19 pandemic. Researchers from Arctic Security and Team Cymru now report the number of compromised organizations in Europe and the U.S. more than doubling between January and March 2020.
Your Questions Answered with Art Gilliland, Senior VP & GM of the Symantec Enterprise Division of Broadcom
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Symantec Security Summary #6
News across the industry
Ransomware Ramps Up
Ransomware has hit the enterprise radar screen in full force with a growing number of U.S. companies coming under attack. An analysis of Security and Exchange Commission (SEC) filings found 1,139 companies calling out ransomware as a potential threat to their business last year, up from 749 in 2018. In the first weeks of May, 745 companies have already flagged ransomware as a major risk, indicating that the attack vector shows few signs of abating.
While ransomware isn’t new, it’s a relatively recent phenomenon in the enterprise. By way of comparison, just eight companies cited ransomware as part of their SEC filings in 2015. In part, the surge speaks to the growing presence of targeted ransomware groups, which have escalated attacks to encrypt an entire organization’s network.
For example, in the last month, the Maze ransomware gang claims to have breached a state-owned Bank of Costa Rica. The ransomware gang, which alleges to have stolen 11 million payment card details, said it hacked into the bank’s network in August 2019 and then again in February 2020. While they stole the payment card data in the second breach, they refrained from encrypting files because of companies were already significantly challenged by the global pandemic. Wasn’t that considerate? Still, the Maze gang blustered that they’ve made a ransom demand with the bank but have so far been unsuccessful. Now they are threatening to sell the stolen data on the dark web.
A logistics giant is also grappling with the fallout from a ransomware attack. The company said it was hit with the Nefilim malware on at least one corporate server containing information relating to past and present employees and some details on commercial agreements. Nefilim typically gives victims a week to pay a ransom or their data and documents wind up on the dark web. So far, the logistics company is not biting. Healthcare has also been a target, with a company reporting it was hit by a ransomware attack on April 11, 2020. While the company didn’t name the ransomware family used in the attack, it confirmed that attackers did steal login credentials and passwords of several current employees.
Even celebrities and their lawyers are not immune to this flavor of cyber attack. A New York law firm, which handles the private legal matters of high-powered icons like Elton John, Madonna, Lady Gaga, Barbra Streisand, and LeBron James has fallen victim to a REvil ransomware attack. The perpetrators are threatening to expose nearly 1TB of celebrity client private data unless the firm forks over a ransom in Bitcoin.
While the number of ransomware attacks are on the rise, so too are the average payment amounts. Research from Coveware revealed that average payments soared by 33% in the first quarter of 2020 compared to fourth quarter last year to hit $111,605. While the median payment held steady at around $44,000, the stepped-up average indicates there are plenty of victims willing to shell out some very large ransom payments.
Cyber Attack Smorgasbord
Ransomware isn’t the only kind of cyber attack in the news as of late. The number of Remote Desktop Protocol (RDP) brute-force attacks significantly increased in mid-March, just around the time the global quarantines rolled out in response to the COVID-19 pandemic. While RDP has always been a factor, the number of instances picked up significantly as people began to work from home and were using RDP technology to log into networks and work-based computers remotely. Meanwhile, the pace of brute-force attacks against Internet-facing RDP servers spiked from 200,000 a day in early March to over 1.2 million during mid-April—and that’s just in the United States.
Spear-phishing campaigns are also front and center. One cyber crime gang that’s been around since mid-2019—dubbed PerSwaysion—is reported to have successfully compromised the email accounts at top-ranked execs at more than 150 companies, according to Group-IB. Most of the group’s victims are in the financial sector and were targeted with classic spear-phishing tactics that ask recipients of an email with a clean PDF file to click on a link to view the content, which eventually tricks them into revealing their Office 365 credentials and provides access to their email data.
In another wrinkle in the phishing world, criminals have started to use Google’s anti-bot tool reCAPTCHA to hide their attacks. Researchers from Barracuda found that perpetrators are using reCAPTCHA walls to block the content of their phishing pages from being scanned by URL scanning services. Moreover, the use of a reCAPTCHA test could make the site more believable to potential victims.
North Korea Strikes Again
On the three-year anniversary of the WannaCry ransomware outbreak, US officials—which originally pinned the attacks on North Korea government-sponsored hackers—claim the Pyongyang regime is at it again.
The Department of Homeland Security Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency (DHS CISA) published advisories for three malware strains it says is being used by the North Korea-sponsored Hidden Cobra group (aka Lazarus, Appleworm). In a joint alert issued by DHS CISA, the FBI and the Department of Defense (DoD), the agencies warned of tools being used to “conduct illegal activity, steal, funds, and evade sanctions.”
The three strains are:
COPPERHEDGE, a remote access tool (RAT) used in the targeting of cryptocurrency exchanges and related entities;
PEBBLEDASH, a Trojan capable of downloading, uploading, deleting, and executing files; enabling Windows CLI access; creating and terminating processes; and performing target system enumeration; and
TAINTEDSCRIBE, a modular Trojan with similar capabilities to PEBBLEDASH.
Time to Get Serious About Cyber Security Training
As hackers ramp up attacks to capitalize on the shift to remote-work prompted by COVID-19, a scary reality has emerged: The lack of serious cyber security training is making companies even more vulnerable.
A recent study found that 66% of remote workers have received no form of cyber security training in the last year with 77% confirming they are just not that concerned about security while working from home. Moreover, 61% of respondents to the Promon survey are using personal devices during remote work hours, which creates additional risks as these devices are typically less secure than corporate-issued gear.
Since the pandemic forced the global workforce to work from home whenever possible, the number and variety of cyber attacks has been on the rise. Cyber criminals are taking advantage of decreased levels of security on personal devices connecting to corporate networks and finding workarounds to initiate enterprise breaches. Wake-up call for enterprise security professionals: Time to send employees back to cyber security school even if the learning is remote.
No Escape from COVID
All across the world, research labs, companies, and governments are frantically pouring time and money into coronavirus research in the hopes of coming up with a vaccine and treatments. Yet even that ground-breaking societal work isn’t exempt from the ills of cyber hacking.
The FBI and CISA just issued a joint alert warning that groups linked to bad actors are targeting U.S. institutions to try to steal COVID-19-related data and intellectual property. The U.S. agencies said they would release technical details on the purported attacks in the next few days. CISA and the United Kingdom’s National Cyber Security Centre (NCSC) recently issued a similar joint alert, warning that hackers are using password spraying campaigns against health care and medical research organizations. The warning advised staff at those entities to change passwords and to implement two-factor authentication to reduce the threats.
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Symantec Security Summary - July 2021
The REvil gang, ransomware and Rewards for Justice
Cyber security fireworks. The latest big ransomware attack may have affected between 800 and 1,500 companies around the world. The supply chain attack began with a supply-chain attack against Kaseya, an IT management software provider that caters to enterprise IT teams and managed software providers (MSPs). The attackers were reported to be the REvil Russia-linked hacking group responsible for other recent high-profile attacks such as the one on meat processor JBS. From what we know so far, the attackers leveraged a vulnerability in Kaseya’s VSA endpoint management, protection, and networking monitoring platform. Experts likened the incident to the SolarWinds supply chain ransomware hit, which impacted an entire ecosystem of companies using a Trojanized software update. The company urged VSA users to shut down their VSA servers to prevent them from being compromised—a move that initially affected at least 36,000 companies.
As new trends are showing, ransomware gangs will often take the time to steal data and delete backups before they encrypt victim’s devices, providing a stronger incentive to pay up to ensure restoration. In the Kaseya attack, the REvil gang eschewed these practices, exploiting a zero-day vulnerability in the VSA servers to automate the attack without accessing the individual victims’ networks. As a result, fewer companies might have felt pressure to pay up since they could restore their networks from backups. The tech site Bleeping Computer posited that only two companies paid a ransom out of an estimated 1,500 victims.
As new trends are showing, ransomware gangs will often take the time to steal data and delete backups before they encrypt victim’s devices, providing a stronger incentive to pay up to ensure restoration.
Meanwhile, the REvil gang has mysteriously dropped offline less than two weeks after the Kaseya attack. While there were no clear answers, researchers mulled several possible explanations. One is that the Kremlin bent to U.S. pressure and forced the gang to close up shop. Another is that U.S. officials had launched their own cyber attack in retaliation and took the group offline. Lastly, it’s possible that REvil’s operators simply decided to lay low for a while.
In the interim, Kaseya released urgent security updates to address the critical vulnerabilities in VSA exploited by REvil. The company also warned customers about an on-going phishing campaign targeting VSA customers through which spammers were using news about updates on the incident to send out emails with malicious links and/or attachments.
“Barely able to keep up.” With ransomware clearly established as a major national security threat this year, the cyber security industry and top cyber security executives are struggling to find enough capacity to man the battle lines. Cyber Seek, a project that tracks the cyber security industry sponsored by the federal National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST), reports more than a half million cyber security jobs left unfilled despite demand and ample corporate cyber security budgets.
One idea being floated to address the gap is the creation of a Civilian Cyber Security Reserve. A group of bipartisan lawmakers have introduced legislation to design a National Guard type program that would exist under the Homeland Security and Defense departments to deal with the growing cyber security threats faced by the U.S. government. In addition, The U.S. government announced the “Rewards for Justice” program, an initiative offering up to $10 million for information that can help identify or locate malicious cyber criminals working for foreign governments that have U.S. infrastructure in the crosshairs.
Ransomware counterpunch. The government and industry are also escalating efforts to tackle ransomware attacks, which have been particularly prolific this year. The U.S. Cyber Security and Infrastructure Security Agency (CISA) released a new ransomware security audit self-assessment capability as a module for its Cyber Security Evaluation Tool (CSET). Called RRA, the tool is designed to help organizations discover how well they are equipped to defend and recover from ransomware attacks targeting IT or operational technology (OT) assets.
There’s also a new crowdsource project tracking ransomware payments and profits. Dubbed Ransomwhere, the website lets victims and security professionals upload copies of ransom notes and other pertinent information to build a better profile of attackers and their methods. The project was started by Stanford student Jack Cable, who is also a researcher at the Krebs Stamos Group.
With ransomware clearly established as a major national security threat this year, the cyber security industry and top cyber security executives are struggling to find enough capacity to man the battle lines.
Another interesting data point on the ransomware front: Expect some changes on the cyber insurance front based on new research from defense think tank Royal United Services Institute (RUSI). According to a RUSI research paper examining cyber insurance and cyber security challenges, the practice may be contributing to the growth of ransomware attacks by enabling the payment of ransom demands. Insurance carriers are also pushing up costs and requirements for coverage in response to surging demand. For example, many underwriters are demanding to see detailed proof of a company’s cyber security practices in order to secure a policy.
Infrastructure attacks loom large. The recent spate of cyber attacks has also raised concerns about infrastructure vulnerabilities—and for good reason. Train services in Iran were disrupted earlier this month after an attack on the computer systems of the country’s national railway, causing delays to both passenger and cargo trains.
At a more granular level, a remote code execution (RCE) vulnerability has been revealed that would make it easier for hackers to take control over Schneider Electric PLCs, which are heavily used in industrial equipment, from manufacturing floor equipment to critical infrastructure. Armis researchers discovered a flaw in Modicon PLCs, which are widely used in manufacturing, automation applications and energy utilities. Researchers warned the bug could be exploited for a variety of attacks, from deploying ransomware to altering commands to machinery. Schneider Electric is working on a patch.
Engineers targeted by Lazarus. A prominent North Korean hacking group has taken aim at engineers in its latest phishing campaign. Lazarus (aka Appleworm) is using fake job offers as a means of luring engineering job candidates and employees in classified roles to click on files that then install malicious malware onto recipients’ computers, according to AT&T Alien Labs. The group first used this tactic last year in a campaign called Dreamjob, whereby they targeted defense contractors.
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Symantec Security Summary - June 2020
COVID-19 attacks continue and new threats on the rise
Red Cross to World Governments: Do More to Stop attacks on Healthcare Orgs
You’d like to think that even cyber criminals would give it a rest while the world deals with the massive health challenges posed by the COVID-19 pandemic. No such luck. In fact, they’ve taken advantage of the health crisis to step up their cyber attacks on hospitals, healthcare, and medical research facilities, as well as on medical personnel and international public health organizations. In response, the head of the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) and 48 politicians and dignitaries from around the world published a letter asking governments to do more to safeguard critical medical organizations from cyber attacks.
Peter Maurer, president of the ICRC, and his fellow signatories, urged governments “to take immediate and decisive action to stop all cyber attacks on hospitals, healthcare, and medical research facilities, as well as on medical personnel and international public health organizations.” What’s more, the letter asks governments to collaborate with cyber security companies and take more action against hackers targeting hospitals and the healthcare industry.
The Unsteady State of Cyber Security
Want a snapshot of the current state of enterprise cyber security? Look no further than a handful of recent surveys that taken together, depict a still disjointed and siloed tool landscape along with a workforce sorely in need of training when it comes to cyber security skills and best practices.
First off, most organizations are still coming at the cyber security challenge using a patchwork approach that impedes overall visibility and has created a crisis in confidence among security professionals, according to the third annual Oracle and KPMG Cloud Threat Report 2020. The report found 78% of the 750 cyber security and IT professionals surveyed are relying on more than 50 discrete products to address security issues while more than a third (37%) tap into more than 100 security tools.
Organizations trying to wrangle this hodgepodge of legacy and point solutions to address data security concerns face an uphill battle, the report found, as the systems are often not configured properly resulting in data loss incidents, exposed web servers and other server workloads, and inadequate use of multi-factor authentication. In addition, 70% of those surveyed believe they are relying on too many specialized tools to secure their public cloud footprint, specifically.
On top of these limitations, enterprises are also struggling with significant security skills shortages, notes a new report from research firm Stott and May. The report, “Cybersecurity in Focus 2020,” found 76% of respondents lamenting a shortage of cyber security skills in their organization, which is a slight improvement over last year when 88% were grousing about talent concerns. Nearly 72% of those surveyed said they are scrambling to procure cyber security talent with no improvement over 2019. Internal skills represent the biggest inhibitor to delivering on cyber security strategy, cited by 39% of respondents. To get around the issue, the report said security leaders were taking more creative approaches to resourcing, including nearly a third (30%) searching internally for transferable skills and almost half (46%) looking to AI and machine learning solutions to offset the skills gap.
Organizations trying to wrangle this hodgepodge of legacy and point solutions to address data security concerns face an uphill battle, the report found, as the systems are often not configured properly resulting in data loss incidents, exposed web servers and other server workloads, and inadequate use of multi-factor authentication
Employees are the source of additional cyber security angst. It turns out people planning to leave their jobs—so called “flight risk” employees who are about to either resign or leave their posts—are a huge source of insider cyber security incidents and data leaks. A recent Securonix 2020 Insider Threat Report found that 60% of insider cyber security incidents and data leaks are caused by folks just about to leave their jobs. These employees or contractors, many with privileged access to systems, potentially steal or sell data, or worse, are the cause of a security failure by moving confidential data to third-party services without permission. The nightmare gets worse: Securonix found that roughly 80% of flight-risk employees will attempt to take proprietary data with them when they leave, from forwarding content to personal emails (43.75%) to abusing cloud collaboration privileges (16%). Securonix is advising companies to go beyond use of point solutions like DLP tools or privileged access management solutions to use of advanced security platforms that leverage purpose-built algorithms to detect specific outcomes.
On a positive note, organizations are beginning to recognize their cyber security deficiencies and making the proper adjustments. In a study from LearnBonds.com, three quarters (70%) of responding organizations say they see the value of increasing their investment in cyber security solutions, especially in the face of COVID-19, which has created a host of new opportunities for cyber criminals. In addition to boosting spending on security, the report found over half (55%) of major organizations planning to increase their investment in automation solutions, in part to address security gaps.
Let’s hope the additional investment and attention bolsters enterprise cyber security readiness because there’s clearly room for improvement.
German Intel sees Russian Hacking Threat to Critical Infrastructure
Remember the Russia-linked hacking group known as Dragonfly 2.0 (also known as Berserk Bear)? They've been around since late 2011, using a combination of malicious emails, watering hole attacks, and Trojanized software to gain access to their victims' networks. In 2017, Dragonfly made news when it targeted the energy sector in Europe and North America. Well, they’re in the news again, this time reportedly targeting German companies in the energy, water, and power sectors.
An advisory from German intelligence and security agencies to operators of critical infrastructure warned that investigators had uncovered evidence of the hacking group’s “long-standing compromises” at unnamed German companies. The real identity of the shadowy group remains unknown but it’s believed to be operating on behalf of the FSB, Russia’s intelligence agency.
New Threats on the Rise
Hackers looking to attack individual servers—that’s yesterday’s news. Today, cyber criminals are more interested in gaining illicit access to corporate networks and soliciting offers to sell access on the dark web. A report by Positive Technologies found the number of dark web posts hawking network access was up 69% in the first quarter of 2020 compared to the fourth quarter of 2019. Not only are the number of incidents on the rise, the price tag for access is also climbing significantly. The report found that dark web pricing for this type of access had a huge range, from $500 to $100,000. In addition, some sellers are offering a commission of up to 30% of the profit from a hack that uses their access details.
Industrial companies are also increasingly in the crosshairs of a hacking group dubbed RATicate that attacks industrial companies though the use of remote access tools (RATs) and information-stealing malware. The group targeted industrial companies in Europe, the Middle East, and Republic of Korea as part of five campaigns between November 2019 and January of this year. More recently, the group appears to have shifted tactics slightly and is using concerns about COVID-19 to convince victims to open the payloads. It’s unclear at this point whether RATicate is doing the business of corporate espionage or acting as a malware-as-a-service provider for others.
Attacks on cloud-based data are also ramping up. According to the 2020 Verizon Data Breach Investigations Report, breaches involving web applications and unsecured cloud storage nearly doubled in 2019 compared to 2018. The rise, Verizon found, can be attributed to companies moving information off-premises as well as misconfigurations. Web application attacks accounted for close to half of all breaches in 2019 (43%), and Verizon expects this vector to be more active throughout 2020 due to the shift in applications and data to the cloud fueled by remote work and COVID-19.
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Symantec Security Summary - June 2021
Ransomware: Need we say more?
Ransomware payback. Amidst the cascade of fresh ransomware attacks, we finally heard some positive news: A rare recovery of the ransomware paid out to a criminal enterprise.
The U.S. Department of Justice clawed back the majority of the cryptocurrency ransom Colonial Pipeline paid out to hackers after cyber criminals hacked its IT network last month, crippling fuel deliveries up and down the East Coast. The giant East Coast pipeline company, which shut down operations for 11 days after the attack that led to gas shortages and price hikes, confirmed it paid $4.4 million in bitcoin to the DarkSide ransomware gang. DarkSide operates from Eastern Europe under a ransomware-as-a-service model and claims that it’s apolitical and not linked to any nation states.
According to Deputy Attorney General Lisa Monaco, the FBI recovered 63.7 Bitcoins out of the approximately 75 originally paid out by Colonial Pipeline. Investigators, who tracked the ransom payment across multiple Bitcoin addresses, recouped most of the funds after gaining access to the private key or password for one of DarkSide’s Bitcoin wallets, although there were no specifics on tactics. The recovery operation was the first for the Biden Administration’s recently-formed ransomware and digital extortion task force. “Ransomware attacks are always unacceptable, but when they target critical infrastructure, we will spare no effort in our response,” said Monaco. The DOJ has also said it plans to coordinate anti-ransomware efforts with the same set of protocols used for terrorism.
DarkSide has reportedly collected more than $90 million in bitcoin ransoms. But in a twist, the group itself became a victim when it lost access to servers and its cryptocurrency was transferred to an unknown wallet in May. The Washington Post reports the U.S. government was not behind the disruption to DarkSide’s operations.
Amidst the cascade of fresh ransomware attacks, we finally heard some positive news: A rare recovery of the ransomware paid out to a criminal enterprise.
High-profile targets. Colonial Pipeline isn’t the only big player targeted by the latest spate of ransomware attacks. JBS, a major meat producer, also suffered a ransomware attack that affected IT systems in North America and Australia, prompting it to shut down plants and alert customers and suppliers to possible delayed transactions. In a statement, the FBI attributed the JBS attack to the REvil ransomware gang (aka Leafroller and Sodinokbi) and “pledged to work diligently to bring the threat actors to justice.” It also emphasized the importance of private sector partnerships in ensuring a quick response to the increasing number of cyber intrusions.
Meanwhile, JBS reported “significant progress” in resolving the attack that hit its North American and Australian operations.
REvil, which has been linked to Russia, has taken credit for hacking Taiwanese hardware supplier Quanta Computer and has published secret Apple device blueprints in the past. Now the group appears to be escalating with an alleged representative of the ransomware gang threatening to double focus on U.S. targets. In an interview posted to the Russian OSINT Telegram channel, since deleted, the purported spokesperson made those assertions while also claiming the group is not afraid of being considered a terrorist organization. In response to U.S. actions, the REvil spokesperson said, “since there’s no point in avoiding the U.S. targets anymore, we have lifted all restrictions. From now on, every entity in this country can be targeted.”
A global battlefield. It’s not just the United States struggling with rising ransomware threats. Japanese conglomerate Fujifilm had to shutter part of its network in early June when it became aware of a ransomware attack. The company said it took measures to suspend all affected systems in coordination with its various global entities and was working to assess the extent and scale of the issue. Fujifilm didn’t specify what ransomware group was behind the attack, but BleepingComputer reported that Advanced Intel CEO Vitali Kremez said the company appeared to be infected with the Qbot malware as of May 15, 2021. Qbot works with the REvil ransomware group, Kremez alleged.
In other random ransomware news, the Steamship Authority, which operates ferries to Massachusetts’ Martha’s Vineyard and Nantucket islands, was hit with an attack. The company said the incident impacted its IT systems, not its radar or GPS functionality so the safety of its fleet was not in jeopardy. No word yet on who was responsible for the attack, and while service was not interrupted, ticketing systems were affected.
It’s not just the United States struggling with rising ransomware threats.
Internet outage. When many of top web sites went offline briefly earlier this month—Amazon, Reddit, and The New York Times, to name a few—the kneejerk reaction was another cyber attack, this time on Fastly, which operates a content delivery network (CDN). Fastly, which got its network back up in short order, attributed the problem to a software bug that was triggered by a valid customer configuration change. The company is now trying to figure out why the bug didn’t surface during testing.
Gone phishing. Microsoft is warning that the Russia-backed hacking group Nobelium is orchestrating a phishing campaign after wrestling control of the account used by the United States Agency for International Development (USAID) on the email marketing platform Constant Contact. The phishing campaign has targeted approximately 3,000 accounts linked to government agencies, think tanks, consultants, and non-government organizations and is mostly surfacing in the United States. The backdoor could be a vector for a range of nefarious activities, from data theft to infecting other computers on a network.
Like ransomware, phishing should be setting off alarms. A new report from Barracuda Networks found that phishing emails smuggled past security defenses tend to stay in employee inboxes for more than three days, on average. Some good news: Only 3% of employees receiving phishing emails either open the malicious attachment or follow the link.
Against a firestorm of cyber security threats, it’s nice to know we’re making a modicum of progress.
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Symantec Security Summary - May 2021
Ransomware, a new Executive Order and Solar Winds fallout
Ransomware on a roll. Ransomware once again dominated the global stage after a cyber crime gang orchestrated a recent attack against a U.S. pipeline company, shutting down operations and reigniting concerns about the vulnerability of major infrastructure.
Colonial Pipeline, which transports gasoline and jet fuel from Texas to New York, said it shut down 5,500 miles of pipeline in order to contain the breach in which hackers stole nearly 100GBs of data. While company officials said the hackers broke into its business systems, not the systems that control the physical pipeline infrastructure, they shuttered the networks and pipeline for precautionary reasons. The impact of the attack had an immediate impact at the gas pumps and industry experts raised concerns about what this might portend in light of critical infrastructure vulnerabilities. The Department of Transportation put out an emergency declaration aimed at ramping up alternative transportation routes for oil and gas.
Colonial Pipeline, which transports gasoline and jet fuel from Texas to New York, said it shut down 5,500 miles of pipeline in order to contain the breach in which hackers stole nearly 100GBs of data.
The FBI has confirmed that the genesis of the attack was a strain of ransomware called DarkSide, which is believed to be connected to a Russian cyber crime gang. The hacking group countered with a notice on the dark web contending they were looking for opportunities to make money, not to carry out an attack on behalf of a foreign government. In the interim, a contingent of private-sector companies, with help from U.S. agencies, disrupted the ongoing attacks and helped Colonial recover some stolen data, according to sources for a Bloomberg article.
Government ramps up response. With this latest entity in the crosshairs, U.S. Justice Department officials are warning about the growing threat of ransomware attacks and have formed a new task force to root out and respond to the growing threat. According to a memo obtained by CNN, 2020 was the worst year on record for ransomware attacks, including those targeting the DC police department, hospitals treating COVID-19 patients, as well as a growing roster of manufacturers.
The Biden administration is also rolling out a 100-day plan to bolster cyber security for the nation’s electric grid. Among the plan’s goals are to encourage owners and operators of power plants to enhance security incident detection, mitigation, and response; to deploy technologies to ensure real-time situational awareness within industrial control systems (ICS) and operational networks; and to reinforce the IT networks and infrastructure used within facilities. The Biden administration also issued an Executive Order (EO) that lays out a series of new cyber security requirements for companies doing business with the government in the hopes of forcing changes and improvements that trickle down to private industry.
SolarWinds campaign bigger than we thought. Speaking of Russian hacking, it looks like the 2020 SolarWinds breach, orchestrated by the state-backed Russian hacking group known as APT29 (aka Fritillary, Cozy Bear), is even more widespread than initially expected. New analysis of the supply chain attack has uncovered 18 additional command and control (C&C) servers used in the campaign, making for an estimated 18,000 companies exposed through receipt of the SolarWinds malicious update. Researchers from RiskIQ said the newly-discovered servers represent a “56% increase in the size of the adversary’s known command-and-control footprint,” and will likely lead to newly identifiable targets.
New analysis of the supply chain attack has uncovered 18 additional command and control (C&C) servers used in the campaign, making for an estimated 18,000 companies exposed through receipt of the SolarWinds malicious update.
In other SolarWinds-related news, the China-based Spiral advanced persistent threat (APT) group is believed to be behind a year-long attack that planted the Supernova backdoor on the SolarWinds Orion server in order to carry out reconnaissance, domain mapping, and data theft.
On the heels of all these high-profile incidents, the U.S. Department for Homeland Security’s Cyber Security Infrastructure Security Agency (CISA), the FBI and NSA, along with the UK National Cyber Security Center recently put out a joint advisory warning organizations about new techniques being used by Russian hackers as part of their escalating cyber security campaigns. The advisory cites new tactics such as exploiting vulnerabilities such as Microsoft Exchange zero-days and leveraging the Silver open source tool as part of the evolving Russian playbook to infiltrate networks as companies shore up their defenses in response to heightened awareness.
And then there’s China. It’s not just Russia amplifying information war fare. Hackers with suspected ties to China have exploited the Pulse Secure VPN to gain access to dozens of organizations, including government agencies, defense companies, and financial institutions. Pulse Secure’s Zero Day vulnerability was exploited in the wild by multiple threat actors to install malware on targeted organizations’ networks. Research published by Mandiant has uncovered 12 malware families associated with the Pulse Secure VPN exploit. A patch for the vulnerability will be released this month, and until then, Pulse Secure has released mitigations to guard against exploit attempts.
Even high-tech royalty isn’t being spared. There are reports that the REvil ransomware gang tried to extort Apple to “buy back” stolen product blueprints to avoid having them leak prior to the company’s big spring event earlier this month. The criminals demanded that Apple pay $50 million in the Monero cryptocurrency by May 1st to avoid having confidential data stolen from its Taiwanese partner Quanta Computer be leaked. Some of the documents were leaked online, but the group eventually pulled all references to the attempted extortion event off its dark web blog, and Apple isn’t commenting.
Banks caught in the crosshairs. No surprises here: more evidence to confirm that the shift to remote work has contributed to a significant spike in cyber attacks against banks and insurance firms. The COVID Crime Index 2021 report found that nearly three quarters (74%) of banks and insurers have seen a rise in criminal activity, including increases in botnet attacks (35%); ransomware (35%), phishing (35%), mobile malware (32%), and COVID-related malware (30%). Insider threats remain an issue for 29% of respondents.
The bottom line: It appears organizations are less secure and customers more at risk of cyber crime and fraud. It’s time to get to work, people.
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Symantec Security Summary - November 2020
Ransomware, Post-Election Cyber Drama and More
Post-election cyber drama. For weeks, the cyber security ecosystem had been razor-focused on staving off potential election-related breaches and voting interference. But all the while, bad actors have remained hard at work launching pervasive strikes across industries and threat vectors.
The hospitality industry, already battered by COVID-19 restrictions, became the target of newly-discovered backdoor malware hunting for sensitive customer and transaction information. The ModPipe malware, discovered by researchers at ESET, takes aim at point of sale (POS) devices running Oracle Micros Restaurant Enterprise Series (RES) 3700 management software, which is actively in use by thousands of hotels and restaurants. ModPipe stands out for its downloadable modules, including one GetMicInfo, which instead of conventional keylogging or credit card skimming, employs an algorithm to gather passwords by decrypting them from Windows registry values. While researchers don’t suspect ModPipe is stealing payment card numbers due to encryption standards, it is capable of accessing database contents, including system configuration, status tables, and some POS transactional data.
ModPipe stands out for its downloadable modules, including one GetMicInfo, which instead of conventional keylogging or credit card skimming, employs an algorithm to gather passwords by decrypting them from Windows registry values.
Hacker-for-hire has global reach. A group of APT mercenaries (dubbed CostaRicto) is targeting victims across the globe with customized malware along with complex VPN proxy and SSH tunneling capabilities. Active since late 2019, this for-hire group has attacked organizations across the globe but has concentrated its efforts on victims in South Asia, particularly India, Bangladesh, and Singapore. Worrisome news for security managers: This group goes to great lengths to avoid detection, with only binaries appearing in-memory, which makes it harder for antivirus and EDR products to keep up.
Texas drivers received a cyber security wake-up call. A provider of insurance software, revealed that an unauthorized third party accessed the personal information of more than 27 million drivers in the Lone Star State. Apparently, the breach took place between March and August when three data files were inadvertently stored in an unsecured external storage service. The files reportedly contained information on driver’s licenses issued before February 2019, and the exposed data included Texas driver license numbers, names, dates of birth, addresses and vehicle registration histories. The relevant authorities have been notified and there is a pending investigation.
In the “is nothing sacred” category, a Finnish psychotherapy clinic reports that it has been hit with extortion attempts after hackers stole patient therapy notes and leaked them on the dark web. The company, with locations across Finland, said the incident happened as early as November 2018, but the attackers didn’t make contact until this September. While few details about the incident are known, reports say the perpetrators initially sought a payment equivalent to around $531,000 to protect approximately 40,000 patient records. The company originally declined to pay up, but when the attackers began posting individual patient records on the dark web and soliciting victims to pay to have their personal information taken down, the company stepped up and reported the incident. The authorities in Finland continue to investigate.
A group of APT mercenaries (dubbed CostaRicto) is targeting victims across the globe with customized malware along with complex VPN proxy and SSH tunneling capabilities.
Ransomware attacks linked back to Iran? Two recent ransomware campaigns that targeted Israeli companies involving the Pay2Key and WannaScream ransomware families have been traced back to Iran. The attacks, which began in October and intensified this month, targeted corporate networks and led to the theft of company data and file encryption. Researchers tracked several payments made by victimized Israeli companies to Excoino, a cryptocurrency exchange based in Iran. The latest reports follow on the heels of a warning by the Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency and FBI earlier in the fall of an Iran-based malicious cyber actor that’s been targeting several industries mainly associated with information technology, government, healthcare, financial, insurance, and media sectors across the United States. More recently, the FBI announced that it had seized 27 domains on the day of the Presidential Election that it said were being used to mount Iran-backed disinformation campaigns. The domains were linked to Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guard.
Speaking of ransomware, ransomware gangs such as Ryuk have been leveraging the Emotet botnet to gain access to new victims. The resulting sharp increase in Emotet spam campaigns has led to fears of a surge in ransomware attacks. Indeed, one recent report found a 1,200% increase in Emotet detections between July to September compared to the previous three months. At Symantec, a division of Broadcom (NASDAQ: AVGO), we’ve also watched a sharp rise in Emotet activity. Detections of Emotet malware increased fourfold between June 2020 and September. A large proportion of Emotet campaigns are blocked at antispam level, meaning the true increase could be even higher than commonly believed. Enterprises need to remain vigilant: Ransomware attackers have been moving away from their usual spray-and-pray tactics and are targeting businesses to maximize potential payments.
Enterprises need to remain vigilant: Ransomware attackers have been moving away from their usual spray-and-pray tactics and are targeting businesses to maximize potential payments.
Even the gaming world was not exempt from the latest spate of attacks. A popular online virtual playground suffered a data breach that impacted 46 million accounts. Aimed at children between the ages 7 through 11, the online site has over 300 million animal avatars created by kids and a new player registering every 1.4 seconds. On November 10, a hacker shared a pair of the company’s databases for free on a hacker forum, and a well-known hacking group, ShinyHunters, reportedly got their hands on the stolen data. Based on a preliminary investigation, it looks like the parent company’s AWS key was obtained after compromising the firm’s Slack server. The attack netted the hackers user names, SHA1 hashed passwords, and more significantly, 7 million email addresses of parents whose children had registered for accounts along with the IP addresses used at sign up.
On the flip side, it’s not bad news. In fact, it looks like there’s a year-over-year reduction in the cyber security workforce gap, reversing the recent trend. According to (ISC)² research, a rising number of cyber security professionals coming into the field, coupled with uncertain demand due to the economic impact of COVID-19, have coalesced to grow the number of people currently working in the field to 3.5 million--about 25% over last year’s estimated workforce. The research indicates a corresponding decrease in the global workforce shortage, down to 3.12 million from the 4.07 million shortage reported last year. Even with those improved numbers, experts say the field still needs to grow about 41% in the United States (and 89% worldwide) in order to meet enterprise needs.
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Symantec Security Summary - October 2020
Trickbot, COVID-19 and Election Security
Trickbot, trapped. The infamous Trickbot botnet, described by many as the world’s largest botnet and the criminal machine behind a myriad of ransomware attacks, has been foiled, at least temporarily, thanks to the work of a U.S. military operation and more recently, a court order.
Both maneuvers were designed to deflate Trickbot before the U.S. election so it couldn’t be a vector for interference in 2020 voting. The Krebs on Security newsletter had first reported that someone had been launching a series of coordinated attacks to disrupt Trickbot, which is described as an army of millions of hijacked Windows computers under the control of Russian-speaking criminals, used to steal financial data and to serve as an entry point for pushing out malware throughout compromised organizations.
In what appeared to be a well-orchestrated strike, Krebs reported that Trickbot-infected systems received a bogus configuration file, typically used to pass on new instructions on where to direct victims to download new malware updates. In addition, millions of phony records about new victims were pumped into the mix in an attempt to overload the botnet and disrupt its operations. Follow-on reporting placed responsibility for that coordinated attack on U.S. Cyber Command as part of a concerted campaign to temporarily disrupt the Trickbot botnet.
A global partnership of security, software, telecommunications and financial services firms, including Symantec, a division of Broadcom, collaborated to obtain a federal court order to disable IP addresses associated with Trickbot servers.
Several days later, an initiative was underway to defang Trickbot’s ability to impact election infrastructure. A global partnership of security, software, telecommunications and financial services firms, including Symantec, a division of Broadcom (NASDAQ: AVGO), collaborated to obtain a federal court order to disable IP addresses associated with Trickbot servers. The group, led by Microsoft and the Financial Services Information Sharing and Analysis Center (FS-ISAC) also worked with a host of global telecom providers to shut down the network.
Through their actions, the collaborators sought to disable the botnet’s command and control servers and to block their ability to lease or buy new servers, which in turn would compromise Trickbot’s ability to rebuild its zombie army before the election. While experts didn't anticipate the botnet would alter votes, they were concerned about the potential to fuel confusion or inflame distrust in voting systems, which was a hotbed issue in the run up to the November election.
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There was other cyber security-related activity as the election drew near. Following a tip from the FBI, Twitter identified and removed 130 Iranian Twitter accounts that were attempting to disrupt conversations during the first presidential debate in late September. In a statement, Twitter said it identified the accounts quickly, removed them from the platform, and shared full details with peers. It said it also planned to publish the removed accounts and content once its investigation was complete to provide greater transparency.
Russian influence also remains a threat being closely monitored. In its October Homeland Threat Assessment, the U.S. Department of Homeland Security warned that numerous nation state actors were potential threats to election security, including China and Iran, but called out Russian attackers as the most disruptive threat. “We assess that Moscow’s primary objective is to increase its global standing and influence by weakening America—domestically and abroad—through efforts to sow discord, distract, shape public sentiment, and undermine trust in Western democratic institutions and processes,” the warning stated. It specifically cited Russian activity to employ social media influence campaigns and media manipulation to inflame social and racial tensions as well as propagating misinformation to incite panic or provoke animosity.
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The quick shift to work-from-home due to the COVID-19 pandemic has also fueled a rise in cyber security events. Arctic Wolf found that the number of corporate credentials with plaintext passwords available on the dark web has surged by 429 percent since March, paving the way for a host of security issues. Ransomware and phishing attempts have increased by almost two-thirds in this year’s second quarter, Artic Wolf found, bolstered by a wave of COVID-19-related phishing incidents. Work-from-home has also contributed to a 243 percent spike in devices connected to open and unsecured Wi-Fi networks, Artic Wolf’s report found.
With more than half (56%) of security professionals experiencing a rise in cyber security threats since the start of the pandemic and 70% admitting that cyber criminals are pursuing new tactics, according to research from Cloarty, what explains the relative inertia to address the issue? The survey found only one-fifth of organizations have made cyber security a priority during these pressing times—a decision likely to have negative consequences down the line.
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Symantec Security Summary - October 2021
BlackMatter, Conti and the Harvester group
Ransomware continues to be a persistent corporate scourge. A new research paper from Symantec’s Threat Hunter Team found that targeted ransomware activity is on the rise these last 18 months, fueled by a proliferation of new actors and the growing sophistication of the ransomware-as-a-service (RaaS) market. According to the research, the number of confirmed attacks reported by organizations increased by 83% in that timeframe, from 81 in January 2020 to 148 in June 2021. Symantec researchers believe the real number of attacks is likely much higher because many targeted attacks are stopped before payload deployment, so they’re not identified as actual ransomware.
The problem is getting so serious, it’s caught the attention of the White House. President Biden announced that the United States would meet with representatives from 30 countries, including NATO allies and G7 partners, to cooperate on combating cyber crime, with a particular focus on ransomware. As described in a press release, the partners will work together to improve law enforcement collaboration, stem the illicit use of cryptocurrency, and engage on these issues diplomatically. “We are building a coalition of nations to advocate for and invest in trusted 5G technology and to better secure our supply chains,” the press release said. “We are bringing the full strength of our capabilities to disrupt malicious cyber activity, including both the risks and opportunities of emerging technologies like quantum computing and artificial intelligence.”
President Biden announced that the United States would meet with representatives from 30 countries, including NATO allies and G7 partners, to cooperate on combating cyber crime, with a particular focus on ransomware.
Continuing on the theme of ransomware: CISA, FBI, and the NSA released a joint Cyber Security Advisory on BlackMatter Ransomware. Since July 2021, malicious cyber actors have used BlackMatter ransomware to target multiple U.S. critical infrastructure entities, including a U.S. Food and Agriculture Sector organization. Broadcom Software was named as contributing to the analysis by CISA.
Conti malware was front and center in other ransomware-related news. Attackers using this type of ransomware are leveraging a new tactic and are taking aim squarely at users of Veeam’s backup solutions to delete backups on victim’s networks. Research from Advanced Intel found that the attackers are hunting for privileged Veeam users and stealing their credentials so they can impersonate them to exfiltrate backups using rclone before deleting them from the victim’s networks. In a statement, Veeam officials advises users to maintain a separate domain to run backup software in the event a primary domain is compromised.
The operators of the Conti ransomware (also known as Miner or Wizard Spider) are also threatening to leak victim data if transcripts or screen shots of ransom negotiations are publicly shared. The reason: The growing number of media reports memorializing the details of ransom negotiations are making their exploits a bit tricker to pull off.
Cryptocurrency also took a cyber security hit. A bug in Coinbase’s SMS-based two-factor authentication systems let attackers steal funds from more than 6,000 customers of the cryptocurrency exchange. The breaches, which occurred between March and May 2021, were the result of attackers getting access to a customer's email address, password, and phone number associated with the account, which enabled them to get in through a 2FA failure. Coinbase said it would reimburse users who lost funds in these transactions, and it updated its SMS Account Recovery protocols to prevent further incidents.
The operators of the Conti ransomware (also known as Miner or Wizard Spider) are also threatening to leak victim data if transcripts or screen shots of ransom negotiations are publicly shared
In the meantime, the Justice Department took steps to shore up security surrounding cryptocurrencies. U.S. Deputy Attorney General Lisa Monaco announced the launch of the National Cryptocurrency Enforcement team, which will include a mix of anti-money laundering and cyber security experts who will be tasked with “strengthening” the Justice Department’s ability to disable financial markets allowing cyber criminals to “flourish.” The effort is also aimed at mitigating the uptick in ransomware, which demands payment typically paid in cryptocurrency.
“Cryptocurrency exchanges want to be the banks of the future,” said Monaco in a virtual speech at the recent Aspen Cyber Summit. “We need to make sure that folks can have the confidence when they’re using these systems and we need to be poised to root out abuse.”
The Harvester group is new to the ransomware scene. A previously unseen actor, likely nation-state-backed, is targeting organizations in South Asia, with a focus on Afghanistan, in what appears to be an information-stealing campaign using a new toolset.
According to Broadcom Software’s Threat Intelligence team, The Harvester group uses both custom malware and publicly available tools in its attacks, which began in June 2021, with the most recent activity seen in October 2021. Sectors targeted include telecommunications, government, and information technology (IT). The capabilities of the tools, their custom development, and the victims targeted, all suggest that Harvester is a nation-state-backed actor.
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Symantec Security Summary - September 2021
Ransomware, Crypto and Blockchain updates
Ransomware continues to dominate cyber security headlines as new variants appear amidst signs that hackers are maturing their strategies and becoming ever-more intentional about selecting their targets.
For the first time, the FBI published an alert warning of a ransomware affiliate operator known as OnePercent, which has been targeting U.S. organizations since November 2020 using a consistent set of tools, tactics, and procedures (TTPs). The group uses malicious phishing email attachments to unleash the IcedID banking Trojan infection vector and then employs Cobalt Strike on compromised endpoints to move laterally throughout the victim’s network to exfiltrate sensitive data. The final step involves deploying a ransomware payload with a note linking to the gang’s Onion website. The FBI alert links the OnePercent Group to the notorious REvil (Sodinokibi) ransomware gang, which was behind many of the recent high-profile attacks. REvil went dark earlier this summer after attacks drew worldwide condemnation, including tough talk from President Biden to Russia’s Putin, but appears to have recently resurfaced, according to reports.
As part of its stepped up policing of ransomware, the FBI also warned of new attacks targeting the agri-food industry. The alert said the increased dependence of smart technologies, industrial control systems (ICS), and Internet-based automation systems makes the industry a more attractive target. Possible fallout could be financial losses, soaring food prices, and disruption to the food supply chain, the warning said. The alert encouraged companies in the sector to take steps to secure their IT networks, including shoring up weakly secured RDP endpoints and patching Internet-facing devices to prevent vulnerabilities.
Ransomware infections are also spreading to universities and towns. Nearly 400 cities and towns have fallen victim to ransomware attacks in recent years, impeding emergency responders, bringing down core systems, and stalling tax payments, among a litany of disruptions, according to a Washington Post report. Howard University suffered a ransomware attack just as students headed back to school earlier this month. The HBCU was forced to cancel all online and hybrid undergraduate classes after an attack compromised its networks.
Ransomware wish list. Threat intelligence firm KILA has analyzed the underground forum posts of ransomware actors on the hunt for collaborators and has come up with a wish list, of sorts, for the preferred victim. Ransomware gangs are primarily targeting organizations with revenues greater than $100 million in the United States, Canada, Europe, and Australia. The healthcare and education sectors are somewhat off limits for many attackers while others are avoiding government and non-profits. Researchers concluded that avoidance of those sectors is less about altruism and more likely about dodging controversy and avoiding the attention of law enforcement.
The red-hot field of cryptocurrency is looking like the next frontier for cyber security attacks. Poly Network, a Chinese company that processes cryptocurrency transactions across blockchain platforms, revealed that over $611 million in cryptocurrency was stolen from its platform. Poly Network attributed the breach to the hacker exploiting a vulnerability between contract calls and advised its customers, including cryptocurrency exchanges like Binance and Coinbase Pro, to refuse transactions from specific wallet addresses to stave off the thieves. Days later, the threat actor returned almost $260 million worth of the stolen cryptocurrency. The supposed thief claimed the heist was less about stealing the money and more about teaching Poly Networks a lesson by exposing their vulnerability. More likely, the turnaround was due to Slowmist claiming to have the goods on the attacker’s identity.
Cyber criminals have developed a blockchain analytics tool to assist in laundering cryptocurrency. According to Elliptic, the Antinalysis blockchain analytics tool has been launched on the dark web—its mission to check bitcoin addresses for links to criminal activity. What this means, according to Elliptic’s co-founder and CEO, is that criminals can “test whether their funds will be identified as proceeds of crime by regulated exchanges,” which is an asset in hiding their activity.
Cyber security legal eagles. In its continuing effort to combat cyber crime and escalating threats, the Department of Justice (DOJ) announced a new fellowship program tasked with training a new generation of prosecutors and attorneys on cyber security issues. Selected attorneys will participate in a three-year rotation through multiple departments and work on cases that “prosecute state-sponsored cyber threats, transnational criminal groups, ransomware attacks, and the use of cryptocurrency and money laundering to finance and profit from cyber-based crimes,” according to a DOJ news release.
If this month’s activity is any indication, they’re going to have a lot of work ahead of them.
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Symantec Security Summary
News Across the Industry
1. More woes loom for healthcare security?
Last September, ProPublica revealed that 187 servers being deployed to store and retrieve medical data in the U.S. were unprotected by passwords or basic security precautions. The upshot: anyone with a web browser or a few lines of computer code could access patient records. Two months later, the situation’s no better with the amount of confidential patient data accessible on the internet still climbing.
The disclosures offer a new twist on a familiar problem. In 2017, the Healthcare Industry Cyber Security Taskforce, funded and overseen by the federal Department of Health and Human Services, warned that “healthcare security is in critical condition.” Unfortunately, we can’t report that the patient is faring much better. Indeed, when it comes to security, the healthcare industry continues to struggle to reduce its exposure to cyber risks as threat actors step up their attacks. Last year, data breaches and ransomware attacks cost the health sector an estimated $4 billion.
In this most recent incident, the problem centered around an aging file format and industry standard known as DICOM, which allows medical practitioners to read and share medical images easily on what’s called a PACS server. But when doctors connect their servers to the internet without a password, they leave sensitive medical imaging and patient data vulnerable.
Learn More: Is Healthcare Security in Critical Condition?
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2. The upcoming census will make history.
Largely because it will be the first one conducted primarily online with respondents encouraged to submit their answers over the internet. What could possibly go wrong?
For starters, everything. Back in 2017, the GAO included the census in its list of the highest-risk government projects since due to cyber security and other issues. Despite some progress. Since then, the Commerce Department says there’s been “partial” progress” but also flagged areas of concern, specifically when it came to the management and oversight of the Census’s IT systems as well as the ability to deal with cyber security weaknesses “in a timely manner and ensure that risks are at an acceptable level before systems are deployed.”
Progress is in the eye of the beholder. Last December, the GAO said the Census Bureau still had 191 unfixed cyber security problems that it characterized as “high” or “very high” risk. What’s more, it said that 26% were 60 days or more past their planned fix date. Following the caucus fiasco in Iowa in early February, there’s extra urgency to make sure sufficient tech and security testing gets done before the census gets underway.
What they’re saying: This may be one of the rare political questions that unites Democrats and Republicans nowadays. Here’s Delaware Democrat John Sarbanes during a recent appearance by Census Bureau officials before the House Oversight and Reform Committee: “If ever there was a juicy target for those who want to hack in and sow discord and all the rest of it, it would be our 10-year census where we are putting it online like never before.” Meanwhile, Rep. Mark Meadows (R-N.C.), who also sits on the committee, weighed in by adding that the census website was more “complex” than the app used in Iowa and therefore has “a lot more chances for cyber intrusions.”
Learn More: The Looming Crisis: Government Agencies and Cyber Security
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3. New BEC attacks beckon.
When BEC attacks first began showing up as a problem back a few years ago, the FBI warned that the scam relies on the oldest trick in the con artist's handbook: deception.” It may not be very sophisticated but it is very effective.
How it works: In its recently-released 2019 Internet Crime Report, the FBI said it had recorded more than $1.7 billion in losses related to BEC attacks. An acronym for business email compromise, BEC attacks take a variety of forms and target companies in many different industries. But the basic aim is the same: to gain access to a company’s network - often through a combination spear-phishing attack with malware - and then carry out surveillance on the organization and its senior executives. Then, at a time of their choosing, the criminals swing into action, sending phone emails, purportedly from the CEO, to someone in finance requesting an immediate wire transfer.
AIG Insurance said that BEC attacks accounted for about 23% of all their cyber insurance claims for losses - more than for ransomware or data breaches - in the Europe, Middle East, and Asia regions in 2018 (based on the latest figures available.)
Learn More: BEC Scams Remain a Billion-Dollar Enterprise
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4. Speaking of financial scams
More than a dozen banks in the US and Canada found themselves recently on the receiving end of a mobile phishing scam that claimed 4,000 victims. In this case, scammers duped victims with messages containing links to phishing pages made to appear like legitimate mobile banking pages. Clicking on links gave the phishers access to users' banking credentials as well as their personal details, including dates of birth. All of that information can later be sold on the Dark Web or used in other fraudulent schemes. The attacks, which had been ongoing since 2019, have since been getting shut down. But this is part of an ongoing challenge.
Why it matters: Banks have long been in the cross-hairs and this was just the latest incident in a years-long trend of cyber criminals targeting financial institutions. The Carnegie Endowment offers a telling snapshot in this timeline it put together of attacks against financial institutions since 2007. That year it logged 3 attacks; last year it was 29.
Learn More: How Banking LoB and Cyber Security Teams Can Get on the Same Page
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Symantec Security Summary – April 2021
Cyber attack complexity, ransomware and staying vigilant
Ready for battle. Experts have been sounding the battle cry for years, but if this last month is any indication, enterprises face an even more diverse and persistent threat landscape as the number, type, and complexity of advanced cyber-attacks and incidents escalate.
Let’s start on the firmware front, which has been identified as an increasingly active enterprise target. According to a March 2021 Security Signals study, more than 80% of enterprises have experienced at least one firmware attack in the past two years. But here’s the kicker: Less than a third (29%) of security budgets are allocated to protecting firmware, and 21% of respondents said their firmware data is unmonitored, leaving most companies radically exposed. The survey found budgets channeled to fund security updates, vulnerability scanning, and advanced threat protection solutions—all critical investments, for sure. But firmware is getting overlooked, perhaps due to lack of awareness and automation, the survey suggested.
Firmware attacks are popular with attackers because they are a bounty for sensitive data, including credentials and encryption keys. Common detection products and general logging tools also can’t peer into firmware, and vulnerabilities allow attackers to remain on a computer even after it’s wiped, putting it further in the bull’s eye.
Firmware attacks are popular with attackers because they are a bounty for sensitive data, including credentials and encryption keys.
Moving on, there’s the issue of ransomware—another festering problem for the enterprise security team. Cyber criminals are making and demanding more money than ever before. The average ransomware payments spiked 171% in 2020, surging to $312,000. But get this: The highest ransom paid out by organizations doubled from 2019 to 2020, jumping from $5 million to $10 million.
COVID-19’s impact on ransomware can’t be overstated. Ransomware operators are taking advantage of the sweeping changes brought on by the pandemic to prey on organizations in the manufacturing, healthcare, and construction sectors, but with healthcare being a standout.
Of all the ransomware hits this year, the Ryuk variation stands out from the pack. An October 2020 joint cyber security advisory from the FBI, the Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency (CISA), and the Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) specifically called out Ryuk attacks as a danger for healthcare organizations.
Legacy enterprise applications are also not immune to the stepped-up cyber security activity. A new threat intelligence report found critical vulnerabilities in unpatched SAP systems are providing a target-rich environment for cyber attackers worldwide. At least 1,500 SAP application-related attack attempts were tracked between June 2020 and March 2021 and there was evidence of more than 300 automated exploitations leveraging seven SAP-specific attack vectors and more than 100 hands-on-keyboard sessions from a wide range of threat actors. The attacks exploited security flaws impacting ERP, CRM, and supply chain systems and the most serious vulnerabilities involved CVSS 10, known as RECON, a remotely exploitable bug in SAP NetWeaver/Java, which was caused by a failed authentication check.
Enterprises are in the crosshairs despite the fact that SAP has a monthly patch cycle; the problem is that most customers just don’t apply the issued fixes for months – in some cases, even for years – after they are released. As a result, attackers have plenty of time to take advantage of unpatched flaws—the research found exploit attempts happening in as little as 72 hours from the release of a patch; it takes as little as three hours for unprotected SAP applications provisioned in a cloud IaaS environment to be compromised.
A new threat intelligence report found critical vulnerabilities in unpatched SAP systems are providing a target-rich environment for cyber attackers worldwide.
The exploitation can lead to full control of unsecured SAP applications, allowing attackers to steal sensitive information, disrupt critical business processes, initiate ransomware, or commit financial fraud. Given the scope and penetration of the SAP portfolio for mission-critical business, attacks could also compromise compliance for SOX, GDPR and other regulations. The threat was significant enough for the Cybersecurity & Infrastructure Security Agency (CISA) to issue an alert based on the report.
In separate, but somewhat related news, Federal agencies urged private companies and government agencies using Microsoft Exchange Server email applications to immediately patch their systems to prevent bad actors from exploiting newly-discovered vulnerabilities. The new flaws were discovered soon after Microsoft announced Exchange was compromised by at least one Chinese state-sponsored hacking group, potentially impacting thousands of organizations.
Even tech support is becoming a vector for cyber security attacks. Vade Secure is pointing to a large-scale email campaign that launched in March that attempts to lure enterprises in with fake billing emails from the leading antivirus software providers. These tech support scammers, pretending to be from Microsoft, McAfee, and Norton, are peppering companies with fake antivirus software billing renewal notices that say recipients will be charged up to $399 for a three-year subscription unless they call a certain phone number to cancel. Once they do, scammers attempt to lure them into installing remote access software that becomes a vector for malware. Vade Secure says it has filtered over 1 million of these emails targeting its customer base.
The burgeoning threat landscape is particularly alarming given the state of most companies’ cyber security posture. In fact, the KPMG 2021 CEO Outlook Pulse survey cited cyber security risk as the number one threat to an organization’s growth over the next three years, cited by nearly one-fifth of CEO respondents. Last year, it occupied the fifth spot on the list with 10% of CEOs indicating it was a threat to their organization’s development.
Digging deeper, a new report from Varonis found data security hygiene severely lacking among health care companies: Seventy-seven percent have 500 or more accounts with passwords that never expire and 79% have over 1,000 user and service accounts that are inactive, but still enabled. Another report found that even employees that have received cyber security training failed when asked to take a basic quiz on the topic. And a growing number of manufacturers, now a top target of cyber criminals and national-state groups, have experienced an incident (61%) with three-quarters of those scenarios taking production offline, according to a report published by Trend Micro.
Despite the gains in cyber security awareness and preparedness, there is still plenty of work to be done.
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Symantec Security Summary – Aug 2020
Ransomware remains rampant and more security news
Russian attacks, redux. Amidst fresh headlines of potential Russian disinformation campaigns to influence the 2020 election and a blockbuster bi-partisan report confirming the country’s role in 2016 election interference, Russia is also ramping up its global hacking efforts.
In a joint security alert issued in early August, the FBI and NSA warned of a new Linux strain of malware deployed in real-world attacks and developed by Russian state military hackers. The GRU’s latest work, dubbed Drovorub, is an undisclosed malware toolset, which when deployed on a victim machine, plants a backdoor inside targeted networks and implements hiding techniques to avoid detection, according to the alert’s description. The agencies say they have evidence that the malware is connected to the Russian state-sponsored APT group known as Swallowtail, Fancy Bear, or APT 28, among other nicknames.
To safeguard corporate systems, the agencies recommend an update to Linux Kernel 3.7 or later and to configure systems so they only load modules with a valid digital signature.
Spear phishing appears to be the conduit for initial access, specifically an email emanating from an HR team member at the targeted organization sent to multiple employees.
Another Russian group was just accused for a targeted cyber espionage campaign conducted over the last three years. RedCurl APT, a newly-discovered advanced persistent threat (APT) group, has been carefully planning attacks on enterprise companies across North America and Europe, attempting to steal commercial secrets as well as personal data.
RedCurl APT was identified by cyber security firm Group-IB after one of its customers got caught in the crosshairs of an attack. After that initial discovery, researchers have uncovered 26 additional attacks against 14 companies since 2018, involving construction firms, retailers, insurance companies, banks, law and consulting firms, and travel agencies, among others.
Spear phishing appears to be the conduit for initial access, specifically an email emanating from an HR team member at the targeted organization sent to multiple employees. The email includes links to malicious files containing Trojans that allow the RedCurl ATP hackers to search systems, download other malware, and upload stolen files to remote servers.
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Ransomware remains rampant. The latest big-name company to fall victim to a ransomware attack is the world’s largest cruise line operator. In a filing with the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC), it was revealed that one of its brands was hit by a ransomware attack on August 15, but it wouldn’t confirm the target.
The filing stated that the company detected a ransomware attack that accessed and encrypted a portion of one brand’s information technology systems. “The unauthorized access included the download of certain of our data files,” the officials confirmed, adding that the data was likely stolen and could lead to claims filed from passengers and employees affected by the potential breach. In 2020, the same company experienced a data breach in March that exposed customers’ personal information, including possible payment data.
Ransomware was also an attack vector for a company catering to another recreational pass time: the cocktail hour. The maker of favorite alcohol brands like Jack Daniel’s and Finlandia, confirmed it was hit by a cyber attack that may have impacted information, including employee data.
The ransomware used in the attack was Sodinokibi, also known as REvil (Ransom Sodinokibi). The company said it was able stop the attackers before its systems were encrypted and is now working with third parties to mitigate the effects of the attack.
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COVID sparks cyber security crisis. As if the physical and emotional toll related to COVID-19 weren’t enough to deal with, the pandemic is now fostering concerns about another kind of health issue—the well-being of corporate networks, which are increasingly under attack as more people work from home.
The FBI recently reported that the number of complaints pouring into the Cyber Division is up to as many as 4,000 daily—a 400% spike from what was common pre-COVID. Interpol is also reporting a shift away from attacks focused on individuals and small businesses to an “alarming” number directed at corporations, governments, and critical infrastructure in the COVID-19 era. Among the most prominent attack vectors is spear phishing, which uses emails, social media, IM, and other platforms to get victims to divulge personal data.
One U.S. Congressman has proposed legislation to help mitigate certain COVID-related cyber attacks.
Legislative efforts. One U.S. Congressman has proposed legislation to help mitigate certain COVID-related cyber attacks. Congressman Andy Barr (KY-06) recently introduced the NIST COVID-19 Cyber-Security Act, which instructs the director of the National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST) to create standards for mitigating and protecting against cyber attacks aimed at American universities researching the virus.
Security bug infestation. Apparently, there is a backlog of more than 57,000 unaddressed security issues as companies struggle to keep up the deluge of vulnerabilities affecting software and infrastructure. According to a new study by IBM and the Ponemon Institute, an average of 28% of vulnerabilities remain unmitigated. As a result, more than half (53%) of respondents to the survey confirm their organizations experienced a data breach in the past two years with 42% saying the breach occurred because a patch was available to fix a known vulnerability but was never applied.
Ineffective security processes were a big part of the problem: 57% of respondents said their firm doesn’t adequately identify which bugs are high priority while only a quarter base their bug patching on business impact.
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Symantec Security Summary – August 2021
LockBit, BlackMatter and some key advancements against cyber threats
Failing cyber security grades. The U.S. government got a major wake-up call this month after a government report issued by the Senate Homeland Security Committee found that critical federal agencies are still lacking basic cyber security protections. The report, issued on Aug. 3 through a bi-partisan congressional investigation, called out key agencies such as the State, Education, Agriculture, and Health and Human Services departments for not establishing effective cyber security programs and not sufficiently complying with federal information security standards. The result: The public’s sensitive information is now unnecessarily vulnerable to data breaches.
Among the key findings in the report, titled “Federal Cybersecurity: America’s Data Still at Risk,” were that seven agencies failed to comply with the Federal Information Security Modernization Act, signed into law by President Obama in 2014. The agencies earned an average C- grade for falling short of the federally-mandated standards. Among the many infractions were the State Department, which left thousands of accounts active on its classified and unclassified networks after employees had left, as well as the Education department, where auditors were able to exfiltrate hundreds of files containing sensitive, personally identifiable information.
The U.S. government got a major wake-up call this month after a government report issued by the Senate Homeland Security Committee found that critical federal agencies are still lacking basic cyber security protections.
In total, six agencies failed to install security patches and other controls used to remediate potential vulnerabilities while a handful of other agencies were still dependent on legacy systems and applications no longer supported by vendors via security updates. The Senate report concluded that the government needs to update EINSTEIN, the flagship cyber security program for federal agencies.
“From SolarWinds to recent ransomware attacks against critical infrastructure, it’s clear that cyber attacks are going to keep coming and it is unacceptable that our own federal agencies are not doing everything possible to safeguard America’s data,” said Republican Senator (OH) Rob Portman, one of the chairs of the committee issuing the report, in a prepared statement. Definitely not an impressive report card for the government in an era increasingly defined by cyber security risks.
Ransomware continues to rage with new threats emerging on the horizon. Take BlackMatter, a new ransomware gang charting its course by learning from the mistakes of notorious groups REvil and DarkSide. In an interview with Recorded Future, BlackMatter said it was interested in targeting large companies with more than $100 million, but claimed it would lay off extorting companies in some sectors, including healthcare, government, and critical infrastructure, among others.
In the interview, the BlackMatter developer denied earlier reports that the new group was behind the Darkside ransomware, which has disappeared since being at the heart of such high-profile attacks as the Colonial Pipeline. Ransomware experts made the link between the two because they are believed to use the same encryption routines. BlackMatter claims to be leveraging parts of the playbook from REvil, Darkside, and LockBit.
Speaking of LockBit, there has been a surge in ransomware activity associated with this group—an indicator, some say, that they are trying to fill the gap left by the Sodinokibi ransomware. An investigation by Symantec’s Threat Hunter Team found at least one former Sodinokibi affiliate now using LockBit—the attacks begin with a file named mimi.exe, which is an installer that drops a number of password-dumping tools. The Threat Hunter Team also found malware known as Neshta on a number of hosts associated with LockBit attacks. Check out the Symantec Threat Hunter blogs to get more in-depth information on this issue.
On a separate front, there is continued fall out from the SolarWinds supply chain attack in January.
Help wanted. Another sign the LockBit ransomware gang is gearing up on the attack front: The group is now trying to recruit corporate insiders to help breach and encrypt networks offering millions to those who carry out successful compromises. Rebranded in June as LockBit 2.0 ransomware-as-a-service, the new group is trying to cut out the middle man and go directly to recruit insiders who already have the proverbial “keys” to the corporate networks. LockBit 2.0 stated they are specifically looking for RDP, VPN, and corporate email credentials they can tap to gain network access.
On a separate front, there is continued fall out from the SolarWinds supply chain attack in January. The Russian hackers responsible have pivoted and gone after the U.S. Department of Justice. According to an official government statement, the Microsoft Office 365 email accounts of employees at 27 U.S. Attorneys’ offices were breached between May 7 and December 27, 2020.
Amidst the flurry of bad news, there were some key advancements in the war on cyber threats. One of the most promising is the new “Joint Cyber Defense Collaborative” (JCDC), stood up by the U.S. Cyber Security and Infrastructure Security Agency (CISA) as a public-private partnership to develop and implement better cyber security plans. Broadcom Software will be participating in the first meeting of the JCDC on Monday, Aug. 23. The partnership seeks to:
Design and implement comprehensive, whole-of-nation cyber defense plans to address risks and facilitate coordinated action;
Share insight to shape joint understanding of challenges and opportunities for cyber defense;
Implement coordinated defensive cyber operations to prevent and reduce impacts of cyber intrusions; and
Support joint exercises to improve cyber defense operations.
The Biden administration also took steps to improve cyber security for critical infrastructure control systems—a growing concern after the high-profile Colonial Pipeline attack and also viewed as a lever for a “real shooting war.” The executive order calls for voluntary measures such as encryption and two-factor authentication as part of an impetus for companies to develop cyber security performance goals.
There is also proposed legislation that would position ransomware as terrorism. The Sanction and Stop Ransomware Act, introduced by Senators Marco Rubio (R-FL) and Dianne Feinstein (D-CA), would sanction nations that back cyber attackers. The bill also calls for the development of regulations for cryptocurrency exchanges.
Random news. For those interested in bug bounty programs, here’s one. Twitter has launched its first AI program sponsored by its Machine Learning, Ethics,Transparency, and Accountability (META) team, challenging people to find bias in its image-cropping algorithm and offering up cash for the winners. First place prize: $3,500.
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Symantec Security Summary – December 2021
The global landscape sees increased cyber attacks
To complicate an already fraught global landscape, it appears nation-backed cyber security attacks are ramping up. On the one-year anniversary of the discovery of the SolarWinds supply chain attack, a Mandiant report finds the Russia-linked attackers are still training their exploits at multiple organizations in the technology sector. Identified by Microsoft as “Nobelium,” the group is now using a bespoke downloader called Ceeloader, which decrypts a shellcode payload to run in memory on an infected device. “The threat actors continue to innovate and identify new techniques and tradecraft to maintain persistent access to victim environments, hinder detection, and confuse attribution efforts,” the Mandiant report found.
Case in point: The French National Cyber Security Agency (ANSSI) warned that the same attackers have mounted multiple phishing campaigns against French organizations since February 2021. When the attackers compromised email accounts belonging to French organizations, they frequently used them to send “weaponized” emails to foreign institutions.
Move over Russia--Iran-related hacking activity is now on the rise. The Microsoft Threat Intelligence Center (MSTIC) has released a detailed report chronicling the evolution of six Iranian threat actors and highlighting the groups’ increasingly sophisticated attacks. Microsoft surfaced three notable trends: The groups are increasingly using ransomware to collect funds or disrupt their targets; they are exhibiting behavior that is more patient and persistent; and they are employing aggressive brute force attacks on intended targets. The Microsoft report concludes that the Iranian groups have evolved into more competent threat actors capable of conducting a full spectrum of operations, including ransomware and disk wipers, mobile malware, phishing attacks, password spray attacks, and even supply chain attacks.
Microsoft sent over 1,600 notifications to 40 IT companies, alerting them to hacking attempts coordinated by Iranian APT groups. There were only 48 such notifications in 2020, Microsoft said.
In a follow-up, the MSTIC and Microsoft’s Digital Security Unit (DSU) reported that Iranian threat actors are stepping up attacks against IT services companies as a way to access their customers’ networks—i.e., reminiscent of the SolarWinds supply chain attack. The partners assess that the string of activity is part of a broader espionage objective to compromise organizations of interests to the Iranian regime. "This activity is notable because targeting third parties has the potential to exploit more sensitive organizations by taking advantage of trust and access in a supply chain," Microsoft said. Just this year, Microsoft sent over 1,600 notifications to 40 IT companies, alerting them to hacking attempts coordinated by Iranian APT groups. There were only 48 such notifications in 2020, Microsoft said.
Heightened Iranian state-sponsored activity prompted a joint security alert from cyber security agencies in the United States, the United Kingdom, and Australia. The alert was authored by the U.S. Cyber Security and Infrastructure Security Agency (CISA), the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI), the Australian Cyber Security Centre (ACSC), and the U.K.'s National Cyber Security Centre (NCSC). It warns of active exploitation of Fortinet and Microsoft Exchange ProxyShell vulnerabilities by Iranian state-sponsored actors to gain initial access to vulnerable systems for follow-on activities, including data exfiltration and ransomware.
Iran is yet another foreign country with its fingers in election tampering. The U.S. Department of Justice recently indicted a pair of Iranian nationals for cyber activity intended to “intimate and influence” American voters during the 2020 U.S. presidential campaign. Among the charges filed against the Iranian nationals were hacking the voter websites of 11 U.S. states, hacking a U.S. media company, and contacting Republican Party members with fake videos of Democrats’ election fraud.
On a separate front, the Pegasus spyware developed by NSO Group of Israel has been found on iPhones belonging to at least nine U.S. State Department employees, according to Reuters. While the backstory behind this breach is still unclear, the hacks took place over the last few months and were targeted at officials based in Uganda or were working on issues related to that country. NSO Group says it doesn’t believe its tools were used, but plans to investigate anyway.
Despite the uptick in international and nation-state cyber crime, there’s bad news on the insurance front. Lloyd’s of London announced that costs associated with nation-state-related attacks will no longer be covered by its insurance policies. Its new “Cyber War and Cyber Operation Exclusion Clauses” will exclude losses related to a cyber operation carried out as part of a war, any retaliatory attacks between specified states, or a cyber-operation that “has a major detrimental impact on the functioning of a state.” Under the new clauses, the company can also refuse to pay out for nation-state-backed attacks that hit essential services like financial institutions, financial market infrastructure, health services, and other utilities.
A cyber attack thought to be ransomware has forced more than 300 supermarkets in northern England to temporarily shut down and switch to cash-only payments.
Ransomware continues to be this year’s biggest cyber scourge. According to report from threat intelligence firm ProDaft, attackers using the Conti ransomware have collected at least $25.5 million in ransom payments since July 2021. Add hotels to the list of victims. It recently disclosed a Conti ransomware attack that impacted guest reservation and room key card systems. The hotel chain says it doesn’t appear that any guest data has been leaked and no ransom demand has been made yet. A cyber attack thought to be ransomware has forced more than 300 supermarkets in northern England to temporarily shut down and switch to cash-only payments.
A new report also finds double extortion tactics are escalating in ransomware attacks. Group-IB’s Hi-Tech Crime Trends Report 2021/2022 finds a 935% spike in the number of organizations hit by double-extortion ransomware, which exposes their stolen data on a data leak site. And on the recovery front, a new report from Sophos reveals it costs more for targets in the education sector to come back from ransomware attacks compared to other industry sectors. Education organizations incur around $2.73 million in expenses to cover downtime, data recovery, device and network repairs, and security updates—on top of ransom payments—which is 48% higher than the global average across all sectors.
Despite everything, ninety percent of IT decision makers admit they’re willing to compromise on cyber security initiatives in order to achieve other digital transformation goals and only half of respondents are confident that the C-suite fully understands cyber risks, according to new Trend Micro research.
Strap in—it’s going to be a bumpy ride.
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Symantec Security Summary – February 2021
Nation state attacks, Industrial IoT and more ransomware
Nation-state attacks escalate. As the New Year kicked off, so did news of cyber-attacks linked to nation states. North Korean hackers were accused of stealing virtual assets worth $316.4 million between 2019 and November 2020, according to a confidential United Nations report. The report, obtained by CNN, accused the North Korean regime of conducting “operations against financial institutions and virtual currency exchange houses” to fund its nuclear and missile programs and to keep the country’s struggling economy afloat.
Links between North Korean hackers and cryptocurrency exchanges have already been credibly established: A 2019 report alleged the heavily-sanctioned nation state had amassed around $2 billion from its infiltration of cryptocurrency exchanges in the preceding five years. And as Broadcom/Symantec research noted, the recent appreciation in the price of Bitcoin means that if that particular cryptocurrency was part of the heist, the illegal bounty is worth far more today than it was when stolen.
Another nation state made a debut in the on-going SolarWinds cyber security saga. Russia was purportedly behind the massive supply chain hack last December that took aim at high-profile targets like the U.S. Commerce, Treasury, Homeland Security, and Energy departments along with private companies. But now Reuters is reporting that Chinese hackers also got in on the game, choosing a different line of attack. The Russia-backed hackers orchestrated the breach by planting malicious code in software updates to the Orion network monitoring tool, impacting as many as 18,000 customers. However, the suspected Chinese crew exploited a separate software flaw in the SolarWinds platform to break into other government agencies, potentially compromising data on thousands of government employees.
As the fallout from the SolarWinds attack continues, the U.S. court system has ditched electronic submission of legal documents in sensitive cases due to concerns its systems have been compromised. The federal courts handed down an order specifying that any documents that “contain information that is likely to be of interest to the intelligence service of a foreign government” will now go back to having to be printed out and delivered in a physical format.
The so-called Domestic Kitten group, has reportedly been conducting widespread surveillance for the last four years on a target list of about 1,200 individuals using a mobile malware called Furball to carry out its spying.
Apart from these high-profile examples, Iranian state-based hacking groups hit the radar screen, accused of spying on Iranian citizens around the globe, according to research from Check Point and SafeBreach Labs. The so-called Domestic Kitten group, has reportedly been conducting widespread surveillance for the last four years on a target list of about 1,200 individuals using a mobile malware called Furball to carry out its spying. The malware is then spread using phishing, Iranian websites, Telegram channels, and malicious SMS messages and can grab call logs, record communications, even steal files. The same research team highlighted another Iran-linked group, dubbed Infy, which was involved in similar spying campaigns, but with far fewer targets.
In response to heightened activity, the Biden administration is taking steps to improve cyber security measures. At a recent national security speech at the State Department, President Biden said they have “elevated the status of cyber issues within our government” and “are launching an urgent initiative to improve our capability, readiness, and resilience in cyberspace.” As part of the plan, the administration hired National Security Agency (NSA) official Anne Neuberger to serve in the new position of Deputy National Security Adviser for cyber and emerging technology. Previously, Neuberger led the NSA cyber security defense operations and was behind the agency group tasked with protecting the 2018 mid-term elections from Russian interference.
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Industrial IoT cyber security nightmare. An incident in early February is a nod to future cyber security disasters as more devices and critical civil infrastructure is connected to the Internet. An unknown hacker broker into a water treatment plant in Oldsmar, FL, and took over the controls system to increase the levels of lye in the water to dangerous levels. Luckily, a watchful plant operator saw the breach happening in real-time, shutting the infiltration down and remedying the systems before the public was in danger.
Timing of the breach was also alarming—it occurred the Friday of Super Bowl weekend, which was held in nearby Tampa. The plant has disabled the remote access capabilities for its systems for now and is working with the FBI and Secret Service to investigate.
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Cyber criminals hit pay dirt. All that ransomware activity seems to be paying off. Despite an overall decline in cyber-criminal activity, payments to ransomware gangs surged during 2020. According to research from Chainalysis, a blockchain analysis firm, ransomware payments using cryptocurrency spiked 311% in 2020, reaching a total volume of $350 million. Profits appear to be concentrated among a core group of attackers—80% of the money gleaned from ransomware attacks has been traced to less than 200 cryptocurrency wallets, the research found.
On the up side, Chainalysis found there is some distance between digital currency transactions and cyber-crime. Cyber-crime transactions using cryptocoins shrunk nearly in half to approximately $10 billion, and because the overall cyptocurrency transaction volumes are up, the share of cyber crime is even smaller – now only .34% of transactions in 2020, down from more than 2% in 2019.
WastedLocker - The Inside Story
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Symantec Security Summary – January 2021
The U.S. Capitol, SolarWinds and Babuk Locker
Sedition and cyber risk. As learn more about what transpired during the assault on the Capitol building on Jan. 6, the offensive has also opened up a Pandora’s Box of information security risks and data privacy concerns, related to everything from missing laptops to the potential for malware and other national security and intelligence threats.
As rioters stormed the building, they broke into Congressional offices, ransacked papers, and in a few cases, stole laptops, including one from Jeff Merkley, the Democratic senator from Oregon, and another unit used for presentations swiped from the office of House Speaker Nancy Pelosi.
While there is no evidence that skilled hackers or committed spies were part of the coordinated mob, the thefts do shine a spotlight on Congress’ overall security posture and raise concerns about whether individual legislators are doing enough to safeguard their computing devices and networks from direct access and infiltration. Security experts say physical access can be even more dangerous than a cyber breach because hackers gain options for compromising a device and its material. In addition, any paperwork on legislators’ desks was left open to exposure, and looters could have captured sensitive material simply by taking photos on their cell phones.
Countermeasures in the works. Experts contend the incident must be treated as a legitimate breach of IT assets, involving such measures as sweeping devices, monitoring network traffic, and also taking surveillance countermeasures to ensure there were no eavesdropping devices planted. One upside is that Senate rules passed a couple of years back to mandate encryption by default for all new devices. In addition, the legislative body works on a two-to-three-year upgrade cycle—an indicator that there is a relatively robust level of data security protection on individual computers.
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In other government-related cyber security news, there is continuing fallout from the on-going SolarWinds attack revealed last month. The massive, on-going intrusion campaign, said to be perpetrated by Russian hackers and spanning government agencies, private companies, and infrastructure entities, is now thought to comprise a variety of unidentified tactics—not just a breach of the SolarWinds Orion infrastructure monitoring and management platform.
The Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency (CISA) issued an alert warning that some victims of the hack had been breached without ever using the SolarWinds platform. Hackers used “tactics, techniques, and procedures that have not yet been discovered,” the alert revealed, and the on-going cyber campaign began as early as March 2019—a harbinger of its sweeping impact.
The hackers turned to a rarely-used technique to keep their command and control (C&C) communications under the radar—a tactic explored in a Symantec Threat Hunter Team blog post. According to the post, the malware used to Trojanize the SolarWinds Orion software employed a domain generation algorithm (DGA) to generate domain names to contact for C&C purposes. Instead of randomly generating characters, this DGA encodes information into the text making up the generated domain names, which helps it fly under the radar. A separate report maintains that malware known as Sunspot was deployed in the SolarWinds build environment and used to inject the Sunburst backdoor into the Orion software.
The Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency (CISA) issued an alert warning that some victims of the hack had been breached without ever using the SolarWinds platform.
A new focus. A new office at the State Department, the Bureau of Cyberspace Security and Emerging Technologies (CSET), was recently approved to address cyber security and emerging technologies, including working to prevent cyber conflicts with adversarial nations. The incoming Biden administration has also announced plans for the first deputy national security adviser for cyber and emerging technology to be held by Anne Neuberger, who most recently had oversight of an organization tasked with preventing digital threats to sensitive government and military industry networks.
Deep investigative dive. SolarWinds, the company whose cyber security software is at the epicenter of the national security breach, is taking on-going steps to mitigate the damage. The firm recently hired Christopher Krebs, the former director of the U.S. Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency (CISA) to consult on the breach and investigate how hackers penetrated its Orion software with malicious code. Krebs, fired by the Trump administration, has started a cyber security consulting company with Alex Stamos, formerly Chief Security Officer at Facebook.
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Buyer beware. PayPal users should beware of a SMS phishing (dubbed smishing) campaign that tries to trick people into handing over account credentials and other sensitive personal data. An SMS message asserts that the recipient’s PayPal account has been “limited” due to suspicious activity and asks the receiver to verify their account by clicking on a link. If they bite, the link serves up a fake PayPal login screen that sends entered information such as data of birth, bank details, etc. to attackers. Paypal advises anyone who has fallen for the attack to immediately go to the site and change their password.
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What is Babuk Locker? The first new targeted enterprise ransomware of 2021. Discovered by security researcher Chuong Dong, the ransomware operation targets corporate victims in human-operated attacks with ransom demands ranging in the tens of thousands of dollars to be paid in Bitcoin. Already claiming victims as diverse an elevator and escalator company to a medical testing products manufacturer, Babuk Locker executables are customized on a per-victim basis to contain a hardcoded extension, ransom note, and a Tor victim URL. While Dong says the coding is not very advanced, Babuk Locker includes secure encryption preventing victims from recovering their files free of charge.
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Symantec Security Summary – July 2020
Ransomware, Elections and Cyber Insurance
Ransomware on the rise. Russian hackers are at it again, this time trying to infiltrate the networks of 31 organizations, including eight Fortune 500 companies, to stage ransomware attacks designed to cripple their IT infrastructure.
The attackers breached the corporate networks with the intent of unleashing the WastedLocker ransomware. WastedLocker is a relatively new malware associated with Evil Corp., a cyber crime outfit once associated with the Dridex banking Trojan and BitPaymer ransomware. The attack was proactively detected and disrupted by Symantec, a division of Broadcom (NASDAQ: AVGO), using its Targeted Attack Cloud Analytics, which employs machine learning to spot activity patterns that might indicate a targeted attack. Symantec’s Threat Hunter team swooped in as back up, verifying the attack while linking it closely to publicly documented activity seen in prior WasterLocker strikes.
What to watch for. The attacks are seeded with a malicious JavaScript-based framework dubbed SocGholish, which masquerades as a software update and was tracked by Symantec to more than 150 compromised websites. Once the attackers gain access to the victim’s network, they use Cobalt Strike commodity malware in tandem with a number of living-off-the-land tools to steal credentials, escalate privileges, and move across the network in order to deploy the WastedLocker ransomware on multiple computers.
Russian hackers are at it again, this time trying to infiltrate the networks of 31 organizations, including eight Fortune 500 companies, to stage ransomware attacks designed to cripple their IT infrastructure.
The fallout. Upon further investigation, Symantec was able to confirm that dozens of U.S. newspaper websites owned by the same parent company were compromised and used by the Evil Corp. attackers to infect potential victims. The Broadcom subsidiary is now identifying tools and tactics used by the attackers to strengthen its defenses against all stages of the attack. Among the interesting, but more alarming things Symantec discovered was that the malware, deployed on common websites, looked for signs that a computer was part of a corporate or government network before infecting.
The bigger picture could be even more alarming. Officials are concerned that ransomware like WastedLocker could be a real problem leading up to and during the Nov. 3 election. According to the New York Times report on the WastedLocker campaign, the FBI has warned that ransomware attacks on county and state government networks could threaten the availability of “data on interconnected election servers” even if that isn’t the original intent of the bad actors.
There’s more where that came from. In other ransomware news, other large corporations appear to be among the latest victims of the Maze ransomware. The Maze gang claims to have stolen more than 100GB of files and has threatened to publish the information if a ransom isn’t paid.
Security researchers have also discovered a new strain of Mac ransomware called EvilQuest. The malware appears to have been found hidden inside pirated Mac software uploaded to torrent websites and online forums, tucked into a Google Software Update, in a pirated version of Mixed In Key DJ software, and slipped into a Mac security tool called Little Snitch.
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Election interference concerns mount. Just as the WastedLocker attacks portend trouble for the Nov. 3 election, this summer’s most high-profile attack aimed at Twitter is considered by many to be another warning shot. The hack seized control of well-known blue checkmark accounts for Bill Gates, Joe Biden, Barack Obama, and host of key business leaders, tweeting links to bitcoin scams. Twitter ended up shutting down verified accounts while it investigated the breach—a move, cyber security experts claim, that would be disastrous closer to election time as it could incite chaos and erode confidence in democracy and institutions right before the vote.
The Twitter hack should also be a wake-up call to organizations about the realities and risks of social engineering attacks. Twitter said an internal employee was the conduit for accessing the social network’s internal administrative tools, which provided entrée to the hackers. However, the
exploit underscores that employees continue to pose significant cyber security risks, and enterprises need to step up efforts in training and insider-threat detection and prevention to close those gaps.
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Insurance policy. One way companies are protecting themselves against the fallout from cyber security risks is by adopting cyber insurance. Cowbell Cyber, a company that deals with threats and exposure, did an analysis which found that Subject Matter Experts (SMEs), in particular, are embracing cyber insurance as part of their cyber resilience plans. According to the report, 65% of SMEs are planning to spend more on cyber insurance over the next two years compared to 58% of large companies.
SMEs believe the investment is well worth it: Forty-five percent of those surveyed believe their businesses will experience a breach over the next year, and 62% of SME respondents said that cyber insurance is well worth the protection.
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Symantec Security Summary – March 2021
SolarWinds, Accellion breach and schools
Biden administration vs. nation-state cyber attacks. It seems pretty clear that the Biden Administration is making cyber security a top priority after a pair of high-profile nation-state attacks reverberated across industries and government during the administration’s first months in office.
In December, Russian hackers compromised the SolarWinds Orion infrastructure monitoring and management platform, using the companies’ build system to push malicious updates to approximately 18,000 of the company’s corporate and government customers. Later, it became clear that China also targeted SolarWinds customers in what was billed as an entirely separate operation.
If that wasn’t enough to sound alarm bells, U.S. officials issued an emergency warning this month after Microsoft reported its Exchange mail and calendar server program was breached by a hacking group working for the Chinese government. Microsoft detected multiple Zero-day exploits used to access on-premises Exchange servers and email accounts while paving the way for installation of additional malware.
The Microsoft Threat Intelligence Center (MSTIC) singled out HAFNIUM for the attacks, a group assessed to be a state sponsor operating out of China, which primarily targets U.S. entities across a range of industry sectors, from higher education to defense contractors and infectious disease researchers. Reports were that the breach affected at least 30,000 public and private entities in the United States alone, although U.S. officials said there was no indications that federal agencies or major defense contractors were caught in the crosshairs.
It seems pretty clear that the Biden Administration is making cyber security a top priority after a pair of high-profile nation-state attacks reverberated across industries and government during the administration’s first months in office.
The U.S. Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency (CISA) issued a rare emergency directive requiring all government networks to upgrade to the latest Exchange software update to fend off the hackers. In a blog post updated on March 3, the software giant said it continues to see multiple actors taking advantage of unpatched systems to attack organizations with on-premises Exchange Servers. According to Krebs on Security reports, two unnamed cyber security experts who briefed U.S. national security advisors have credited the attack with seizing control over “hundreds of thousands” of Microsoft Exchange servers worldwide—each system representing one organization reliant on Microsoft Exchange for email.
A New York Times story said that the Biden administration was already preparing a response to the SolarWinds attack via a series of sanctions along with clandestine actions across Russian networks that will be apparent to President Vladimir Putin and his intelligence and military apparatus, but not the world at large. On the heels of the Chinese Microsoft Exchange attack, a “whole of government response” has been elevated and tasked to Anne Neuberger, appointed by the Biden administration to the new post of Deputy National Security Adviser for Cyber and Emerging Technologies.
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Hunting bug bounties. An independent security researcher scored a $50,000 bug bounty for his discovery of a vulnerability that could let anyone take over any Microsoft account without a user’s knowledge or consent. Laxman Muthiyah uncovered a flaw in Microsoft’s account recovery process that enabled him to brute-force the seven-digit security code sent to a user’s email address or mobile phone to confirm identity before a password reset that would recover access to their account. Although Microsoft imposes rate limits, encryption, and other checks to prevent such brute-force attacks, Muthiyah was able to “automate the entire process from encrypting the code to sending multiple concurrent requests.”
Muthiyah reported the glitch to Microsoft and a patch was issued last November. He got his bounty award on Feb. 9 via the Hacker One bug bounty platform.
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The number of companies impacted by the Accellion breach continues to grow. Accellion, an IT provider that provides file transfer services to more than 3,000 clients, confirmed that UNC3546, a criminal attacker, had exploited multiple vulnerabilities in its software to install malware. When the breach was first discovered in December, multiple outlets linked the attack to a ransomware gang known as Clop along with another hacking group called FIN11.
Initially, a large grocery store chain reported that personal data from some of its pharmacy services customers might have been stolen, including Social Security numbers and some medical history. After that report, other companies confirmed similar attacks, including a prominent law firm Jones Day, a university, and bank in New Zealand, among others.
Social security numbers and home addresses of employees were allegedly posted on the Clop ransomware gang’s leaks site with the intention of extorting the bank to pay up.
Now, the second-largest savings bank in the United States, says it’s been affected and has started notifying customers. Social security numbers and home addresses of employees were allegedly posted on the Clop ransomware gang’s leaks site with the intention of extorting the bank to pay up.
Additionally another cyber security business has also been swept up in the latest wave of attacks with its files reportedly being leaked to the Clop ransomware site. Data published on the leaks site includes invoices, purchase orders, tax documents, and scan reports. It’s not yet known if Clop sent ransom notes to the company before leaking the data, but other victims have received them in the past.
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School house hacks. It’s not just businesses who are experiencing a rise in cyber crime—a new analysis on the state of cyber security in K-12 schools in the United States found a record-breaking number of incidents occurred last year.
New research released at the K-12 Cyber Security Leadership Symposium recorded 408 publicly disclosed school incidents this past year, including student and staff data breaches, ransomware outbreaks, phishing, and social engineering. The report found that “school district responses to the COVID-19 pandemic also revealed significant gaps and critical failures in the resiliency and security of the K-12 educational technology ecosystem.” The surge in school cyber incidents were blamed for school closures, millions of dollars of stolen taxpayer dollars, and student data breaches connected to identity theft and fraud.
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Symantec Security Summary – November 2021
Supply chain attacks, ransomware and government initiatives
The U.S. government fired off major salvos in its ongoing cyber security offensive. Executing a two-pronged approach, the Biden administration advanced serious efforts to get the government’s cyber security house in order while taking aggressive steps to combat on-going foreign and domestic cyber security attacks.
On the home front, the Biden administration rolled out a bug fix mandate, giving civilian federal agencies six months to patch cyber security threats found between 2017 and 2020. The Cyber Security and Infrastructure Security Agency’s (CISA) first-of-its-kind directive covers 200 known threats discovered by experts during that period as well as 90 additional flaws found in 2021. The goal, the report says, is to force agencies to fix all potential threats, major or not, and to establish a basic list for private and public organizations to follow.
At the State Department, cyber security has been identified as one of five pillars in the agency’s modernization effort. Along with stepped up efforts to hire more STEM workers and to update the department’s capabilities for remote work, Secretary of State Antony Blinken is aiming to create a new bureau for cyber space and digital policy to bring American diplomacy into the 21st century. As part of the effort, the agency is planning to add 500 new civil service positions and increase its IT budgets by 50%.
There is also a crackdown on escalating cyber attacks. The Justice Department is promising arrests and other actions as part of on-going efforts to combat ransomware and other cyber crime. In recent interviews, Deputy Attorney General Lisa Monaco promised more arrests, seizures of ransom payments to hackers, and new law enforcement operations in the “days and weeks to come.” The department made good on that promise with new charges brought against a suspect in Ukraine over the July REvil ransomware attack on software company Kaseya, which reportedly infected 1,500 businesses. The government also seized an estimated $6 million in ransom payments as part of the operation.
In addition, the Justice Department announced the Civil Cyber-Fraud Initiative, which will pursue contractors which hide or fail to notify the government about cyber security breaches using the False Claims Act.
The Justice Department is promising arrests and other actions as part of on-going efforts to combat ransomware and other cyber crime.
Ransomware once again in the spotlight. The U.S. government convened a major global ransomware summit last month with participation from more than 30 countries. The two-day virtual event was aimed at improving global network resilience, addressing illicit cryptocurrency usage, and elevating both law enforcement collaboration and diplomatic efforts. While rival nations Russia and China weren’t invited to this summit, officials didn’t rule out including them in future sessions.
A multi-country operation was responsible for turning the tables on the ransomware group REvil (aka Leafroller, Sodinokibi), hacking it and forcing it offline in recent weeks. A report from Reuters alleged that the FBI, along with Cyber Command, the Secret Service, and like-minded countries were engaged in a coordinated action against REvil and other cyber-crime groups. Sources close to the investigation told Reuters that the initiative has successfully compromised REvil’s computer network infrastructure and gained control over some of its servers. REvil, reportedly responsible for the May cyber attack on Colonial Pipeline and meatpacker JBS, was shut down temporarily in July in the aftermath of the Kaseya ransomware supply chain breach.
The Darkside ransomware gang was also in U.S. government’s targets. The State Department said it is offering a $10 million reward for any information that may lead to the identification of members of the gang, which is linked to a group Symantec tracks as Coreid. There is a $5 million reward for information leading to the arrest and/or conviction in any country of any individual conspiring to participate in a DarkSide variant ransomware incident, according to a press release put out by the government.
In the spirit of protecting critical infrastructure, the FBI, NSA, CISA, and EPA issued a joint cyber security advisory on threats aimed at water facilities. The advisory warned of “on-going malicious cyber activity” by known and unknown threat vectors on U.S. water and waste system facilities, which could impede the ability to provide clean and portable drinking water and to manage wastewater.
Russia is at it again. Despite earlier sanctions imposed by the Biden Administration in response to some of these cyber operations, the Russian intelligence agency (the S.V.R.) has launched a new campaign to infiltrate thousands of U.S. government, corporate, and thinktank computer networks, according to warnings from Microsoft and cyber security experts. Categorized by a top Microsoft security officer as “large and on-going,” the effort is reportedly aimed at data stored in the cloud. Microsoft is insisting the percentage of successful breaches are small, but it recently notified more than 600 organizations that they had been the target of approximately 23,000 attempts to breach systems.
Employees in the financial sector take note: A phishing scam called MirrorBlast aims to trick employees into downloading weaponized Excel files to scam and infiltrate corporate networks. Cyber security company ET Labs, which discovered the campaign, maintains the weaponized Excel file can easily bypass malware detection systems because it’s accompanied by extremely lightweight embedded macros.
Supply chain attacks are surging, according to data breach reports. New information from the Identity Theft Resource Center (ITRC) claims that a total of 793,000 more individuals have been affected by supply chain attacks this year so far than in all of 2020. The North Korean group Lazarus (aka Appleworm) is the latest to mount software supply chain attacks, according to new research from Kaspersky. They claim Lazarus group is using updated variants of the DeathNote cluster and BLINDINGCAN malware to build supply chain attack capabilities with recent attacks specifically targeting a South Korean think tank and an IT asset monitoring solution vendor.
Overall, there’s been a rise in global cyber attacks since the onset of the COVID-19 pandemic, according to new analysis from Check Point. Check Points reports there are 40% more attacks weekly on organizations this year compared to last year, with the average increase in the United States even higher, at 53%. The research found those in the education/research sector experiencing the highest volume of attacks followed by government/military and then health care. VirusTotal reports there are more than 130 different ransomware families now in circulation.
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Symantec Security Summary – September 2020
Protecting the vote and more security news
Cyber attacks on the rise. It appears that the cyber security industry can’t escape the general consensus that 2020 is shaping up to be the year we hope to soon forget. In fact, a new report finds there were more cyber attacks in the first half of 2020 than all of 2019. Chalk it up to the sharp transition to remote work and school due to the COVID-19 pandemic or the rapid growth of ransomware-as-a-service offerings—the report said both contributed to the burgeoning number of attacks in the first half of this year.
VPN vulnerabilities are another growing concern. The U.S. government issued a warning about an Iranian espionage group known as Pioneer Kitten, which was found exploiting recently-patched vulnerabilities in Pulse Secure Citrix NetScaler and F5 VPN products. According to the joint alert, put out by the Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency (CISA) and the FBI, Pioneer Kitten is taking aim at companies in the IT, government, healthcare, financial, insurance, and media sectors across the United States, using mass scanning tools to identify open ports and then exploiting VPN vulnerabilities to gain network access. The goal, according to the agencies, is to install ransomware on the victim’s network.
Speaking of ransomware—it continues to be a major threat vector, particularly in the public sector as of late. After a ransomware attack hit a school’s IT network, the city was forced to postpone its first day of school. In a statement, the school district confirmed it was hit by a ransomware attack that impacted several of its internal IT systems that managed school buses and transportation routes, causing a prolonged outage that set them back a day from the planned Sept. 8th opening.
The 10th largest school division in the United States, was also hit by a ransomware attack, and the Virginia-based school district was working with law enforcement to investigate. While the district didn’t specify the strain of ransomware used in the attack, the Maze group claimed responsibility, publishing an archive of roughly 100MB (about 2% of what was stolen) of student data and administrative documents before encrypting files.
It appears that the cyber security industry can’t escape the general consensus that 2020 is shaping up to be the year we hope to soon forget.
Beyond schools, the Fourth District Court of Louisiana became a target, hit by the Conti ransomware group in an attack that knocked its website offline and published stolen court data on the dark web.
Beyond these incidents, other garden variety cyber threats continue to rear their head. In one example, there was fall out from a developer on GitHub who leaked AWS keys. While GitHub initiated a response, it didn’t fully address the issue. Over a 30-day period, researchers scanned more than 150 million entities from GitHub, GitLab, and Pastebin and found nearly 800,000 exposed access keys, 40% of which were tied to database stores, 38% to cloud services, and 11% to online services. These type of credentials could allow unauthorized access to company data in databases or in the cloud; alternatively, unauthorized users could also expose, destroy, or use the data for manipulation.
The stakes are high. The fallout from any type of cyber attack could be severe as exemplified by what just befell a coffee chain. The parent company of the coffee and donut chain just settled a lawsuit brought by New York’s attorney general, which claimed it ignored cyber attacks that compromised the online accounts of its customers. They doled out $650,000 in fines and costs and agreed to upgrade its security protocols.
In the meantime, there are new efforts to fight back against cyber security transgressions. Just this week [SEPT 14], the House passed bi-partisan legislation aimed at improving security for federal Internal-connected devices. The Internet of Things (IoT) Cybersecurity Improvement Act would require all Internet-connected devices purchased by the federal government to comply with minimum security recommendations outlined by the National Institute of Standards and Technology. It also mandates companies or groups providing such devices to the federal government to notify agencies if the IoT device has a vulnerability that could open the door to an attack.
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Protecting the vote. In the countdown to the 2020 election, the U.S. government and the private sector are taking steps to try to curb the spread of misinformation and ward off the possibility of foreign interference in the vote.
Microsoft recently stepped up with warnings that the Russian military intelligence unit that attacked the DNC in 2016 is back at it, this time taking aim at people and resources associated with both Democrats and Republicans. Chinese hackers were discovered ramping up attacks on the private emails of staffers associated with the Biden campaign along with targets in academia and the national security establishment.
In the countdown to the 2020 election, the U.S. government and the private sector are taking steps to try to curb the spread of misinformation and ward off the possibility of foreign interference in the vote.
Tech companies have been working with federal agencies to support efforts to secure the November election. In fact, members of a government-private-sector consortium meet regularly to discuss trends and to compare notes on illicit activities and behaviors happening on their respective platforms.
With cyber security experts in short supply, some states are calling in the big guns—literally, the National Guard to help protect the integrity of the 2020 election. Ten states have already committed to using their Army or Air Force National Guard cyber security units to safeguard the election process and there are many more evaluating the opportunity, government officials said. The guard personnel will offer general support such as evaluating infrastructure for vulnerabilities and performing tasks such as network intrusion analysis and cyber hunting.
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Symantec Smart Government: Cyber Redefined
Here’s how government agency technical experts are moving data to the cloud securely and the best practices they’ve learned along the way
Data breaches are on the rise, which is too often the result of a misconfigured system within a cloud infrastructure as was the case in the recent theft of the personal details of more than 106 million credit card applicants from cloud storage. This latest incident really highlights the need for extending on-premises defense in depth approaches used into the cloud.
Therefore, it is critical that government IT decision makers have venues where they can learn about the latest best practices and tools fellow government IT and information security executives are applying to secure their migration to the cloud.
On August 6, Symantec hosted the “Navigating the Government Cloud Security Voyage Lunch” event focused on how to effectively secure cloud migration.
We had a great lineup of government agency technical experts who talked about their migration to the cloud and shared best practices. We wrapped up the event with Symantec’s John Emerson, director of cloud product sales, who spoke about our cloud security portfolio and touched upon some unique capabilities that Symantec offers and why they are important.
Daniel Jacobs, Senior Security Architect, Centers of Excellence, within the Technology Transfer Services of the U.S. General Services Administration (GSA), gave the opening keynote. The key takeaway: The greatest challenge for agencies in their cloud journey is “to change the narrative away from incentivizing product-heavy, siloed security models. Some of those may look great on dashboards,” he said.
“But we need to move the incentive toward outcome-based, cooperative systems that are directly aimed at the relative credible threats that you are experiencing today. In your cloud journey, it is critically important that you work with partners and consider all your objectives,” Jacobs said.
“Agencies which operate their security in a vacuum should expect to suffocate,” because there are too many resources available to help agencies branch out and expand – from Bug Bounties to threat intelligence programs and services.
Cloud and Security Opportunities
A consistent theme running among the government executives who participated in the panel discussion was that the migration to the cloud offers the opportunity to consolidate and modernize their approach to security. In summary, each panelist was asked to give one piece of advice they could give attendees about mitigating cyber risk and taking advantage of the cloud.
“Use an agile approach and take small pieces at a time, and do your lessons learned,” said Denise Hill, Acting Deputy Chief Information Officer for Enterprise Policy, Portfolio Management and Governance with the Department of Energy. Additionally, agencies should adopt governance models “because that is where you get a lot of the collaboration” within agencies.
“When you are designing, design for your marginal communities,” Andrew Marquardt, Chief Enterprise Architect with the U.S. Bureau of Reclamation, advised. “If you do that average design, you are going to fail all the time. Because there is no such thing as an average user,” such as the case with the Bureau which has workers in low-bandwidth locations and in many cases offline.
A consistent theme running among the government executives who participated in the panel discussion was that the migration to the cloud offers the opportunity to consolidate and modernize their approach to security.
Agency managers should make sure they are achieving the goals they want as their agencies move to the cloud, according to John Evans, Chief Information Security Officer for the State of Maryland. “A lot of agencies in the state wanted to do a simple lift and shift into the cloud. We determined that wasn’t a great way to do things for most of our use cases in the state,” Evans said. The state would have missed out on the opportunities to look at business process reengineering, leverage the cloud service providers native offerings, employ containerization and micro-segmentation. Plus, the agencies would continue to accrue more technical debt as they maintained legacy systems. Consequently, “it is worth doing a rebuild of applications versus lift and shift.”
“Take more risk, but ensure those risks are calculated,” said Jeff Harris, Chief of Cyber Security Operations with the U.S. Small Business Administration (SBA). “SBA is a risk-tolerant organization and is like being at Google, which is agile focused. This allows the agency to take advantage of ideas and creativity of its people,” he noted.
Symantec’s Approach
From a Symantec perspective, the areas that agencies need to secure are email, network, endpoints and cloud apps. Agencies are leveraging security services across determination points such as user behavior, threat protection, data protection, Emerson said.
“The ideal architecture is where you are leveraging those core services across the agency for the aspect of your organization you are trying to secure,” Emerson said. If done right, it is built once and put in place for the whole organization rather than having multiple systems for virus protection, anti-malware or data protection.
Emerson described how agencies can extend their data protection services into the cloud with solutions such as Symantec Data Loss Prevention and gain visibility into the cloud with Cloud Security Access Broker.
Symantec’s Smart Government: Cyber Redefined Lunch Series gathers government experts and leading cyber practitioners to discuss the issues most pertinent to government IT decision makers and help them learn how access governance, information protection and advanced threat protection can mitigate the risks inherent in government cloud adoption.
As part of this program, Symantec is regularly publishing thought leadership content and recaps of the events on a separate microsite, dedicated to federal, state and local cyber professionals. For more content please click here.
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Symantec Suggests 4 Steps You Can Take Today to Combat Zero-day Attacks
Helping navigate a new landscape
Protecting against zero-day vulnerabilities has always been a challenge for organization. It can feel like climbing a mountain with no summit. But changes in the threat landscape have made these threats even more dangerous.
First, attackers have shifted from targeting vulnerabilities in web browsers, to going after the likes of Microsoft Exchange, web servers and remote access software. The top 20 exploits blocked by Symantec in 2021 were all targeted at servers.
And once a zero-day becomes public attackers move faster in exploiting these vulnerabilities than organization can in updating software. Take Log4J, a widely used java-based logging utility on web servers. It was discovered in early December of 2021. Attackers were so focused on taking advantage of this new vulnerability that by the end of the month Symantec had blocked more attacks attempting to exploit these Log4J than any other vulnerability in 2021.
The situation is challenging. Patch management critical. But additional steps can be taken to address this situation. Here are 4 things you can do.
Employee Training
While not as popular, exploiting vulnerabilities that target end-users has not gone away. And employees still need proper training to recognize phishing threats and social engineering ruses. It still only takes a single click of an email or a visit to a compromised web site, combined with a vulnerability exploit, to spread malicious software into the corporate network.
Threat Intelligence
There is a lot of Threat Intelligence products out there. They offer a wide array of features. There is much to get excited about as these feeds can provide deep insight on threats. But in evaluating Threat Intelligence don’t forget vulnerabilities. You want a feed you can customize to alert you of vulnerabilities in the software that you use. Forewarned is forearmed.
Demand Transparency From Your Suppliers
We’ll never have bug free software, so start with having your vendors explain their polices and procedure around software vulnerabilities. Have they published Responsible Disclosure guidelines? Do they have a simple and easy way to report vulnerabilities? How do they deliver patches to update any affected products? Start by asking your vendors these questions. And hold them accountable.
The next step is to ask about their secure coding practices and protecting you against supply chain attack. Secure coding is an evolving discipline. We don’t have all the answers yet. Smart vendors view it as a journey, not a destination. So look for a plan that’s focused on constant, incremental improvements.
Harden Your Servers
Servers are under attack. They can be exploited as a gateway into an organization. They also hold data that attackers want to steal. Hardening them against zero-days is a critical part of a proactive defense.
The right solution is something like Symantec Data Center Security (DCS). DCS was designed to enable hardening against vulnerabilities, to protect your servers even before patches are deployed. As an example, take the threat from Log4J. DCS had multiple policies in place preventing Log4J, or any other vulnerability, from being exploited on servers it protected.
Of course, DCS does a lot more. It delivers comprehensive server protection, providing visibility, compliance, monitoring, and management for a broad array of OSs and legacy servers.
Today the threat from vulnerabilities is as high as it’s ever been. Proactive protection is critical. For information on how Symantec can help contact us.
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Symantec Takes Microsoft Purview to the Next Level
New DLP and CASB integration with MS Purview enhances data security
Safeguarding sensitive data has become paramount for organizations across various industries. But while traditionally stored on premises, customer records, financial data, and intellectual property have now found their way into the cloud. Data protection has become complex.
Microsoft Purview Information Protection (formerly known as Microsoft Information Protection or MIP) offers a solution to discover, classify, and safeguard sensitive information within organizations. By employing sensitivity labels, organizations can enforce varying levels of restrictions based on the content's nature. This ensures that data is properly encrypted and access is controlled. Symantec DLP Core and DLP Cloud integration with Microsoft Purview Information Protection simplifies and enhances this data protection.
By leveraging Symantec's Data Loss Prevention (DLP) policies, the process of applying labels becomes automated. In cases where DLP policies are violated, sensitive labels are automatically applied. Thanks to DLP, these labels can even be used to automatically encrypt the files in Microsoft Purview. And organizations can configure policies in Symantec DLP to inspect encrypted files and emails through Microsoft Purview Information Protection.
With the Symantec integration the inspection process allows for the scanning of sensitive information, regardless of whether the data is on the cloud or on-premises. Policies can also be configured to detect the presence of sensitive labels and respond to them regardless where they live. Depending on the response rule, files containing sensitive data can be quarantined, deleted, or access can be revoked for risky users.
The integration of Symantec technologies with Microsoft Purview Information Protection not only enables the inspection of encrypted files for sensitive information but automates the application of sensitivity labels based on the content's sensitivity. By combining these robust capabilities, organizations can ensure that their sensitive data remains secure, regardless of its location.
For in-depth information please see our TechDoc.
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Symantec Threat Inspection Engine: Powering Network Cloud Security
Symantec’s industry-leading deep file inspection capabilities are cloud-delivered and available across your entire network – not just on the endpoint
At Broadcom Software, we know that in today’s world, the threats to enterprise security are relentless. Security Operations Center (SOC) teams receive on average 10,000 alerts per day, with some estimates pushing that number to more than a million. Creating even more difficulty is the increasing sophistication of these attacks that become more successful over time. Many employ tactics that target separate seams in a network’s defenses making it even more challenging and time-consuming for SOCs to correlate and understand.
That’s why many enterprises are moving to a multi-layered network protection model for their cloud security strategy. And with many organizations somewhere on the cloud migration timeline, the need is great for a hybrid network protection model that allows for unified threat efficacy and deployment, either on-premises or in-cloud.
All this has elevated the critical role of threat inspection engines to enterprise cloud security strategy. And it’s why, especially with the uncertainties created by the war in Ukraine, so many businesses are re-evaluating the value and efficacy of their present engines. This new awareness only serves to highlight the greater functionality and protection offered by the Symantec Threat Inspection Engine through the Symantec Web Protection Suite (WPS) in a multi-layered network protection model.
Award-winning protection network-wide
Symantec, by Broadcom Software, has long been recognized as the industry leader in threat inspection at the endpoint level. It is the only vendor to be rated at the top of endpoint protection tests across all platforms, Windows, MacOS, and mobile. Now, this same award-winning, tested-and-proven, file threat-inspection technology is available across your entire network – and not just on the endpoint. Now an important inspection layer in our cloud Secure Web Gateway, enterprises have the same deep file inspection capabilities in a more powerful cloud environment.
Symantec Threat Inspection engine scans an extensive array of file types to find, and expose known and unknown threats. It leverages telemetry and 3rd party intel to block threats and it uses machine learning, heuristics and detonation amongst other techniques to classify threats.
Symantec AI and security experts create signatureless proactive protection. This same engine that powers our industry-leading endpoint, CASB, and email solutions is also a key component of the Symantec SASE framework, powering our leading Secure Web Gateway (SWG), delivering multi-level threat inspection of all your web traffic.
Symantec Threat Inspection engine offers:
Fast and flexible deployment for an added layer of inspection for all web traffic
Advanced ML technology stops unknown threats
Automated updating of ML detection prevents in-field evasion and false positives
Blocking and identification of 100 percent of all known threats
Effective protection against new file types, packers, and obfuscated scripts
Freedom of choice
As a critical component of Symantec WPS, enterprises can freely decide where they want to apply that powerful protection. With WPS, organizations can decide where they want to apply that same protection -- on-prem or in-cloud -- with the exact same license. Symantec offers organizations full freedom of choice and unified efficacy.
A win-win value proposition
The greater functionality offered by the Symantec Threat Inspection engine as part of WPS provides better protection against all threats for both current and future Broadcom Software customers. Customers who already benefit from the Symantec Threat Inspection engine at the endpoint can enjoy better protection at the network level thanks to the added capabilities of WPS.
Customer ownership
The Symantec Threat Inspection engine is included in Symantec Web Protection and is a critical component of our cloud-delivered security stack. However, for customers needing a hybrid deployment option to support on-premises needs for in-depth threat inspection, licensing allows for unlimited deployment on high-performance Symantec SWG hardware or as a virtual appliance.
Multiple layers of inspection
Symantec Threat Inspection engine is a critical part of a comprehensive threat inspection strategy.
It’s a strategy that starts with the Symantec Proxy-based SWG serving as the top, or first part of the funnel to identify malicious or suspicious websites. Unknown content works its way down through the Threat Inspection engine in an increasingly granular way to identify malicious websites, content and files. In a recent customer example, it resulted in a 10x reduction in SOC investigations. Following the proxy’s inspection of nearly 42 billion web requests in a month, the Threat Inspection engine scans all files – 8,000 were automatically identified as malicious and blocked, 539 thousand were dynamically sandboxed, and ultimately, only 389 were identified for further SOC analyst attention. This was compared to an average of 4,000 SOC events they addressed each month.
Change the network security game
In a world buffeted by the winds of war and relentless cyber attacks, it’s time to re-evaluate the value, power, and efficacy of your threat inspection engine. Arm your SOC analysts with the one that can change the game and give them the advantage through unified efficacy and workflow: the Symantec Threat Inspection engine – cloud-delivered, hybrid, or on-prem – available through the Symantec Web Protection Suite (WPS). Contact us now to learn how Broadcom Software can help modernize, optimize and protect your enterprise.
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Symantec U.S. Government Affairs: What’s Ahead in the New Year
Key policy issues we are monitoring
Welcome to the Symantec Government Affairs blog, where we, as a division of Broadcom, will look at U.S. public policy and legislative issues relevant to Symantec Enterprise customers throughout the year.
With a new Administration and a power shift within Congress, here are some of the issues we are closely watching in 2021:
Economic stimulus package – President Biden has made it clear that he wants an economic stimulus package to pass within his first 100 days in office. While being negotiated at the time of this writing, the package could include funding for broadband expansion and other IT related improvement.
SolarWinds fallout – Congressional committees and Executive branch agencies have already begun fact-finding to determine how the hack happened, the breadth and magnitude of the damage caused by the hack, and how to prevent similar attacks from occurring in the future. We expect Congressional hearings, investigations, reports and recommendations this year, with potential increases in regulations and requirements to supply chain security.
Big Tech reform – There is potential for movement on several issues impacting the technology sector:
Section 230 revisions: There is bi-partisan support, albeit for different reasons, to make changes to the “tech liability shield.” While consensus will be difficult, look for various proposals dealing with content moderation and holding platforms accountable to gain steam.
Federal privacy bill: Another ongoing legislative issue that has bipartisan support but also significant disagreement on specific provisions is privacy. Look for some progress to be made on federal legislation that appeals to both parties and deals with the patchwork of various state legislation being proposed or already in place.
Antitrust: Various legislation on antitrust enforcement likely will be introduced following up on last session’s House Judiciary Committee’s report, but significant hurdles remain for consensus. Increased funding to enforce existing antitrust laws may be the most viable option.
The Government Affairs Office at Broadcom will be carefully monitoring these issues and will keep you updated on significant developments that may impact your business.
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Symantec Web Isolation: An Essential Part of Your SASE Strategy
Enable Safe Browsing in the Enterprise
The web is a dangerous place. Without intending to, users can get into all kinds of trouble, whether they inadvertently browsed to a dangerous webpage or clicked a malicious link that was emailed to them. Just a few clicks can expose your organization to a devastating breach. Of course, you can protect your users and your organization by severely limiting web access, but such a Draconian approach could severely constrain users from doing their jobs. The fact is, just about everyone needs access to the web throughout the workday, and it’s not possible to allow or block every site.
How to Enable Safe Browsing at Your Organization?
At Symantec, a division of Broadcom (NASDAQ: AVGO), we believe you can go far toward that goal by implementing web isolation technology. By separating out questionable sites and placing them in secure, disposable containers, web isolation executes web sessions away from endpoints. Sending only safe rendering information to users’ browsers enables users to visit potentially dangerous websites without the risk of infection. A similar approach can also protect email attachments that have passed through other security filters but are still deemed to have potential risk.
How Does This Work?
Symantec Web Isolation connects each active browser tab to a secure browser running in a container either on-premise or in the cloud. This secure browser interacts with the internet for the user, ensuring attacks stay away from the local machine, while preserving the user experience. Information from the secure browser is rendered back to the end user, and unless visually indicated, users may not even know they are being isolated. To ensure high system availability, Symantec dual mode isolation automatically selects the right method for each class of webpage, whilst providing an operational failsafe.
This type of security does not require detection based technologies AND eliminates entire classes of attacks. In addition, because Web Isolation controls both ends of the communications, it can apply controls like read-only for suspicious sites (to prevent phishing), DLP on all outgoing data and other sophisticated controls, very easily with minimal configuration or administrative challenges.
By integrating Web Isolation into a SASE strategy an organization can strengthen their environment so that their endpoints and users are protected while preserving their existing governance and compliance regimes.
Web isolation fits well into Gartner’s Secure Access Service Edge (SASE)* architecture as a central way to provide absolute security and visibility on end user web browsing. By integrating Web Isolation into a SASE strategy an organization can strengthen their environment so that their endpoints and users are protected while preserving their existing governance and compliance regimes.
We understand the nature of website risk, spanning the criticality of data security, and protecting against sophisticated phishing and water hole attacks. To this end, Symantec’s web intelligence considers websites in terms of risk, recognizing that risk to be dynamic. For example, a website that was safe a few minutes ago can quickly become the source of malware or a phishing attack, enticing users to give up their usernames, passwords or sensitive data. Comprehensive web security analytics are used to quantify risk by evaluating the age of the web site, the owner, the content it is hosting, and whether similar sites or IP addresses have a history of delivering malware. This allows every website to be allocated a risk score, and using this, Web Isolation can be applied either selectively (to certain higher risk websites only) or in full. Without this analysis, there will inevitably be trade-offs between over-blocking web access, which angers and frustrates end users as well as overwhelming IT Support teams, or being open to attack, which can jeopardize your business.
By isolating web sites according to risk level, it is possible to hit the sweet spot between over-permitting and over-blocking access. As you can see in the chart above, implementing Stage 1 isolation delivers dramatic benefits. Additional risk reductions are more gradual, but can be vital, depending on the user and web content being accessed. Applying maximum isolation in conjunction with other protection technologies – Stage 4 – might be necessary for organizations where the risk tolerance for a website attack or breach is very low. Some organizations also decide to deploy Isolation in a hybrid format, where the majority of users are protected with selective isolation, and other higher value users experience full isolation.
Using Symantec Web Isolation
Symantec Web Isolation works in concert with other cyber security technologies. For example, when combined with Symantec Secure Web Gateways, rich policies can replace standard, inefficient “allow or deny” policies by isolating traffic from uncategorized sites or URLs with suspicious or potentially unsafe risk profiles. By integrating with Symantec messaging solutions, Email Threat isolation quarantines links in email to prevent phishing threats and credential attacks, and ensures attachments that do not trigger existing anti-malware screens, but are considered risky, are presented in an isolated form to reduce attacks.
Web Isolation changes the equation completely.
You might ask why Web Isolation is needed if you already have existing web protections in place like Proxies, NGFW or endpoint protection. Web Isolation is meant to work in conjunction with those kinds of security technologies to eliminate common types of risks. Consider, that for all of those security controls to work, they must be enabled and running, have up to date signatures, visibility on the traffic or payload, etc, etc. If any of these things is lacking, then the endpoint is vulnerable to an attack. Web Isolation changes the equation completely.
On a practical note, maintaining a high level of protection for an organization's entire endpoint estate can create operational challenges and may prove impossible even in the most sophisticated organizations. Ensuring that all operating systems, software/browsers, and security controls are all up to date and patched for all critical vulnerabilities (at all times) is challenging to say the least. Web isolation can act as a buffer and give an organization flexibility to implement the patching and updating regime that works best for them, striking a balance between operational and security concerns.
By preventing threats from entering at all, web isolation can significantly reduce the volume of attacks to endpoints in an organization. It means less infected systems, less chasing of detection alerts, a lower risk profile associated with web browsing and more time to focus on real threats.
Bottom Line:
Web access is an essential part of work. Safe browsing must be also. As you implement a SASE architecture at your organization, be sure to include web isolation.
*Gartner does not endorse any vendor, product or service depicted in its research publications, and does not advise technology users to select only those vendors with the highest ratings or other designation. Gartner research publications consist of the opinions of Gartner's research organization and should not be construed as statements of fact. Gartner disclaims all warranties, expressed or implied, with respect to this research, including any warranties of merchantability or fitness for a particular purpose.
Source: Gartner “The Future of Network Security Is in the Cloud,” Neil MacDonald, Lawrence Orans, Joe Skorupa, 30 August 2019.
Webinar - Securing the Digital Transformation with Symantec SASE
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Symantec Web Protection Suite: A Single Gateway for Web and Cloud Applications
At the office, working from home, surfing the web or using cloud applications - Symantec is there for you
The world is changing. The internet is changing. And the security demands on your network need to keep pace. If you had to describe your ideal Secure Web Gateway (SWG) with five words, hopefully Secure is at the top of your list. It’s even in the name. Soon thereafter, do words like Dependable, Flexible, or Capable come up? At Symantec, a division of Broadcom Software, we believe they should.
Whether in the office, at home or on the go, modern workers need access to web content and cloud applications to maintain high levels of productivity. If you can’t provide fast, secure access to that information, some “resourceful” employees will find other means to get it - behavior that poses a direct threat to their enterprise networks.
When it comes to managing and monitoring cloud applications, many information protection and compliance professionals count on the comprehensive Cloud Access Service Broker (CASB) capabilities enjoyed by our Symantec DLP Cloud customers. They get enterprise-grade protection for data in-motion and at-rest with an amazing set of controls and other management capabilities. However, sometimes a complete CASB solution is more than what you immediately need. In those cases, the dependable, flexible and highly-capable Secure Web Gateway (SWG) functionality in Symantec Web Protection Suite may be the perfect solution to solve many common CASB use cases.
SWG Leadership
The Symantec Secure Web Gateway has helped shape the entire SWG market. Our flagship SWG offering - Symantec Web Protection Suite - is a turnkey solution that includes centralized management, reporting, world-class threat intelligence, sandboxing, SSL inspection, isolation, and many of the features and functionality of Cloud Access Security Broker (CASB) solutions.
Symantec Web Protection Suite (WPS) includes visibility into the use of over 35,000 cloud applications to provide insight into Shadow IT and enable the blocking of unsanctioned applications. Indiscriminate blocking access by category is an old-school approach to a modern problem. The fact is, you want to enable secure and controlled access to foster productivity. And Symantec Web Protection Suite is up to the task.
Four Levels of Control
Symantec Web Protection Suite provides four new Application Visibility and Control features that are designed to work independently or in combination to solve even the most nuanced cloud application access problems. They enable more granular security by grouping applications and application functionality into types of use. Using application identification in this way ensures setting access policy controls is both easy to understand and simple to apply.
The best way to understand how the controls work is to think of the policy on a sliding scale. On one end of the scale is the broadest definition and level of control. On the opposite end is the narrowest and most fine-grained level of control.
The four categories, or levels of application visibility and control are:
Application Groups
Application Groups is the broadest way to look at cloud applications. Web Protection Suite customers can control up to 200 different application groups. In fact, every catalogued application on the web belongs to at least one. Examples of applications groups range from Backup to Billing & Invoicing, FileSharing to Workflow Management, and just about every other cloud application you can imagine
Application Names and Visibility
Individual Application Names provides the capability for enterprises to target specific apps they need while controlling the full Application Group. So, if you have a corporate account with Box you can create a policy to allow it, while blocking the rest of the File-Sharing app group. Identification alone has great value, and a simple to use, screen-based dashboard tool allows security managers to select from the applications seen and set policy to block them as needed.
Application Attributes
Application Attributes expose additional meta-data about applications for even more granular control. Symantec, as a division of Broadcom Software, maintains over 200 attributes across it’s database of cloud applications enabling policy that can be combined with other criteria to meet security requirements. For example, enterprises could block access to all cloud applications which do not have proper certifications such as ISO27001 or SSAE-18 SOC2 Type II. Or combine Application Groups with Attributes to protect your user’s privacy, for example only permit access to Health Care applications which have HIPAA compliance policies.
Application Operations
Application Operations provides the most granular control of all. It drills down into specific operations of an application to apply further controls to what users can do. An intuitive policy editor allows administrators to select specific actions permitted for individual applications. Users can be permitted to interact with some of an application’s operations and denied access to others, such as allow downloads but deny uploads for certain file-sharing applications.
CASB for the Masses
The CASB capabilities of Web Protection Suite supercharge access security for the new realities of an expanding web and growing user population. It offers enterprises the SWG they need to answer the challenges of a changing world and internet. Each Web Protection Suite license follows-the-user whether you choose a cloud-delivered, on-prem, or hybrid security architecture. They can securely access cloud applications from your office, from home, from the airport, or anywhere in between.
When a fully-capable CASB solution is more than you need for now, Web Protection Suite’s CASB features may be the perfect solution for you. Then when you’re ready for the full-featured CASB solution, powered by the Symantec CloudSOC engine, just let us know. We’ll be happy to help you step up.
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Symantec Web Protection Video Playlist: Helping Cross the Bridge to Cloud Security
Providing a data-centric SASE solution
A simple refresh of Symantec ProxySG appliances can open the door to exciting new features and unmatched cloud security. To help Broadcom Software’s Symantec customers get full value from our new capabilities, we’ve developed a growing YouTube playlist of short videos that highlight key features and show you just how easy they are to implement. Symantec Web Protection, our new, hybrid-enabled Secure Web Gateway (SWG), allows organizations to move to the cloud at their own pace, taking all of SWG’s trusted capabilities with them.
Symantec Web Protection uniquely delivers all the components as outlined by Gartner for a data-centric SASE solution, including Secure Web Gateway, Remote Browser Isolation, Comprehensive Threat Intelligence, Application Visibility & Control, Advanced Content Inspection, Reverse Proxy, Cloud Firewall Service and much more. To get started learning about the new features we suggest customers start with a few of the videos below.
Cloud SWG: Enabling Decryption for Full Visibility – See how easy it is to enable full decryption in Symantec Cloud SWG for full visibility and inspection of all web and application traffic.
Setting up Initial Policy – Set up initial policy for the content filtering feature in Symantec Cloud SWG. Understand your options for simple modification and customization of policy rules.
High Risk Isolation for Edge SWG – When your on-premises SWG identifies a site with a risk level of 5 or higher, or an uncategorized site, send traffic to Symantec Web Isolation (remote browser isolation) for a safe and uninterrupted browsing experience. This feature is available in Symantec Web Protection for on-premises proxies running SGOS V7.3+.
Symantec Cloud SWG: Selective Intercept – Lighten your on-premises proxy's load by selectively sending traffic to Symantec’s Cloud SWG for inspection. Move traffic to the cloud as you see fit and at your own pace.
Check out the rest of the playlist, subscribe and add it to your bookmarks. We’ll continue to add short, informative videos to help you get the most out of Symantec Web Protection.
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Symantec WebPulse Explained: Category Update Coming October 12
Users benefit instantly from these new defenses and updates
At the heart of the Symantec Secure Web Gateway solution is WebPulse, a sophisticated AI-driven platform that analyzes uncategorized URLs on the fly and delivers a risk assessment back to the gateway in milliseconds to protect your network. WebPulse has been in operation for 15 years and it gets stronger every day because it is powered by user-driven behavior at 15,000 of our enterprise customers. It is a key part of our Global Intelligence Network (GIN).
WebPulse uses its cloud infrastructure to seamlessly deliver frequent database updates as well as new defense types, such as analytical methods and additional language support. Users benefit instantly from these new defenses and updates without having to revise their appliances or software as a service. Here’s how it works:
Requests for URLs are first checked against the local Intelligence Services database on the proxy, or the local categorization cache on other Symantec products. If the URL can be categorized locally (usually about 95 percent of the time), the information can be used to allow or block the request. If the URL is not in the local database or categorizations cache, the URL is dynamically sent to WebPulse.
WebPulse will check the URL against a central master database in the cloud and return the result to the gateway to allow or block the request.
If the URL is not in the central master database, WebPulse utilizes a real-time voting system to arrive at Risk Levels (one to 10) for the particular URL request as well as the content category. That information is sent to the requesting service.
On October 12th, Broadcom Software’s Symantec Network Security Team will perform updates to the WebFilter URL categories. These changes will enable modern threats to be correctly sorted to assist with policy creation and incident response. There is a new Intelligence Services Category consisting of Email Marketing, URL Shorteners, Cryptocurrency, Cloud Infrastructure and Compromised Sites. We have deleted the Sexual Expression category and most of these URLs will be moved to the Adult/Mature Content grouping.
At Symantec, as a division of Broadcom Software, we remain ever vigilant so our customers can spend more time on task – not putting out fires.
Any product that uses Symantec Intelligence Services or Symantec WebFilter could be affected, including Security Analytics, SSL Visibility Appliance Software, Web Security Service, Reporter, Packet Shaper, Web Isolation and ProxySG.
Be aware that changes to categories or applications could potentially affect customer policy. Please review the changes carefully and adjust your policy accordingly so your policies are aligned with the available categories and applications.
At Symantec, as a division of Broadcom Software, we remain ever vigilant so our customers can spend more time on task – not putting out fires.
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Symantec Web Security Fireside Chat: Roadmap Roundup
Leaders of Broadcom Software’s network and cloud security team talk about new developments and what’s coming next
Symantec by Broadcom Software is relentless in its efforts to improve network and cloud security. Recently, I had the opportunity to sit down with the product management team that leads our network and cloud security solutions. Nate Fitzgerald is Director of Product Management, SASE Core Services, and Alex Campbell is Director of Product Management, Cloud Management. What follows is an edited version of our “fireside chat”.
AH: At Broadcom Software, we’ve moved our cloud SWG solution over to Google Cloud. Can you refresh our memory on that effort and the results?
NF: Over the last couple of years, we’ve consolidated all our cloud platforms onto Google Cloud. Not only has that made us more agile, it's contributed to the stability of the platform. It allows us to adapt to market conditions faster. And considering the struggles of many other companies, it's completely insulated us from supply chain issues. We’ve never been denied a “core” in Google Cloud.
AC: It’s a great partnership. Speaking of its value to Google as well as ourselves, I think it’s worth pointing out that we are the Google Cloud Customer of the Year Award recipient for 2021. Earlier this year, in April 2022, we were also honored to receive the very first Google Cloud DevOps Award.
AH: What are some of the other real-world customer benefits of the Google Cloud transformation?
NF: Oftentimes, a new feature or product offering will require additional infrastructure or capacity before it can be released to customers. In the legacy model, I like to call it “DIY Cloud,” this means the team has to execute on physical hardware procurement for dozens of data centers, which can take months, or even over a year under current global conditions. The speed of that process is severely constrained by the supply chain, shipping, logistics, lockdowns, political instability, and even customs delays. That list includes a lot of factors that cannot be controlled by the vendor.
You are at the mercy of a global system that is failing at an epic scale. So under the DIY Cloud model, customers will have to wait before they can realize new value in all regions. In Google Cloud, that same process takes a fraction of the time. There is nothing for us to ship, no parts for us to wait on, no congested ports, no racks to assemble in a factory, and no logistics.
Commissioning infrastructure is a one-click activity that we control. A great example of this in action is a new feature coming out soon that allows our WSS Agent install base to access their private applications using our ZTNA technology. Once the technology is ready to go GA, it will be rolled out to the entire world in a few weeks. In truth, we could go much faster, but we use a slow-roll deployment process to ensure quality. And I think that’s where you want to be: You don’t want procurement to be the long pole because it’s almost completely uncontrollable. Google Cloud allows us to control our infrastructure destiny. Imagine working for a SASE vendor using the DIY Cloud model. It’s a complete guess as to where, and how much, infrastructure they will need 6 months to a year from now, because that’s how long it might take to get it. That’s like predicting what the weather will be like in Denver, Colorado May 1, 2023. No one has any idea. There could be a foot of snow or it might be sunny and 80 degrees. But those are the sorts of predictions that you have to accurately make if you are operating a DIY Cloud. It’s a fool’s errand.
AC: Another is that if Google Cloud expands its footprint to regions and countries around the globe, our footprint is also expanded. Google spends billions on their infrastructure so we don’t have to. It’s great to see new regions pop up on the map. We can adopt them very quickly, it’s a simple business decision - again - something we control. It relieves us and it relieves our customers of the responsibility to have to worry about those things.
Symantec by Broadcom Software is relentless in its efforts to improve network and cloud security.
AH: What about the results of this in terms of customers moving to the cloud?
NF: Anytime we discuss speed and agility factors, you're touching on delivering the road map faster and on-boarding customers quicker, because we’re not talking about customers with 500 seats. We’re talking about onboarding customers who, in many cases, have hundreds of thousands of users. Workloads like that don’t fit into the overflow envelope that everyone maintains to some extent. You’ve got to have a faster way to spin up very large workloads very quickly. No one wants to hear that their on-demand cloud, for whatever reason, doesn’t actually have an underlying ability to scale elastically.
AH: Can you share your top two or three most significant additions to our cloud SWG solution?
NF: An important trend for us to address is endpoint agent consolidation. It’s normal for enterprises to have over a dozen endpoint agents. The overhead to maintain each is significant. It seems that one source of agent spraw is the practice of best-of-breed vendor selection where you could easily have separate cloud SWG, CASB, and endpoint protection agents, possibly more. Increasingly, we hear customers talk about pivoting to a “best-of-suite” procurement strategy, which is to say, they’re starting to prefer one vendor that is “good enough” vs. multiple vendors that are “perfect” across a product spectrum. With Symantec, customers can keep the product depth that they’ve come to love, while still getting the benefits of vendor consolidation. So a key value that we bring with our platform is the ability to use one agent to solve for multiple -- and growing -- use cases. Currently, those use cases are obviously setting up endpoint protection, and you add the traffic steering for cloud SWG, and within that, CASB, CASB Gatelets, and cloud DLP, so there’s four workloads there right now, and we’re about to add a fifth and sixth, which is the zero trust network access (ZTNA) agent capability and digital experience monitoring (DEM), thanks to our acquisition of AppNeta. That’s a lot of value coming from a single installer. Every customer I’ve interviewed in the past two years is interested in reducing the number of agents on their devices without sacrificing critical security controls. Symantec Cloud is a great way to do that.
NF: Localization zones. Localization zones provide an end-user browsing experience in countries where, frankly, no SASE vendor has a POP and probably won’t for years. This means that websites will come back in the native language instead of in the language of the country where the nearest data center is located. That’s a very important technology for our global organizations because it reduces potential resistance to adopting the technology. We believe the technology should be invisible to the end user up until the point it protects them from harm. Apart from that, In recent months, we’ve added new compute-POPs in Delhi, India, Toronto, Canada, and Melbourne, Australia, and we’ll continue adding more as Google expands.
AC: The ability to tie the SSL encryption in our cloud to their own root certificates. To make that a cloud-native solution which ties it into Google or into AWS is the purpose of our key management service (KMS). It allows users to use the encryption keys already installed on their laptops or workstations. This saves the organization from having to create and deploy another encryption certificate in their environment. Not only is it a security feature, but it also gives them full control as they move to the cloud by giving them certificates their browsers trust.
With Symantec, customers can keep the product depth that they’ve come to love, while still getting the benefits of vendor consolidation.
AH: What are some of the other developments that network security customers should expect to see in the coming months?
NF: Almost all our enterprise customers access a varying number of business partner websites that restrict access to IPs controlled by the customer. For some customers it’s a few dozen sites but some have hundreds of websites that authenticate this way. I’m not saying this is a good way to perform 2FA, but until these 3rd parties evolve to better methods (something we don’t control), our customers need a cloud solution that can handle this type of traffic. Today, these workloads cannot be handled by our multi-tenant platform because we use a single pool of IPs shared across tenants. This architecture provides the fastest, most efficient scalability for our customers, so we wanted to find a way to keep that model in place, because it works really well, while still offering dedicated IPs. We’re happy to say we’ve solved that problem and we will start testing it next month in production. Once we’re done, customers will be able to move those IP-dependent workloads to our cloud knowing that the IPs they egress from are unique to their organization. The solution is entirely cloud native, there is no backhaul and nothing for the customer to maintain in a cloud VPC or in their own data centers.
NF: For years we’ve had the leading agent-less ZTNA capability which is great for both managed and unmanaged devices. To complete the offering, we’re adding an agent-based ZTNA capability so we can support a broader variety of private applications and non-standard protocols. Agent-based ZTNA will also, as a general rule, be quicker to implement, especially if you have already deployed our agent. WSS Agent 8.1.1 seeds this technology on the agent side in preparation for the service side update. Currently, it’s in public preview, meaning we have several real enterprises using the technology on a limited basis right now.
AC: That same capability is also coming to the Symantec Endpoint Security agent. At that point, there will be no difference between the WSS Agent’s capabilities and what’s in the Symantec Endpoint Security or endpoint protection agent. So, I think that’s great for customers as well.
NF: Something I would add is our digital experience monitoring (DEM) capability which will quickly differentiate itself in the market. Our customers are looking for a way to get more knowledge and control over the user experience, especially with the continued proliferation of remote work. Customers want a solution that scales well and that’s what we want to deliver. Again, we deal with customers with tens of thousands or hundreds of thousands of users, so monitoring a few hundred endpoints is not good enough. The recent acquisition of AppNeta will play an important role in this capability.
AC: The remote user is complex because they are typically working from their own home networks. It’s a different ballgame. This new feature gives their organizations a lot more visibility and better troubleshooting tools to support their remote user populations. It starts with just being able to validate a user’s performance complaint, and then goes further to understanding the root cause. Obviously, the endgame here is knowing there’s a problem and having a solution in progress even before the user opens a support ticket.
At that point, there will be no difference between the WSS Agent’s capabilities and what’s in the Symantec Endpoint Security or endpoint protection agent.
AH: So, to wrap-up, what do you see as the long-term vision for Symantec network security?
AC: Continuing our delivery of a best-in-class Security Services Edge (SSE) portfolio. Moving to Google Cloud builds upon that. We’ve moved our cloud DLP platform to Google Cloud so customers can have a pure cloud solution. Customers can now have a secure DLP and Symantec Web Gateway with the ease and scalability provided by a true hyperscale platform.
We continue to expand our solutions around integrated CASB, which already include the ability to reference 45,000 CASB app definitions in your secure web gateway policy.
NF: Continuing to make it easier for customers to migrate to the cloud. That often means bringing hybrid technologies to bear. Most large enterprises are not going to do forklift migrations, in fact, almost none of them will. Continuing to support their security needs through on-premises solutions that are unified with their cloud security, is still key.
AC: Things that encourage customers to reduce vendors where it makes sense, not only from a cost perspective, but to improve economies of scale and simplify operational complexity.
NF: And certainly, keeping the agent count as low as possible. That is going to be huge going forward.
AH: Finally, speaking personally, when it comes to network and cloud security, what are you both most passionate about?
NF: I think I’m most passionate about the stability of the platform. When you outsource internet access, you’re putting a lot of trust in your vendor. We have made huge investments in stability and they have paid off. If uptime is a concern for you, I think you will be challenged to find a more passionate team when it comes to uptime.
AC: On my side I’m driving for a seamless cloud transition. As some of our Proxy, DLP, and Endpoint customers have been using our tools for 20 years they have invested in workflows and processes built around key capabilities of the products. Those customers want to adopt Cloud and we are going to provide them all the goodness of Symantec without a need to completely redesign their policy and processes.
AH: Thank you both for taking the time to talk with us today.
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Symantec Web Security Service: Marking a Year of Resiliency and Progress
Make great strides in a year like no other
At the outset of 2020, few, if anyone, anticipated a massive, practically overnight paradigm shift in web security. It’s been that kind of a year, of course, a black swan, once-in-a-century storm, notable for disruptions and accelerated digital transformation. Far from rattled, we boosted our resiliency while making headway in product development.
Let me update you on our progress. One year ago, we began our Broadcom journey confident that it would equip us with the R&D firepower and the necessary resources to amplify our web services offerings. And we needed it. As the COVID-19 shutdowns upended on-premises enterprise security paradigms, we logged a 333% increase in agent use to our cloud Secure Web Gateway (SWG).
Far from rattled, we boosted our resiliency while making headway in product development.
The immediate challenge? Helping many of our customers achieve a secure digital transformation in a matter of weeks—instead of months or years. Our customers aimed to protect their remote workers without backhauling traffic to their data centers. Using cloud-delivered SWG, we promptly shifted their deployment with universal policy enforcement, sparing them both the cost and hassle of rewriting their access-control policies.
Time to Value
Since then we’ve made timely investments in our hosting infrastructure that will provide our customers with even quicker time to value. We introduced a portfolio licensing agreement that broadens and improves our product access. And we’re making enormous strides in our industry-leading SASE solution.
First, the cloud. We’ve worked overtime this year to rapidly migrate our systems to better support our customers and partners. It’s difficult to rank them, but here are five great reasons we tapped Google Cloud to host our global Web Security Service (WSS), along with all other Broadcom cloud services:
Elastic scale and improved resilience
Increased focus on cyber security innovation
Quicker deployment of new services
Reduced reliance on congested public internet routes
Increase quantity and scope of infrastructure certifications
In other words, we’re building a comprehensively better experience both for you and for our support team, too. Google Cloud will focus on networking services while we focus on security services.
One way we know the platform is working: we see reduced latency between our integrated services. Plus, we can add scale and spin up features in hours versus the days or weeks it might have taken with our own data centers.
The Road to SASE
According to Gartner, “network security architectures that place the enterprise data center at the center of connectivity requirements are an inhibitor to the dynamic access requirements of digital business.”¹
Gartner also added that to achieve low-latency, “enterprises need SASE offerings with a worldwide fabric of points of presence (POPs) and peering relationships.”¹ We’ve checked off that box for you. Now, customers can peer with WSS via Google peering points in nearly 200 public internet exchanges.
In March we noted that SASE is introducing a new architecture for a new era. We’re very focused on making this vision come true. Now we’re providing new Symantec, a division of Broadcom (NASDAQ: AVGO), CloudSOC CASB capabilities to Symantec Intelligence Services subscribers within Symantec SWG — market-leading functionality at no additional charge.
Now, customers can peer with WSS via Google peering points in nearly 200 public internet exchanges.
With this step, we’re making it easier to write controls that govern what users can or cannot do within SaaS apps. We see CASB as another important step along the path to an integrated SASE experience, and more capabilities are coming. The timing is right: SASE’s security policies are tied to validating identities rather than location.
That’s one reason why we’re stepping up our investment in SASE: it is defining our product roadmap and organizational structure.
What are your organization’s cyber security priorities heading into 2021? Watch this space as we continue to rapidly scale our industry-leading SASE deployment. To learn more about what we’ve been up to, check out the on-demand WSS webinar below.
* * *
¹ Source: "The Future of Network Security Is in the Cloud” Neil Macdonald, Lawrence Orans, Joe Skorupa, Aug 2019
Webinar - Web Security Service: Looking Back and the Road Ahead
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Symantec Wins TSIA’s Coveted `Rated Outstanding, Global Assisted & Self-Service Support’
Award marks major milestone in the journey Symantec began five years ago when we set out to transform how to deliver enterprise customer support
I’m proud to inform you that Symantec has successfully achieved the Technology Services Industry Association (TSIA) “Rated Outstanding, Global Assisted & Self-Service Support” certification — an honor that very few companies receive. The certification recognizes that Symantec meets the highest industry standards for customer support operations as part of TSIA’s Operational Best Practices certification program. In order to achieve this distinction, Symantec participated in a rigorous audit process that evaluated over 225 operational best practices for delivering industry-leading, technical support. The comprehensive audit process was developed by over 50 leading technology companies and ensures Symantec is delivering outstanding customer support at the channel, center, regional, and global level.
Symantec has successfully achieved the Technology Services Industry Association (TSIA) “Rated Outstanding, Global Assisted & Self-Service Support” certification — an honor that very few companies receive.
The award is a major milestone in the journey we began five years ago when we set out to transform the way Symantec delivers enterprise customer support. Back then, we had 13 different support organizations, located in 28 global locations around the world, creating an inconsistent and disjointed support experience. Since then, we’ve worked hard to improve on that by providing our customers with a unified support experience across the entire Symantec product and services portfolio.
Today, we have a single enterprise support organization providing a consistent experience across the globe. We provide an integrated blend of assisted and self-service support, including the MySymantec service portal, diagnostic tools, a searchable knowledge base, online forums, and phone, email and chat interactions. Using the portal, forums and knowledge base, customers can get timely answers to many support questions without having to contact us. When they do reach out, we use precision-based routing to make sure they are sent to the support professional most qualified to help them resolve their issues, based on the level of expertise required, product knowledge and languages spoken. Behind the scenes, there is a seamless handoff among all of our support channels, so customers don’t have to answer questions they’ve already been asked — all information is logged within their case history. If customers use any of our diagnostic tools, they can upload the results, and that information is automatically attached to their support case.
Today, we have a single enterprise support organization providing a consistent experience across the globe.
For enterprise customers who desire a more intimate relationship, Symantec offers Premium Support. Our Premium offerings include access to Customer Success Managers (CSMs) and Technical Account Managers (TAMs) who have deep expertise and knowledge of customer systems, change controls, and access to the entire Symantec ecosystem. CSMs & TAMs directly manage escalations, deliver system reviews, and provide proactive services like health checks, upgrade planning and feature optimization.
The result of all this? We’ve seen a significant increase in customer satisfaction and time to resolution via our assisted and self-service channels. The support we provide is consistent, reliable and predictable. Customers don’t have to call into a second number or be routed to staff that doesn’t have background on their cases. They get high-level help quickly and seamlessly. In many instances, they can solve their own issues, using our online support tools.
This certification recognizes all our hard work, and that’s important not just for our customers, but for our partners and employees as well. Partners know that in teaming with Symantec, we are delivering the highest level of support possible. And our employees can see that all their work and dedication has paid off where it really matters — satisfying our customers and making them more secure.
The journey doesn’t end here for us. The award makes us want to work even harder. We know that delivering world-class support is vital for our customers’ security and success. So we’re at work designing and providing the next generation of support in a fast-changing security landscape. It’s increasingly a cloud-based world, and the support we provide recognizes that.
In the days of on-premise software, when a customer needed help, they had one way of getting support — by calling us. Today, as I outlined in this blog post, we provide multiple channels and personalized options. We’re now taking a step beyond that to partner with our customers through the entire life cycle of their relationship with us. So we are moving towards a customer support organization that becomes more proactive, that doesn’t just wait for customers to contact us, and gets in touch with them with advice on how to protect themselves better, based on their specific circumstances.
Expect to see more improvements from Symantec Enterprise Support in the future. As we continue our journey, we’ll tell you about all the changes and improvements we’re making. So check back regularly and many thanks for joining us on our path to providing world-class support and services.
Symantec has successfully achieved the Technology Services Industry Association (TSIA) “Rated Outstanding, Global Assisted & Self-Service Support”
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Symantec XDR: A Streamlined Approach to Enterprise Security
Simplifying Enterprise Security Architecture
In response to ever-increasing threats, companies are assembling an extended portfolio of cyber security capabilities. However, the piecemeal nature of deployment typically leads to a highly complex and siloed landscape that makes it difficult to detect and respond to advanced threats efficiently and cost-effectively.
Enter XDR (Extended Detection and Response), a new approach to simplifying and uniting previously disparate security technologies. XDR builds on endpoint detection and response (EDR) platforms by adding telemetry streams from multiple control points into a unified incident detection and response platform. While XDR solutions vary by vendor, most cover endpoint, network, and cloud workload protections and include proven capabilities for dealing with common threat vectors, from file detonation capabilities such as sandboxing to threat intelligence and analytics.
XDR builds on endpoint detection and response (EDR) platforms by adding telemetry streams from multiple control points into a unified incident detection and response platform.
XDR’s promise of unifying the security landscape comes at a time when companies are struggling with too many systems and too much noise. According to ESG Research, almost *two-thirds of large enterprises currently have at least 25 cyber security products in use and **84% of organizations are actively integrating myriad security analytics and operations technologies. More than *one-third of organizations report that one of their three biggest challenges managing assorted security products is that they generate high volumes of security alerts making it difficult to prioritize and investigate security incidents.
*Source: ESG Master Survey Results, Enterprise-class Cybersecurity Vendor Sentiment, March 2020.
**Source: ESG Research Report, The Rise of Cloud-based Security Analytics and Operations Technologies, December 2019.
XDR addresses this challenge by providing an integrated platform that automatically collects and correlates data from multiple proprietary security components. Symantec, a division of Broadcom (NASDAQ: AVGO), with their XDR approach, serves as a unified security environment much like what is possible with SIEM (Security Information and Event Management) and SOAR (Security Orchestration, Automation and Response) platforms, but without the custom integration and programming requirements. Symantec’s Integrated Cyber Defense enables XDR. The out-of-box, integrated nature of Symantec’s ICD platform promises to accelerate threat detection and mitigation, helping security operations (SOC) investigators zero in on the most urgent threats.
XDR systems centrally store event data, actions, and intelligence in a common format, which allows for contextualization and correlation across multiple systems as opposed to single system alerts that could be excessive, repetitive, and potentially misleading. With thousands of security alerts coming in from multiple systems, security organizations are struggling to turn all that noise into actionable alerts that promote advanced detection.
That’s where XDR promises to be a game changer. XDR platforms correlates individual product events to system wide incidents, which bolsters detection, incident context, event enrichment and response focus. XDR improves the productivity of operational security staff by leveraging multiple control point events for incident validation and focusing investigation targets; through sophisticated built-in AI and analytics, XDR platforms automate repetitive tasks while delivering context that aids in faster incident resolution.
Symantec Enterprise XDR
Symantec’s XDR Differentiator
XDR is gaining prominence as enterprises search for ways to combat ever-expanding threat vectors. Cyber security Ventures estimates that the growing number of data breaches has led to almost 4 million digital records stolen each day. Organizations are still struggling with how to best protect their environments—in fact, ESG Research shows that *44% of IT professionals report it takes their organization several months to act on insights derived from data analytics activities and initiatives.
*Source: ESG Master Survey Results, The State of Data Analytics, August 2019.
As their detection and prevention technology footprint grows, security organizations struggle with how to monitor and make sense of the thousands of daily alerts coming in from disconnected sources. While many have attempted to use APIs to integrate detection and response data using SIEM or more recently, SOAR, as the centerpiece of security operations, the approaches are cumbersome. In addition, the systems excel at collecting logs, but fall short in their ability to correlate alerts from multiple platforms to detect incidents. Many also lack a full incident response capability.
Key to a successful XDR platform is collecting telemetry from all control points and normalizing it. This allows the platform to compare apples to apples. Symantec achieves this through Integrated Cyber Defense Exchange (ICDx) that enables a true open architecture. Symantec’s approach offers the largest coverage across all critical control points, including endpoints, email, cloud security, and data loss prevention, allowing for deep visibility and remediation across the entire network.
By natively integrating multiple security products into a cohesive system, Symantec's ICD platform improves detection by coordinating the findings from individual products to detect events that might otherwise have gone unnoticed.
ICDx simplifies integration, providing the SOC with a unified picture of the security landscape instead of monitoring and remediating alerts from disconnected silos. ICDx standardizes and normalizes data across all critical control points while integrating with SIEM and SOAR, helping SOCs easily correlate and act fueled by like-to-like intelligence. By natively integrating multiple security products into a cohesive system, Symantec's ICD platform improves detection by coordinating the findings from individual products to detect events that might otherwise have gone unnoticed. Symantec’s integrated platform also improves security by rapidly sharing information and correlating incident response across products as part of the recovery. For example, alerts about suspicious activity on the network could be confirmed or ruled out through analysis of endpoint activity.
Symantec’s ICD platform is also bolstered by its Global Intelligence Network, the largest civilian global security intelligence and research network. GIN’s sophisticated threat intelligence helps security teams better assess risks and take the proper actions to counter imminent threats. Symantec also applies a deep range of machine learning, advanced analytics, and artificial intelligence to help detect threats and initiate a response whether that’s through automation or a SOC analyst.
While still new and relatively immature, XDR is fast emerging as a viable way to transform a patchwork of disconnected security tools into a cohesive unit. Symantec’s ICD platform enables XDR and our approach offers the widest coverage across all control points and addresses the key integration challenges, helping enterprises promote improved detection accuracy and more efficient security operations.
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Symantec XDR: Automatically Reducing Attack Surfaces
Why Preventative Measures Could Reduce the “R” in XDR
A skillful boxer knows how to make himself a smaller target – to reduce his attack surface. It’s a strategy that has proven effective in many a bout -- just check out some of Muhammad Ali’s fights on YouTube. In cyber security, the same principle applies. If your attack surface is reduced, a bad actor has fewer points of your organization to target, strengthening your ability to defend by focusing on those attack vectors.
Security teams continue to struggle in fundamental areas like detecting and responding to threats as quickly as possible due the overwhelming number of incidents and alerts that require their attention. One way to do this better, is to reduce your attack surface through Extended Detection and Response (XDR). Symantec Integrated Cyber Defense enables XDR and is our strategy for simplifying and uniting cyber security tools, with these key capabilities:
Threat data collected across all fully-integrated control points and normalized for correlation
Visibility with rich context and correlation across control points
Attack surface reduction by leveraging conviction Metadata, deception technologies, and cross-control point actions
Collaborative response to incidents through workflows
Automatic end-to-end remediation of threats at any control point
Auto-enhancing security based on correlated customer telemetry and real-time local context within the customer environment
Risk score that represents the enterprise security posture and recommendations to improve posture
Your attack surface consists of all the places where your organization is exposed to attack. By identifying risky behaviors across your security stack, you can isolate questionable behaviors and thereby reduce your attack surface. Symantec’s Integrated Cyber Defense (ICD) puts into place controls that reduce attack surfaces, and the telemetry collected through Integrated Cyber Defense Exchange (ICDx) helps mitigate risky behaviors and targeted attacks.
Detecting these various threats and risky behaviors, then taking action to reduce or eliminate attack surfaces is a key outcome of XDR. Below we highlight some key technologies in ICD that help reduce various attack surfaces.
Attack Surface: Public Cloud Workloads
With the global outbreak of Covid, almost every organization transitioned to the cloud overnight. While many organizations planned a digital transformation over time, the outbreak forced many to move much faster. The cloud is an open frontier for adversaries—an abundance of attack surfaces. Those attack surfaces become even more visible when an organization misconfigures a workload in the public cloud. According to IBM X-Force, there was a 424% increase in data breaches due to cloud misconfigurations.
Enter Cloud Workload Assurance—a cloud security posture management solution (CSPM) for public cloud infrastructure-as-a-service (IaaS) platforms, including AWS and Microsoft Azure. It’s a cloud-native, API-driven service that provides continuous security monitoring and compliance checking. It monitors your cloud resources for critical misconfigurations and provides easy-to-follow, guided remediation steps—all within a single console. With CWA, you can remove configuration of your public cloud workloads as one attack surface.
Attack Surface: Multi-cloud Environments
While many companies are shifting to public clouds, they don’t just choose one public cloud. According to IDG’s 2020 Cloud Computing study, more than half (55%) of organizations currently use multiple public clouds. Of this group, 34% say their organization uses two public clouds, 10% use three public clouds and 11% use more than three public clouds. In shifting to public clouds, organizations are responsible for securing what’s in the cloud, whereas public cloud companies like AWS and Google secure the cloud infrastructure itself. This is the “Shared Responsibility” model that public clouds adopted quite a while ago. Many cloud providers typically use proprietary infrastructure and orchestration tools to secure their cloud infrastructure. Clearly what’s needed is a simple and cost-effective way for enterprises to secure workloads and reduce risk.
Enter Cloud Workload Protection (CWP). Symantec Cloud Workload Protection automatically discovers and inventories all workloads running on AWS, GCP, Azure, and OCI public cloud platforms. Workloads are profiled and categorized according to security risk, for example: Do virtual instances have CWP agents installed? Have the right security policies been applied to them? Have workloads been attacked or compromised? All workloads and their security status are then displayed on a simple visual topology map.
Security teams continue to struggle in fundamental areas like detecting and responding to threats as quickly as possible due the overwhelming number of incidents and alerts that require their attention. One way to do this better, is to reduce your attack surface through Extended Detection and Response (XDR).
Usage of an organization’s cloud will surge and dissipate, as employees access the cloud workloads in peak and/or low periods of activity. CWP’s cloud-native integration enables security that deploys and scales automatically with workloads based on intelligent and customizable rule sets. It automatically applies security and monitoring policies to all new workloads as they are spun up or spun down.
With cloud workloads protected, the question now moves to Storage. How do you remove cloud storage as a potential attack surface? Enter Cloud Workload Protection Storage—an anti-malware and scanning solution for Amazon S3 and Azure Blobs. It utilizes industry-leading Symantec Endpoint Protection (SEP) anti-malware technologies and while scanning, it keeps storage contents in a protective environment until the “All Clear”. CWP Storage is integrated with our Data Loss Prevention solution so that your on-premises policies are automatically applied to your cloud storage.
Both Cloud Workload Assurance (CWA) and Cloud Workload Protection (CWP) are integrated with our industry-leading Data Loss Prevention (DLP) solution. This key integration lets you audit your cloud assets, monitor them for attacks, and be able to tell you which cloud assets are holding sensitive data. That’s the power of XDR in the cloud.
Attack Surface: Active Directory
Active Directory, a directory service developed by Microsoft, is a database and set of services that connect users with the network resources they need to get their job done in any organization. It contains critical information about a company’s environment, including what users and computers there are and who is allowed to do what. Information that any adversary would love to know. Active Directory has a 95% market share among the Fortune 500 companies, so is widely used. How can you protect an attack on your Active Directory?
In Symantec’s comprehensive Endpoint Security Complete, we include a feature called Threat Defense for Active Directory (TDAD). It effectively controls an attacker’s perception of the organization’s internal resources—all endpoints, servers, users, applications, and locally stored credentials. It autonomously learns the organization’s Active Directory structure in its entirety and uses this data to create an authentic and unlimited obfuscation. In other words, we remove Active Directory as an attack surface by making the data in Active Directory obscure or confusing to the attacker.
Attack Surface: Employee Behavior
Employees and how they behave—what apps they access, what links they click, what sites they visit, what data they download—has become a fast emerging attack surface. Adversaries take advantage of unsuspecting and at times, naive, employee actions inside the firewall and remotely. Detecting these threats and responding to them is critical for organizations. That’s where Behavior Isolation comes in. Behavioral Isolation works to reduce attacks upon the network, and ensures employees and customers can access the services and programs they need in a safe environment. As part of Symantec Endpoint Security Complete, the Behavior Isolation feature helps organizations identify app behavior that is unusual and potentially risky, gain better visibility of risky behavior and manage that risky behavior more easily. Ultimately, it reduces this potential attack surface by blocking behavior that is unusual, and allows behavior that is authorized.
Attack Surface: Remote Devices
With use of mobile devices has increased astronomically, given the global pandemic and employees working from home during lockdown. Reducing mobile devices as attack surfaces is tricky—an organization doesn’t want to wait for a mobile device to be compromised before “responding” to the threat. That’s where cross-control point sharing comes in. One of the biggest values of XDR is the ability to share data and identify a threat on one control point, and proactively mitigate it on another. With the integration of Symantec Endpoint Security Complete and Web Security Service (WSS), that’s exactly what happens. If WSS detects a malicious file on the network, it informs SES Complete which then checks every device for that same malicious file. If found, SES Complete isolates the affected endpoint from the network proactively and can scan for and isolate the file across any endpoint, anywhere in the world. You can read more about how this works in our blog called “XDR: Helping Keep Your Users Safe” by Jeremy Follis.
But how about unmanaged devices? With the onslaught of Covid-19, many organizations have had to deal with employees using their own devices to access networks. Symantec’s CloudSOC Mirror Gateway (an add-on feature for CASB) enforces the same level of security controls on an unmanaged device as on a managed device, without needing an agent. You can read more about CloudSOC Mirror Gateway in our blog called “Symantec CloudSOC Mirror Gateway: Solving the Unmanaged Device Problem” by my colleague Dori Varas.
With XDR you can reduce your attack surface and let security teams continue to focus on fundamental areas like detecting and responding to threats as quickly as possible. At Symantec we are here to help you do this through our strategy for simplifying and uniting cyber security tools. Don’t leave yourself open for a knock-out punch from your attackers - XDR can help you fight back.
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Symantec XDR: Data Normalization is the Key
Normalization Allows for Correlation and Richer Threat Intelligence
To provide your organization an effective cyber defense, you need to see clearly what’s going on. That means gaining a broad view of all control points – no easy task when many companies have deployed a multitude of disparate security technologies. Unless the events from these security tools can be coalesced, cyber security personnel can be easily overwhelmed, leaving their organizations vulnerable to attack.
At Symantec, a division of Broadcom (NASDAQ: AVGO), Extended Detection and Response (XDR) is our strategy for simplifying and uniting cyber security tools, as Ryan Stolte, CTO of our Information Security Group, explains in this blog entry. Thanks to XDR, when an incident happens, you can identify it across all control points – network, email, cloud, identity, information and endpoint. That enables you to tell how malware got in, how long it stayed and what it did. That seems straightforward, but how does it work? Let’s take a look under the covers.
To provide your organization an effective cyber defense, you need to see clearly what’s going on.
The first step is to collect information across all the control points, starting with logging information. Again, it sounds simple. But cyber security tools log events differently, using different nomenclature. A destination IP address, for example, might be expressed one way by one tool and another way by another.
The solution to this is data normalization. It’s far from a new idea, but data normalization is especially necessary in this context. When you bring together lots of data from different sources in a data lake for use by an analytics platform, you have to make sure the data from each control point is labeled in a consistent way.
ICDx makes it work
That’s where Integraterd Cyber Defense Exchange (ICDx) comes in. Built-in ICDx collectors gather log information and put it into a data schema so that username, IP address, role and process are labeled consistently across all the different control points. This normalized data provides a contextual, visual picture to help the analyst perform triage, incident response and incident remediation. Without the data normalization capabilities of ICDx, a SOC analyst is faced with unwieldy manual processes.
As you can see in the diagram below, ICDx sits between numerous data sources (at the top) the SOC and SOC front-ends (at the bottom).
In addition to data collection and normalization, ICDx includes these capabilities:
Smart forwarding: enables a manager to define the parts of log events that should be sent to different destinations. For example, threat information might be sent to a SIEM, while log information might be forwarded to a data lake. Meanwhile, all logs can be sent to a centralized archive for compliance.
Automated response actions: enables an analyst to block a file across the enterprise. ICDx federates the blocking action and applies it across all control points.
Analytics: enriches data with threat intelligence, then feeds it to a SOC front end.
Third-party integration: provides interoperability with multivendor products. Integration through Open IOC enables an analyst to search for indicators across Symantec and non-Symantec products.
In short, ICDx is the integration and routing point of XDR. Considering the number of tasks it performs and the complexity it simplifies, it’s remarkable that configuration requirements of ICDx are minimal: All you need is IP address, username and password. Then just press a button. Soon your control point data will be normalized and you’ll gain the complete enterprise view you need to provide the cyber protection your organization deserves.
Here’s where to find out more and download ICDx for free: go now
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Symantec XDR: Top 5 Insights from ESG’s XDR Research (It’s a Slam Dunk)
Everyone is talking about Extended Detection and Response (XDR). We highlight top results from ESG’s XDR Research and how Symantec delivers
I’m a basketball junky. I’ve been playing since I was eight years old, played through University, and even coached for many years. I just love the game—the skills it takes, playing as a team, and game day. Nothing beats game day. You can go into a game thinking you know your competition, predict what plays they’ll run, and understand the mindset of the player you’re guarding—but when it's game time, it’s real-time data on your competition that gives you the competitive advantage.
Perhaps that’s one of the reasons that as a marketer, I love research. It’s that game time feeling. A marketer can make an intelligent guess about what a customer’s or partner’s behavior means, or an intelligent guess about their motivation based on experience, but it’s the research—that “game day” knowledge —that helps us adjust our thinking and better serve our customers.
Most recently, I’ve been digging into research on Extended Detection and Response, or XDR. It’s a security framework specific to the Security Operations Center (SOC) that delivers cross-control point protection. As my colleague Ryan Stolte wrote in his blog about XDR: XDR is a new approach to simplifying and uniting previously disparate security technologies.
The Enterprise Strategy Group (ESG) recently conducted formal research on XDR and the insights they share are important to Enterprise companies navigating the world of XDR. Below are the top 5 insights from the study.
#1 Better Security Efficacy
There are lots of benefits to XDR:
Stronger security posture as you are able to detect threats from any control point
Share threat data, correlate it and then take action on it
Reduce complexity as you integrate across the security stack
Simplify SOC processes and send fewer alerts for SOC analysts to hunt down and investigate
With all those benefits, what are customers actually looking for as the top priority for XDR? According to the research: increased security efficacy. In fact, 67% of cyber security professionals say the ability to detect modern and complex attacks is a key capability they want from XDR.
Specifically, the cyber security professionals who responded, point toward:
Improving detection of advanced threats (34%),
Increasing automation of remediation tasks without involving IT (33%)
Improving mean time to respond to threats (29%)
Symantec’s strategy of Integrated Cyber Defense delivers an integrated security stack to customers, allowing solutions to share deep threat intelligences so you can detect more advanced threats more quickly, automating some security tasks, and improving the time it takes to respond to threats. It’s end-to-end security you need to protect, detect, and respond to today’s—and tomorrow’s—threats. Read more on the value of Integrated Cyber Defense in our blog called “The Cyber Security Platform Shift – More Secure, Less Complex.”
67% of cyber security professionals identify the ability to detect modern and complex attacks as a key XDR capability. [1]
#2 Investing in "Data Plumbing"
Data ingestion is key to XDR and it’s also a very big challenge. Each control point collects telemetry in different formats because of the nature of that control point. Network telemetry is very different from Endpoint telemetry which is very different from Information telemetry. But to correlate the data, so you can compare like to like, you need this telemetry in a “normalized” state.
According to ESG’s research, cyber security professionals identify “data plumbing” as a key investment area that would add the most significant additional value to what they are already doing.
It’s understandable why: there’s more and more data that SOCs are collecting over time. SOCs need to manage that data, normalize it, and then correlate it for the deepest insights. My colleague Kyle Black explains data normalization in more detail in his blog.
#3 Integrating Across the Security Stack
ESG’s XDR research indicates that integrating across the security stack is a top priority. If you look at the history of SOCs building out their systems, they’ve been more reactive—installing point products as needed to block a particular threat. ESG cites from their Cyber Security Landscape study that organizations have on average 25 point products in their security stack. Organizations have come to realize that integrating across the stack and consolidating cyber security solutions offers multiple benefits: reduced complexity, streamlined security operations, and most importantly, much stronger security.
93% of cyber security professionals say integration is a top priority as they build out a SOC technology architecture. [2]
More than three years ago, Symantec started the integration process, creating what we call Integrated Cyber Defense. We knew, then, the importance of integrating solutions and we started with our own. We also created a software layer called Integrated Cyber Defense Exchange (ICDx) that allows customers to integrate third-party solutions, like Splunk and ServiceNow, into a single architecture. Integrations will continue to be critical in the future, and Symantec delivers integrations more completely than any vendor—which leads to the realization of XDR. Symantec’s Integrated Cyber Defense enables XDR. Probably the best news for our customers is that ICDx is free to Symantec customers. You can download it here.
#4 Integrating Third-Party SIEMs
In their research on XDR, ESG recommends that organizations “embrace and extend Security Information and Event Management (SIEM) while looking for SOC budget dollars.” Organizations recognize the value of SIEMs, seeing it as popular and effective. A good XDR solution will collect telemetry across control points, correlate it, and work alongside SIEMs like Spunk to derive insights. For Symantec customers, that’s easily accomplished with ICDx. The architecture we’ve designed simplifies the collection and correlation of threat telemetry, and appends even more insights based on all the knowledge and data we have in our Global Intelligence Network (GIN), the largest civilian cyber security intelligence network in the world.
The bottom line is that we know Symantec will not be your only vendor, so we’ve created a way for you to easily and quickly integrate third-party solutions into a single architecture.
The bottom line is that we know Symantec will not be your only vendor, so we’ve created a way for you to easily and quickly integrate third-party solutions into a single architecture.
#5 XDR is Here Now
The most surprising insight from the ESG XDR research is that XDR is real—not just a buzzword. In researching XDR, most experts predicted that XDR is two years out. The ESG research indicates that organizations plan to put budget toward XDR in the next year.
70% plan XDR investments in the next 12 months. [3]
To me, this indicates that organizations see the value in XDR and are ready to apply budget against it. This is exciting for Symantec as our Integrated Cyber Defense is market-tested and enables a complete XDR solution. We have the most complete cross-control point protection with industry-leading solutions, and an easy way to integrate third-party solutions.
It's just like shooting the winning bucket at the buzzer on game day.
[1], [2], [3] Source: The Impact of XDR in the Modern SOC. Enterprise Strategy Group, November 2020
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Symantec Zero Trust
Trust can be your worst enemy when it comes to network security
At Symantec, a division of Broadcom, we understand that the world gets more complex by the minute. That’s doubly true for network security as applications live in clouds and edges, perimeters are disappearing, and users are working across the globe.
The situation is fragmented. It’s worth taking a page from shipbuilders: segment security platforms into air-tight compartments. A ship uses them to contain a hull breach and avoid sinking. A modern network architecture needs compartments for much the same reason, and an “air-tight” security posture is worth striving for.
Up to now, security protocols have asked a user who they are and let them in after a myriad of multi-factor authentication (MFA). It’s a one-time test, and after that, a user can generally move freely in the network environment. The new thinking requires us to observe and continually evaluate user behavior in real time – and to ask more questions.
Trust No One
While that may seem severe, it all rests on properly defining partitions by need or use. We all have finite resources and need to determine: who has the right to gain access? And when do I cut off or reduce access?
Protecting resources is nothing new. As a practical example, the daily limit on the maximum amount of cash you can withdraw from a regular retail checking account via ATM is a good example of balancing security and convenience. Security comes first.
At Symantec, we understand that the world gets more complex by the minute.
Practicing Zero Trust, or more specifically applying risk controls, enables the balance of security and usability. While we assume a breach can take place, the damage caused can be contained within understood parameters and remediation policies. This enables businesses to then categorize risk by different dimensions such as cost, reputation, user satisfaction, and productivity, and create Identity and Access Management policies accordingly.
Following Identities
The ability to observe an identity as it moves from one channel to another enables an enterprise to achieve two very important goals.
First, to continuously authenticate or validate existing sessions of an identity to ensure it's still valid, has not been revoked, and still has the necessary privileges to access desired resources. Plus, the ability to construct a seamless audit trail for forensic or non-repudiation purposes.
Second, a business is then maximizing the user experience by ensuring the most seamless interoperability possible, preventing multiple sign-ins and overlapping/redundant session timeouts.
Applying Zero Trust principles makes authorization truly adaptive and smarter -- by leveraging such information as User Context, Application Context, and Device Context. Is the user on a seldom-visited application from a novel device at an odd time? It pays to be suspicious.
Typical authorization decisions do not evaluate a user’s ongoing validity. That’s problematic as that identity may be experiencing hijacking or replay attempts. Nor does it take into consideration the level of assurance to which the identity may have been authenticated. That opens the door to breaches based on stolen identity credentials
Determine Confidence
When achieving Zero Trust, it is important to also pay attention to the “confidence factor,” or by extension, the “risk factor.” This metric determines how much trust is required in order for Identity and Access Management protocols to execute, which in turn leverages risk-based IAM policies to define expected behavior.
The end result is explicit verification predicated on understanding the risk of any given transaction or process. When the risk is low, the impact of a breach is lessened and certain verifications could be optional. On the other hand, when the risk is high, a breach can be highly problematic and must be mitigated by additional verification steps.
The good news is that you can leverage Zero Trust solutions no matter what your IT infrastructure looks like: all it takes is implementing the right process within those security solutions.
This approach balances the need for security with the need for convenience and agility. For example, an account that belongs to an administrator with a panoply of sensitive entitlements must be guarded by a strong authentication policy with mandatory MFA. On the other hand, a self-service request for an application-level entitlement may be approved automatically as long as the user’s peer group has the same level of access.
The good news is that you can leverage Zero Trust solutions no matter what your IT infrastructure looks like: all it takes is implementing the right process within those security solutions. To learn more about Symantec’s Zero Trust solutions, read more here.
Watch Webinar: Zero Trust - How it Works
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Symantec Zero Trust Framework
The Zero Trust model is founded on the belief that
organizations should not automatically trust anything
inside or outside its perimeters and must verify
everything trying to connect to its resources before
granting access—based on identity, context, and
trustworthiness. To accomplish this goal, you must
build an integrated platform that shares information
across different security technologies.
Introduction
The concepts of Zero Trust are not new; they have been around for years.
However, three recent developments are making Zero Trust more relevant
and its adoption more important than ever:
• Cloud Migration: The spread of cloud technologies is changing every
facet of modern IT, including reshaping the way we develop and use
applications. Organizations embracing the cloud are enjoying a range
of business gains, but cloud adoption also introduces new security
challenges. Traditional security tools were not designed to adapt to the
dynamic nature of these cloud environments.
• Secure DevOps: At its most fundamental level, DevOps seeks to
engage Agile methodologies to increase the speed and quality at which
innovation can be introduced into applications. One of the key facets
of DevOps is automation; however, traditional security processes and
tools are still heavily dependent on human configuration and effort to
implement. As a result, security is often being ignored because it impacts
the delivery of apps to the market.
• Remote Workforce: The modern enterprise was already facing an issue
with “Bring Your Own Device” movements within the workforce, but this
issue was compounded by the COVID-19 shutdown. Traditional perimeter
defenses, such as firewalls and VPNs, were not scaled to handle the
large number of employees suddenly forced to work remotely, many of
whom may have been forced to access corporate resources with personal
devices.
Although each of these challenges may look unique and different, and they
may not seem related, the reality is that a Zero Trust approach addresses
them all. But before we discuss the elements of the Symantec Zero Trust
solution, let’s look at the key pillars of Zero Trust.
The Pillars of Zero Trust
In 2009, Forrester developed a new information
security model called the Zero Trust Model which has
since gained widespread acceptance and adoption
(although the term zero trust was actually coined
by Stephen Paul March in 1994). Since its creation,
Forrester has continued to evolve the model to its most
current state.
The Forrester model includes seven pillars. Data sits
at the center of the Forrester model because this is
what you are trying to protect. People, devices, and
workloads surround data because these are three
primary “actors” trying to access and use the data.
Networks are the primary means to connect the actors
to the data. The final two pillars represent automation
and orchestration (the ability to make all of the pillars
work together to seamlessly enable secure access to
the data) and visibility and analytics (the ability to
know who is accessing the data for governance and the
ability to detect and prevent unauthorized access).
Achieving Zero Trust with Symantec
Integrated Cyber Defense
The following sections describe the Symantec solutions
that address each Zero Trust Model pillar.
Securing Devices
Devices are a primary target for cyber attackers.
With today’s global threats adept at entering at the
endpoint, it can take less than 7 minutes for an attacker
to compromise an entire enterprise. The impacts on
businesses can be staggering. Properly protecting
endpoint devices in today’s environment requires
addressing threats and attacks across the entire attack
chain via attack surface reduction, attack prevention,
breach prevention, and detection and response.
Symantec Endpoint Security (SES) Complete delivers
a comprehensive and highly integrated endpoint
security approach, protecting all traditional and mobile
endpoints while providing interlocking defenses at
the device, application, and network level and using
artificial intelligence (AI) to optimize security decisions.
Symantec defends endpoints proactively to reduce
the attack surface with advanced policy controls
and technologies that scan for vulnerabilities and
misconfigurations across applications, Active Directory,
and devices connecting to the endpoint. It proceeds
with hardening the system and locking down processes
and behaviors to render many attacker tactics and
techniques ineffective.
Symantec also stops breaches and prevents attackers
from persisting or dwelling on the network. Pairing
network firewall and intrusion prevention capabilities
with deception and Active Directory security to stop
lateral movement, Symantec prevents credential theft
and blocks reconnaissance efforts.
To help quickly close out endpoint incidents and
minimize attack impact, SES Complete combines
endpoint detection and response (EDR) technologies
with Symantec security operations center (SOC)
analyst expertise to precisely detect advanced attacks,
provide real-time analytics, and enable active threat
hunting for investigations and remediation.
SES Complete works alongside other Symantec
security solutions and integrates with third-party
vendors via the Symantec Integrated Cyber Defense
Exchange (ICDx) strategy. With these SES Complete
integrations, IT security teams can detect threats
anywhere in their networks and address threats with an
orchestrated response.
Additionally, another point of attack is the
communications between devices and corporate
applications and resources, which are predominantly
done using APIs. Symantec addresses this threat
vector with its Layer7® API Management solution,
which is lightweight, low-latency mobile gateway with
integrated security and management controls designed to help enterprises safely and reliably expose internal
assets to developers and remote apps as mobile APIs.
Deployable in the cloud, on-premises, or in a hybrid
configuration, the gateway solves critical, mobilespecific challenges around identity, security, adaptation,
optimization, and integration. Layer7 has Common
Criteria Certification in two profiles, addressing the
needs of regulated industries, as well as public sector
requirements. In addition, it is FIPS 140-2 out of the
box, and can be configured for both FIPS 140-3 and
PCI-DSS compliance. Layer7 includes both OAuth and
OpenID Connect (certified in four profiles), and includes
over 100 built-in policies to protect against DoS and
API attacks.
Layer7 also includes a mobile SDK to integrate with
enterprise IAM systems such as SiteMinder, as well
as social login, to maintain a seamless end-user
experience. The SDK also supports multi-factor auth
and biometric authentication on devices that support
this. Finally, Layer7 tracks the relationship between
the user, the app, and the device, and can trigger
further authentication when an action deviates from
the established pattern (meaning, when a user looks at
his bank account and makes mobile deposits regularly,
a transfer request for a large amount can trigger a
biometric authentication requirement in order to
continue).
Securing People
Extending Zero Trust to people begins with
authentication—positively identifying legitimate users
from fraudulent ones is a critical and foundational step
as you cannot effectively enforce access controls if
you do not really know who is requesting the access.
Symantec VIP addresses this challenge by providing
multifactor credentials and contextual risk analysis
from the cloud so that stronger authentication can be
applied where it is needed.
Once authenticated, you must ensure that only
authorized users gain access to sensitive resources.
For over 20 years, Symantec SiteMinder has been
helping organizations by providing seamless Single
Sign-On (SSO) access to on-premise and cloud-based
applications. Furthermore, SiteMinder can also be
enhanced through integration and implementation of
Symantec Secure Access Cloud. Cloud-delivered Secure
Access Cloud manages granular access to enterprise
applications in IaaS/PaaS environments or on-premises data centers.
Privileged accounts are often an organization’s most
valuable asset—and the most likely to be exploited by
external hackers or insider threats. One compromised
privileged account can cause irreparable damage
to infrastructure, intellectual property and brand.
Symantec Privileged Access Manager (PAM) is
designed to prevent security breaches by protecting
sensitive administrative credentials, controlling
privileged user access, proactively enforcing security
policies, and monitoring and recording privileged
user activity across virtual, cloud, and physical
environments.
Finally, you must address least privileged access.
Certainly the aforementioned access management
tools can grant or deny access to your resources, but
they do not ask the question, should the user have
this access at all. Symantec Identity Governance and
Administration (IGA) addresses this challenge by
streamlining and automating the processes associated
with reviewing and certifying user access—and this
access governance ensures that users are only granted
the level of access that they absolutely need.
Securing Network
The traditional approach to securing the network
perimeter has been rendered obsolete by a perfect
storm of mobile users, remote offices and home
working, cloud apps, compliance obligations, and
evolving security threats. Network and security teams
need solutions that protect a remote workforce that
needs to be connected around the clock and from any
location. At the same time, they need a seamless and
secure solution that improves the user experience.
Secure Access Cloud provides highly secure granular
access management for enterprise applications
deployed in IaaS clouds or on-premises data center
environments. This SaaS platform eliminates the
inbound connections to your network and creates
a software-defined perimeter between users and
corporate application and establishes applicationlevel access. This zero-trust access service avoids
the management complexity and security limitations
of traditional remote access tools, ensuring that all
corporate applications and services are completely
cloaked—invisible to attackers targeting applications, firewalls, and VPNs.
Another aspect of protecting the network is providing
secure access to the web, and this connectivity often
requires traffic to be backhauled to an enterprise data
center so that security and policies can be enforced;
however, this approach is no longer effective. Symantec
Web Security Service (WSS) provides superior security
for data, apps, and users through a comprehensive
cloud-delivered Secure Web Gateway. Built upon an
advanced proxy architecture, Symantec WSS offers
protection from advanced threats, protection of
sensitive information, and compliant cloud application
use—all delivered with scale upon a resilient, highperformance network backbone.
To protect against advanced email attacks which are
delivered via SMTP (a different channel from most
Internet activity), dedicated email threat and data
protection capabilities are required. Email threats
have evolved; no longer is traditional spam and
anti-malware detection effective. With the rise of
ransomware, phishing, and business email compromise
fraud, sophisticated detection, prevention, and risk
avoidance methods are needed. Symantec Email
Security protects against advanced threats, risky URLs,
and impersonated email. Web Isolation technology
allows uncategorized or risky webpages to be opened
in a secure, disposable container, stopping webdelivered malware or phishing sites from impacting
users. In addition, email encryption that integrates
with Symantec DLP extends an organization’s data
protection policies to the email channel.
Securing Workloads
As organizations have shifted their applications to
cloud environments, security concerns have been
raised. And although most cloud infrastructure puts
strong safeguards in place to help protect customer
privacy, there is often a lack of visibility into who is
using the cloud and how they are using it, especially
when it comes to large workloads of sensitive data that
may be stored and/or processed in the cloud.
Symantec CloudSOC CASB empowers organizations
to confidently enable cloud applications and services
while helping them stay safe, secure and, compliant.
CloudSOC enables rapid detection and response to
security issues for cloud apps and infrastructure all in
one platform. CloudSOC can protect sanctioned and
unsanctioned use of the cloud platform within your
organization with the following initiatives:
• Monitoring, logging and analyzing user and admin
activity
• Enforcing access controls to prevent
misconfigurations
• Detecting and remediating risky exposures in
different cloud instances
• Defending cloud storage from advanced malware and
APTs
• Detecting compromised accounts with user behavior
analytics
• Detecting and restricting misuse and shadow cloud
instances
Symantec Cloud Workload Protection automates
security for cloud workloads, enabling business agility,
risk reduction, and cost savings for organizations,
while easing DevOps and administrative burdens.
Rapid discovery, visibility, and elastic protection of
cloud workloads enable automated security policy
enforcement to help protect applications from
unknown exploits.
In addition, with potentially thousands of cloud
resources deployed across multiple regions and
multiple clouds, Symantec Cloud Workload Assurance
provides visibility into cloud environments, assessment
of cloud security posture, and enforcement of security
and compliance policies. Organizations can also have
visibility and control of the cloud management plane,
which is used to manage and configure cloud resources
such as launching virtual instances or configuring
virtual networks. The solution continuously monitors
a cloud environment for resource misconfigurations
that can expose data to the public internet. It extends
the ability to resolve issues quickly with easy-to-follow,
guided remediation steps developed by security
analysts and compliance experts.
Symantec solutions for securing the cloud infrastructure
provide organizations with a comprehensive view into
who is using the cloud and how they are using it. By
deploying Symantec CloudSOC CASB, Symantec Cloud
Workload Protection, and Symantec Cloud Workload
Assurance, organizations can help protect their cloud
environments from misconfigurations, misuse, attacks,
threats, and data loss.
Securing Data
Symantec Information Security secures data stored
on-premises and in the cloud. It provides total
visibility and control of data flowing in, out, and
across your organization’s extended perimeter. Our
leading DLP solution integrates with CASB, web, and
email gateway technologies to find data stored on
endpoints, servers, file shares, databases, SharePoint,
and more. Underpinning the integration is a single
data protection policy giving you consistent and
up-to-the-minute protection, avoiding the hassle of
policy duplication. The Symantec integrated solution
delivers Zero Trust controls, today. Consider a remote
user on an unmanaged device looking to access SaaS
applications. With our innovative Mirror Gateway, part
of an integrated SASE solution, they get a high-quality
security and end-user experience without the need for
a reverse proxy or agent installed on the device.
Analytics and Automation
Efficient investigation and remediation processes are
critical to any Zero Trust approach. Symantec solutions
provide the telemetry that feeds our targeted attack
detections, the deep forensic records that speed
investigations, and powerful tools to quickly remediate
breaches. Built on strong preventative protections in endpoint, network, email, and cloud infrastructure, we
integrate data-driven analytics and reporting across all
control points and create a way to capture telemetry
from other solutions within the security stack through
our Integrated Cyber Defense Exchange (ICDx)
technology. ICDx collects data, normalizes, and then
correlates it, analyzing events across a wide range of
control points, including third-party solutions, to deliver
rich threat intelligence to analysts.
The Symantec Global Intelligence Network (GIN) is
one of the largest civilian security threat intelligence
networks in the world. It applies artificial intelligence
to analyze over 9 petabytes of security threat data.
It offers the broadest and deepest set of threat
intelligence in the industry—the biggest global footprint
of threat intelligence. We have spent more than two
decades collecting data, applying advanced analytics
and machine learning, and using our own threat experts
to review and interpret the results. The GIN supplies
threat intelligence to all our cyber security solutions. It
is the fuel that makes our industry-leading technologies
protect businesses more completely.
Symantec Security Analytics delivers enriched, fullpacket capture for full network security visibility,
advanced network forensics, anomaly detection, and
real-time content inspection for all network traffic.
Armed with this detailed record, you can conduct
forensic investigations, respond quickly to incidents,
and resolve breaches in a fraction of the time you
would spend with conventional processes.
Symantec Information Centric Analytics (ICA) is a User
and Entity Behavior Analytics (UEBA) technology
and a core component of our Symantec Data Loss
Prevention (DLP) solution. It enables rapid identification
of insider threats and cyber breaches. Through
centralized analytics, extensive dashboards, and indepth metrics, ICA escalates those issues that might
otherwise go unnoticed or demand complex analysis.
With automated remediation recommendations, ICA
provides organizations with the visibility and workflows
necessary to directly reduce exposure to sophisticated
threats, greatly reducing manual effort.
Summary
Achieving Zero Trust is a journey and requires the
integration of many types of security tools that have
traditionally operated in their own silos. Many of these
tools may already exist within your enterprise, some
delivering value but likely with the potential to deliver
even more. Customers need a partner to weave all of
these disparate systems together—a partner who can
also help fill in the gaps where they exist. Broadcom is
that strategic partner. Our Symantec security portfolio
delivers endpoint, network, information, and identity
security across on-premises and cloud infrastructures,
to provide the most complete and effective Zero Trust
solution in the industry. Our Integrated Cyber Defense
technology can weave these products and your existing
security solutions into a platform that can secure your
workforce, your data, and your workloads to deliver
superior visibility and control.
Challenge
Traditional perimeter defenses have
been disappearing as organizations
shift applications and workloads from
on-premise data centers to cloud
infrastructure. These technologies
were never meant to scale to handle
the large numbers of remote workers.
A Zero Trust architecture is designed
to address these challenges; however,
organizations are struggling to
integrate the different pillars of Zero
Trust into a consolidated platform.
Opportunity
Zero Trust offers a comprehensive
framework that secures legacy
and future applications across the
hybrid environment. In many cases,
organizations already have many
of the building blocks necessary
to achieve Zero Trust, but these
security tools and technologies exist
within their own silos. The Symantec
Integrated Cyber Defense approach
brings these disparate systems
together. Not only do we provide all of
the components necessary to deliver
Zero Trust, but we also can integrate
with your existing solutions to protect
those investments.
Benefits
A comprehensive security approach,
embracing the principles of both
Zero Trust and Secure Access Service
Edge (SASE) models, will protect
data regardless of where it is used or
stored: on the mainframe, on-premises,
or in the cloud. It also protects users
and their devices, which are capable
of accessing this data from anywhere.
Zero Trust leverages security data
across different security tools to build
intelligent and comprehensive usage
patterns that improve threat detection.
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Symantec Zero Trust: Identity and Access Management Policy
The integration of Layer7 API Management and Symantec VIP Authentication Services
I have been working in the Application Programming Interface (API) management space for over twenty years. At the start of my journey we talked about services and then web-services. These services were either XML- based or SOAP-based, and in the beginning were mainly for B2B interactions, or for some internal applications calling other internal applications. As these services became more important and more open to 3rd parties, etc., security became key.
It’s All About the User
Things like XML encryption and signing morphed into WS Security and all the standards that came with it. But these interactions were rarely about the user. It was the application being approved to call the service. With the mobile explosion, service became more user based and REST overtook web services as the de facto standard for phone based applications making calls to our resources. With this change the applications were not the only thing that needed to be authenticated. The user needed to be identified as well. Standards such as OAuth and OpenID Connect came to our rescue.
This was great, a user (or resource owner), could grant the application permission to make REST calls on its behalf. But not all API calls are the same and there are requirements to authenticate the user with stronger authentication techniques as well as interpreting the risk associated with each API call. Do we really want the same security level for an API call that gets our bank balance compared to the API that transfers funds to a 3rd party account?
Integrations
One of the projects we are working on right now at Broadcom, is to integrate our Symantec VIP Authentication Services into Layer7 Management, including the OAuth Toolkit. This enables us to authenticate users using standards such as FIDO (Fast ID Online) and passwordless authentication. Think about the apps you use - Multi-Factor Authentication (MFA) should be a minimum for applications that share or use customer information.
By using the combined products, our solution can now authenticate a user using standard passwords along with more secure methods of authentication, such as a one-time-password (OTP) or device based system like YubiKeys. This gives the target of authenticating users based on something they know and something they have and should be part of any strong Identity and Access Management policy.
By using the combined products, our solution can now authenticate a user using standard passwords along with more secure methods of authentication, such as a one-time-password (OTP) or device based system like YubiKeys.
The other great advantage of a system that supports so many different authentication methods is that we can use advanced methods to re-authenticate users based on the risk associated with individual API calls. To go back to the banking example, a transfer of $50 may not need any authentication on top of the standard login. But for larger transactions we may wish to ask the user to re-authenticate using an OTP or FIDO based method. Both the applications user and the service provider see the value and protection of making these calls with this so-called step up authentication. Additionally, these benefits are further enhanced when you combine this level of security with the session management capabilities of a web single sign-on solution, which can provide seamless access to multiple applications and services, but also leverage these risk services and step-up authentication when the user engages with more sensitive services or data.
A Zero Trust Approach
The integration of Layer7 API Management and Symantec VIP Authentication Services provides a Zero Trust approach to protecting mobile-based applications and services, by positively identifying every user and device requesting access. The contextual risk services also minimize the friction to the end user by only prompting them for stronger authentication when it is really needed. And the API security ensures that all communications between the user’s device and the backend applications are protected.
In the future, Symantec as a division of Broadcom, sees more and more applications and services enforcing security in this way. Today we expect banks and medical applications to enforce in this way. But as privacy laws and consent management become more prevalent in the industry, this will expand dramatically. In the following video you can see just how the user flows look and how we have upleveled the security for our API calls.
Watch the video below for a brief demo:
New Authhub capabilities with Siteminder and Layer7
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Symantec’s CASB, DLP Solutions Receive “In Process” Designation from FedRAMP
Serving as the next step in the government’s stringent security authorization process FedRAMP has become synonymous with security excellence
It can be difficult to overstate how much a Federal Risk and Authorization Management Program (FedRAMP) designation means for a security product. Last year alone, FedRAMP helped the government avoid spending an additional $170 million on cyber security. In total, FedRAMP authorized solutions currently cover one-third of the world’s internet traffic with providers, and protect more than five million digital assets.
“We’ve tried to continue to keep that bar high and enforce those things that are important to security,” FedRAMP Director Matt Goodrich recently said. “I think that’s one thing that’s continuing to make cloud get more and more adoption across the federal government. We’ve been able to show that many times, even with security, not only are you getting better services with cloud than what you’re getting with your own services – you’re getting better security many times as well.”
FedRAMP has become synonymous with security excellence, both inside and outside of the federal government.
That is why I am excited to announce that Symantec’s Cloud Access Security Broker (CASB) and Data Loss Prevention (DLP) solutions have received an “In Process” designation from FedRAMP, under sponsorship from the Department of Homeland Security.
CASB allows agencies to confidently leverage cloud applications and services while staying safe, secure and compliant. DLP offers a single console and unified policy management for every channel – cloud, endpoints, storage, email and web – to protect sensitive data wherever it is used.
Symantec’s Cloud Access Security Broker (CASB) and Data Loss Prevention (DLP) solutions have received an “In Process” designation from FedRAMP, under sponsorship from the Department of Homeland Security.
While an “In Process” designation does not yet give us authorization, it is an important step along that process. The “In Process” standard shows that we are actively working on the documentation and controls required to achieve an authorization, and that an agency is reviewing that documentation with the intent to provide an Authority to Operate (ATO).
More than anything, though, this announcement confirms Symantec’s commitment to the federal government. The FedRAMP authorization process is meant to validate security controls, to ensure that an industry solution is hardened enough to work in a government environment. The federal government has some of the highest standards for cloud solutions of any organization in the world. As a trusted partner and advisor to the government, taking part in the FedRAMP program shows how seriously we take our relationship with our federal customers, and the investments we are making in that regard.
Agencies face some of the most difficult security challenges, including protecting the country’s most sensitive information. Earlier this year, Symantec’s Email Security Service – Government received FedRAMP authorization, and we have a roadmap established for our other cloud capabilities to go through the process. Please keep an eye out for other announcements as we continue to push towards a full suite of FedRAMP authorized solutions.
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Symantec’s Catalyst 2020 Event Delivers
Partners Get Center Stage Attention
Nearly a year after becoming part of Broadcom, a reinvigorated Symantec, a division of Broadcom (NASDAQ: AVGO), offered an in-depth look at the company’s retooled tech strategy to empower its partners on the front lines in the battle for enterprise cyber security.
Catalyst 2020, the company’s first virtual customer summit on global cyber security, featured updates from an assortment of executives, including Broadcom CEO Hock Tan, describing a myriad of changes at Symantec since last year’s blockbuster acquisition brought together two of the world’s leading enterprise technology companies.
The topics ran the gamut – everything from technology integration to new opportunities for closer collaboration – that reinforced the message to partners participating in the day-long event: This is a very different Symantec from the company they dealt with prior to Nov. 4, 2019.
“There’s no way getting around the fact that this year has been crazy,” said Art Gilliland, senior vice president and GM of the Symantec Enterprise Division. But today, Gilliland said, the post-acquisition churn was well in the rear-view mirror with Symantec taking the necessary steps to make “our innovation really hum.”
Yet Gilliland reminded the audience that the refashioned Symantec remains unchanged in one respect: It remains the market innovator when it comes to cyber security.
As he offered an insider’s view of the nearly year-long transition, Gilliland noted how the company’s streamlined operations and new efficiencies throughout the distribution chain have made it easier than ever to work with Symantec – all to the benefit of both partners and customers. He pointed to changes that reduced the number of SKUS along with more flexible licensing and pricing policies to eliminate extra paperwork and, ultimately, provide bottom-line value.
Yet Gilliland reminded the audience that the refashioned Symantec remains unchanged in one respect: It remains the market innovator when it comes to cyber security. With Broadcom’s heft behind it, Symantec can deploy enviable resources to retain that advantage by investing in targeted R&D that will generate the leading-edge security tools and infrastructure needed to compete in the cloud era and help organizations succeed throughout ever phase of their digital transformation.
“We really understand the environmental and infrastructure changes you are going through,” he said, adding that Symantec is prepared to make sure its partners are ready to meet that new security challenge.
A Robust Cyber Security Arsenal
A key pillar in Symantec’s strategy is Integrated Cyber Defense (ICD), a platform that includes different security functions including endpoint security, identity security, information security, and network security both on-prem, in the cloud and hybrid. ICD remains an ongoing focus for Symantec, promising to continue to drive more integrations in the future.
According to Rob Greer, Vice President Information Security Group, the ongoing integration of Symantec’s portfolio of products will soon feature a cloud-based console that security teams can use to manage information policies on-prem as well as in the cloud. That would be welcome news to overworked SOCs and other security professionals. Getting different security products to work seamlessly remains as big a challenge as ever. (It’s especially fraught when the products come from different companies.)
Other speakers talked about recent product announcements offering enhanced security functionality. For example, Symantec’s new security services platform now extends protection that helps developers – famous for not being good at building security – develop secure apps in the course of their normal work routines.
Elsewhere, Adam Bromwich, Vice President Endpoint Security Group, took viewers on a guided tour of how Symantec’s new Threat Hunter capability, a new feature of Symantec Endpoint Security Complete, is finding thousands of attacks each month – most notably the discovery of WastedLocker, a particularly virulent form of malware used by the hacker group Evil Corp.
The roots of victory trace back to having the right tools to meet a new constellation of threats. Indeed, effective threat detection can’t rely solely on EDR. With Symantec’s Threat Hunter, Symantec’s analysts are able to take advantage of the company’s machine learning capacity to help SOC teams expose more attacks and identify potential breaches.
“When you look at Symantec’s telemetry, we have 9 trillion lines (of code) and building every moment as we get new data from customers,” said John Holland (Principle Cyber Intelligence Analyst, CISSP). But that massive amount of information can easily overwhelm human analysts. That’s where having resources to targeted attack analytics that can quickly comb through data makes all the difference – and yields results, according to Holland.
A New Era for Symantec Partners
Beyond the sundry technology advances on display, Symantec also offered a customer update, including a new focus on the success of the company’s most strategic partners.
Karen Buffo, SED Chief Marketing Officer, said the goal would be to ensure partners came away with “a positive experience” working with Symantec. “We want to give them the ability to be more successful. We’re listening.”
And changes are afoot. In fact, Roy Borden, Symantec’s Vice President of Global Partner Sales, said Symantec had enacted “sweeping and fundamental changes” in the last 12 months. “We’re no longer trying to be all things to all organizations,” he said. “We’re focusing on organizations that invest with us. We’re also focusing on simplicity. We had a partner program that, quite frankly, required high-level math skills to figure out how much margin you were making. We’ve stripped the complexity out of the program and systems.”
Beyond the sundry technology advances on display, Symantec also offered a customer update, including a new focus on the success of the company’s most strategic partners.
At the same time, Borden promised partners that Symantec would equip them with both the tools and the customer access to establish “strong, long-lasting relationships with their customers. We’re not leaving you on your own.”
“You will see even more simplification around pricing and SKUs,” he said. “All this means spending less times on process and more time on selling. I couldn’t be more excited for our partner community.”
For access to all of the great content from Catalyst, don’t miss the “on demand” access here available only until Oct. 29, 2020.
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Symantec’s Cloud Security Threat Report Shines a Light on the Cloud’s Real Risks
What are the real cloud security challenges your enterprise faces — and what can you do about them? Read on
For years, the cloud has been changing the way enterprises work. But we’re now at where the cloud doesn’t merely help the business. Today, the cloud is the business. Put simply, it’s the way we get things done.
That transformation has helped enterprises. But it also brings with it a serious set of cyber security challenges, including a lack of visibility into corporate infrastructure, the difficulty of protecting complex, heterogeneous IT environments, and a growing number of attack surfaces.
What are the real cloud security challenges your enterprise faces — and what can you do about them? The best place for an in-depth look is Symantec’s 2019 Cloud Security Threat Report. And for solutions, turn to Symantec’s Zero Trust cloud security. I’ll cover both in this blog post.
Cloud-Related Dangers
For the Cloud Security Threat Report, Symantec surveyed 1,250 security decision makers worldwide to understand the shifting cloud security landscape, the scope of shadow IT and shadow data usage, and to gauge the maturity of security practices as enterprises transition to the cloud.
We found that the complexity in the way the cloud is used creates serious visibility problems for IT. Tracking these cloud workloads is a universally recognized problem. Ninety three percent of survey respondents report they have issues keeping tabs on all their cloud workloads. And the problem will continue to grow rapidly.
Most IT and SecOps organizations are underestimating the amount of cloud in use and it’s growth rate. According to the survey, the average organization believes its employees are using 452 cloud apps. However, according to Symantec’s own data, the actual number of shadow IT apps in use per organization is nearly four times higher, 1,807. The survey found cloud app deployment increased 16 percent over the past 12 months and is expected to surge 22 percent in the next year. Given the significant underestimation of apps in use coupled with the rapid growth rate, organizations are facing a mounting challenge to secure their migration to the cloud.
Apps aren’t the only problem. The cloud makes it easy for enterprises to lose control of their data. Oversharing cloud files containing sensitive and compliance-related data was cited as a problem by 93 percent of respondents. Additionally, according to the survey, respondents are underestimating the risks associated with compromised accounts by a factor of 8.
The survey also found companies aren’t able to adapt their security to their increasing cloud use. More than half of respondents (54 percent) say their organization’s cloud security hasn’t been able to keep up with the expansion of their use of new cloud apps.
Because of organizations’ immaturity in cloud security, enterprises often underestimate the scale and complexity of cloud attacks. The survey found DDOS attacks and cloud malware injections are the three most commonly investigated cloud security incidents. And while they struggle with stopping data breaches, internal Symantec data also indicates that unauthorized access threats account for the bulk of such incidents (64 percent.) That shows that organizations’ security culture and behavior are struggling to keep pace with the shift to cloud. Indeed, Symantec internal data shows that 85 percent of companies are not using best cloud security practices as outlined by the Center for Internet Security.
Learn More Now
What to Do Next
The cloud is the center of IT and increasingly, the foundation for cyber security. Understanding how threat vectors are shifting in the cloud is fundamental to making the necessary updates to your security program and strategy. Symantec’s Cloud Security Threat Report shines a light on how to secure the digitally transformed, virtual organization of today and tomorrow, so check out the report here. For a in-depth look, register for the webcast I’ll be presenting on July 25 with Jim Reavis, Co-Founder and CEO, Cloud Security Alliance.
Register for Webinar Here for North America
Register for Webinar Here for APJ
Register for Webinar Here for EMEA
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Symantec’s Global Intelligence Network: 20+ years of Intelligence Analyzed and Categorized
One of the largest civilian security threat intelligence networks in the world
If you want to get a taste for how things can change over time, 20 years is a good time measurement.
For example, here we are in 2021. And while 2001 might not seem like a long time ago, keep in mind that 20 years ago, the Golden State Warriors finished their season with a record of 17-65, Blockbuster Video stores were still going strong (and not giving a thought to a little company called Netflix), and Apple was still a few months away from releasing the first iPod, and, eventually, upending the music industry.
Yes, times and trends change. But, one thing that remains as consistent is Symantec's, as a division of Broadcom, commitment to threat intelligence gathering and analysis. And after 20 years, our Global Intelligence Network (GIN) is emblematic of how our experience, and the sheer scale of real-time data that we analyze and assess, provides the best tools and experts around when it comes to identifying and detecting threats quickly and protecting customers from attacks.
Symantec’s GIN is one of the largest civilian security threat intelligence networks in the world. Our GIN correlates information from 175 million endpoints, more than 126 million attack sensors, 160 million email account users and 80 million web proxies. And with that, we analyze more than 9 billion petabytes of security data, categorize 75 million malicious activities, and process 1 billion security requests a day.
With such scale, Symantec’s GIN is capable of identifying threats even before zero day. The game of cat and mouse becomes moot because of our ability to quickly let customers know about threats, provide them with the tools they need to block attackers from getting inside their networks, and detect and delete threats should an attacker manage to get inside an organization.
We don’t wait around for bad things to happen. With its ability to identify so-called 'One-Hit Wonders', Symantec’s GIN is unique. These One-Hit Wonders are the kinds of sites that network attackers put up, use to do whatever malicious activities they have in mind, and then take down all on the same day. A security vendor who relies on data that is, for example, seven days old before assessing an attack- is basically letting the bad guys get away. Our GIN goes after One-Hit Wonders the day they attempt their attacks and works to stop those attackers before they can wreak havoc on a network.
While collecting data on threats is extremely important, our GIN is about more than that. We leverage data from third-party threat feeds, analysts and customers who are willing to share their telemetry with us. With that information, Symantec applies machine learning along with advanced analytics to glean insights on threats and attacks. We store all of that in a data lake in the cloud for the quickest possible access and use.
And we don’t forget the human factor, either. Our GIN’s tools and solutions are bolstered by a team of thousands of analysts that work 24 hours a day, seven days a week, to bring experience, expertise and technical knowhow to the battle against organizational threats of all stripes and colors. You can say that when the machine can’t identify something, we have the humans in place to take over and get the job done.
We don’t wait around for bad things to happen. With its ability to identify so-called 'One-Hit Wonders', Symantec’s GIN is unique.
But, even with all of our skills, scope and size, we have not forgotten about the need of companies to ensure the privacy of individuals. We neither collect, nor retain, any sensitive information that is unnecessary. We do this through the use of data-minimization and privacy-by-design principles. We obfuscate data when necessary in order to ensure the privacy of legitimate users, while still collecting the information needed to identify and fight back against threats and attacks.
Whatever a company’s cyber security requirements may be, Symantec can customize a solution to fit those needs. The key ingredient is machine learning built on decades of Symantec experience and the GIN, working with large organizations to automate the configuration of protection settings and deliver the highest level of custom protection with zero impact to productivity.
Our decades of intelligence expertise is also verified by the reach Symantec’s GIN has among the biggest companies in the world. We serve more than 90% of Fortune 50 companies, and 8 out of every 10 companies in the Fortune 500. And we have assisted in the arrest of more than 150 alleged cyber criminals.
The status of Symantec’s GIN has been 20 years in the making. And when you have 20 years of experience under your belt, you’re going to see things that others won’t. The best intelligence is real-time intelligence, and that is what Symantec’s GIN has delivered as part of the world’s largest global security community. And that is also what customers can expect, and will get, in the years to come.
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Symantec’s Integrated Cyber Defense Platform
Trust the platform that is not just the buzzword of the day
Industry buzzwords invade our space like junk mail or spam. Overnight, it seems, words like “cloudification” pop up in blogs or webinar promos. When you hear a new term, it’s natural to wonder if you’re missing out.
But there’s another wrinkle to buzzwords. Just when we tire of the hype about tools, or scalability, or ecosystems, somebody (we won’t name names) mangles the true meaning of a popular concept like “platforms.”
Done right, platforms can accomplish more things, more efficiently, than even good point products.
Have platforms changed? In one positive way, yes: they are more open than they once were. But there’s another more perplexing change: some folks dilute the term to mean any type of multi-function software. And that’s not the true value of software platforms, particularly in the security industry.
At Symantec, a division of Broadcom (NASDAQ: AVGO), we love platforms, because experience tells us it matters to you, our customers. Done right, platforms can accomplish more things, more efficiently, than even good point products. True cyber security platforms provide both functional and data integration—sharing critical information between modules to amplify the response to new or known threats. Pseudo-platforms aren't worth the digital ink to explain what they do.
All Platforms are Not the Same:
How do you identify a bona fide cyber security platform? We recommend asking these three questions:
1. Does it reflect a substantial product vision?
A successful platform must decrease complexity, increase security, and reduce cost. You can’t boost security without a comprehensive vision. That’s why there are four pillars to Symantec Integrated Cyber Defense (ICD) platform: endpoint security; network security; identity security; and information security. Yes, you could (at great expense) attempt to cobble together disparate cyber security apps, but programming Frankenapp to simultaneously identify and impede novel threats would require a bit of alchemy. Unlike standalone apps, ICD integrates critical security technologies—and information sources—making it much quicker to adjust your security posture dynamically, when unexpected attacks occur.
2. Can it expand your team’s capabilities?
Achieving the right balance between a platform’s single point of integration and its ability to expand your SOC capabilities is essential to a sustainable cyber security platform. A platform will never last if it curtails your team’s flexibility to connect to SOC front-ends, for instance, including those from Splunk and IBM, among others. A truly integrated platform leaves your team more time to do their day job, rather than spend time on coding integrations. There’s less time needed for training and for maintenance. Ultimately a true platform allows for better outcomes, allowing for Level 1 Security Analysts to do Level 2 work.
3. Is there actual synergy between the platform modules?
When dealing with multiple multi-function products, a Security Operations Center (SOC) spends a great deal of time integrating those solutions on their own. And most SOCs suffer from a signal-to-noise ratio problem. This is somewhat similar to the classic garbage in, garbage out conundrum in financial software. Our customers tell us that analyzing alerts from point products cause analysts to waste time pursuing irrelevant anomalies, investigating whether this is a true threat or a false positive. We take a different approach, offering a Unified Security Event Model—you integrated once with Symantec, then all Symantec products will work. No additional integrated required. Our Unified Security Event model is also focused on sharing proactive and accurate threat intelligence. We not only offer centralized event collection, normalization and archiving on a single messaging bus, we also centralize filtering and forwarding to various SOC tools. With that capability, you can filter out events across products that you consistently see are not adding value to any investigation.
A Platform that Unifies, Automates, and Deploys Easily
An overnight shift to digital has caused many customers heartburn—how do you unify what’s on-premise and what’s moving to the cloud? ICD can unify on-premise and cloud cyber security solutions, enabling seamless deployment operations. Again, that’s not something one could easily replicate. With distributed work teams, there’s an increased emphasis on protecting all attack points, such as endpoints, email, web, network, information, and identities. These are tasks that standalone products simply can’t duplicate. With the integration of all attack points, it’s much easier for Symantec’s platform to automatically mitigate a threat, when possible.
Orchestrating intelligence from our Global Intelligence Network is vital to the success of ICD. The data is ingested dynamically, enabling ICD to take action on threats before other standalone packages or platforms find out about it. If it’s a threat we know, ICD can respond directly; otherwise, we send it to a Security Operations Center (SOC) or Security Information and Event Management (SIEM) to take action.
Orchestrating intelligence from our Global Intelligence Network is vital to the success of ICD.
We believe that a platform must not only secure your enterprise, it has to deliver rapid time to value. Your SecOps teams can’t be successful if they are constantly juggling multiple point products or tweaking a platform to get it to respond to threats in a coordinated fashion.
Platforms earn their keep not just by eliminating data loss and providing excellent endpoint protection, they must also reduce management complexity—freeing your team to become more productive and effective.
Trying to stop competitors from diluting the value of platforms is much like trying to block spam calls or pop up ads. You make a bit of progress, then they’re back at it. We know platforms matter, and we will continue to offer a platform that serves our customers now and into the future.
Watch Video: Symantec Integrated Cyber Defense
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Symantec’s Latest Intelligence Page: Your Weather Report for the Threat Landscape
We've revamped the Latest Intelligence page with new metrics and a new look.
For more than a decade, Symantec has been publishing monthly intelligence reports, providing a snapshot of what is happening on the threat landscape. Over the years these reports have focused on a variety of activity, covering topics ranging from spam to botnets (and even spam botnets). Back in early 2016, we moved away from PDF reports and launched a new, dynamic page on the Symantec website, providing the latest intelligence available.
Today we are happy to share the next iteration of this Latest Intelligence page. With this new page comes a whole new set of metrics, previously only available annually in the ISTR, along with several old favorites from the intelligence reports over the years. We have also revamped the look and feel of the page, making it easier to navigate, as well as providing a more mobile-device-friendly interface.
This new approach allows us the opportunity to tell new stories surrounding the threat landscape. We can now share trends on specific malicious activity classifications, ranging from ransomware, to cryptojacking events, to attacks against IoT devices.
To provide a few real-world examples from just last month, financial Trojan activity rose in September by 12.5 percent when compared to August. Then, looking at the specific financial Trojans active during this time frame, we can see that Ramnit is responsible for the lion’s share of activity. However, it appears that this Trojan’s activity declined 6.9 percentage points since August. In comparison, Emotet and Trickybot saw an increase of 8.3 and 2.7 percentage points respectively, likely contributing to the overall increase in activity.
Figure 1. Financial Trojan activity metrics
Another interesting item that we decided to look at with the launch of this new page is network attack types. The metric reveals that SMB-related attacks dominate this field, comprising around half of all such attacks in a given month. In contrast, attacks against technologies such as Flash and Java, which were quite popular in past years, have declined drastically, well down into the single digits.
Figure 2. Top network attack types metric
As we stated in early 2016, when the first version of the Latest Intelligence page launched, the threat landscape is never the same two months in a row. One month there is a jump in web attacks; another might see a spike in downloader activity. This can make the threat landscape a tricky scene to navigate. We hope that our new Latest Intelligence page helps make doing so just a little easier.
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Symantec’s Threat Hunters
Shining a light on new threats and protecting against critical attacks
When it comes to investigating attacks and advanced threat actors, the capabilities of Symantec, by Broadcom Software, are robust. The Symantec Threat Hunter Team follows a detailed and highly successful process of shining a light on attacks and the groups behind them, whether they be espionage groups or high-level cybercrime operations capable of extorting millions of dollars from their victims.
Our investigations allow us to build a broad picture of the attack, including a profile of the attackers, and the tools, targets, and motivations behind it. The goal is to develop actionable intelligence. These insights are used to improve our products’ ability to protect against critical threats. We often share this information with customers as well in order to keep them up-to-date on the adversaries they face.
Our Threat Hunter organization behind this process is a multidisciplinary group split into three teams who collaborate closely, and the work of each team often feeds into that of the others.
When it comes to investigating attacks and advanced threat actors, the capabilities of Symantec, by Broadcom Software, are robust.
The analysts on the front line who investigate incidents on customer networks and hunt for new threats are our Threat Hunting and Threat Research Team.
Their work feeds into the Security Intelligence and Analytics Team, which uses these initial findings to continually train our machine learning analytics technology to automatically find similar patterns of potentially suspicious activity. The resulting analytics give the Threat Hunting and Research team new leads for further investigations. They also trigger the creation of alerts in the EDR console, informing customers of potentially malicious activity.
Once the findings are documented, our Threat Intelligence Content team creates a range of materials for customers. They produce documents with actionable information about new tools or tactics associated with a known threat actor via “Threat Alerts”. These short reports list all available indicators of compromise (IOCs) linked to the threat, in addition to additional contextual information. In cases where they know a potentially critical breach is underway on a customer’s network, they also will reach out to the contact directly.
This is one reason why Threat Alerts have received high marks from our customers and partners. Ultimately, they have helped stop many ransomware attacks before the attackers had a chance to steal or encrypt data.
The analysts on the front line who investigate incidents on customer networks and hunt for new threats are our Threat Hunting and Threat Research Team.
The Threat Intelligence Content Team also produces the Threat Landscape Bulletin, a daily digest of the big cybersecurity news stories, and two white papers per quarter. These are longform research pieces discussing a major threat or trend that’s active on the cybercrime landscape, such as ransomware or Living-off-the-Land tactics. Other papers focus on particular threat actors, such as our upcoming paper on Russian espionage groups. All of this valuable intelligence is available to customers.
Our Threat Hunter team is continually on top of the threat landscape and has taken the lead in uncovering significant new threats. In March of this year, we lifted the lid on Daxin, which is without doubt the most advanced piece of malware Symantec researchers have seen used by a China-sponsored espionage group. Going by its capabilities, Daxin is certainly a key tool in China’s cyber arsenal. It is optimized for use against hardened targets, allowing the attackers to burrow deep into a target’s network and exfiltrate data without raising suspicions.
The Symantec Threat Hunter team also has been highly active in responding to threats linked to the Russian invasion of Ukraine. Because of this we were able to share IOCs relating to Russian attacks against Ukraine in the hours preceding the launch of the invasion, and, since then, we regularly publish updates with new information on recent attacks.
Find out more about how our Symantec Threat Hunter group remains vigilant against cyberattacks large and small with the information below.
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Taiwan targeted with new cyberespionage back door Trojan
Symantec identified a previously unknown back door Trojan infecting organizations primarily located in Taiwan, as well as Brazil and the United States.
In late August 2015, Symantec identified a previously unknown back door Trojan (Backdoor.Dripion) infecting organizations primarily located in Taiwan, as well as Brazil and the United States. Dripion is custom-built, designed to steal information, and has been used sparingly in a limited number of targeted attacks. The attackers behind this campaign went to some lengths to disguise their activities, including using domains names disguised as antivirus (AV) company websites for their command and control (C&C) servers. These attacks have some links to earlier attacks by a group called Budminer involving the Taidoor Trojan (Trojan.Taidoor).
The threat posed by custom malware such as Dripion illustrates the value of multilayered security. Unknown threats may evade signature-based detection, but can be blocked by other detection tools which identify malicious behavior.
Background
Our investigation began when we received three file hashes, which we determined to have the functionality of a back door with information-stealing capabilities. The malware appeared to be new, rarely detected, and not publicly available. As we analyzed the binary and compared it against other known back door Trojans, we realized this was custom-developed malware.
Developing a back door with information-stealing capabilities designed to evade detection requires both knowledge and funding. Usually when we see a new back door Trojan like this, it is tied to organizations involved in cyberespionage campaigns.
Malware downloader
One of the first steps taken when investigating malware is to determine how it is getting onto a victim’s computer. Many publicly available downloaders exist; however, only a few unique downloaders have been used over the past few years that have been exclusive to cyberespionage activity. Since Dripion appeared to be used by a single attacker against a small target group, we wanted to determine if the downloader could provide additional evidence to help attribute the threat to any known threat groups.
The downloader was identified as Downloader.Blugger (MD5: 260f19ef39d56373bb5590346d2c1811). It is not a new piece of malware, having been in existence since at least 2011. How the victim was infected with Blugger is currently unknown.
Blugger used encryption to make its infrastructure and commands queried in the URL requests harder to detect. After decrypting however, we identified the following URL requests:
http://classic-blog.[REDACTED DOMAIN 1].com/nasyzk/20002630
http://nasyzk.[REDACTED DOMAIN 2].net/blog/post/251315428
Both of the domains we analyzed in the URLs requested by the downloader are publicly accessible blogs. The downloader contacts these blog URLs in order to retrieve Dripion for installation.
The blog posts are primarily in English yet most of the targets are based in Taiwan. As illustrated in Figure 1, one of the blogs references US healthcare spending. It is unknown if the attacker created the blog or simply compromised another to use in their attacks. If the blog was compromised, then the attacker likely would not create posts themselves as it would show the blog’s creator that something was awry. If the blog was created by the attacker, it may be an attempt to develop a blog with topics that would likely be of interest to the intended target. Most of the blogs were related to news events.
Figure 1. Screenshot of one of the blogs used to infect the victim with Dripion malware
The Dripion back door Trojan
Once Dripion is installed, the attacker can access the user’s computer. Dripion has the functionally of a back door Trojan, letting attackers upload, download, and steal pre-determined information from the victim, and execute remote commands. Information such as the victim’s computer name and IP address are automatically transmitted to the C&C server upon the initial infection.
CommandDescription
GoSleepSleeps for 10 minutes
GoKillAttempts to delete itself and ends its activities
GoByeDisconnects from the computer
nodataSimilar to GoBye
CommandExecute command (lpCommandLine in CreateProcessA), redirect result through pipe to .tmp file and Download file
UpFileWrite data in file on victim's computer
DownFileWrite data to a remote open file (InternetWriteFile). The .tmp file used may be deleted after success operation.
ExecuteFileCreate a new process (CreateProcessA)
Table 1. Commands associated with the Dripion malware
Additionally, the developer of the Dripion malware used XOR encoding for both the binary configuration file (XOR: 0xA8) as well as network requests with the C&C server (XOR: 0xA3), to make detection more difficult.
Dripion has been identified in multiple variations and has version numbers hardcoded within the malware. This indicates that the attackers have the ability to both create and develop their own custom malware as well as update their code to provide new capabilities and make detection more difficult.
Ties to previous cyberespionage activity
The use of publicly accessible blogs to distribute malware is a tactic we have seen previously, but few cyberespionage groups have used this technique. Fewer still have used this strategy to deliver custom-developed malware not often seen in the wild.
The first piece of evidence pointing towards a link with previous cyberespionage campaigns was the use of the Blugger downloader, which has only been used by a group Symantec calls Budminer. This group has used Blugger to distribute its own custom malware known as Taidoor (Trojan.Taidoor). Symantec has previously written about Budminer’s Taidoor campaigns. Significantly, this is the first time we have seen Blugger used to deliver malware other than Taidoor.
Further investigation uncovered a second tie with earlier Budminer activity. One of the Blugger samples associated with Dripion connected with a root domain also used in Taidoor-related activity.
Figure 2. Dripion and Taidoor share ties with the same root domain.
Both of the URL queries originated from the Blugger downloader which connected to the blog classic-blog.[REDACTED DOMAIN 1].com. They then call out to subdomains of the domain [REDACTED DOMAIN 3].net. Both Dripion and Taidoor not only connected to the same website (classic-blog.[REDACTED DOMAIN 1].com) but also used the same URL (classic-blog.[REDACTED DOMAIN 1].com /nasyzk/[ENCODED TEXT]) to obtain the encrypted C&C configuration.
Targeting
Symantec first identified activity involving Dripion in September 2015. Based on the timestamp of the earliest known sample however, Dripion may have been in existence since 2013. The Dripion activity that we have analyzed is extremely targeted and has involved far fewer victims compared to the number of users infected with Taidoor.
Figure 3. Detection of unique Dripion and Taidoor file hashes by region
The similarity between the two sets of activity is the number of unique file hashes found infecting users located in Taiwan.
Unfortunately, we need more data to determine if the timestamps associated with Dripion dating back to November 2013 (7ad3b2b6eee18af6816b6f4f7f7f71a6) are legitimate or if they have been forged. The earliest known Dripion activity we were able to validate took place in November 2014. Despite the one-year gap in activity, it is possible that campaigns involving Dripion happened during this period and went undetected due to its small target window.
Another interesting tactic used to deceive potential targets lies within the C&C infrastructure. The attackers created multiple domains with names similar to that of legitimate companies and websites in the antivirus community. For example the domains hyydn.nortonsoft[.]com and mhysix.mcfeesoft[.]com were both C&C domains used in attacks. Using typo-squat domains to mimic legitimate sites is a tactic frequently used to trick the targets as well as defenders, in an effort to make the domains blend in with normal activity.
Conclusion
We began this investigation with what we believed was a new campaign using an unidentified back door Trojan against targets primarily in Taiwan. As the investigation grew we found multiple ties between this newly discovered attack and activity associated with the Budminer cyberespionage group:
Same unique downloader (not publicly available and only seen used in China-based cyberespionage activity)
The unique downloader used by both Dripion and Taidoor encrypts data using the victim's MAC address as the RC4 key
Use of the same blogs for distribution of malware (Taidoor and Dripion)
Use of shared C&C infrastructure (at the root domain level)
Similar targeting (primary location of targets is Taiwan)
We compared Dripion against Taidoor malware samples to determine if there was any shared code or if it may have originated from the same developer. Our findings concluded there were no similarities between the two malware families. However, the downloader used by both malware families has unique attributes, and we believe it to be from the same developer.
So what does all this mean? Attribution of cyberespionage groups is difficult and needs to be done carefully based on fact and not assumptions. We have a number of ties between the two sets of activity. Not all of the ties are strong on their own, but together provide a strong case that there is a relationship between the groups targeting Taiwan using Dripion and Taidoor malware.
Based on the evidence we have presented Symantec attributed the activity involving the Dripion malware to the Budminer advanced threat group. While we have not seen new campaigns using Taidoor malware since 2014, we believe the Budminer group has changed tactics to avoid detection after being outed publicly in security white papers and blogs over the past few years.
This investigation is just one example of Symantec’s ongoing effort to identify unknown emerging threats. By remaining one step ahead of adversaries, we can protect customers with intelligence-driven security.
Mitigation advice
Always keep your security software up to date to protect yourself against any new variants of this malware.
Keep your operating system and other software updated. Software updates will frequently include patches for newly discovered security vulnerabilities which are frequently exploited by attackers.
Delete any suspicious-looking emails you receive, especially if they contain links or attachments. Spear phishing emails are frequently used by cyberespionage attackers as a means of luring victims into opening malicious files.
Protection
Symantec and Norton products protect against these threats with the following detections:
Backdoor.Dripion
Downloader.Blugger
Trojan.Taidoor
Indicators of compromise
File hashes
2dd931cf0950817d1bb567e12cf80ae7
3652075425b367d101a7d6b6ef558c6c
59ff5624a02e98f60187add71bba3756
865d24324f1cac5aecc09bae6a9157f5
eca0ef705d148ff105dbaf40ce9d1d5e
f4260ecd0395076439d8c0725ee0125f
3652075425b367d101a7d6b6ef558c6c
285de6e5d3ed8ca966430846888a56ff
31f83a1e09062e8c4773a03d5993d870
4438921ea3d08d0c90f2f903556967e5
7ad3b2b6eee18af6816b6f4f7f7f71a6
b594d53a0d19eaac113988bf238654d3
c3e6ce287d12ac39ceb24e08dc63e3b5
e0c6b7d9bdae838139caa3acce5c890d
e7205c0b80035b629d80b5e7aeff7b0e
c182e33cf7e85316e9dc0e13999db45e
272ff690f6d27d2953fbadf75791274c
ae80f056b8c38873ab1251c454ed1fe9
260f19ef39d56373bb5590346d2c1811
FE8D19E3435879E56F5189B37263AB06
68BEBCD9D2AD418332980A7DAB71BF79
CBDE79B6BA782840DB4ACA46A5A63467
Infrastructure
hyydn[.]nortonsoft.com
mhysix[.]mcfeesoft.com
gspt[.]dns1.us
unpt[.]defultname.com
198.144.100.73
208.61.229.10
200.215.222.105
61.222.137.66
103.240.182.99
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Takeaways About GDPR
Q&A: Ilias Chantzos discusses the ramifications of one the biggest regulatory changes governing data.
Circle May 25 on your calendar. That’s when the EU’s General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR) takes effect. And yes, GDPR is living up to its advanced billing as a Very Big Deal.
GDPR, which puts strict new requirements on how enterprises collect and use personal data, also applies to customer information that gets processed outside of the 28 member nations of the European Union.
Few people are more familiar with the impact of the looming changes in data-collection and handling practices than Ilias Chantzos. A former legal and policy officer in the Directorate General Information Society of the European Commission, Chantzos joined Symantec in 2004 to build its government affairs program.
We recently caught up with Chantzos to help gauge the ramifications of this turning point in the history of privacy and data regulation.
Q: Who is subject to the GDPR?
Chantzos: The GDPR regulates information governance within an organization, on top of addressing the protection of individual personal data. GDPR is applicable to all organizations within the European Union and can apply also to organizations outside the EU when certain conditions are met. For instance, if a company has a website that targets a European market, though there is no presence in the EU, the GDPR applies. It is critical to remember that GDPR applies when personal data are transferred outside of Europe and that GDPR does not just concern the data of customers but also of employees or business contacts (suppliers, partners). You can determine how GDPR impacts your organization here, by taking this Symantec GDPR quiz to find out.
Q: What are the requirements around breach notice?
Chantzos: Data protection regulators have included security requirements in privacy legislation. GDPR makes those requirements much more detailed and stringent. Personal data needs to be effectively protected from malicious or accidental incidents that affect the confidentiality, integrity, availability or authenticity of the data. In case of a data breach organizations are expected to discover the breach and may be required to notify the data protection authority within 72 hours since its detection. Further notification of the individuals affected by the breach may also be required.
Q: What does the GDPR say about data transfers? What is the impact of shadow IT, where users are running rogue applications?
Chantzos: A company is expected to provide the same level of protection to personal data collected that are GDPR relevant irrespectively of where that data resides or where they get transferred. This includes data transfers that happen outside the European Union or the use of cloud computing or applications that employees or partners bring into the IT environment of an organization that is outside what the IT department has vetted and approved. The GDPR expects that the organizations will exercise accountable usage of technologies in a way that allows them to demonstrate compliance with GDPR and meet their privacy obligations.
Q: What is the risk of non-compliance with the GDPR?
Chantzos: This is a frequently asked question. All organizations want to better understand their GDPR risk and a lot depends on their business models and their level of compliance maturity. The penalties of non-compliance are several and apply to all organizations covered by GDPR – regardless of their global location. The GDPR foresees remedies such as the ability of a data protection authority to forbid a particular type of processing all the way to administrative fines up to twenty million Euros, or four percent of annual worldwide turnover (whichever is higher). The penalties however don’t take into account the detrimental impact to reputation and brand that such decisions may have on companies. On top of what the GDPR delivers, countries around the world in regions like Asia Pacific and America are currently considering or developing regulations that mirror the standards set in the GDPR for data protection.
Privacy law has been with us for a while. In Europe, there has been harmonized privacy legislation since 1995. In that sense GDPR is an evolution not a revolution. For organizations that have already significant compliance experience with privacy and cyber security requirements the GDPR will be a step up. However, for those with less experience it will create significant challenges and will require them to revisit their business processes.
If you found this information useful, you may also enjoy:
Article 84 of the GDPR Concerning Penalties
GDPR for Dummies
IDC Assessment
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Take No Ransomware Prisoners with Office 365
IT organizations need a way to minimize the damage by detecting and interrupting what could potentially turn into a mass encryption event
While somewhat eclipsed by other threat vectors in recent years, ransomware remains a significant danger to organizations migrating to cloud-based platforms like Microsoft Office 365.
Compromised cloud login credentials, public links, infected emails, and easily accessible file shares are just some of the ways ransomware pivots off other cloud apps to penetrate the Office 365 environment. Indeed, Symantec research previously found that every 131 emails contained a malware attack, and 61% of organizations were hit with ransomware in 2016.
Symantec’s latest Internet Security Threat Report (ISTR) found that while overall ransomware attacks were down 20% in 2018, the vector continued its assault on the enterprise, increasing 12% and accounting for 81% of all ransomware infections. Email campaigns remain the primary means of entry, and Symantec telemetry found that Microsoft Office users were the most at risk of falling for email-based malware. The research revealed that nearly half (48%) of malicious email attachments are in fact Office files, a leap from 5% in 2017. Mobile ransomware is also becoming a bigger problem, growing by 33% in 2018.
The high-profile Cerber ransomware targeted millions of Office 365 users via a phishing campaign in 2016, encouraging users to click on a bogus email attachment, which then encrypted their photo, video, and document files and demanded a ransom in order to unlock them. Follow-on targeted attacks were conducted by the SamSam group in 2018—Symantec’s 2019 ISTR found evidence of 67 SamSam attacks, most aimed at organizations in the United States.
To stop the flow of ransomware, organizations need to prevent malicious files and emails from getting to users, mainly by instituting cloud-sharing permissions.
While Office 365 has built-in security protections, they aren’t enough to detect and analyze every malicious file and emails for ransomware, let alone prevent them from ever reaching enterprise users. Office 365 has some limitations in its security controls that organizations need to address.
To stop the flow of ransomware, organizations need to prevent malicious files and emails from getting to users, mainly by instituting cloud-sharing permissions. On the chance ransomware is able to infiltrate the enterprise environment, IT organizations need a way to minimize the damage by detecting and interrupting what could potentially turn into a mass encryption event.
The Symantec Defense
The combination of email security technologies and a Cloud Access Security Broker (CASB) can help deliver the visibility and protections necessary for stopping ransomware in its tracks. As part of Symantec’s security portfolio, Email Security.cloud is employed to detect ransomware, among other threats, in, or attached to, emails while blocking users from accessing links to malicious web sites. CloudSOC, Symantec’s CASB solution, picks up protection from there by extending visibility and control into Office 365 apps beyond email and to other cloud applications.
Both Email Security.cloud and CloudSOC are fortified by Symantec’s antimalware engines, machine learning, and sandbox techniques to identify advanced threats. CloudSOC, for example, employs a sophisticated machine learning-infused analytics engine to continuously monitor user behavior and access to identify risky behavior patterns, including abnormal log-in and cloud access, encrypted file activity, and unusual uploads, downloads, or data destruction. For example, the behavior analytics capabilities could detect and flag as suspicious a particular user account that continuously downloaded content from a corporate Office 365 app and then uploaded the same content to personal file sharing apps.
Symantec’s Email Threat Isolation technology provides another layer of protections. This capability will automatically direct users to an isolated, secure, and disposable container where they can safely click on suspect links or interact with questionable websites without infecting the greater enterprise with ransomware or other malware. The technology also prevents users from downloading suspect files and will not allow them to submit their corporate credentials, preventing further attacks.
The Email Threat Isolation and machine learning technologies are bolstered with threat intelligence input gathered from Symantec’s Global Intelligence Network, billed as the largest civilian threat database. There are thousands of small, micro clues about whether something is good or bad traffic and the system uses pattern matching and machine learning to interpret incoming emails and prevent against future attacks.
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Taking Cyber Security to New Levels of Visibility and Rapid Response
Organizations need to reduce the complexity and speed threat detection and response. The combination of Symantec and CyberSponse offers a powerful solution
Cyber security analysts are drowning in a rising sea of alerts. By any measure, the numbers are staggering. A survey of security analysts by Enterprise Management Associates revealed that the average enterprise Security Operations Center (SOC) encounters more than 10,000 alerts per day, while nearly 30 percent reported they receive more than 1,000,000 per day. When one considers that the same survey revealed that analysts spend up to 30 minutes in incident response (IR) triage for each alert selected for review, it’s no surprise the bad guys are winning. For security analysts, the reality is similar to a real-world Hunger Games, but with the odds clearly not in their favor.
Indeed, more than a third of the respondents say that sometimes the only way they can cope with the stress is to ignore an alert and hope for the best. Adding more fatigue to the fire, the vast majority of the alerts are eventually found to be misidentified as critical or result in false positives. It’s no wonder that nearly 80 percent of analysts say they feel overwhelmed. The situation is unsustainable – and it’s only getting worse.
The average enterprise Security Operations Center (SOC) encounters more than 10,000 alerts per day, while nearly 30 percent reported they receive more than 1,000,000 per day.
According to a joint report by Accenture and the Ponemon Institute, the cost of cyber crime has risen more than 62 percent over the past five years, with the average enterprise experiencing 130 data breaches per year. At an average cost globally to each organization of nearly $12 million annually, security leaders are under relentless pressure to stop the bleeding and improve security.
Automating and Orchestrating Cyber Security
To accomplish these goals is the reason why I founded CyberSponse in 2012. CyberSponse provides the automation and orchestration software to automate many of the manual processes involved in cyber security. It replicates many of the most common analyst tasks typically performed using a keyboard and a mouse, but at machine speeds far faster than any human capability.
The CyberSponse CyOps platform automates and orchestrates an organization’s security products so that they work seamlessly together through integrated playbooks. These playbooks pre-configure common security workflows and customize them to an organization’s own security processes. They allow analysts to accelerate informed decision making by eliminating the time-consuming tasks involved in collecting all the evidence and data needed to make those decisions.
CyberSponse achieves significant time savings by taking over the repetitive grunt work involved in reviewing every alert to determine if it’s false or positive. It accelerates mean time to detection (MTTD) and mean time to response (MTTR) by increasing the speed of threat detection and incident response (IR). And it opens the door to better analytics for tracking what the SOC determines are real threats, rather than wasting analyst time and resources reacting and responding to false alarms. CyberSponse also improves analyst morale as its automated capabilities reduce the sensory overload brought on by the volume of alerts and constant repetition of manual processes.
Powerful Integrations with Symantec
But what I feel offers one of the most powerful recommendations for CyberSponse is how it allows organizations to take maximum advantage of the full array of Symantec’s Next Generation security products. Working together, CyOPs functions like a traffic cop, an integrator that enables Symantec products to work together on an organizational level faster and more cohesively. CyberSponse also extends the benefits of Symantec security products to other, non-Symantec security products by enabling them to work just as easily together, and at that same machine speed.
Customers that take advantage of our joint offerings will benefit from having the increased visibility of a 360-degree view of their organization. They will have the capability to combine both Symantec endpoint telemetry and network activity to get a better and more precise picture of the state of their IT environment. Once a malware, living-off-the-land (LOTL), or other alert is triggered, the CyOPs platform immediately orchestrates the right Symantec products, such as Symantec EDR, Security Analytics, and Integrated Cyber Defense Exchange to enrich, correlate, and assess the incident data. CyOPs then automates the workflows for confirmation and analysis to rapidly identify the degree of threat posed. And once confirmed, it quickly performs any necessary remediation actions required. Using this approach, SecOPs teams can increase their efficiency, mitigate any skills shortages and reduce the time spent chasing too many alerts.
The bottom line is that the strategic partnership between Symantec and CyberSponse offers organizations the solution they need, that you need, to reduce MTTD and MTTR and the complexity of detecting, threat hunting, and responding to relentless and persistent cyber attacks. Our combined strengths, analytics, automation and orchestration capabilities will empower your security operations teams and put them back in control of the cyber warfare game.
I invite you to visit our two adjacent booths and experience for yourself how powerfully we work together at our joint Symantec-CyberSponse security demo in the Expo Hall at Black Hat USA 2019 in Las Vegas, August 7 & 8, 2019. I look forward to seeing you there.
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Taking Guesswork Out of Mobile Security
Lessons learned about how to deploy mobile security with peer-tested strategies that work
We live in a mobile-centric world, a fact that has not gone unnoticed by cyber criminals. In a classic application of the Willie Sutton approach, they continue to step up both the ferocity and the sophistication of their attacks because, simply put, mobile is increasingly where the money is nowadays.
Consider the following: The number of new mobile malware variants soared 54% last year, compared to 2016, according to Symantec’s recently-released Internet Threat Research Report. What’s more last year also witnessed an average of 24,000 malicious mobile applications that got blocked each day. And there’s no indication that there’ll be any letup in 2018.
That’s not going to derail what’s been a historic technology transition to mobile. At the same time, however, it underscores the extent of the challenge to security practitioners as the number of potentially vulnerable points of entry into their organizations increases exponentially each year.
Symantec recently surveyed customers who navigated this passage to get a better sense of what the process entails and what lessons it might offer to companies looking to put their own mobile security strategy in place.
When asked why they thought it was important to secure their mobile devices, more than 60% of the respondents mentioned the sensitivity of their data.
“This may seem very basic but if you go back a couple of years, many people were not as motivated about mobile,” said Symantec Mobile Security Specialist Brian Duckering. “We were still focused on traditional devices. But over time it has become pretty clear that mobile is a pretty big target for hackers and the people who want to infiltrate your companies and get to your data.”
More than 40% pointed to the ubiquity of mobile devices in people's lives as well as the range of threats they now must contend with.
“With mobile, [the devices] are always on,” Duckering noted. “Ask someone how long their mobile devices are turned off. They are always connected to the internet and it provides a huge target for malicious actors and hackers.”
Because people use their phones for both business and personal purposes, it opens up additional opportunities for attackers to deploy social engineering and other hacking techniques to try and infiltrate malware onto the devices.
And it's not just malware. People are connecting to public networks when they are at home or traveling, logging into public Wi-Fi at coffee shops at airports. That offers attackers new ways to steal data by duping unsuspecting users with man-in-the middle techniques.
So what were the most important things to keep in mind when organizations started their mobile security journeys?
One was a need to prioritize assets to protect and not try to protect everything - the focus being on critical content
A need to take end-users into account. User needs were paramount, and it was incumbent to listen to them. In the end, happy users drive high adoption rates
Lastly, productivity shouldn’t be impaired by the proposed solution. Don’t put demands on users that will drive them away. The process should be easy to deploy and use and should not result in a drain on device batteries
“This was a pleasant surprise because we figured people would talk about tactics and strategies of a company about how to protect information,” Duckering recalled.
He said the results reflected a priority on making sure that users were productive and had can use their devices for work and personal uses - “and then make sure they are able to do that in a secure way.”
“You don't want to lock down everything,” he added, pointing to the growth of Shadow IT where users and departments go outside of normal corporate channels to procure products that they want.
“If it impedes their ability to do what they want to do, they will go around [the company] and it have a negative impact on security,” according to Duckering.
Lastly, when it came to figuring out the most important requirements of a mobile security solution, the top considerations in the survey results spoke to the need for comprehensiveness. Users simply do not want piecemeal solutions.
The results also underscored the importance attached to making sure any solution aligned with the organization's priorities. It had to be reliable but it also needed to receive the proverbial thumbs up when it came to user experience and usability.
Use Case: The Royal Bank of Canada
The Royal Bank of Canada has offices around the world and employs 25,000 people. The bank needed a mobile solution that provided both added security and also offered regulatory compliance. It also wanted a workable solution that users would embrace, not actively seek to circumnavigate, according to Brian Jacome, the Director of Applications and Controls at the bank.
“Being able to onboard users seamlessly with little or no manual intervention is a huge factor,” Jacome said. “We didn’t want calls coming into the help desk.”
When it came to figuring out the integuments of a successful mobile security plan, Jacome said organizations need to make sure they understand the priorities of the business as well as of the users.
Echoing the survey findings, he said planning must put a priority on users’ needs and ease of use. It may be easier in theory than in practice, but the goal ought to be a seamless integration to foster a low effort deployment and not require extra maintenance.
You can listen to what Jacome and Duckering discussed in fuller detail by tuning into a recent webinar they participated in by clicking here.
If you found this information useful, you may also enjoy:
Webinar: Solving Mobile Security: Peer-tested Strategies That Work
Keys to Crafting a Winning Mobile Security: Customers Weigh In
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Taking on BEC Scammers: It's Not Mission Impossible
BEC scammers continue to snooker victims but here’s what organizations can do to lower their risks
Business Email Compromise (BEC) scams continue to claim enterprise victims, posing new headaches for security practitioners.
Indeed, Symantec found that 7,710 organizations were hit by BEC attacks in 2017, accounting for an average of 4.9 times per victim. It’s costing victims dearly; the FBI, which took down 74 BEC fraudsters in June, found that BEC scams resulted in adjusted losses of over $675 million last year. The agency’s Internet Crime Complaint Center (IC3) reports that over $3.7 billion has been reported as stolen funds from BEC schemes to date.
A BEC scam can be a targeted spear phishing scheme used to gain legitimate email account information, or a simple spoof of an email from a person’s boss or trusted vendor.
Scammers typically dupe victims by using common subject lines such "payment" followed by "urgent", "request", "attention", and "important." Unfortunately, BEC scams are often polished enough so that they largely go unnoticed.
A scammer sends email that looks like it came from a legitimate organization with the intent of redirecting a wire transfer into the scammer’s bank accounts. Scammers often try to disguise their communications as coming from banks, real estate firms, rental agencies, and other organizations that handle large money transactions. They then send fraudulent emails to individuals and organizations responsible for making large purchases with wire transfer information to transfer money to the scammers account.
Laundering their ill-gotten gains is another important step in the BEC scammer’s process. They find people through romance schemes or work from home propositions, for example, and trick them into accepting the large stolen funds by check or wire transfer.
Then these unsuspecting money mules send most of the funds back to the scammers – while keeping a small bit as payment for their trouble. As innocent as these people may be, they can be found to be complicit and subject to criminal prosecution, the same as the scammers who tricked them. The upshot: Financial fines and a sentence to serve time in prison.
A scammer sends email that looks like it came from a legitimate organization with the intent of redirecting a wire transfer into the scammer’s bank accounts.
What You Can Do
If you believe you are a victim of a BEC scheme, request a wire recall from the originating bank. Then file a complaint with the IC3: https://bec.ic3.gov/. Be sure and save all the emails and documents you received and sent that are related to the scam.
The IC3 offers the following steps to help mitigate attacks.
Frequently monitor your Email Exchange server for changes in configuration and custom rules for specific accounts
Consider adding an email banner stating when an email comes from outside your organization so they are easily noticed
Conduct End User education and training on the BEC threat and how to identify a spear phishing email
Ensure company policies provide for verification of any changes to existing invoices, bank deposit information, and contact information
Contact requestors by phone before complying with e-mail requests for payments or personnel records
Consider requiring two parties sign off on payment transfers
“Symantec has been tracking this scam for some time, said Kevin Haley, Symantec’s Director of Services Product Management.
Indeed, Symantec was part of a joint effort between private industry and a law enforcement working group to help apprehend business email compromise (BEC) attackers.
“Our anti-spam technology can actually find and block these types of attacks,” Haley said. “And I’m pleased to say that some of the security intelligence we have collected has assisted law enforcement in the arrest of individuals behind these scams.”
Still, Haley noted, no one is immune. And it does take an extra level of awareness and vigilance to protect your organization from BEC schemes. BEC schemers are increasingly aggressive and – as many organizations have learned to their dismay – increasingly successful.
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Taking Stock of the Changing Threat Landscape, Circa 2018
Businesses can now review Symantec’s 2018 Internet Security Threat Report to track the shifting tactics that attackers are deploying and take counter-measures to block them.
As any commander knows, a battle can turn on the quality of the information available about the adversary.
It’s true in war and it’s also true in the security world, where businesses are locked in an ongoing battle to defend their data against savvy adversaries capable of launching increasingly potent attacks. That’s why enterprise managers thirsting for the best intelligence available about this fast-changing threat landscape can glean important new insights with the release of Symantec’s 2018 Internet Security Threat Report.
This annual compilation is a massive effort, pulling together a variety of data sources from across Symantec’s vast Global Intelligence Network. And as in years’ past, it makes for sobering reading. I’m hardly going out on the line predicting that 2018 is likely to set new records for cyber attacks. But it’s up to CSOs and CISOs to prepare their organizations for attackers coming their way from any number of directions.
Let’s take a closer look at the highlights from the report:
Explosive Increase in Cryptojacking
Cryptojacking has been around for a while. But it exploded toward the end of 2017 as sophisticated cyber criminals seized on this technique to attack their targets. The sharp growth measured on a percentage basis - an 8,500% increase year-to-year - reflected the fact that we’re starting from a relatively small base. It also attested to the fact that attackers were reading the headlines about the exponential growth in the price of virtual currencies. Up until late last year, it wasn’t worth their time. Every business needs to prepare accordingly because as long as the price of cryptocurrencies remain high, cryptojacking is here to stay. Coin miners can slow devices, overheat batteries, and if enough of your processing power is being stolen, make devices unusable. For organizations, coin miners can put corporate servers at risk of shutdown and inflate cloud CPU usage, imposing unexpected and higher costs.
This crime can be trivial to implement, because a basic attack is browser-based. This low barrier to entry means that criminals don’t even need to try and download malware to a victim’s Mac or PC. Instead, the attacks require a couple lines of code inserted into a popular website and cyber criminals can harness stolen processing power and cloud CPU usage from consumers and enterprises. After an attacker inserts a single line of code into a legitimate website, anyone browsing that site will be unknowingly mining cryptocurrency for someone the entire time they are connected.
The search for more processing power to mine more coins and hence make more money is leading to another kind of trouble: file-based cryptojacking. When you consider the profitability of cryptojacking through a browser versus a server, there's no contest. Cyber criminals can make a lot more money if they infiltrate a company’s servers. If you fail to protect yourself from those attacks, you’re paying for someone else’s mining operation.
A couple of related points:
Browser-based cryptojacking attacks are platform-agnostic - and Macintosh computers are not immune. Indeed, attacks against the Mac OS rose 80% in the last year, most of that from coin-mining attacks.
The ISTR also noted a 600% increase in IoT attacks in the last year as cyber criminals sought to exploit the poor security of these devices. I can't say that all the attacks were linked to cryptojacking or cryptocurrency mining, but it certainly was a factor as cyber criminals sought to profit by controlling devices to help them mine en masse.
Download ISTR 23
Attackers Stick with Single Method to Infect Victims
Even as cyber criminals become more sophisticated, the ISTR reveals that they still prefer to bank on familiar tactics that have worked so well in the past. Indeed, 71% of targeted attacks groups still use spear phishing emails to infect their victims. It may be the oldest trick in the book but it’s cheap, it’s easy and it’s highly effective. It also continues to frustrate the best efforts of CSOs and CISOs to secure their organizations. The fact remains that people still remain too easy to fool.
Some other revealing aspects of attacker behavior:
Sophisticated and organized targeted groups are on the rise, growing by 16 percent last year.
The use of Zero-Day attacks continues to fall out of favor. Only 27% of the 140 targeted attack groups that Symantec tracked have been known to use Zero-Day vulnerabilities at any point in the past.
While we’ve long talked about what type of destruction might be possible with cyber attacks, we’ve moved beyond the theoretical, with more than 10% of all attacks being designed to disrupt.
Implanted Malware Targets the Software Supply Chain
Symantec identified a 200% increase in the number of attackers trying to get past defenses by injecting malware implants into the software supply chain. Another way to interpret this: There was one attack every month last year, compared to four attacks annually in the prior years. Perhaps the most notable example of how this works was in the Petya outbreak in which attackers used accounting software as their point of entry. Once inside an organization Petya then deployed a variety of methods to spread laterally across corporate networks, spreading its malicious payload.
Ransomware is Now a Business
Hoping to make an easy score, cyber criminals swarmed into the ransomware market in 2016. But by 2017, the ransomware market had undergone what in financial parlance would be described as a correction. Falling ransom demands signaled that attackers had overpriced their product, losing “customers.” As they saw less profit, many cyber criminals shifted their focus to coin mining and banking Trojans, hoping for more lucrative returns.
But while ransomware rates might be flattening out, don’t interpret that as a signal that ransomware is on the verge of disappearing. Indeed, the number of ransomware variants still increased by 46 percent. In other words, criminal groups are innovating less but they are still very productive. Symantec surveyed end-users around the globe and found that about 1 in 10 had been attacked by ransomware. The devastating Wannacry attack that hit the National Health Service in the UK serving as the most prominent example of the havoc ransomware can wreak.
Mobile Malware Continues to Surge
Mobile malware continues its steady climb and can no longer be ignored. The number of new mobile malware threats continued to grow, a 54% increase from the year before. Symantec blocked 38,000 malicious mobile applications each day in 2017. And despite the efforts to fix vulnerabilities in mobile operating systems, having patches available do not been mobile users are protected. For example, we discovered that only 20% of Android devices run the newest version of the OS. Just 2.3% are on the latest minor release. This remains a huge and vexing issue. If users can't get the latest release version of the OS on their phones, the availability of patches is of little use.
Meanwhile, mobile users face myriad privacy risks from so-called “grayware.” These are apps that are not malicious but can still prove troublesome. Symantec found that 63 percent of grayware apps leak the device’s phone number. With grayware increasing by 20% in 2017, this is a problem organizations will continue to reckon with this year.
Want to learn more?
This is just a taste of the main findings from ISTR 23. To find out more about these and other areas of the cyber security threat landscape, download ISTR 23 now.
You can also join Symantec threat experts in your region as they review the findings:
Register here for the Americas webinar
Register here for the EMEA webinar
Register here for the APJ webinar
Download ISTR 23
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Taking the Security Stress Away From Your Workforce, From Isolation to Downloads
Symantec and Votiro: A Powerful Combination
Trusting your workforce to be productive extends to trusting that they follow your security guidelines, have up-to-date web browsers, and don’t download anything they (and you) will regret later. This helps mitigate the risk of a security breach but—as we all know—doesn’t prevent one entirely.
Employees want to communicate and collaborate with co-workers – to click on links, download files, email, and surf the web – securely and quickly. Organizations need to support these activities, so that employees can continue working without having security as an additional stress factor, production blocker, or barrier that results in unauthorized tools, data moving off corporate-owned devices, or stealth IT.
Employees want to communicate and collaborate with co-workers – to click on links, download files, email, and surf the web – securely and quickly.
Symantec, a division of Broadcom (NASDAQ: AVGO), and Votiro, a cyber security company that provides award-winning technology to eliminate file-based threats, offer a powerful combination of technology that addresses an organization’s security concerns without getting in the way of the user. Votiro’s Positive Selection™ technology eliminates file-borne threats through template-based reconstruction, allowing only known-good content in and leaving malware and threats behind without blocking files, flattening files, or impacting file functionality.
What employees actually want from security
Attackers are able to mimic legitimate websites, links, and branded emails better than ever, obscuring the risk from even your most cyber-aware employees. This blog from Votiro illustrates some recent attacks. Non-security employees are not security experts and, whatever level of vigilance they may have, the onus should not be on them to be responsible for thwarting a cyber-attack.
Cyber security awareness training is good and useful, but won’t stop all attacks. What employees want is the security stress to be eliminated from their workflow for them. They want to click with confidence, knowing that they won’t introduce a security breach and that threats have been eliminated before reaching them, leaving them to maintain their thought-processes and productivity levels without disruption. Employees don’t want a lengthy wait for links and files to be checked for malware or other malicious content, interrupting their workflow and slowing them down.
The solution required may appear to be a dichotomy of continuity of workflow versus security, but this does not need to be the case.
Securely browse the web, safe from malware and phishing attacks.
Symantec Web Isolation provides users with a fast and safe browsing experience. Isolated webpages are run in a secure, disposable container, effectively creating an air gap between the user’s browser and the webpage. This immediately protects against browser vulnerabilities being exploited or malicious code running in the background to infect a device. The same technology allows webpages to be presented in read-only mode, protecting against fake websites used in phishing attacks. Read our recent blog which describes Isolation in more detail and explains how it supports your SASE strategy.
Stress-free secure web downloads
Votiro’s Secure File Gateway for Web Downloads applies Positive Selection™ technology to allow only known good content to reach employees. Instead of taking time to create and maintain detection, filtering, sandboxing, and other investigative technologies to search for and detect increasingly sophisticated, evasive, and innovative threats in web downloads, Votiro only looks for the positive. It knows more than 150 file types intimately and breaks files down into individual elements, then allows just the known and trusted elements of the file to pass through and reach staff. This processing is achieved in milliseconds, is transparent and results in a fully functional and threat-free file.
Votiro & Symantec: Putting employees’ minds at ease, from web to files
Web isolation technology is great at separating the searching device from potentially harmful content. As soon as staff want to download files and copy links onto their own devices, the isolation element disappears, separation is no more, and security is potentially compromised. Votiro’s Secure File Gateway for Web Downloads enables employees using Symantec Web Isolation to download files securely, with no impact on the user experience.
Multi-layered security solution
The solution to continuity of security from web to device is achieved with a multi-layered approach. Symantec Web Isolation combined with Votiro’s Secure File Gateway for Web Downloads with Positive Selection™ results in a seamless, secure, and productive environment for staff working from anywhere.
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Taking your Symantec DLP Program to New Heights
A systematic approach delivers better outcomes with fewer surprises for your business
It may come as no surprise that customers want to tap into the deep expertise that Symantec, a division of Broadcom, has about protecting data. However, what often surprises them is that we often have questions that they may not have even anticipated. You see, while Symantec provides world-class DLP technology, technology is just one piece of the broader Data Loss Protection picture. A parallel can be drawn with the world of aviation. An airline operator needs excellent aircraft (technology), and they also need many different other skills such as aircrew, ground handling staff, maintenance, flight operations (people), and inter-connected systems to tie passenger demand to aircraft availability (processes).
So, perhaps, on reflection, it really isn’t a surprise that we need to ask questions. If you don’t know what data you need to find or protect, and why, it is almost impossible to tell you how to deploy a system to detect, monitor and protect the right sensitive data. Without clarity of purpose there is a high risk that mistakes will be made - simply put, the wrong data will be blocked or sensitive data will fly under the radar.
Requirements and Planning
Our long history in the information security industry has taught us that those customers that commit to upfront planning and ongoing review achieve the best outcomes. They think hard about their requirements, consider a range of solutions and take a step wise approach to implementation. Just think about that for a second. Imagine that you deploy an untested policy with aggressive block controls, and then find that almost every email and cloud upload is now being stopped. This is a major consequence that has just grounded your entire operation. On Air DLP we want level headed, methodical pilots. Hot headed, mavericks need not apply!
Plan, Do and Review
So now we’ve established that DLP needs to be a program, we accept that there are three phases we need to care about - Plan, Do and Review. What might be surprising is where the balance of effort is spent. Aircraft operators use the “rule of thumb of thirds”: that is they spend a third of their time planning, a third doing and the final third reviewing. Aircraft are expensive to operate, represent a complex system (that involves people, technology, processes and information) and the stakes are high. You do not want things to go wrong!
Protecting Sensitive Data
Protecting sensitive data is similarly complex. If you are operating a DLP program, just where are you spending your time? Are you:
Planning on how you identify sensitive data to reflect future working patterns and compliance requirements?
Doing, that is operating the system, creating policies and responding to incidents?
Reviewing the effectiveness of the current controls, identifying how to fine tune and optimise the system?
In Symantec’s experience, time spent on reviewing and planning pays great dividends. We advocate that customers engage in a regular, scheduled review process that enables them to improve both their tactical and strategic performance. You wouldn’t operate aircraft without a process for daily, weekly and longer term scheduled maintenance. The habit of inspection is well ingrained in the world of aviation. For example, before every flight the ground mechanic reviews that the aircraft is fit to fly. And guess what, once the mechanic has approved the aircraft for flight, the pilot then inspects and verifies to his/her satisfaction that the aircraft is fit for flight. How often do you double check and seek a second opinion before deploying changes to your DLP system?
We work with many of our customers to review their DLP program and to review:
Program and Strategy Governance
Policies
Remediation
Infrastructure and DLP Channel Coverage
Metrics / Integration
Time to review you DLP program
Through this process we collaborate with customers to understand their systems, resources and current levels of effectiveness, all with a view to assessing the maturity of their program. We always find that no matter how mature a customer believes their DLP program is, there are always short term and longer term improvements that are identified. If you haven’t reviewed your DLP program recently, why not use this as a starting point? Simply ask your Broadcom sales representative about how we can support you with an Information Protection Program Review or contact us here. It may just take your DLP program to new heights!
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Tallying Up the Hidden Costs of Cryptomining Malware
As cryptomining malware leads to a surge in cryptojacking, organizations look to blunt the impact of the unwanted code on users' systems
When the price of Bitcoin and other cryptocurrencies surged in December 2017, "mining"—the act of solving computationally complex tasks to procure new coins—became all the rage.
Cryptocurrency miners sought ways to buy, build or steal the computational power needed to out-calculate other miners. Top-of-the-line graphics cards—used for creating the parallel-computing systems needed to compete for coins—sold out across the Internet. Cyber criminals loaded up their favorite malware with payloads that could turn compromised systems into cryptomining botnets. They also attacked websites, such as Showtime's homepage, using Javascript code that co-opted visitors browsers for their processing power.
In 2017, the use of coin-mining malware jumped by a factor of 85, according to Symantec's 2018 Internet Security Threat Report.
"It went from almost nothing to a large number of people participate in mining in almost no time," said Kevin Haley, director of product management for Symantec's Security Technology and Response.
The menagerie of malware, cryptocurrency-mining payloads—often referred to as cryptominers or, in the case of browser extensions, cryptojackers—may seem relatively benign, but there is a cost. The code can cause high usage of a computer's central processing unit (CPU) or graphics process unit (GPU). The upshot: devices slow down, batteries overheat and system lifespan winds up getting curtailed.
While many cryptominers often tamp down their activities to avoid detection, often times the software is installed with a default configuration, using up all available resources, said Troy Mursch, an independent security researcher and owner of the Bad Packets Report.
In a paper published with researchers at Concordia University, Mursch found that thousands of websites had adopted cryptojacking and that most used about 25 percent of a user's CPU. More recent Android-focused malware, known as ADB.Miner, spread through thousands of devices in China and South Korea, consuming 100 percent of their processing power.
Even in cases where consent is given, Mursch noted, users often do not understand the impact of the mining code on their systems.
"Bottom line, the fact remains is they are stealing your computation, electricity and power to mine currency," he said.
Power Play
While cryptocurrency mining may not cost individuals a great deal, the cost overall is staggering. The calculations needed to verify the Bitcoin ledger and mine currency—known as proof of work—requires more than 70 terawatt-hours each year, enough to power 6.5 million U.S. households, according to the site Digiconomist.
With cryptomining malware and cryptojacking, the miners pass along those costs to the owners of the host systems. Most currencies require increasingly complex computational effort to acquire coins. Based on the average electricity price in different states, for example, Crescent Energy Supply calculated that a single Bitcoin costs anywhere from $3,224 to $9,483 in power.
Using other people's systems to mine cryptocurrency may be the only way to make the effort profitable.
Unfortunately, the complexity naturally means that a greater number of compromised—or cooperating—systems need to be linked together to generate money.
"Eventually, with cryptocurrency, a lot of people will stop doing it," Symantec's Haley said. "But a lot of people will say—if I'm making only half as much, I need to double the number of machines. So the problem will get worse before it gets better."
Defending Against Mining
Companies have already started taking steps to blunt the impact of mining. Google had allowed cryptomining extensions to be hosted in its Chrome Web Store as long as the extension had a single purpose and a clear consent, but recently banned all cryptomining extensions from the marketplace. In addition, the company is reportedly working on an update that will limit certain Javascript programs from consuming a significant amount of CPU time.
"If they would do something like that, it would be fantastic," Mursch said.
In addition, most security software detects cryptomining programs and blocks them.
Mursch does not expect the cyber criminals and currency speculators stopping any time soon. Cyber criminals use malware to make money from compromised systems. The most popular ways to turn computers into cash is to hold the data hostage (ransomware), corral a large number of computers to attack other systems (botnets), or use the computers to accomplish another goal. Cryptomining falls into the latter category.
It also means that as long as cryptocurrencies allow someone to turn computing power into cash, cryptominers and cryptojacking will continue.
"For this to stop, we would have to get past proof-of-work of cryptocurrencies," Mursch said. "It is going to be part of the hackers’ toolkit. It is not going to replace ransomware or extortion. The hot cryptocurrency is Monero, but there are others coming down."
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Targeted Attacks: The Game Has Changed
Targeted attackers are getting craftier than ever, figuring out new ways to evade detection. But all is not lost
As targeted attacks increase in numbers and sophistication, defenders find themselves overmatched and underequipped.
Next-gen products that promised to help defenders specifically with such attacks have simply failed to deliver and added to the chaos. That’s because these security products remain stuck in a point product world where everything that defenders see is a point-in-time at a single control point event. Next-gen detection products only see one tiny window into an attack– they see files, traffic, logins, etc. in isolation and only promise detection -- potentially alerting you only after the horse has left the barn.
These next-gen point products send alerts to a SOC team generating a whole new responsibility of threat hunting. The SOC needs to figure out how to prioritize all those alerts, coalesce them into a broader attack view, and ultimately find the needle in the haystack. It isn’t long before the system gets swamped with an insanely high number of alerts - most of which turn out to be false alarms. Because each next-gen product has a myopic view, they alert on anything that could possibly be suspicious to avoid missing anything, and they assume a SOC team is there to make sense of it all.
Bottom line – organizations we have spoken to repeatedly tell us that next-gen detection technologies have failed to deliver.
Targeted Threats
The targeted attack problem has been years in the making. Targeted attacks primarily go after intelligence or PII – anything valuable -- but increasingly we are seeing attackers manipulate, destroy, and disrupt their targets. These attacks often involve state-supported actors working at the behest of foreign governments. More recently, we’ve also seen increased organized crime gang activity.
These are sophisticated attackers equipped with the tools and know-how to get what they want. Symantec, which tracks over 140 targeted attack groups, found that last year each group was responsible for hitting an average of 42 companies.
What’s more, targeted attackers are getting craftier than ever. Targeted attackers have figured out ways around nearly everything the security industry has thrown at it including scanners, sandboxes, network anomaly detection, user login anomaly detection, machine learning, and EDR capabilities. They rely almost entirely on dual use tools that are already found on user machines to evade detection. In every case, they look like an administrator, not like an attacker.
Organizations have struggled to keep up. They’re not only hampered by solutions with limited, point-in-time views but they also wind up wasting time chasing false alarms. All the while, targeted attackers are covertly exfiltrating data.
The upshot: post-breach forensics discovers the real attack – only after the damage gets done.
Changing the Rules of the Game
So far, the game has been all about detection. Next-gen vendors tout how they can spot anomalies and detect suspicious behaviors. But these technologies don’t prevent attacks – they create false alarms and they miss attacks that rely on dual use tools (no malware). At best, a SOC might find an attack if they correlate alerts from several products together (involving yet another product purchase – a SIM or threat platform). “Might detect” is not a solution to the targeted attack problem.
Last month, Symantec introduced a new capability called Targeted Attack Analytics. TAA is designed to give defenders an edge by sniffing out targeted attacks before they can inflict damage. We took a fundamentally new approach, one that doesn’t require lots of point-in-time anomaly detection scanners. We apply advanced machine learning across all local and global data, across all control points, all at once, utilizing our Integrated Cyber Defense Platform. The high precision analytics we have developed, not a SOC team you must staff, look at both suspicious and mundane data – especially anything dual-use – to find new attack activity before attackers can get a chance to exfiltrate data. No other product does this today.
Symantec began this effort about four years ago. It was a moonshot – we didn’t know if it would be possible to safely collect data and process it at such volumes – and we didn’t know if we could marry our threat detection expertise with the latest artificial intelligence capabilities. We hit many roadblocks along the way – but we persisted – and the results have been as incredible as we hoped. Since rolling out TAA as part of our Advanced Threat Protection (ATP) product, we’ve uncovered over 1,600 targeted attacks that were previously unknown to the security community. Many were related to the groups we were already tracking, though some were new, such as Treehopper, Dragonfly, Shamoon activity, Thrip, Seedworm, and Elfin.
Our biggest discovery came last fall when we first started using TAA. Our new analytics revealed that Dragonfly was back and inside over 100 power companies in the US. The group uses several infiltration techniques — watering holes, hijacking updates, and e-mails. Symantec’s TAA system successfully located covert communications channels, spotted the enumeration of assets on local systems, and identified the use of several dual use tools.
TAA is a disruptive leap in capability for targeted attack detection. Finally we can sniff out attacks before they do their damage.
But there are also important implications here for resource-constrained companies and their SOCs. Think of the efficiency gains. Defenders won’t any longer need to spend precious time wading through seas of alerts. TAA’s ability to spot attacks will help companies save time and energy. They can now shift resources to higher priorities, whether that be improving overall cyber hygiene or hardening their organizations’ security environment.
TAA is built into our Advanced Threat Protection (ATP) product. Our cloud-based high precision artificial intelligence analytics run constantly across our enormous data lake to identify attacks in their early stages. They then generate a full report that gets pushed to our ATP product, where a high priority alert gets generated. Full details about what TAA saw are provided so that the SOC analyst can understand not only the impacted infrastructure, but also what kinds of activity took place. Often the attack activity is automatically linked to known attack groups so the SOC can learn more about the motivation of the attacker.
The tech industry is prone to hyperbole and we often hear people talk about paradigm shifts. But suffice to say that in this case, we’ve been able to change the rules of the game and made it impossible for targeted attackers to hide any longer. By any measure, that’s a very big deal.
For an in–depth read, download this white paper to learn more how Symantec provides cloud–based analytics to EDR customers using the Advanced Threat Protection: Endpoint solution.
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Targeted Ransomware: Proliferating Menace Threatens Organizations
With several new targeted ransomware groups emerging over the past two years, the number of organizations being hit by targeted ransomware attacks has multiplied.
Targeted ransomware has quickly become one of the most dangerous cyber crime threats facing organizations. Over the past two years, the number of organizations being hit with targeted ransomware attacks has multiplied as the number of gangs carrying out these attacks has proliferated.
A successful targeted ransomware attack can be devasting for an organization. Attackers generally attempt to encrypt as many machines as possible, targeting servers as well as ordinary computers, and will often try to encrypt or destroy back up data. The affected organization could have its operations severely disrupted, losing access to vital data and services. Loss of business and reputational damage could add to the likely high financial cost of any clean-up operation.
Faced with this kind of chaos, it is hardly surprising that some stricken organizations consider paying the often-exorbitant ransom demand. Given this outcome, nor is it surprising that a growing number of cyber criminals are turning their attention to targeted ransomware.
In a new white paper, published today, Symantec has found that the number of organizations being attacked by targeted ransomware has grown rapidly since the beginning of 2018.
Multiplying threats
The rapid growth in attacks coincides with the emergence of a number of new targeted ransomware gangs. For some time, the only attacker of note was the SamSam group (Ransom.SamSam), which was responsible for attacks against a string of organizations, mainly in the U.S. However, SamSam’s success meant that it was only a matter of time before other groups moved into this niche. In early 2018, another actor—Ryuk (Ransom.Hermes)—appeared and almost immediately began attacking more organizations per month than SamSam.
By the beginning of 2019, the number of targeted ransomware operations began to multiply, with several more gangs appearing on the scene, including GoGalocker (aka LockerGoga) (Ransom.GoGalocker), MegaCortex (Ransom.MegaCortex), and RobbinHood (Ransom.Robbinhood). In addition to the groups involved exclusively in targeted attacks, there are also a number of ransomware groups, such GandCrab (Ransom.GandCrab) and Crysis (aka Dharma) (Ransom.Crysis), who’ve been reportedly carrying out targeted attacks into addition to indiscriminate attacks.
"Number of organizations being hit by targeted ransomware attacks has multiplied in the past year. https://symc.ly/2LmWrEd"
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Figure. Number of organizations affected by targeted ransomware attacks, by family, January 2017 to May 2019 (stacked column)
New breed of threat
First appearing in January 2019, GoGalocker typifies the current type of targeted ransomware attack being deployed against businesses. The attackers behind the ransomware are skilled and knowledgeable enough to penetrate the victim’s network, deploy a range of tools to move across and map the network while using a variety of techniques to evade detection, before simultaneously encrypting as many machines as possible.
GoGalocker deploys a number of detection evasion techniques during its attacks, such as digitally signing the ransomware with legitimate certificates, making it far less likely that they will be flagged as untrustworthy.
In carrying out its attacks, GoGalocker borrows many of the tools and techniques used by espionage groups, making extensive use of publicly available hacking tools and living off the land tactics. Once inside the victim’s network, the attackers run PowerShell commands to run shellcode that enables them to connect to the attacker’s command and control server. A variety of tools are then deployed to traverse the network and steal credentials:
PuTTY: a command-line utility used to create SSH sessions.
Mimikatz (Hacktool.Mimikatz): a freely available tool capable of changing privileges, exporting security certificates, and recovering Windows passwords in plaintext depending on the configuration.
Wolf-x-full: A multi-purpose tool capable of querying a range of remote machines for basic information, viewing a list of installed programs, uninstalling programs, disabling Windows User Account Control (UAC) and UAC remote restrictions, and disabling the Window Firewall.
GoGalocker deploys a number of detection evasion techniques during its attacks, such as digitally signing the ransomware with legitimate certificates, making it far less likely that they will be flagged as untrustworthy. The attackers will also usually attempt to disable any security software before installing the ransomware. This is not because of any innate weakness or vulnerability in the security software it disables, rather that the group uses stolen administrator credentials to turn the software off or uninstall it.
In several of the attacks seen by Symantec, once the attackers were finished mapping the network, they used batch files to spread the ransomware to multiple computers before executing the encryption process.
As a final precaution, the attackers log off the current user. In at least one case, they also changed local user and administrator passwords using a net.exe command. The likely motive for this was to prevent anyone from logging in and halting the encryption process.
Since first emerging at the beginning of 2019, GoGalocker has already attacked organizations across a broad range of industry sectors including computer services, accountancy and auditing, consultancy, financial services, power tools, building and construction, financial services, publishing, printing, metals, and warehousing and storage. Twenty-three percent of the target organizations were located in the U.S., but outside of this, a high proportion of victims were in Scandinavia, including Finland (23 percent), Norway (15 percent), and Sweden (8 percent).
MegaCortex link?
One of the most interesting findings to emerge from the research was the discovery of some connections between GoGalocker and MegaCortex. Both ransomware families perform the following actions:
Create a log file in C:\\
Work using the master/slave model
Use module interprocess in Boost library to share data and communicate between master and slave
Use functions to enumerate logical drives before encryption
Use native functions to work with target files:
NtOpenFile, NtReadFile, NtWriteFile, NtClose
Encrypt files using AES-128-CTR
Execute the command “cipher.exe /w” to wipe unused data after finishing encryption process
In addition to this, the rich header of the MegaCortex and GoGalocker executables is compiled with almost the same version of Visual Studio 2017 (minor build version 27030 and minor build version 27027 respectively). Finally, both ransomware families have used Cobalt Strike malware in their attacks. One of the Cobalt Strike beacons used in a MegaCortex attack connects to an IP address that has previously been linked to GoGalocker.
While it may be possible that both MegaCortex and GoGalocker are operated by the same group, the activity during the pre-infection process points towards distinct groups. A more likely explanation for the link is that both ransomware families were developed by the same third-party developer for two separate groups of attackers.
Robust defenses needed
A ransomware attack that involves encryption of hundreds of computers and servers is probably one of the most disruptive and costly forms of cyber attack any organization could experience. The hastening pace of targeted ransomware attacks over the past 12 months means that organizations need to educate themselves about this threat and ensure that robust, overlapping defenses are in place. The perceived success of the current crop of targeted ransomware groups makes it highly likely that more cyber crime actors will attempt to move into this space.
Protection
Symantec has the following protection in place to protect customers against these attacks:
File-based protection
Hacktool.Mimikatz
Ransom.Crysis
Ransom.GandCrab
Ransom.GoGalocker
Ransom.Hermes
Ransom.MegaCortex
Ransom.Robbinhood
Ransom.SamSam
Mitigation
Symantec recommends users observe the following best practices to protect against targeted ransomware attacks:
Local Environment
Ensure you have the latest version of PowerShell and you have logging enabled.
Restrict access to RDP Services: Only allow RDP from specific known IP addresses and ensure you are using multi-factor authentication.
Use File Server Resource Manager (FSRM) to lock out the ability to write known ransomware extensions on file shares where user write access is required.
Create a plan to consider notification of outside parties. In order to ensure correct notification of required organizations, such as the FBI or other law enforcement authorities/agencies, be sure to have a plan in place.
Create a “jump bag” with hard copies and archived soft copies of all critical administrative information. In order to protect against the compromise of the availability of this critical information, store it in a jump bag with hardware and software needed to troubleshoot problems. Storing this information on the network is not helpful when network files are encrypted.
Implement proper audit and control of administrative account usage. You could also implement one-time credentials for administrative work to help prevent theft and usage of admin credentials.
Create profiles of usage for admin tools: Many of these tools are used by attackers to move laterally undetected through a network. A user account that has a history of running as admin using psinfo/psexec on a small number of systems is probably fine, but a service account running psinfo/psexec on all systems is suspicious.
Email
Enable 2FA to prevent compromise of credentials during phishing attacks.
Harden security architecture around email systems to minimize amount of spam that reaches end-user inboxes and ensure you are following best practices for your email system, including the use of SPF and other defensive measures against phishing attacks.
Backup
Implement offsite storage of backup copies. Arrange for offsite storage of at least four weeks of weekly full and daily incremental backups.
Implement offline backups that are onsite. Make sure you have backups that are not connected to the network to prevent them from being encrypted by ransomware.
Verify and test your server-level backup solution. This should already be part of your Disaster Recovery process.
Secure the file-level permissions for backups and backup databases. Don’t let your backups get encrypted.
Test restore capability. Ensure restore capabilities support the needs of the business.
Further reading
To learn more about targeted ransomware, download our whitepaper - Targeted Ransomware: An ISTR Special Report
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Tech Support Scam Integrates Call Optimization Service
Scammers are using service to dynamically insert phone numbers into scam pages.
Symantec has observed tech support scammers using a popular call optimization service, allowing them to dynamically insert phone numbers into their scam web pages and potentially giving them additional features to make their scams more successful.
Tech Support scammers continue to adapt their methods to ensure long-term success. We previously outlined how tech support scams have evolved by leveraging “living off the land” tactics to avoid detection. They have also used various other methods to evade detection, from simple JavaScript obfuscation to more advanced encryption algorithms such as the Advanced Encryption Standard (AES).
In this blog, however, we look at how scammers are now making use of legitimate call optimization services in order to make their scams more efficient.
Call optimization services
Call optimization services are commonly used by businesses whose customers interact with them over the phone. These services can provide the following features:
Tracking the source of inbound calls
Creation and management of phone numbers
Call load balancing
Call forwarding
Call analytics
Call routing
Call recording
These services help businesses gain useful insights about their customers which can be used to help improve and optimize marketing campaigns. However, now it seems tech support scammers are also using call optimization services to optimize their own “campaigns,” as we recently discovered.
The scam
As with many tech support scams, it is initiated when an unsuspecting user visits a malicious website or is redirected to one by various means such as a malvertisement or compromised website.
Figure 1. Scam page claims computer is blocked due to a malware infection
The scam web page informs the victim that the computer has been blocked due to a malware infection and tries to lure the user into calling a “toll free” number for assistance. An audio file, stating that the computer is infected, is also played in the background when the user arrives on the scam web page.
Joining the dots
A first look through the source code for the scam web page reveals the piece of code responsible for playing the audio.
After that, we come across some interesting pieces of JavaScript.
Figure 2. Script used to gather information about the browser used by the victim
The script seen in Figure 2 retrieves information about the browser used by the victim. Tech support scams performing browser fingerprinting is nothing new but most scams only focus on the browser name. This particular scam goes a step further and retrieves the browser version as well. Based on the browser name and version number, the victim is redirected to a different scam page, as can be seen in the code shown in Figure 3.
Figure 3. Victims are redirected to different scam pages depending on browser name and version number
In Figure 4 we can see a script which is part of a popular call optimization service’s advanced JavaScript integration.
Figure 4. Script used by a popular call optimization service
When a specific tag from the call optimization service is present in the scam URL, the script retrieves the scammer’s phone number from the service’s servers. When the servers return the scammer’s phone number, the tag triggers the “Callback” function. This function is responsible for retrieving and displaying the appropriate phone number for victims to call.
If the tag from the call optimization service in not in the scam URL, the phone number is retrieved by loading an XML file and then parsing it to retrieve the number, which is then displayed on the scam page (see Figure 5).
Figure 5. Script used to load XML file that contains the phone number to be displayed on scam web page
However, by using the call optimization service’s tag in the URL the scammers can dynamically insert phone numbers into their scam pages. This can be useful, for example, if victims are based in multiple countries, as the victim can be shown a phone number that calls someone that speaks their language.
Other possible uses
Using call optimization services to make sure the correct phone number is displayed to each victim is just one feature we know of that tech support scammers are using. It’s possible that scammers are also taking advantage of many more of the features offered by these useful services, such as call load balancing during busy times, rerouting calls to other “tech support” agents so no customers/victims are lost; tracking the source of inbound calls, allowing the scammers to tailor their service; accessing detailed analytics about calls, which could help scammers understand what they need to do to improve their success rate. These are just a few of the many features scammers could incorporate.
Call centers, ecommerce vendors, affiliate networks, and all manner or small to large organizations have recognized the advantages of using call optimization services to improve their business, and now the criminals behind tech support scams have begun doing the same.
Prevalence and protection
Symantec proactively protects customers against tech support scams. Our intrusion prevention system (IPS) protects customers from tech support scams by blocking the malicious network activity associated with such scams using a wide variety of detections.
From January 1, 2018 through June, Symantec’s IPS blocked more than 93 million tech support scams.
Figure 6. Tech support scams blocked by Symantec’s IPS – January to June 2018
Mitigation
Norton Security, Symantec Endpoint Protection, and many other Symantec security products have comprehensive network-based protection features such as firewall and IPS built in. To protect yourself from these types of scams, ensure that these features are enabled.
Also, make sure to only visit legitimate websites when you need support for any product.
Last but not least, make sure your security product is updated regularly.
More information on tech support scams can be found here.
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Tech support scams increasing in complexity – Part 2
Tech support scammers continue to adopt new techniques, including using AES to obfuscate scam content.
In my last post, I discussed the evolution of tech support scams and their growing penchant towards the use of code obfuscation to hide their malicious activity behind heaps of obfuscated JavaScript code. This growing trend was an endeavor, undertaken with a single and simple objective in mind: to avoid detection by string-based detection engines employed by various security vendors. This allowed the attackers behind these fake scams to remain under the radar and still be as effective as ever.
Since then, a year has passed and a lot of water has flowed under the bridge. The threat landscape has witnessed a lot of significant changes, some of which include the introduction of JavaScript-based coin miners, malware (in particular ransomware) exploiting vulnerabilities in Microsoft’s implementation of the Server Message Block (SMB) protocol to spread, and the continuing decline in exploit kit activity. But where do tech support scams stand in today’s threat landscape?
As it turns out, tech support scams have got meaner, adding new anti-detection techniques to their arsenal. Over the past year, there has been a growing trend towards so-called “living off the land” tactics, which involves attackers using tools and technologies already installed on target computers. The main benefits behind using this approach are twofold: the attacker can target a larger pool of victims (as most of the users have these tools installed by default or use these technologies frequently), and at the same time keep a low profile (as these tools are not inherently malicious, using them is unlikely to trigger any alarms). In this blog post, I will describe how tech support scams have embraced this approach by making use of the Advanced Encryption Standard (AES) specification algorithm to obfuscate their scam content.
What is AES?
Advanced Encryption Standard or AES is an encryption algorithm used to encrypt sensitive electronic data so as to protect it from unintended third-party use while the data is stored or is in transit. AES is fast in both software and hardware and is the first (and only) publicly accessible algorithm approved by the National Security Agency (NSA).
Now tech support scams are following the trend and are using the AES encryption algorithm as an anti-detection mechanism.
While I’m not going to deep dive into the intricacies of this algorithm, the fact that it allows for strong data encryption, and is in widespread use around the world to secure sensitive data, makes it an ideal candidate for living off the land attacks. We have already witnessed this algorithm being used in various ransomware threats, such as TorrentLocker (Ransom.TorrentLocker) and TeslaCrypt (Trojan.Cryptolocker.N), and in other attacks such as in phishing kits. Now tech support scams are following the trend and are using the AES encryption algorithm as an anti-detection mechanism.
The scam
The scam is initiated when an unsuspecting user visits a malicious website or is redirected to one by various means such as a malvertisement or compromised website.
Figure 1. Scam web page claiming victim’s license key has been deleted by malware
The scam web page informs the victim that the license key file has been deleted from the computer due to a malware infection and tries to lure the user into calling a “Toll free” number for assistance. An audio file, stating that the computer is infected, is also played in the background when the user arrives on the scam web page.
Joining the dots
A first look through the source code for the scam web page reveals the piece of code responsible for playing the audio.
After that we come across some interesting pieces of JavaScript code.
The first piece of code loads a file named aes.js, which is actually a library code implementation of the AES algorithm. As is the usual practice with software code development, this library is then used to decrypt AES obfuscated content on the fly, as we will see later.
The second piece of code contains two JavaScript functions. The first function takes AES encrypted hexadecimal content as input and uses a predefined hardcoded encryption key. The function proceeds as follows:
The hexadecimal input is first converted into normal byte format.
The AES library is then used to decrypt this byte content which is then presented to the victim. In particular, the AES algorithm in the “Counter” mode is used.
The code in Figure.2 is a sample from the AES library which is used for this decryption process.
Figure 2. Code sample from the AES library which is used for the decryption process
The second JavaScript function works in a similar fashion except for a minor difference in the input format. The function takes a HTML DOM element as input, from which it then extracts the encrypted HTML content. The function then proceeds to decrypt this content, similar to the earlier function, and then replaces the encrypted HTML content in the DOM element with the decrypted content which is then presented to the user.
Moving forward, the scammers use the first function repeatedly by feeding it with pre-calculated encrypted hexadecimal content, to decode it on the fly into the scam messages, which are then presented to victims. A sample block of code can be seen in Figure.3.
Figure 3. Pre-calculated encrypted hexadecimal content
The code seen in Figure.3 decodes into the sample seen in Figure.4.
Figure 4. Decoded content used in scam messages
This is essentially what is visible to victims when they land on the scam web page. The scam page also has JavaScript code to look out for certain keyboard key presses. Any attempt to press ESC, F11, or the Ctrl+Alt+Delete combination is thwarted by the web page going full screen, making the scenario more alarming for the user.
Work In progress
While this tech support scam does, to a certain extent, manage to avoid detection, it fails in other aspects. For example, by using hardcoded values such as, for example, the operating system that the victim is supposedly using (hardcoded value is Windows 7), there is a risk that users will figure out it’s a scam. Considering these types of scams are usually tailored to each victim, it’s a likely assumption that this is still a work in progress and the scammers could well add more features in the future.
A continuing menace
Even though the threat landscape has evolved a great deal in the year since my last tech support scam blog, these scams have continued to persist and keep generating revenue for the criminals behind them. Tech support scams have also started integrating JavaScript-based cryptocurrency miners into their web pages, which serves a dual purpose in the sense that cryptocurrency can be mined using the victim’s CPU power and, as the computer’s performance becomes sluggish due to mining, it also makes the victim believe that their computer really is infected.
These new techniques employed by criminals demonstrate that this type of scam is continuing to evolve and that there is still plenty of money to be made, as such I think it is safe to assume that tech support scams are here to stay.
Protection
At Symantec, we provide a variety of products to protect our customers. Our Intrusion Prevention System (IPS) security component proactively protects customers from tech support scams by blocking the malicious network activity associated with such scams using a wide variety of detections. The scam is thus blocked even before it reaches the end user.
Our IPS telemetry for this year shows that the countries targeted the most by tech support scams were the U.S., UK, Canada, Australia, and Japan.
Figure 5. The U.S., UK, Canada, Australia, and Japan were the main targets for tech support scams
Mitigation
Norton Security, Symantec Endpoint Protection, and many other Symantec security products have comprehensive network-based protection features such as firewall and IPS built in. To protect yourself from these types of scams, ensure that none of these features are turned off.
Also make sure you visit legitimate websites when you need support for any product.
If you notice any piracy related to our products, please feel free to contact us here. Last but not the least, make sure your antivirus product is updated regularly. More information on tech support scams is available here.
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Tech Support Scams Increasing in Complexity – Part 3
Scammers make use of multiple encoding techniques at one go to create a multiple-level obfuscated scam.
In my previous blog, I discussed how technical support scammers embraced the technique of “living off the land” by making use of encryption algorithms such as Advanced Encryption Standard (AES) to obfuscate scam content. In the past, I also wrote about scammers’ use of simple encoding techniques to avoid string-based detection engines. In both scenarios, the scam made use of one unique technique across the board. The same obfuscation technique was used multiple times to decode the content on the fly and then perform its intended tasks: scaring the victim through various means, such as non-closing windows, pop-up windows which never seem to go away, preventing the victim from closing the scam by disallowing the pressing of certain keyboard keys, among others.
This blog completes my trilogy of posts on obfuscated scams. This time, I look at how scammers make use of multiple encoding techniques at one go to create a multiple-level obfuscated scam which offers very little scope for detection engines.
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The scam
Typically, the scam starts when an unsuspecting user visits a malicious website or is redirected to one by various means, such as a malvertisement or compromised website.
One such scam I observed on November 9 was in Italian, although similar campaigns may also come in other languages. This one in particular informs the victim that their computer has been blocked due to “display and dissemination of materials prohibited by Italian law” such as adult content. It also informs the victim that to unblock their computer, they must pay an “administrative penalty” of 500 euros with an iTunes Gift Card. Such tactics are designed to incite worry among victims and get them to pay.
Figure 1. Sample of a malicious website (in Italian) that a user visits, or to which a user is redirected
Connecting the dots
Going through the source code of the scam reveals a large chunk of obfuscated content, as shown in Figure 2.
Figure 2. Looking at the source code of the scam reveals a large chunk of obfuscated content
Moving further, I observed the code used for decryption of this obfuscated data:
Figure 3. Decryption routine used in the scam
First, the obfuscated content is captured into a variable and then converted into a base64-encoded content. Then, this base64-encoded content is decoded using the function “atob” and written on the browser, as shown in Figure 3.
After decoding the base64 content, I was able to see a few of the strings which the scam displays to the victim. However, the story does not end here. Moving further, I could still see obfuscated code and decryption routines being used.
Figure 4. AES-encrypted content obtained after first-level deobfuscation
The code also loads the following JavaScript library, which is interesting:
<script src=“https://cdnjs.cloudflare.com/ajax/libs/crypto-js/3.1.2/rollups/aes.js”></script><script>
This CryptoJS library is widely used for AES obfuscation and deobfuscation. This indicates the scam uses AES as its second-level obfuscation technique. Decoding the AES obfuscated content reveals the final layer of the scam with almost no obfuscation being used.
What makes this scam different?
While code obfuscation has been used in scams for a while now, the use of multiple-level encoding is not common. The scam typically forces string-based detection engines to focus detection on strings of random numbers or characters as described above, which, in most scenarios, is highly prone to false positives. Thus, it can be said that this scam uses living off the land encoding techniques to sneak through antivirus engines and avoid detection.
Prevalence and protection
Symantec proactively protects customers against tech support scams. Our intrusion prevention system (IPS) technology protects customers against tech support scams by blocking malicious network activity associated with such scams using a wide variety of detections.
From July through October 2018, Symantec’s IPS technology blocked more than 37 million tech support scams.
Figure 5. Symantec IPS technology blocked more than 37 million tech support scams from July-October 2018
Our IPS telemetry for this year shows that the countries most targeted by tech support scams were the U.S., Japan, Canada, UK, and Germany.
Figure 6. The U.S., Japan, Canada, UK, and Germany were the main targets for tech support scams, according to Symantec IPS telemetry
From July through October 2018, Symantec IPS technology blocked more than 37 million tech support scams. Our IPS telemetry for 2018 shows that the countries most targeted by these scams were the U.S., Japan, Canada, UK, and Germany.
Mitigation
Norton Security, Symantec Endpoint Protection, and many other Symantec security products have comprehensive network-based protection features such as firewall and IPS built in. To protect yourself from these types of scams, ensure that these features are enabled.
Also, make sure to only visit legitimate websites when you need support for any product. Last but not least, make sure your security product is updated regularly.
More information on tech support scams can be found here.
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Tech Support Scams Now Get Users to Install Potentially Unwanted Apps
Tech support scammers' new trick is to get users to install potentially unwanted apps instead of calling a support hotline.
Tech support scams continue to prey on unwitting victims. We have seen in recent months how these scams are constantly evolving, from the use of call optimization to the use of Advanced Encryption Standard (AES) and a multi-level obfuscation scheme.
Tech support scammers' modus operandi is to get the victim to believe that their computer has been infected with malware, and that their only recourse is to call a technical support number for assistance on cleaning the system. Once on the call, a purported support executive would ask the victim for remote access to their computer and then charge a fee for the supposed cleaning they did.
While scammers' playbooks remain more or less the same, we have recently seen how scammers are now tricking victims into installing a potentially unwanted application (PUA), rather than urging them to call a support helpline.
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Quick scan, quick scam
Toward the end of 2018, we observed a tech support scam campaign that displays a fake Windows alert, warning the victim that their computer might be infected. The scam prompts the victim to approve a supposedly quick 10-second scan of their computer.
Figure 1. Fake infection alert prompts the victim to allow a "quick scan" of their computer
Once the user clicks OK, the scammers pull off a highly convincing but fake system scan that is almost identical to Norton Security's. We will provide details on how exactly the scammers pull this off later in this blog.
Figure 2. Clicking OK initiates a bogus system scan that looks very similar to Norton Security's
At the end of the fake scan, the victim is informed that their PC is indeed infected and then asked to download and install an update to their antivirus software. Upon clicking Proceed, a potentially unwanted application (PUA) is downloaded and installed onto the victim's computer.
Just like most tech support scams, this one typically begins after the user visits a malicious website, or is redirected to one through malvertising or a compromised website.
How the fake scan works
We went through the scam's source code to see how this fake scan trickery was achieved.
The code contains HTML div elements with the display property set to "none", as shown in Figure 3.
Figure 3. The display property is set to "none" to ensure that the div element is not visible to the victim
This setting of display property ensures that the div element is not visible to the victim as soon as the page loads.
Moving forward, we see JavaScript code, as shown in Figure 4.
Figure 4. JavaScript code to uncover hidden elements to give the illusion that a scan is in progress
The setTimeout() method calls a function or evaluates an expression after a specified number of milliseconds. When the script shown in Figure 4 starts executing, it will first change the display style of the div to "block" after two seconds, thereby making the div visible to the victim. The scammer progressively increases the time period for the subsequent calls to the setTimeout() function. This makes the "windows" appear on top of each other, one after the other, on the front end. Thus, the victim first sees the start of the scan process, followed by the intermediate in-progress scan graphics, and finally the graphic box, which displays that the system is infected.
In Figure 4, we can see some values being assigned to different HTML elements via JavaScript. For example, the element "cnt1" is being assigned a value of 218, "path1" is assigned a value of "C:\Windows\System32\sihost.exe", and so on. These are the values for the number of files scanned and the current file being scanned as it appears on the front end. The scammer cleverly makes use of the setTimeout() function to change these values over a period of time, giving the victim the illusion that an actual scan is in progress and that their files are being scanned.
The scammer cleverly makes use of the setTimeout() function to change values over a period of time, giving the victim the illusion that an actual scan is in progress and that their files are being scanned.
PUAs vs helplines
In this scam, the scammer does not force the victim to call a support helpline, but rather tricks the victim into downloading a PUA. Typically, a PUA comes bundled with other intended software and gets installed along with the intended software.
PUAs have been known to perform the following actions on the computer:
Display annoying pop-up windows
Degrade the user's internet browsing experience by changing search engines and default home pages
Perform random redirections
Steal user information stealthily
More recently, mine cryptocurrency in the background, degrading the health of the victim's hardware
In a typical tech support scam revenue-generation model, the scammer is dependent on the victim calling the support helpline to earn revenue. However, in this case, we have observed that the malicious code keeps track of the number of victims who are tricked into installing the PUA.
Figure 5. JavaScript which performs click tracking and PUA redirection
In this scenario, the scammer earns revenue by maximizing the number of PUA installs. Digging into our telemetry, we located an unsecured attacker dashboard, which shows the revenue distribution for this model.
Figure 6. Sample of an attacker's dashboard showing ROI for this PUA revenue-generation model
In Figure 6, we can clearly see the number of clicks generated by each traffic source and the corresponding returns on investment (ROI) from these sources.
This model is similar to that used in the exploit kit (EK) space, where malware authors use EKs as a mechanism to deliver their malware to more and more victims and thereby maximize their profit.
Not exclusive to Norton
In the past few weeks, we have also seen similar tech support scams that follow the PUA revenue-generation model. One such scam tricks the victim into believing that their Windows drivers are not updated and asks them to download and install the "latest drivers", which are actually PUAs.
Figure 7. Fake pop-up asking users to download the latest drivers
If this new model proves more profitable than the helpline route down the road, we are likely to see its adoption increase among scammers.
How to stay safe
Know what's real from fake. Even though the "Norton" scan looks almost indistinguishable from the real one, there are many attributes that easily indicate it is fake:
The files on a computer system cannot be scanned by a website running inside a web browser. Thus, any website pretending to scan your system is performing a fake scan.
Updates to the Norton security product are attempted through the product GUI and do not require manual user interaction, such as the download of any additional components via the browser.
The scam has hardcoded attributes, such as "30 days of subscription remaining", which vary from user to user.
Prevalence and protection
Symantec proactively protects customers against tech support scams. Our intrusion prevention system (IPS) technology protects customers by blocking malicious network activity associated with such scams using a wide variety of detections.
In the last quarter of 2018, Symantec's IPS blocked more than 89 million tech support scams.
Figure 8. Symantec's IPS technology blocked more than 89 million tech support scams in Q4 2018
Mitigation
Norton Security, Symantec Endpoint Protection, and many other Symantec security products have comprehensive network-based protection features such as firewall and IPS built in. To protect yourself from these types of scams, ensure that these features are enabled.
Also, make sure to visit only legitimate websites when you need support for any product. Last but not least, make sure your security product is updated regularly.
More information on tech support scams can be found here.
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Text-Based COVID-19 Spam Wants Your Information, Money
Symantec’s Email Threat Isolation stops spammers as they continue to take advantage of coronavirus pandemic.
This is a follow-up to our previous blog on COVID-19 related spam campaigns. This blog will share some insight on the latest wave of COVID-19 themed spam campaigns and how Email Threat Isolation (ETI) from Symantec stops these emails from accomplishing their goals.
Symantec has continued to observe numerous malicious email campaigns taking advantage of the global panic surrounding the coronavirus outbreak. While we previously discussed malspam (malware bearing) emails, now a wave of text-based spam campaigns have emerged. These emails do not contain any malicious attachments and instead rely on what is written in the email to trick users into handing over information or money.
Change is the only constant
According to Symantec telemetry, as well as COVID-19 related phishing and malspam campaigns, spammers are increasingly using text-based campaigns. One reason for this is that it is comparatively cheaper and easier than phishing and malspam campaigns as there is no need for compromised domains or malware. The most abused vanity TLDs used in these campaigns are .xyz, .top, and .site.
These text-based spam campaigns include the following types of scams:
Business proposition emails from small to medium-sized manufacturing factories offering to sell medical equipment like surgical face masks, personal protective equipment (PPE) kits, sanitizers, and ventilators
Emails from generous donors claiming to be giving away large sums of money to those in need
Lottery scam emails
Emails asking for donations from individuals via cryptocurrency or gift cards
Figure 1. Blocked COVID-19 related emails: March 25 – May 19, 2020
Symantec Email Threat Isolation
One of the best solutions or defense mechanisms provided by Symantec to its customers is Email Threat Isolation (ETI). ETI technology checks emails and attachments for phishing URLs or malicious content hosted on them. This technology de-risks the threat scenario by providing an extra layer of protection that allows users to safely browse unknown or shady websites, without risk of malware infection or credential theft. ETI is offered within the Symantec Email Security.cloud and Symantec Messaging Gateway solutions, and also as a standalone product that works with email security solutions from other vendors.
Phishing emails disguised as COVID-19 reports
Phishing emails masquerading as COVID-19 funding reports are being spread in spam campaigns. These emails try their best to trick recipients into clicking on links that lead to phishing web pages designed to steal credentials. Threat actors have designed convincing email templates that appear to come from reputable file-sharing/storage services and use them for their phishing campaigns. An example of this can be seen in Figure 2. The email content is kept short and mentions that a confidential document has been shared with the email recipient. In order to view the “Confidentiality.pdf” file, the user needs to click on “OPEN FILE”, beneath which a recently registered domain is used to form a phishing URL:
https://[REMOVED]covid.com/
The phishing URL opens as a legitimate looking login page requesting the user to enter credentials.
Figure 2. Phishing email disguised as a notification message regarding a confidential document
In Figure 3, Email Threat Isolation (ETI) alerts the user that the web page is potentially unsafe to visit and automatically enables the protected view with read-only mode. This helps to safeguard the user’s credentials or confidential information from being compromised.
Figure 3. Symantec’s Email Threat Isolation (ETI) warns the user about the phishing web page and enables a protected view with read-only mode
In Figure 4, a bogus email template is used to tell the recipient that a COVID-19 report file has been shared with them. When the “View” button is clicked, the user is brought to a phishing web page constructed with the help of a compromised domain:
https://[REMOVED]/ssl/?@=
Figure 4. Phishing email disguised as a COVID-19 funding report notification
Business proposition emails offering medical equipment
These emails claim to come from small to medium-sized manufacturing firms, offering for sale a variety of medical equipment. The email templates used are kept simple and direct. As with many of these scam emails, there are often grammar, spelling, and punctuation errors present.
In Figure 5, the threat actor provides a list of medical equipment specifying the type of respirators and masks available for purchase. The email also mentions that special chartered shipping services are available for VIP clients and provides shipping details.
Figure 5. Spam email offering a variety of medical equipment with different shipping options
In Figure 6, the threat actor poses as a supplier from China keen to ship various types of face masks to different parts of the world with abundant stock ready to ship.
Figure 6. Spam email supposedly from a supplier in China offering different types of face masks
Generous donors offer donations
This is another variation of the infamous advance fee scam. These emails are generally kept short and try to attract victims by offering generous monetary donations. In Figure 7, a generous wealthy couple is supposedly donating money for the Covid-19 relief effort. The email asks the recipient to provide personal details to a lawyer in order to claim the money.
Figure 7. Spam email offering a generous amount of donation as COVID-19 relief.
The email shown in Figure 8 is supposedly from the United Nations, in relation to COVID-19 relief. The email asks the recipient to verify their email address, which will then allow the sender to begin a conversation with the user and begin their scam. The subject line of this email starts with “Re:”, a tactic used to trick the recipient into thinking the message is a continuation of previous correspondence.
Figure 8. Spam email supposedly from the United Nations requesting validation of an email address before compensation can be made
Lottery scam emails
These emails are themed as notification emails notifying the user they have been selected in a lottery to receive coronavirus compensation. In Figure 9, one of these emails asks the user to provide personal information before applying for their share of $1,000,000.
Figure 9. Lottery scam email asks user for personal information
Requesting donations via cryptocurrency
These emails leverage cryptocurrencies and QR codes. The email shown in Figure 10 presents the recipient with a Bitcoin wallet address and a QR code to supposedly donate money or “food gift cards” to help with the coronavirus pandemic relief effort. Scanning the QR code brings up the same Bitcoin wallet listed in the email text. The email also lists an email address where all gift cards should be forwarded to.
Figure 10. Spam email leveraging Bitcoin wallet and QR code for fund donations
In Figure 11, the threat actor poses as a doctor and urges recipients to donate funds towards the COVID-19 Solidarity Response Fund, which will supposedly help with the production of a COVID-19 vaccine. Donations are requested to be paid to the provided Bitcoin wallet address.
Figure 11. Spam email leveraging Bitcoin wallet to donate funds for production of Covid-19 vaccine
Snowshoe campaigns
Snowshoe campaigns continue to be a firm favorite for spammers. These campaigns appear with heavy randomization in header fields to avoid detection. Snowshoe campaigns come in large batches in a short period of time. Along with heavy randomization of email features, these runs also use a myriad of topics and themes. In addition, these emails are distributed with a variety of originating IP addresses, domains with different gTLDs, and heavy obfuscation to avoid detection. In Figures 12 and 13, threat actors have made use of current affairs and designed their email templates accordingly. These include themes like “Elon Musk Reveals How to Profit from Coronavirus” and the promotion of a “Touch Free Body Thermometer.” Ultimately, the URLs hyperlinked beneath the words “Register now!” and “Browse Thermometers” contain newly registered spam domains.
Figure 12. Snowshoe spam email on “How to Profit from Coronavirus!”
Figure 13. Snowshoe spam email promoting “Touch Free Body Thermometer”
Protection against COVID-19 themed messages
Predictive filtering systems focused on URL and other email features are deployed in timely intervals to catch changes in the rapidly changing email threat landscape. With the help of predictive filtering systems, threats that use email as a medium are filtered or blocked before they cause menace. This approach has also proved beneficial to detect the variation in these types of attacks and filter them down in terms of volume or scale.
Mitigation steps
Email users are requested to thoroughly check emails and if deemed suspicious, please report it to Symantec.
Question any emails requesting actions that seem unusual or aren't following normal procedures.
Analyze potential threats using analytics technologies that can pick up on the subtle differences between clean and infected emails and identify indicators of compromise.
Conduct end-user awareness training to raise overall awareness of phishing among employees.
Defense mechanisms
At Symantec, response teams strive hard to protect our valuable customers by introducing new defense mechanisms against such challenging attacks. An array of defense mechanisms is deployed in different layers at .cloud and Symantec Mail gateway level to block similar attacks.
Symantec Email Security.cloud Data Protection: Provides granular control to identify suspicious messages based on various indicators and helps to flag messages that are coming from outside the organization.
Symantec Data Loss Prevention: Helps combat the data theft scenario by seamlessly integrating with our Email Security solutions.
Email threat isolation (ETI) from Symantec: Checks emails and attachments for phishing URLs or malicious content hosted on them. This technology de-risks the threat scenario by providing an extra layer of protection that allows users to safely browse unknown or shady websites, without risk of malware infection or credential theft. Symantec Email Threat Isolation is offered within the Symantec Email Security.cloud and Symantec Messaging Gateway solutions, and also as a standalone product that works with other vendors' email security solutions.
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The 2024 Ransomware Threat Landscape
Understanding attackers' TTPs is key to stopping attacks before ransomware is deployed.
Although we are just a few weeks into the new year, ransomware attacks – and their costly impact on today’s enterprises – are already making headlines. According to our new report, The 2024 Ransomware Threat Landscape, published today by the Symantec Threat Hunter Team, part of Broadcom, “ransomware continues to be one of the most lucrative forms of cybercrime and, as such, remains a critical threat for organizations of all sizes.”
The new report analyzes the ransomware threat landscape over the past 12 months, from new operators in the field to attackers’ top tools and tactics, techniques, and procedures (TTPs) and provides actionable intelligence – including real-world attacker case studies – that can help organizations stop attacks early in the attack chain.
Among the report’s key findings:
Ransomware attacks spiked in October 2023 and the number of organizations affected by ransomware in October 2023 was 66% more than a year earlier. This was one of the biggest surprises in 2023. We would have expected ransomware to drop slightly during that period after the Qakbot disruption, but the opposite happened.
The main infection vector for ransomware is no longer botnets – instead, it is the exploitation of known vulnerabilities in public facing applications.
Except for the ransomware payload itself, attackers are increasingly eschewing malware while carrying out attacks. Many of the tools attackers use are legitimate software, either dual-use tools or operating system features.
Windows operating system components are the most widely used legitimate software (so-called living off the land). PsExec, PowerShell, and WMI are the top three most frequently used tools by attackers.
Remote desktop/remote administration software is the most widely used type of legitimate software introduced by attackers onto targeted networks. This includes AnyDesk, Atera, Splashtop, and ConnectWise.
The Snakefly group (aka Clop) demonstrated a worrying new template for extortion attacks with its exploitation of the MOVEit Transfer vulnerability. By identifying zero-day vulnerabilities in enterprise software, it can steal data from multiple organizations at once, netting itself a huge pool of victims from a single attack campaign.
Top 2024 Ransomware Trends
Based on these findings and other intelligence, we can expect the following ransomware trends to continue through 2024 and beyond:
Ransomware is no longer just a North America problem: Increasingly, we are seeing lots of groups who are targeting organizations in other geographies and non-English-speaking countries.
Vulnerability exploitation is going to continue: We’re seeing a growing number of attackers who realize the value in jumping on recently patched vulnerabilities. The scanning for unpatched systems starts the day that the software patch is released.
Cryptocurrencies are not going away anytime soon: There was a period of time when it looked like cryptocurrencies, a key plank of the ransomware business model, were going to die off a bit, but it now seems to be gaining a renewed legitimacy with the SEC approval of crypto ETFs. As long as cryptocurrencies are around, ransomware is going to be around.
Encryption-free attacks are on the rise: The trend towards a greater reliance on data theft as leverage for extortion ahead of encrypting computers will continue. Encryption is labor-intensive to perform. We’ve seen some groups experiment (successfully) with encryption-free attacks, where they just go in and steal some data.
Why Defenders Must Pivot: The Need for Adaptive Protection
One thing we know for certain – ransomware will remain a persistent threat to all organizations, regardless of size. To help mitigate this risk, organizations should adopt a defense-in-depth strategy, using multiple detection, protection, and hardening technologies to mitigate risk at each point of a potential attack chain. In addition, organizations should prioritize deepening their knowledge of current infection vectors used and commonly employed in ransomware attacks. This information will assist in prioritizing and identifying potential areas of weakness and help strengthen a defensive posture.
As a result, defenders increasingly are turning to Symantec Adaptive Protection in their fight against ransomware. To help close the attack routes available using living-of-the-land tools, Symantec Adaptive Protection maps out the different attack methods used by attackers and displays this data in the form of a heatmap for quick reference. Incident responders can leverage this data to understand which living-of-the-land tools are being used in various different attacks such as advanced persistent threats (APTs) and ransomware. Symantec is currently tracking 70 specific behaviors across 54 living-of-the-land tools and is uniquely positioned to quickly react and update this data based off the changing landscape.
Next month, we will be publishing a paper focusing on how Adaptive Protection strategies increase efficacy and efficiency. Check back with us for more details in the coming weeks.
Conclusion
What was our team’s number one learning about ransomware in 2023? The ransomware cybercrime ecosystem is highly durable and continues to survive disruption from law enforcement and other efforts. Yet, the good news is that there are steps you can take today to reduce the risk of ransomware. By combining actionable intelligence about ransomware attackers TTPs with Symantec Adaptive Protection, defenders can better understand how their organizations might be compromised – and take the necessary steps to protect against it.
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The Announcement of OCSF: Open Cybersecurity Schema Framework
Symantec Enterprise helping lead the way into the future
For years, customers have asked the industry to come up with a way to make data more interoperable and to make it easier for tools to communicate with each other. Now we’ve finally done it.
Announcing OCSF
At BlackHat 2022 several leading technology companies came together to announce a new open data standard for sharing cybersecurity information, called the Open Cybersecurity Schema Framework (OCSF). Essentially, OCSF gives customers a common way to share data from different security tools, and it is quite a big deal. The OCSF project was initiated by a partnership between Splunk and AWS, which built on the ICD Schema developed at Symantec—now part of Broadcom Software.
Adoption of OCSF
Until now, enterprise SOCs have had to invest great effort trying to make things work together, which was valuable time better off spent looking for threats. Think about this: the average SOC has been found to use around 45 different security tools. That leads to ongoing management headaches considering how tools store their telemetry in different ways.
When SOCs were first coming into their own, all of the large security software vendors touted their platforms as the solution. This “single vendor” solution did not work. Enterprises continue to rely on multiple vendors and the result was incompatible data sets of security telemetry. Large enterprises ended up having to invest in integrating all of their security tools on their own in order to have any data query abilities. At most large companies, I see SOC teams that employ a full team of engineers who do nothing but convert data and update programs to handle new types of data.
The OCSF project was initiated by a partnership between Splunk and AWS, which built on the ICD Schema developed at Symantec—now part of Broadcom Software.
It's not just the burden of having to do a lot of busywork on integration. Accuracy is another big problem. Since products store their data in many different ways, during conversion there’s a higher chance of error and exposure for the business.
This integration and conversion work gets tiring – fast – especially as enterprises add or upgrade their security infrastructure. No surprise that in more recent years, SOCs have become more outspoken and more demanding, telling vendors that they wanted products that were easier to integrate, not exist as standalone castles.
The Power of OCSF
OCSF is removing that hassle by facilitating a common way to store telemetry, making it far easier to integrate tools. Information can be passed from one tool to the next. The schema is consistent, and data flows seamlessly into the data lakes and analytics tools that the SOC relies on.
This project is particularly near and dear to my heart, as OCSF’s roots can be traced back to a Symantec Enterprise initiative to enable all of our products to correlate data. That initiative quickly uncovered the key challenges. It may seem simple, but getting multiple products to store data and treat machines, files, and events the same way is not easy. This standardization effort within Symantec grew into our Integrated Cyber Defense (ICD) platform. Fast forward to today, and the same schema and approach is now the foundation of the open-source project that resulted in OCSF.
The Future of OCSF
OCSF was designed by security engineers. It is meant to make things easier for the people who are involved in cybersecurity every day, and who face an increasingly complex landscape. We need more vendors to adopt the OCSF format to make it universal. Oftentimes, standards proposals get put forward that work to the benefit of particular companies. That’s not the case here. There’s no proprietary advantage for anyone who adopts OCSF. As an industry, we all benefit by doing the right thing for customers. Rallying behind a common standard just makes good sense.
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The Barbarians Are Inside the Gate: Least Privilege and Zero Trust
Once a rogue insider or hacker penetrates your access defenses, everything in the enterprise is at risk. The second tenet of Zero Trust, least privilege, is the only real-world solution.
This is the second article in a continuing series exploring the meaning and real-world impacts of the three tenets of the Zero Trust security model. The first is here.
The threat of malicious insiders is a problem that companies continue to have to deal with. As an example, on September 1, 2017, law enforcement officials discovered that a former employee with a Coca-Cola subsidiary was in possession of a hard drive that contained employee data. The information of 8,000 individuals employed with the enterprise Coca-Cola were affected by this data breach.
In that incident, the compromised data included names, Social Security numbers, addresses, ethnicity, credit card data, financial data and other information linked to employees, suppliers, and contractors.
The threat of malicious insiders is a problem that companies continue to have to deal with.
In another example, in 2018, a former Chicago Public Schools (CPS) employee was charged with stealing personal information from 70,000 CPS employees. The employee was a temporary IT-worker who stole the information — names, employee ID numbers, phone numbers, addresses, birth dates, criminal histories, and any records associating individuals with the Department of Children and Family services — in retaliation for being fired.
So, is there any solution to prevent these types of attacks? Yes, and it underscores the importance of the second tenet of the Zero Trust security model: enforcing least privilege.
Enforcing Least Privilege Access
The focal point of the Zero Trust model is that enterprise data needs to be protected at all costs. There are three pillars to this security model:
Secure access: No one or nothing gains access to the network without authorization. (Read the first article of this series about this tenet here.)
Least privilege: Grant access only in the most limited way possible and restrict that access to only what that user requested and is explicitly authorized.
Log everything: All network traffic must be continually logged and inspected to ensure that only the authorized access is ever allowed to proceed.
In principle, the second tenet, granting least privilege access, boils down to ensuring that a user is only given just enough privileges to be able to do their job, and not granted access to the whole network.
Enforcing zero trust-based access principles is even more important now as the network perimeter becomes increasingly meaningless in a borderless network landscape. And in the post-pandemic, “new normal”, the perimeter is unlikely to ever come back. Indeed, according to Gartner, almost three quarters of companies expect to shift five percent or more of their workforce to remote work on a permanent basis.
More than ever, it’s clear that the business perimeter needs to be defined around the user and data rather than around offices and machines.
Enforcing zero trust-based access principles is even more important now as the network perimeter becomes increasingly meaningless in a borderless network landscape.
Traditionally, verification of users was a one-time check. Users authenticated to the network through a virtual private network (VPN). But once authorized, they were not monitored and free to access any application.
The modern approach, embodied by zero trust, is to continuously establish and re-establish the trust of the user. It requires, and only grants access to other applications after verifying the user’s privilege for that access through multiple contextual and environmental variables.
The second tenet of Zero Trust ensures that only securely authenticated users and devices have access to target applications with the view to keep your most critical data protected. It determines the user’s continuing access by persistently asking the following questions for each and every single attempt to access something new:
Who is requesting access?
What is the context of the request?
What is the risk of the access environment?
If you’re not monitoring and continually assessing who is coming into your network and who has access to certain files, the possibility of an insider attack becomes just a matter of time. Adopting a comprehensive Zero Trust approach and applying it's vitally important second tenet of enforcing least privilege is a step in the right direction to securing your most important assets.
Get Your Data in Order
But that’s not the whole of it. A clear understanding of your organization’s data assets and having granular visibility of data access across your entire network estate is critical for a successful implementation of a Zero Trust architecture. And while there is no single technology that will provide organizations with a complete Zero Trust state, a suite of products such as those provided by Symantec provide the technologies that will protect enterprises and ensure that the next “Insider Threat Headline” doesn’t happen to your organization.
Zero Trust in 30 seconds
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The Battle to Bolster IT’s Control over the Endpoint Just Changed
Symantec, VMWare unite around a major technology integration that will transform the capability of enterprise customers to protect their digital workspaces
With more businesses turning into digital businesses, the task of securing a growing constellation of users, apps, devices and networks gets more important - and more challenging - all the time.
Threat actors continue to deploy a combination of new and old tactics to exploit vulnerable defenses. For enterprises, the consequences of getting this wrong can lead to the theft of valuable IP and other coveted data in a breach. The result: lawsuits, financial loss and irreparable reputational harm.
But there’s strength in numbers and one of the hallmarks of Symantec’s strategy is to unite with technology partners to build out a rich ecosystem of trusted solutions. It’s also why we’re pairing up with VMware in a major technology integration initiative to bolster the ability of enterprise customers to secure their digital workspaces.
Symantec is supporting VMware’s Workspace ONE Trust Network, integrating our technology to help solve problems that customers frequently encounter managing and defending their endpoints. Let’s take a look at an example of how this might work in practice.
BYOD and its Discontents
Let’s consider some of the changes being ushered in by the Bring Your Own Device (BYOD) movement. In the last several years, the number of people who use their own personal equipment at work has skyrocketed. Indeed, when you look at the types of devices people now use in the enterprise, it’s not just PCs or Macs anymore. BYOD means more mobile devices, including tablets and smartphones.
Here’s where things get complicated. IT has historically managed software installations. From the enterprise’s perspective, a well-managed endpoint is a secured endpoint. IT understandably would like to continue to provision security software and keep it up to date to effectively manage the protection of all the business’s endpoints.
But the popularity of BYOD has loosened IT’s once-tight control over that process and forced enterprises to rethink their traditional approach to managing endpoint security. While organizations still need to protect against compromised devices that might introduce risk into the organization, it’s hard to manage that situation when employees are not willing to relinquish full control over their devices in return for being able to access corporate apps.
Also, users may unlock or “root/jail-break” their mobile devices and tablets to run side-loaded apps and games, personalize their UI experience, or bypass built-in security restrictions. That’s an invitation to trouble because it makes their devices more susceptible to being exploited by cyber criminals. Since users are no longer constrained to installing officially sanctioned software from iTunes, their devices become vulnerable to infections.
We’re helping VMware to combat that challenge. Workspace ONE helps establish trust across the digital workspace by offering organizations enhanced abilities to authenticate users when they log on. It also elevates the authentication requirements based upon individual device types. Say that someone is attempting to access a corporate app while working outside the office in a coffee shop. Instead of just requiring the usual active directory credentials, such as a user’s name and password, the system will further request a second factor to authenticate the employee’s identity.
At the same time, SEP (Symantec Endpoint Protection) bolsters Workspace ONE’s authentication process to prevent potentially unhealthy devices from introducing threats into the organization. A user might provide the correct password and even pass the second factor requirement. But SEP can go a step further to discern whether the device used by an employee is infected and then block it from accessing the network before any damage gets done.
Also, Symantec taps into the most in-depth information in the industry about the security health of an endpoint. If a device ever gets infected by a piece of malware or if we discover unusual file or network activity around that device, that information will get transmitted to Workspace ONE. VMware will ingest the data and trigger a workflow engine that lets the organization take defensive measures based on these deeper insights into its security situation.
The threat landscape for enterprises is evolving faster than ever. The need for integrated security solutions has never been greater, specifically across mobile and endpoint devices as they are commonly the main touchpoint for an end user accessing corporate data. Symantec’s integration efforts with Workspace ONE help support VMware’s vision of the Workspace ONE Trust Network, ultimately helping provide customers with a modern security approach against the evolving threat landscape in the digital workspace.
When you combine Symantec’s endpoint protection with VMware’s unified endpoint management, it’s a major advance for customers in need of a modern security approach as they navigate into our digitized future.
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The Building Blocks for Zero Trust
With Zero Trust emerging as the next generation of cyber security, federal managers must understand how to make their agencies “Zero Trust protected”
The thing is, Zero Trust is not a set of tools that agencies can buy. Zero Trust is a security concept, a strategy, and architectural design approach, geared to help organizations proactively control all interactions between people, data and information systems.
In a Zero Trust model, you cannot trust anything coming in or going out of your network. This means that agencies must create a new type of data-centric perimeter around information. To protect data, agencies need strong encryption techniques tied to intelligent authentication. In short, agencies cannot afford to blindly allow users (person or non-person entities) to access data without checking their identity.
However, implementing Zero Trust does not require a comprehensive replacement of existing networks or a massive acquisition of new technologies. Instead, the framework should strengthen other existing cyber security practices and tools. As the ACT-IAC whitepaper on the subject notes, “many federal agencies already have elements of Zero Trust in their infrastructure and follow practices that support it in their day-to-day operations. For instance, identity credential and access management (ICAM), access standards based on trust algorithms, automated policy decisions, and continuous monitoring are critical components that are needed for successful adoption of Zero Trust.”
In a Zero Trust model, you cannot trust anything coming in or going out of your network.
Agencies should take an incremental approach to adopting Zero Trust. The first step for agencies is to have a clear understanding of their users and their roles, their data, and their technology assets before beginning to implement Zero Trust. Many government systems are aging and siloed but that does not mean that they cannot also be a part of Zero Trust. “Zero Trust solutions can start within a single organization or cross-organizational application, and rapidly drive all users and devices that interface with that organization or application to come into compliance and register their attributes for authentication and authorization,” according to the Defense Innovation Board report, The Road to Zero Trust (Security).
The Zero Trust exTended Framework (ZTX), developed by Forrester, is one approach to applying Zero Trust within an organization. Described as a data-focused version of Zero Trust, ZTX allows users to directly map technology purchases and strategic decisions to the execution of a Zero Trust strategy. The ZTX framework maps technologies and solutions to the framework’s six pillars, which include:
Pillar #1 – Users People/Identity Security
This includes the use of technologies like ICAM and multi-factor authentication, as well as continuously monitoring and validating user trustworthiness to govern their access and privileges. Technologies for securing and protecting users’ interactions, such as traditional web gateway solutions, are also important.
Pillar #2 – Device Security
Real-time cyber security posture and trustworthiness of devices is a foundational attribute of a Zero Trust approach. Some solutions such as Mobile Device Managers provide data that can be useful for device-trust assessments. But MDM alone cannot provide the visibility and level of protection agencies require now. MDM is a core component of enterprise mobility management (EMM) which also includes mobile application management, identity and access management and enterprise file sync and share.
Pillar #3 – Network Security
As the ACT-IAC report notes, the traditional infrastructure firewall perimeter “castle and moat” approach is no longer enough to protect networks, especially as data moves in and out of multiple cloud infrastructures. The perimeter must move closer to the data in concert with micro-segmentation to strengthen protections and controls. The ability to segment, isolate and control the network continues to be a pivotal point of security and essential for a Zero Trust network.
Pillar #4 - Application and Workload Security
Securing and properly managing the application layer as well as compute containers and virtual machines is central to ZT adoption. Agencies need the ability to identify and control access to applications in a more granular way to make accurate access decisions. Consequently, multi-factor authentication is an increasingly critical part of providing proper access control to applications in ZT environments.
Pillar #5 – Security Automation and Orchestration
To be effective, Zero Trust must make full use of security automation response tools that automate tasks across products through workflows while allowing for end-user oversight and interaction. Security orchestration will connect the disparate automated security information and event management and behavioral analysis tools used in Security Operation Centers into an integrated way.
Pillar #6 – Security Visibility and Analytics
Zero Trust leverages tools like security information management, advanced security analytics platforms, security user behavior analytics, and other analytics systems to help security experts observe in real-time what is happening within their networks so they can orient defenses more intelligently. The focus on the analysis of cyber-related event data can help develop proactive security measures before an actual incident occurs.
The bottom line is data authentication is the foundation of Zero Trust. Users, endpoints, email and cloud applications have become communication channels that serve as attack vectors. In a Zero Trust model where you cannot trust anyone or any device, focusing the perimeter around data protection with intelligent authentication is the best security approach. Therefore, agencies must have a clear understanding of their users and their roles, their data, and their technology assets before beginning to implement Zero Trust.
If you don’t know what you have, you can’t monitor it.
To learn why a data-centric approach is the foundation of Zero Trust and to find other resources on Zero Trust click here.
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The Case for SASE
Data is your most important asset. Are you protected?
Over the past decade, there has been a continuous evolution in both technology and the manner in which companies protect their data. Until 2019 there was a steady adoption of cloud-based services, but then humanity got hit with its own malware in the form of COVID. This forced organizations to send the majority of their employee’s home causing a rapid adoption of cloud-based technology. During the same period the situation got worse with the microchip shortage as companies scrambled to find mobile computing options to replace the traditional end user PC. As a result of both these issues, companies have been searching for a method to both protect cloud centric data and allow employees the use of their own devices to continue working from home.
Data is the most important asset that any organization possesses -- whether it’s trade secrets, electronic health records or any other sensitive information. A decade ago, a company could stand up firewalls, IPS systems and proxies and do a fairly good job of keeping the bad guys out. Then along came the cloud. It brought a slew of new problems that forced security professionals to rethink the way they protect the crown jewels.
The transition from a controlled defensive position to the wide-open cloud is still ongoing for many organizations. Traditional security architectures required building tall walls around the castle with on-premises appliances, but this approach is no longer adequate. The result has been widespread loss of data visibility, compliance and protection as users work remotely.
Data is the most important asset that any organization possesses -- whether it’s trade secrets, electronic health records or any other sensitive information.
The challenge now is to build new walls farther out – between the data and users at the endpoint. It’s a new security perimeter. Gone are the days of simply securing online sessions inside the castle behind ramparts and a mote. How do you get insight into data when a user isn’t plugged into a corporate network? A virtual private network isn’t sustainable as it requires backhauling too much traffic.
This is where Secure Access Service Edge (SASE) comes in. It’s a bundle of technologies and strategies that include the convergence of network services and network security solutions, Zero Trust principles, extensive points of presence and simplified management and monitoring. Together, this approach allows you to capture network traffic and push security policy enforcement out to the edge.
Symantec Web Security Service is the foundation of Symantec’s, by Broadcom Software, SASE solution. It integrates multiple advanced security technologies and makes them available from the cloud. WSS runs on a high-performance, fully redundant cloud-native infrastructure consisting of more than 40 POPs. This network, among the largest and best connected in the world, is edge-optimized for remote employees working from home and on mobile devices. The software-defined infrastructure heals much faster than the previous generations of cloud SWG infrastructure used by other vendors, which rely on physical network components to scale.
Also part of the SASE Architecture:
CloudSOC allows organizations to control access to data hosted on SaaS platforms. Administrators can also detect and block access to cloud and other unauthorized (shadow IT) applications and enforce controls such as malware scanning on file downloads.
Symantec Cloud Firewall Service performs deep inspection and gives organizations control of network traffic over all ports and protocols. It identifies traffic from different applications and can apply policies based on applications, user groups and factors such as the user’s location.
Symantec Web Isolation defends against ransomware, malware, and phishing attacks that target browsers. Users are allowed to access uncategorized and potentially risky websites, but pages from those sites are executed and rendered in a remote, secure, disposable container. Only an interactive rendered image, of the original webpage, is delivered to the user’s browser.
Symantec's Data Loss Prevention Cloud Integration enables an organization to publish policies from their existing on-premise DLP architecture to WSS, cloud based email services, and CloudSOC CASB. This integration allows an organization to continuously analyze and protect web, application, and email traffic to prevent sensitive content from leaving their control or being accessed by risky users or devices. This behavior enforces centrally managed security and compliance policies and reduces the chance of a data breach.
Content and Malware Analysis allows the actions of suspicious files and malware to be observed and analyzed in an isolated sandbox in the Broadcom cloud platform. It reveals malicious behaviors and exposes zero-day threats without risk to your endpoints and systems.
Symantec Secure Access Cloud offers an agentless Zero Trust Network Access solution that provides point-to-point connectivity at the application level, cloaking all resources from the end-user devices and the Internet.
Today’s security environment requires three foundational components: data visibility, monitoring, and response/remediation. With SASE we’re afforded all three.
I’ve been working in IT infrastructure and security for more than a decade. I’m honored to be a Broadcom Software Knight and I have certifications in ProxySG, Web Security Service and Web Isolation. I also hold a Broadcom SASE Framework Master certification.
To learn more on how Broadcom Software can help you modernize, optimize and protect your enterprise, contact us here.
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The Changing Environment of Privileged Access Management
It’s time to rethink the concept of privileged access management with Symantec Enterprise
I don’t have to tell anyone why we at Symantec, a division of Broadcom (NASDAQ: AVGO), are concerned about privileged identities and why the Enterprise should be as well. They are the source of many of the data breaches you see in the news today, most recently where many high profile Twitter accounts were hacked and someone obtained credentials belonging to a small number of employees with privileged access and used those credentials to bypass two-factor protections and access a key internal system.
The key area of change that is driving these customer challenges today, is that privileged identities used to be IT focused only and now they are also outside of IT and everywhere in the organization. In many enterprises today, C-suite executives are routinely granted privileged access as well as people in accounting, HR and marketing. But unlike traditional privileged accounts where the passwords are tightly managed and controlled, employees outside of IT rely on basic password security which can be easily hacked. They also often have more privilege than they really need.
The key area of change that is driving these customer challenges today, is that privileged identities used to be IT focused only and now they are also outside of IT and everywhere in the organization.
I recently had the privilege of talking with Merritt Maxim, VP, Research Director from Forrester during a Symantec Enterprise webinar, where we discussed customer challenges associated with this dynamically changing environment and also emerging requirements not being addressed by Product Information Management (PIM) vendors today.
One area Merritt points out in our discussion, is the influence that the migration to the cloud is having on privileged access management. He explains that privileged users are now managing a much broader range of endpoints than they were with only on-prem applications which creates new dynamics and new deployment models. The enterprise will now need to protect accounts for both cloud and on-prem, increasing the breadth and complexity of privileged access management. In addition, the variety of targets is expanding from where they are hosted to how they are accessed by employees which also contributes to the new complexity.
The good news is that a consensus is emerging among security leaders that there are specific steps we can take to address these challenges effectively and here our suggestions below for the Enterprise to consider:
Step 1: Discover: Identify all privileged accounts
Privileged access management systems used to collect an organization’s most critical data and lock it up or “vault” that data on a server. Today, going through the process of discovering how many privileged accounts you have and who they are is a key first step. Simply put: It’s difficult to prevent a data breach when an organization doesn’t even know what it needs to secure in the first place.
Step 2: Implement: Deploy a hybrid privileged access model
This deployment model must accurately reflect the reality of the modern enterprise and should be based on the model of “least privilege” - the restriction of individual user access rights within a company to only those which are necessary in order for them to do their job. To be effective, a privileged access management system should be a hybrid model that can address the needs of an on-prem AND cloud-based environment, while at the same time keeping the future in mind and how the environment will be evolving. This hybrid deployment of a least privilege business model will keep your infrastructure current and not open to attacks.
Step 3: Redefine: Update the organization’s understanding of privileged users
What it means to be a privileged user is changing. There is a slow growing awareness that these accounts need to be not just secure but also user-friendly. Business leaders – CEOs, CFOs – don’t necessarily know or should be expected to understand complex computer code, just as data-entry personnel or contractors must be able to do their jobs. And all of them could be privileged users in the current environment.
With all the potential new privileged users, there is a need for high scalability and speed to scale up and scale down. As Merritt explains, the combination of increased endpoints and the sheer number of new privileged users creates the need for this scalability. As new business initiatives and programs ramp up, so must privileged access management. As the initiative completes, it also needs to ramp down again quickly.
New privileged access management systems, such as Symantec Privileged Access Management, that are based on principles of least privilege and zero trust allow customers to:
Maximize your Investment: Symantec PAM combines the industry’s highest scalability with the lowest cost of ownership to deliver a solution that will protect the entire enterprise without breaking the bank.
Protect Hybrid Enterprise: Symantec PAM controls privileged access across all IT resources, from cloud to mainframe, and compliments Symantec Endpoint and Network Security solutions.
Address Regulatory Compliance: Symantec PAM provides many of the controls governing privileged access that are mandated by emerging data privacy laws and regulatory and industry compliance mandates.
In my next blog, the topic I will cover is “What is Privilege and How it is Changing” and I look forward to sharing more of or learning in the areas of Privilege Access Management.
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The Crucial Aspects of Secure Web Gateway
Leading Cyber Security into 2021
With all that has happened during 2020, for many, just maintaining a sense of stability can count as a major accomplishment.
For example, the COVID-19 pandemic forced many enterprises to implement work-from-home policies for employees, seemingly overnight, that provided stable network access and security systems. Entire organizations had to adjust to new remote practices, and with those practices came a need for more and better data security across cloud-based environments.
At Symantec, we have met those challenges. We have done so via our experience in getting out in front of security matters before those become issues for our customers. Providing our customers with world-class network and information security solutions that deliver the services their employees need to do their jobs in stable, remote environments is key to our customers’ successful digital transformation.
As the market shifts toward SASE, Symantec remains a leader in the arena of Secure Web Gateways (SWG) which is at the core of an effective SASE strategy.
A key area of our focus is delivering secure access service edge (SASE) framework capabilities. This framework emphasizes protecting people and data over fixed data centers, and is proving to be a crucial component of the digital transformations taking place with many enterprises.
As the market shifts toward SASE, Symantec as a division of Broadcom, remains a leader in the arena of Secure Web Gateways (SWG) which is at the core of an effective SASE strategy. The Secure Web Gateway is the lynchpin of a solution that prevents both in-bound threats and out-bound data exfiltration. It is the control point for enforcing compliance with corporate and regulatory policies. When it comes to the Secure Web Gateway, Symantec has a strong track record that makes us a leader in the industry.
Monitoring and Visibility
For example, according to Gartner 2020 Critical Capabilities for Cloud-Based Secure Web Gateways report* Symantec scored among the highest among participating SWG vendors for Monitoring and Visibility Use Case. It goes without saying that enterprises need to be able see how their users are behaving when they are online, and that capability is imperative during this pandemic period when more employees are working remotely and accessing networks from home.
We continue to deepen the integration of both our CASB and DLP offerings with our SWG, delivered in the cloud and on site at enterprises’ data centers. We are the market leader when it comes to SWG appliances, and we continue to be the best in the industry due to the overall strength and security of our Secure Web Gateway solution.
The reason Symantec stands out is that our proxy solution enables our customers to have full visibility into different segments of the internet. Not only do we dynamically categorize each internet site with best in class artificial intelligence and machine learning, but we also do application identification and segmentation. We identify 250 high level application groups and 35,000 applications. Symantec customers not only have unparalleled visibility, but more important is what that visibility enables - they can then control the traffic based on policy and risk. We don't stop there, we can actually give visibility into what the user is doing within the most important and risky applications. For example, are employees posting source code on GitHub?
This graphic was published by Gartner, Inc. as part of a larger research document and should be evaluated in the context of the entire document. The Gartner document is available upon request from Symantec.
Staying Connected from Home
In addition to monitoring and visibility of users online, the process of connecting offices and mobile workers has become a crucial part of any enterprise’s SWG playbook. The growth in use of SaaS applications such as Office 365 and Salesforce has caused many companies to employ security stacks in the cloud, and ensure secure remote access to cloud-hosted applications. Gartner gave high marks to Symantec’s integration of its Symantec Endpoint Security into its cloud-based Web Security Service because the combination eliminates the need to employ an endpoint agent that is specifically dedicated to the redirection of traffic.
Malware Detection and Advanced Threat Defense
Finally, malware detection and advanced threat defense is the third important piece of SWG. The analysis of internet traffic for malware and other advanced security threats through a technique called “sandboxing”—or detecting malware that gets inside of files, is more important than ever. Symantec offers its highly rated sandboxing technology as a cloud service feature and an appliance for potential customers. Symantec Web Isolation creates a secure execution environment between users and the web. The addition of Web Isolation to Symantec’s SWG maximizes business and user productivity with secure, unrestricted web access to uncategorized and potentially risky websites while minimizing operational overhead and complexity related to managing web access policies, support tickets, security alerts, and forensic investigations.
As we look ahead toward 2021, we remain committed to providing leading SWG technology and services to meet the needs of enterprises that are navigating the changing landscape of network security. We have always been a leader in security, and with our customers in mind, we will ensure that our customers receive nothing less than our very best.
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*Gartner, “Critical Capabilities for Cloud-Based Secure Web Gateways, 9 December 2020, John Watts, Lawrence Orans”
Gartner does not endorse any vendor, product or service depicted in its research publications and does not advise technology users to select only those vendors with the highest ratings or other designation. Gartner research publications consist of the opinions of Gartner’s research organization and should not be construed as statements of fact. Gartner disclaims all warranties, expressed or implied, with respect to this research, including any warranties of merchantability or fitness for a particular purpose.
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The Cyber Security Platform Shift – More Secure, Less Complex
How Symantec Enterprise’s Integrated Cyber Defense reduces the integration burden on customers in a fast-changing security world
The cyber security world is undergoing dramatic shifts and the changes are coming fast and furious.
Our increasingly mobile and cloud-centric era imposes new burdens on security leaders. But this is a cyber security landscape that bears little resemblance to what they faced just a decade ago. Consider the following:
The growth of cloud and mobile technologies generates more endpoints to manage, more networks to secure and more data to protect. Unfortunately, most organizations still can’t hire enough qualified personnel to staff their operations.
The haphazard growth and expansion of security infrastructures is creating complexity and slow response time. The upshot: a patchwork of fragmented tools that are expensive to manage –putting extra strain on SOC resources – and that get in the way of effective and rapid threat detection.
Attackers are not just more opportunistic; they’re also more sophisticated, exploiting security weaknesses to steal data and inflict reputational damage on companies that fail to keep their guards up.
Symantec Enterprise's, a division of Broadcom (NASDAQ: AVGO), goal was to help customers drive down the cost and complexity of cyber security, while improving response times and efficacy.
All Together Now
Disconnected point security tools worked fine in 2009, but years later, they aren’t cutting it. I hear this all the time from customers, who want the industry to provide a more holistic approach to cyber security, one that works across devices, networks, applications and clouds. CISOs don’t have the time or the resources to waste trying to jerry rig increasingly outdated systems.
They’re asking for help consolidating and integrating their portfolio and third-party product offerings, using platforms and architectures that will grow and adapt as their security needs change. They are asking for help achieving Zero Trust architectures.
Symantec's answer is Integrated Cyber Defense (ICD). It unifies cloud and on-premises security and provides best-of-breed protection across endpoints, networks, applications and clouds.
ICD also integrates the best of Symantec and third-party products and services. More on that in a moment.
A Short History of Integrated Cyber Defense
This is not an insignificant achievement and it’s the result of a journey that started when we acquired Blue Coat. That acquisition added market-leading web and cloud security technologies to Symantec’s leadership in endpoint, email, secure web gateway, CASB, and DLP market spaces. The technology world was changing, and we were staying ahead of those changes.
But in our conversations with customers, we also heard they faced a quandary as they further integrated cloud and mobile technologies into their operations. They wound up spending enormous amounts of time and money integrating all of their point technologies, or worse, could not integrate them at all. They needed help deriving value from their – increasingly heavy cyber security investments. Against that backdrop, we invested in an integration strategy and roadmap to deliver what would be known as Integrated Cyber Defense.
We invested significant R&D effort to integrate our products around key customer pain points – protecting information in SaaS applications; integrating complementary technologies like cloud access security broker (CASB) and DLP; enhancing endpoint security with advanced endpoint detection and response (EDR) to protect against targeted attacks; and securing infrastructure from endpoint to cloud for “Zero Trust” security implementations.
Our goal was to help customers drive down the cost and complexity of cyber security, while improving response times and efficacy.
We subsequently acquired innovative security technologies like Fireglass, Skycure, Appthority, Javelin, Luminate and others to address emerging challenges – and quickly integrated them into the Symantec portfolio. At the same time, we opened our APIs to do deeper integration work with key technology players.
Our goal was to help customers drive down the cost and complexity of cyber security, while improving response times and efficacy. We set out to create an open platform to reduce the integration burden on our customers as they worked in a heterogeneous IT world.
Further, we opened up our APIs, designed new interfaces if they didn’t exist, and built a program to recruit key partners from across the security landscape. And with our announcement today, I’m thrilled to report that the idea has resonated throughout the industry. Along with the rollout of ICD, 120 partners are working with us and have, so far, built more than 250 new applications and services that work with our platform. This includes elite partners like Amazon, Box, IBM, Microsoft, Oracle, and Splunk.
Even in an industry where hype is too often the rule rather than the exception, this marks unprecedented collaboration. I’m really proud of the progress Symantec has made, but what matters most is that our customers are also clearly seeing the value.
Looking to the Future
So where do we go from here?
We will continue to invest in products, services and partners that enhance our delivery of Integrated Cyber Defense. A few key R&D priorities include:
More and better tools for cloud migration
Extensive use of artificial intelligence and machine learning throughout our portfolio
More ways to automate and manage security
We believe this will ensure more value to customers and better security for their organizations.
Broadcom’s Symantec Enterprise Division is uniquely positioned with a clear vision and winning portfolio – along with thousands of experts working every day on the front lines to protect our users. And what our shared experience teaches is that the best defense for the future is an integrated defense.
Symantec Integrated Cyber Defense
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The Cyber Security Pressure Cooker
Too much complexity, too many distractions, too much noise – it’s all taking a steep, personal toll on the people working the front lines of cyber security
Feeling stressed? Burnt out? Overwhelmed by the perfect storm of regulation, new threat vectors, well-funded adversaries, rapid technological change and the growing complexity of a sprawling IT estate? Well, you’re not alone. Burnout runs rampant in the cyber security industry.
Symantec, in partnership with psychologist and academic Dr. Chris Brauer, the Director of Innovation at Goldsmiths, University of London, has issued new research based on the experiences of over 3,000 cyber security decision makers. And it tells a harrowing tale.
Four in five are burnt-out and just under two thirds think about quitting their job or leaving the industry - and no wonder: When two thirds say they feel ‘set up for failure’, it’s evident that cyber security professionals face a battle they feel is difficult to win.
The full report is available here.
Looking around at the industry, this comes as no real surprise. The profession has always had acute moments of pressure, but it is becoming clear that the everyday role is reaching a state of chronic overload.
The problem isn’t that security staff aren’t good at their jobs, but that the job itself has become immensely challenging. The sources of stress are myriad:
The threat of multi-million-pound data protection fines
Matching wits with an increasingly well-resourced adversary
Plugging a widening skills gap
Being accountable for the security of an increasingly complex and sprawling IT estate, whilst not having meaningful control of said estate
Having to fight to retain your already insufficient budget
Taking on responsibility for increasing regulatory requirements
Or knowing as you go home at night that you might already have been breached and you just don’t know it yet
Two in five reported concerns that they would be held personally liable for a data breach. Just over half feared dismissal if a breach happened on their watch. One of the most disconcerting findings of the report was that a third said the volume of threat alerts - the very thing aimed at helping them do their job - was making it harder to keep their organisation safe. Two thirds said they’d felt ‘paralyzed’ by the overwhelming volume of threat alerts. Four in five said that having ‘too many threat alerts to deal with’ was increasing stress.
There’s a cruel irony to the fact that tools and systems designed to help protect the enterprise are increasing stress. And it’s clear that this is already impacting the security of organisations. Most of the people we questioned (67%) said their cyber security teams left work at the end of the day with threat alerts left unreviewed. A third said their organisation is currently vulnerable to avoidable cyber security incidents. 41% expect a breach to be inevitable while a quarter acknowledge that they’ve already been hit by a cyber security incident that could have been avoided.
Sensory overload, fatigue and stress impair memory, disrupt rational thinking and negatively impact every cognitive function we have. We just don’t make very good decisions when we feel under siege by these stress-inducing factors. Yet the workflow of the average cyber security professional is more like spaghetti junction than a blank slate. Highly stressed workers are far more likely to be disengaged and ultimately quit. In an industry already suffering a skills shortage, this kind of stress can present a significant risk.
A Better Approach
If we maintain the status quo, the battle against hackers becomes a war of attrition that we will ultimately lose. They’re getting smarter, more determined, better funded and are working together to build more powerful tools. We must therefore do things differently.
It’s clear that the current patchwork approach to security tooling and strategy is creating more problems than it solves. Over the years, as each new vulnerability and technology emerged, so too did a new security bolt-on to protect it. The result is a patchwork of toolsets, telemetry and protection that increases overheads, bogs down technical talent, slows down digital transformation and fails to correlate information effectively. Each tool has its own corner of the universe to deal with, and there’s not enough oversight of enterprise risk.
There’s too much complexity, too many distractions, too much noise. To enable security staff to protect our businesses, we must reduce the chaos. Leaders must consolidate, automate and build long term strategic cyber-security plans to lift themselves out of this reactive state.
It’s clear that the current patchwork approach to security tooling and strategy is creating more problems than it solves.
This tension is underpinning a push towards simplicity and integration across the industry: fewer vendors, less complexity, and more centralized management. With this transformation the cyber security industry is entering the platform era.
Symantec’s own Integrated Cyber Defense platform is a response to the fragmentation, complexity and talent gap that we currently see within the industry. It’s already received widespread recognition, not just from the companies using it, but also from the likes of analysts IDC and Forrester.
We’re bullish that the cyber security profession can turn-around this state of overload with the right talent, processes and tools. Our High Alert series, based on this research, will explore the key themes of cyber security overload and provide helpful guidance on how to overcome its challenges.
A mature, well-integrated cyber security function has the power to enable a business to take advantage of the wide-spread transformation taking place in technology today. Companies must address the complexity within their own cyber defense structures if they are to adopt a more strategic approach and protect cyber security talent from overload.
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The Cyber Security Whodunnit: Challenges in Attribution of Targeted Attacks
Our focus continues to be on researching the methods, tools, and techniques used by targeted attackers
When discussing the latest targeted attack campaign, the question invariably arises, “Who was behind it?” It’s a simple question, but one which has become increasingly difficult and complex to answer.
Attribution of cyber attacks has never been an exact science. Security researchers typically cluster attack incidents together and try to attribute them to known attack groups based on similarity of digital fingerprints, such as code similarities, shared tools and shared infrastructure. However, attribution using such methods is becoming increasingly difficult with the trend of attackers “living off the land,” eschewing custom tools in favor of using standard operating system features and off-the-shelf tools to compromise their targets. There’s also the classic problem of attackers inserting false flags including purposeful misdirection, obfuscation, and fake clues designed to mask their identities.
Despite these challenges, attribution remains an important part of attack analysis. By tying activity to specific groups, we start to see patterns of behavior that allow us to better understand the attackers’ motivation, their target profile, and the assets they’re pursuing. Generating this intelligence is critical to protecting our customers, as well as assisting law enforcement, an area where Symantec has a significant history.
But there are limits to how far we can go with attribution. Even if we can tie specific incidents to a known attack group, identifying who or what organization is directing or funding that activity is not in the scope or focus of what we do. This level of attribution requires the substantial resources and access to information that is generally available only to law enforcement or government intelligence agencies.
These agencies have demonstrated growing success in this area, such as the U.S. government attributing the 2016 election interference campaigns to the Russian government. More recently, the Department of Justice filed charges against a North Korean hacker for the WannaCry attacks and other campaigns. This outcome was achieved through collaboration with members of the security industry, including Symantec. Symantec regularly supports and collaborates with law enforcement and intelligence agencies by sharing our attack data to support their investigations.
Symantec has the largest civilian threat collection network in the world, giving our researchers unparalleled visibility across the entire threat landscape of the Cloud Generation.
Our focus continues to be on researching the methods, tools, and techniques used by targeted attackers so that we can develop entirely new capabilities to protect our customers. Symantec’s Targeted Attack Analytics is just one recent example of a new innovation we’ve developed to help customers to automate the discovery of entirely new and sophisticated attacks.
Symantec has the largest civilian threat collection network in the world, giving our researchers unparalleled visibility across the entire threat landscape of the Cloud Generation. We encourage you to check back to Symantec's blog platform to get regular updates on our research and innovative new protection capabilities in the future.
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The Death of Endpoint Anti Virus?
Don’t make the mistake of believing you can rely solely on native security mechanisms for defense. The economics of compromising such an ecosystem are on the side of the attackers
Back when the earth was still cooling, I worked at Microsoft. In the very earliest days of Hyper-V, when Virtual PC was still a brand, I received training from one of the specialists there. I recall him speaking about ‘enlightened’ operating systems. Those which knew they were being virtualized. Another thing he said which stuck with me, was “heaven help us when the malware authors realize this is possible.”
Even in the very earliest days of sandboxing, it was clear what he meant and it turned out to be the most prophetic thing that anyone has ever said to me. Polymorphic malware which detects the presence of debuggers and virtualization technologies seem to be a virtually de facto standard today - at least, among sophisticated authors who want a real chance of their malware running unmolested in the “real” world.
This made me turn my attention to the notion of situational awareness among the bad guys. Recognized as a strategic non-negotiable by the police, military, air traffic control and fire fighters; situational awareness is now given maximum priority by attackers. Proactive reconnaissance on the target landscape before even attempting an inroad to a target system is absolutely the order of the day.
This means that the typical components of production infrastructures are held in hacker’s laboratories and tested 24/7. They’re exploring zero-day vulnerabilities, documenting the quirks of the file system, understanding the logging mechanisms and yes, mapping protection mechanisms inbuilt to the operating systems. Once you can frustrate the native security mechanisms of the target OS, you have a hall pass. More than that you have a hall pass for a building where the monitors are tied up in the basement.
Given how comprehensively criminals now understand operating systems and how corporations customize them, it makes no sense to me to rely solely on native security mechanisms. It absolutely contradicts the (sound) principles of Defense in Depth. Once an attacker has tested and fingerprinted the antivirus solution that the operating system ships with, he can very easily circumvent and frustrate it. He has effectively dealt with two layers of the landscape, but with one set of tests.
The economics of compromising such an ecosystem are again on the side of the attacker.
When I hear about organizations discussing the possibility of removing third party solutions in favor of native antivirus, a conversation about Defense in Depth is often all it takes to make them reconsider.
However, I could also mention the fact that the best modern antivirus solutions are ‘microscopic’ Defense in Depth ecosystems of their own. They include Intrusion Protection Systems that detect irregular patterns of behavior, protecting against threats like WannaCry before they even reach the OS. They include precision crafted mechanisms that detect thousands of nasties per signature, and when you’re dealing with over a million new malware variants a day, this is a very good thing.
The best modern antivirus solutions are ‘microscopic’ Defense in Depth ecosystems of their own
Real Defense in Depth
The top malware solutions understand how applications should behave, and when malicious entities are attempting to masquerade as trusted components. They protect the protection mechanisms like the AV solution itself, the Security Manager in Java and the Structured Exception Handlers in Windows. They prohibit applications from captaining running processes and seeking to get under the radar. They even prevent applications like Acrobat Reader spinning up executable content or running PowerShell scripts. With additional controls, they can even enforce the use of specific USB keys and blacklist particular applications known not to be needed on the system for optimal operation.
Leveraging machine learning, having acknowledged its value in keeping up with such rapidly proliferating threats, optimum AV software runs malware samples against decision trees. These trees have successfully categorized over a hundred million good and bad pieces of code. It also refreshes the algorithms every three weeks to account for new methods used by attackers and novel methods used to trick the existing logic.
The very best AV solutions can detect and analyze packed or encrypted malware. They supply specific conditions to convince even ‘enlightened’ malware that it is safe to decrypt payload before executing it under a million-watt spotlight.
Even taking advantage of the ubiquity of reliable connections to the cloud, quality AV solutions can leverage vast intelligence sources online. Comprising the knowledge and intelligence of hundreds of man-years of research as well as telemetry from hundreds of millions of endpoints, this offers the highest visibility to machines which otherwise could never host such vast databases.
The most cutting-edge solutions also leverage advanced detection, by placing deceptive capabilities on the endpoints. This means that the most sophisticated malware or human attacker that has got that far then has to navigate a dense mesh of fake information before they can move to the next stage of their campaign.
When I speak to customers about Defense in Depth, I suggest to them that a native AV solution represents the same defense layer as the system it protects. The very best third-party AV solutions offer at least NINE separate layers, all independent and each needing to be breached before the next needs to be tackled. This is what best of breed means to me, from an endpoint perspective.
Anyone seriously considering natively protecting their desktop estate should consider this. Attackers understand ingress vectors better than 99% of even the most skilled IT teams. The more pitfalls, pressure sensors and tripwires you can put in their way, and the more intelligence underpinning them, the better.
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The Dinosaur
Web Isolation, a solution to keep your organization protected
“When he woke up, the dinosaur was still there,” wrote Augusto Monterroso in The Dinosaur, believed to be the shortest story in the history of literature.
Perhaps that thought ran through the head of someone on the Microsoft security team when he awoke recently to find that good old Internet Explorer is still there but now suffers from a critical security vulnerability.
You might ask: who is still using Internet Explorer these days? Well, according to statscounter.com, about 4.5% of the desktop browser market share is still attributed to Internet Explorer. According to our Web Isolation cloud platform statistics, IE takes an even bigger share, accounting for 10-20% of web browsing sessions. So while modern web services like YouTube, Spotify and Slack have stopped supporting IE11, and one Australian retailer even set a special “IE tax”, this old dinosaur is still alive and kicking.
The current version of this browser, Microsoft IE11, was first introduced with Windows 8.1 and Windows 7 back in October of 2013, and is the last planned version of Internet Explorer. Microsoft has already moved on to Microsoft Edge, making it the default browser in Windows 10. The end-of-support for IE 11 is tracked by a countdown on the domain Death-to-IE11.com, but that’s not happening for over 5 years and 8 months.
What Can You Do:
Meanwhile, enterprise network defenders may justifiably be wondering what they should do about persistent use of legacy browser software.
One solution is to deploy Symantec Web Isolation. Web Isolation will run a remote Chromium browser, regardless of the end-user’s browser, to help protect against any web-borne attack, known and unknown, without affecting the user’s web browsing experience. This approach is different than traditional signature-based detection, which can be highly inefficient against attacks that rely on JavaScript-based vulnerabilities, for example.
One solution is to deploy Symantec Web Isolation.
Some customers deploy Web Isolation into their entire web traffic. Some others deploy it only for riskier websites, identified using Symantec Global Intelligence Network. Heck, you can even deploy it for any web session originating from Internet Explorer.
Symantec Web Isolation works with Symantec’s industry leading Secure Web Gateway solutions, including ProxySG and Web Security Service (WSS), and passes the risky and uncategorized websites to Web Isolation to prevent over-blocking, while protecting the end-user. Web Isolation can also integrate with non-Symantec web gateways.
And what about our friend the intrepid security engineer tasked with patching a moribund browser? I imagine when asked if he had read Monterroso’s short story about the dinosaur, he replied: “I am still in the middle of it. I had a really rough week.”
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The Evolution of Emotet: From Banking Trojan to Threat Distributor
Evidence indicates that Mealybug, the threat group behind Emotet, has evolved from maintaining its own custom banking Trojan to operating as a distributor of threats for other groups.
Mealybug is a cyber crime actor that has been active since at least 2014. It is identified by its use of its custom malware, Trojan.Emotet. It appears to have changed its business model in recent times, evolving from targeting banking customers in Europe to using its infrastructure to act as a global packing and delivery service for other threat actors.
Because it can self-propagate, Emotet presents a particular challenge for organizations. Network worms have been experiencing a kind of renaissance, with notable examples like WannaCry (Ransom.Wannacry) and Petya/NotPetya (Ransom.Petya). Network spreading also means that victims can become infected without ever clicking on a malicious link or downloading a malicious attachment. Once on a computer, Emotet downloads and executes a spreader module that contains a password list that it uses to attempt to brute force access to other machines on the same network.
"Group behind #Emotet Trojan start global packing, delivery service for other threat actors https://symc.ly/2KHADCx"
CLICK TO TWEET
Emotet’s method of self-propagation—brute forcing passwords—has additional potential to cause major headaches for organizations as it may result in multiple failed login attempts, which can lead to users becoming locked out of their network accounts. This has the knock-on effect of increased calls to IT helpdesks and general loss of productivity. This was a hallmark of the notorious Conficker (W32.Downadup) threat and, 10 years later, threats continue to cause similar problems.
As well as brute forcing passwords, Emotet can also spread to additional computers using a spam module that it installs on infected victim machines. This module generates emails that use standard social engineering techniques and typically contain subject lines including words such as “Invoice”. Some subject lines include the name of the person whose email account has been compromised, to make it seem less like a spam email. The emails typically contain a malicious link or attachment which if launched will result in them becoming infected with Trojan.Emotet.
Most recently, Mealybug appears to have expanded its operations to primarily become a distributor of threats for other attack groups.
Emotet becomes a global threat
When Mealybug was first identified in 2014 it was using Emotet to spread banking Trojans, and was focused on targeting banking customers in Germany. At the time, Mealybug was using Trojan.Emotet as the loader portion of W32.Cridex.B, a rewritten version of the Cridex banking Trojan. In 2015, Mealybug started targeting Swiss banking customers as well and evolved Emotet into more modular malware. The new version of Emotet had separate modules for its loader, banking data theft, email login theft, distributed denial of service (DDoS) attacks, and malicious spam.
Mealybug has primarily been engaged in using Emotet for the delivery of banking Trojans, and in 2017 it was the first group to deliver the IcedID (Trojan.IcedID) banking Trojan. However, also in 2017, it was observed delivering the Trojan.Trickybot and Ransom.UmbreCrypt ransomware. Mealybug has developed its capabilities over the years and now appears to offer an “end-to-end” service for delivery of threats. It delivers the threats, obfuscates them to reduce the chances of detection, and provides a spreader module that allows the threats to self-propagate.
Emotet gets an initial foothold on a victim machine or network by sending an email containing either a malicious link that leads to a downloader document or that has a malicious document attached. Anti-analysis tactics have been present in Emotet since at least 2015 and, in 2018, Emotet’s payload consists of a packed file containing the main component and an anti-analysis module. The anti-analysis module performs multiple checks to ensure it is not being run on a malware research machine, then loads the main component. Either PowerShell or JavaScript is used to download the Trojan, which delivers a packed payload file to the victim machine. Once on a machine, the latest version of Emotet:
Moves itself to its preferred directory
Creates a LNK file pointing to itself in the start-up folder
Collects victim machine information and sends it to the C&C server
It can then download any new payloads from the C&C server, and execute them. Emotet can download an updated version of itself, or any other threat. Existing versions of Emotet download modules from the C&C server that include:
Banking module: This module intercepts network traffic from the browser to steal banking details entered by the user. This is what gave Trojan.Emotet its reputation as a banking Trojan.
Email client infostealer module: This module steals email credentials from email client software.
Browser infostealer module: This module steals information such as browsing history and saved passwords.
PST infostealer module: This module reads through Outlook’s message archives and extracts the sender names and email addresses of the messages, presumably to use for spamming.
According to Symantec telemetry for the first half of 2018, its focus now is mainly on targets in the U.S.
All information stolen by these modules is sent to the C&C server. Emotet also has a DDoS module that can add the infected machine to a botnet to carry out DDoS attacks.
Figure 1. Trojan.Emotet primarily focusing on targets in the U.S.
Emotet’s geographic targets have also increased significantly over the years. After a relatively quiet period since 2015, detections of Emotet surged in the second half of 2017, and in that year Mealybug’s targets included victims in Canada, China, the UK, and Mexico. However, according to Symantec telemetry for the first half of 2018, its focus now is mainly on targets in the U.S.
Figure 2. Trojan.Emotet detections by geographical region
Qakbot
Since February 2018, Emotet has been used to spread W32.Qakbot, a family of banking Trojans known for behaving like network worms.
Like Emotet, Qakbot can self-propagate. Qakbot attempts brute force access to spread across networks and also uses “living-off-the-land” tools to propagate. It uses PowerShell to download and run Mimikatz (Hacktool.Mimikatz), an open-source credential stealing tool that allows attackers to move rapidly across a network once they have established an initial foothold.
The fact that both Emotet and Qakbot have self-spreading capabilities mean that once these threats get onto your network they can spread aggressively. The fact that both attempt brute force access to spread across networks also increases the risk of users being locked out of their devices. A spike in Qakbot detections in February 2018 indicates that “double-spreading” of the threat was taking place, meaning that Mealybug was using Emotet to spread Qakbot across networks, while Qakbot was simultaneously using its own self-spreading capabilities. The account lockout scenario is a very real danger, and a potential major headache for organizations.
Figure 3. W32.Qakbot detections January 1 to May 28, 2018
Symantec analysis shows that Emotet and Qakbot are packed with the same packer, but there are multiple factors that suggest Mealybug is only providing Emotet as a delivery service for the actors behind Qakbot, and is not controlling the Trojan.
There does not appear to be any overlap between the C&C infrastructure of the two Trojans, and analysis also revealed differences in the code of their main components and in their anti-debugging techniques.
Mealybug using two different spreading mechanisms is also surprising because, as mentioned above, both Trojans attempting to brute force passwords could trigger account lockouts and stop the Trojans from spreading. It is unlikely Mealybug would use the two different spreading techniques if it was controlling both Trojans. For these reasons we believe Emotet and Qakbot are controlled by two separate groups, and that Mealybug is offering Emotet as a delivery mechanism for other threats.
Talking ‘bout an evolution
Mealybug seems to have found its niche as a provider of delivery services for other threats. The main component of Trojan.Emotet functions as a loader, and can theoretically support any payload. While it is still primarily known for distributing banking Trojans, it can in theory spread any threat, and there have been reports of it distributing the Ransom.UmbreCrypt ransomware. Mealybug presumably makes its money by taking a cut of the profits made by the threat actors who use its services. From what we can see, Mealybug appears to be operating for more than one attack group at a time, so we have no evidence that it offers itself as an “exclusive” distributor. In November 2017, Mealybug was observed delivering the Trojan.Trickybot and W32.Qakbot threats simultaneously onto the same machine in a few instances, and in one case within a few minutes.
Mealybug’s shift from distributing its own banking Trojan to a relatively small number of targets, to acting primarily as a global distributor of other groups’ threats is interesting, and backs up an observation we made in the ISTR that threat actors are evolving and refining their techniques and business model to maximize profits. In the ISTR we outlined how some threat actors appeared to be turning to coin mining as it became hugely profitable due to the rise in the value of cryptocurrencies. It appears Mealybug has decided that it can best maximize its returns through taking a role as distributor.
It may be that Mealybug was finding it harder to make money exclusively from banking Trojans so it had to change its approach. The growth in popularity and use by banks of two-factor authentication (2FA) has made it more difficult to compromise accounts by stealing credentials, and awareness and protection has improved as online banking has matured.
Challenges for organizations
Mealybug activity presents a number of challenges for organizations, including:
Its worm-like capabilities mean it can spread rapidly across organizations.
Emotet’s network-spreading capabilities mean that computers can become infected without any user interaction.
Brute forcing passwords increases the chances of users being locked out of their machines in victim organizations, causing headaches for IT teams and affecting productivity.
Best practices
Emphasize multiple, overlapping, and mutually supportive defensive systems to guard against single point failures in any specific technology or protection method. This includes deployment of endpoint, email, and web gateway protection technologies as well as firewalls and vulnerability assessment solutions. Always keep these security solutions up-to-date with the latest protection capabilities.
Employ two-factor authentication (such as Symantec VIP) to provide an additional layer of security and prevent any stolen or cracked credentials from being used by attackers.
Educate employees and urge them to exercise caution around emails from unfamiliar sources and around opening attachments that haven’t been solicited.
Require everyone in your organization to have long, complex passwords that are changed frequently. Encourage users to avoid reusing the same passwords on multiple websites, and sharing passwords with others should be forbidden.
Protection
Symantec has had protection for Mealybug attacks since the initial identification of the group’s activities in 2014 and blocks such activities at every level of Mealybug’s attack chain.
Detections by stage
Email:
Symantec Email Security products block malicious emails associated with Emotet.
Embedded link stage:
Web Attack: Emotet Download 2
Macro downloader stage:
W97M.Downloader!g20
Main module file stage:
W32.Emotet.B
Trojan.Emotet
Trojan.Emotet!g1
Trojan.Emotet!g2
Trojan.Emotet!g3
Trojan.Emotet!gen4
Trojan.Emotet!g5
Main module loaded stage:
Trojan.Emotet!gm
C&C communication stage:
System Infected: Trojan.Emotet Activity 3
System Infected: Emotet Activity 2
System Infected: Trojan.Emotet Activity 4
Spam and stealer and spreader module stage:
Ransom.Crypto!im
Emotet spreader infection stage:
SONAR.SuspPE!gen39
SONAR.Heur.RGC!g571
Targeted Attack Analytics
Symantec’s new Targeted Attack Analytics (TAA), available in our ATP Product can detect attacks where an executable spreads to multiple machines across a network via credential theft, brute forcing, or an exploit. TAA detects Emotet’s malicious activity due to patterns in its spreading behavior. In particular, TAA will detect when files are dropped by Emotet’s spreader module on multiple machines in an organization.
Threat intelligence
Customers of the DeepSight Intelligence Managed Adversary and Threat Intelligence (MATI) service have received multiple reports on Emotet. These reports detail methods of detecting and thwarting activities of the group that leverages this Trojan.
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The Evolution of Security—Where Are We Going?
Symantec and Aurora partnering to lead the way
New threats, new challenges, and new vulnerabilities emerge every day; we have certainly learned this throughout the past year. Lucky for us, and lucky for you, new, innovative solutions are also emerging.
When I started my career in the information security industry over 15 years ago, I was the lead engineer at my company’s first enterprise-wide whole disk encryption roll-out across the entire organization of over 15,000 plus endpoints using Symantec Encryption Desktop solution. Now, as a senior engineer with Aurora’s services team, I have been instrumental in providing professional services for the deployment of Symantec Data Loss Prevention (DLP) for our customers across the entertainment, financial, and healthcare industries. Since 1990, security-conscious companies have turned to Aurora professionals for support of their business critical applications. Our experienced team of security experts helps our clients to conquer the complex challenges of data security.
Secure Access Service Edge (SASE) goes beyond your current security solutions by combining networking and SaaS capabilities.
When Aurora’s relationship with Symantec, a Division of Broadcom, began over 20 years ago, it was all about encryption. Encryption was the be-all and end-all of security. We were encrypting, we had encryption keys, and that was going to be the solution to every security problem for years. Of course, more complex issues arose such as managing encryption for remote workers, decryption, etc. Through these shifts, Aurora has continued to be a Premier Partner of Symantec, providing our joint customers with both solutions and services to match. We have engineers on staff that pride themselves on tracking the pulse of security. As we look towards the future of technology, Secure Access Service Edge (SASE) certainly comes to mind.
SASE
Many of our customers have asked us: “What’s the big deal with SASE and is it right for me?”
As the enterprise heads towards 5G, organizations will be processing data files at speeds we’ve never seen before. The introduction of 5G is going to require increased bandwidth and computing resources in addition to an increase in security. Data will have to be both encrypted and decrypted as it moves throughout your on-premise and cloud environments. The introduction of 5G and the demand for increased cloud security requires a security structure that is advanced and innovative.
In the increasingly cloud-based landscape of today, adopting a SASE compliant framework is becoming more critical for security-conscious companies.
Secure Access Service Edge (SASE) goes beyond your current security solutions by combining networking and SaaS capabilities. The architecture allows you to enable connectivity for users that are working from anywhere with the security capabilities that enforce proper security policies. The goal is to have a Secure Access platform that enables your organization to securely connect any user from anywhere on any device to your company resources.
In the increasingly cloud-based landscape of today, adopting a SASE compliant framework is becoming more critical for security-conscious companies. We recognize that achieving a SASE framework isn’t one size fits all. It can mean deploying DLP, CloudSOC, or better securing your mobile entities. Aurora can provide security consulting services to help you reach a SASE framework, and better protect your organization in the cloud.
Aurora and Broadcom Panelists discuss Symantec's new cloud security solution: SASE.
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The Evolving Challenges of Mobile Security
Why last year’s mobile defense technology is no longer enough
A year ago, a conversation about the state of the art of mobile threat defense (MTD) would have included the ability to identify attacks across the various threat vectors – apps, networks, vulnerabilities – and, more importantly, the ability to proactively protect sensitive information, wherever it resides. Remarkably, most MTD solutions had not made much headway on the protection front, but eventually, it will be expected of any solution worth consideration.
Meanwhile, the bad guys have continued to launch more creative attacks while even well-meaning users put data at risk every day simply by using their devices the way they were intended – connecting to networks, installing apps, and yes, even occasionally being behind on their security patches. So where does technology need to go from there? You can always make existing security better, of course. But there are more things that hadn’t even been considered a year ago, but soon will be essential.
SEP Mobile Extends CASB to Mobile
Let’s start with those security enhancements. A dizzying array of new technologies have evolved for both inspecting for mobile risks and protecting organizations from them. This includes new core technologies that may be used for multiple detections and protections, such as cross-platform network defense and countermeasures, or xNDC. Here are just a few more capabilities that mobile security specialists are starting to demand:
Phishing – protection against phishing URLs and malicious domains.
Secure DNS – ensures mobile traffic is encrypted through application of the secure DNS of choice.
Router analysis – better detection of compromised routers by detection of untrusted DNS servers.
Content manipulation classification – smarter detections of content manipulation to detect more granular variations in content patterns, allowing more accurate risk scoring.
Custom alerts – a secure system to be used for custom security alerts that go directly to users, bypassing cumbersome and unreliable emails.
Scam phone calls – help users to be more productive by blocking scam phone calls.
What about the apps? The term malware has been ubiquitous in the security space for some time, but we have learned that apps do not have to be malicious to put your sensitive data at risk. The mobile app reputation service (MARS) industry began to evolve around this theory, and it is clear now that this is an essential element of mobile security. MTD solutions should clearly have this functionality built in as part of the core product, and not require customers to purchase separate, unintegrated technology.
Finally, enterprises are starting to realize that the best overall defense of their systems and sensitive data comes from a coordinated and integrated application of multiple technologies. To that end, a collaboration of capabilities is ideal, where threat intelligence may be shared out to make each solution smarter and all solutions will see immediate benefit from new detections, wherever they may occur.
Symantec customers can now more easily manage traditional and modern operating system devices with SEP integrations that allow single sign-on to multiple consoles.
While all of this may sound far-fetched, Symantec has been busy since the acquisition of Skycure, the leading MTD technology, and the technology advancements mentioned above are just a sampling of new capabilities from the last few months. This includes the acquisition and integration of Appthority, the undisputed leader in the MARS market. They built out the most complete mobile application analysis framework ever, including all kinds of risky and unwanted behavior, from app stores in 22 countries around the world. Every company, industry and region has different needs, and Appthority technology allows organizations to specify the unique behaviors and characteristics of apps that create unacceptable risk for them.
SEP Mobile customers now have full access to this technology, directly from the SEP Mobile Console. It is also now possible to bring many of your existing security solutions together for mutual benefit and more effective security overall. Symantec customers can now more easily manage traditional and modern operating system devices with SEP integrations that allow single sign-on to multiple consoles. SEP Mobile also has the power to extend valuable solutions designed for the desktop onto the mobile devices. For example, CASB and DLP solutions provide critical protections for many business processes yet have been difficult or impossible to apply to mobile.
Now, CASB and DLP policies can be easily and seamlessly applied to mobile devices with no additional agent. The same has been done for Web Security Services (WSS).
Furthermore, these integrations all contribute to Symantec’s Integrated Cyber Defense strategy by allowing not only the integration of critical functionality, but the essential and immediate sharing of threat intelligence across solutions and platforms through the Symantec GIN, such as when a new mobile incident is identified, many other Symantec solutions will immediately benefit.
Analysts, like IDC, are also making predictions on where the mobile threat market is going and has a new report that names Symantec a leader in this space. Read the report here.
For more information on SEP Mobile visit the product page.
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The Flip Side of Digitization: Data and its Ethical Discontents
Increasingly, security practitioners are being forced to wrestle with a host of new issues that aren’t so black-and-white any longer
As information technology and the internet continue to pervade our lives, the ability of private industry and governments to control information and access details of our private lives also raises a host of ethical issues.
Take the recent controversy surrounding Cambridge Analytica after it targeted specific segments of the population based on data harvested from unsuspecting Facebook users for political purposes. While Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg has apologized, the company faced sharp Congressional criticism for moving too slowly to make privacy changes.
Facebook may be the current lightning rod for criticism but there were already growing calls to treat the vast amount of user data with more foresight and consideration. Indeed, as digitization continues apace, ethical challenges will become increasingly important, according to Sean Brooks, a research fellow at the University of California at Berkeley's Center for Long-Term Cyber Security.
"The fact is that the stakes of information security have grown and changed, and that is creating a lot of different types of ethical considerations," he said. "We used to talk about a line between the Internet and real life — that line is essentially gone. The things you want to do online have meaningful impact on your real life."
Increasingly, security practitioners are being forced to wrestle with a host of new issues. For instance, should network defenders attempt to aggressively investigate attackers to gain more information on them, even if it requires taking actions on systems that they do not own? Or should vulnerability researchers out an uncooperative company's vulnerabilities, even if it puts systems at greater risk?
"I think we recognize that there are a lot of pitfalls that threat intelligence researchers can run into," said John O'Keefe, senior corporate counsel and cyber security intelligence legal adviser at Symantec. "Many of the risks are legal, but even more are ethical."
At the recent RSA Security Conference, UC Berkeley's Brooks discussed the potential pitfalls for security professionals of unrestrained use of technology. While citizens and consumer are increasingly cognizant of the dangers, ethical dilemmas pose threats to companies as well. Many companies have been happy to exist in the gray areas and yet-to-be defined ethical landscapes. Part of the problem is that people have guidelines for considering ethical questions, but for companies, a policy is needed and that requires foresight.
"At a functional level, a person can respond to a set of ethical questions, but a company is going to sort of take in a set of stimuli and figure out what is best for it in any given situation," Brooks said. "That policy or process will come in the form of regulation."
Here are some of the most sensitive areas.
1. To disclose or not disclose?
In the late 1990s, the discussion of when and how to disclose vulnerabilities was fairly straightforward, pitting the researcher who found the issue against the company that needed to fix the problem.
However, as technology has become more ingrained in business operations and personal lives, the impact of vulnerabilities has changed dramatically, said UC Berkeley's Brooks. Rather than crashing thousands of systems with a worm, the exploitation of a vulnerability has led to ransomware attacks such as WannaCry and NotPetya that have inflicted major financial losses.
"The discussion over vulnerabilities, breaches and security incidents have changed in tenor, because in the past, it has been more about talking about the state of a company being jeopardized, and now you see a lot more societal impacts as the stakes of incidents are disclosed," Brooks said. "So no longer do companies have to talk about the number of records lost in a breach, but now we are talking about the impact on democracy of a lack of information security."
2. Testing security without permission
The search for vulnerabilities poses its own ethical dilemmas as well. In the past, finding a vulnerability in a production system could have led to legal threats or criminal charges. Both researchers and the companies who are the focus of research have faced ethical questions. Is it appropriate to test a system without permission, even if that system is being used as part of malicious infrastructure? Is it ethical to threaten legal action or pursue a researcher who is performing altruistic vulnerability research?
Even though many companies have given explicit permissions to researchers to test their services through bug bounty programs, the questions continue to be at the center of a debate around security research.
"I've seen cyber security researchers at other companies get close to some legal lines based on the ways they’ve accessed an attacker's infrastructure," Symantec's O'Keefe said.
3. Ethical hacking back
A step beyond unsanctioned penetration and vulnerability testing is hacking back—often euphemistically called active defense—where defenders investigate and pursue attackers to identify them and possibly take further actions against them.
In one case, for example, a potential hacker or researcher was impersonating a Symantec employee to gather information that could be used in spear phishing attacks, according to Charles Kafami, senior threat intel analyst for Symantec DeepSight Adversary Intelligence.
"I had to ask how far I could go to the edge of the envelope to get information on that individual," he said.
Last year, legislators introduced a bill in the U.S. House of Representatives to carve out some exemptions for companies to conduct limited operations against attackers. The idea is fraught with ethical issues, said UC Berkeley's Brooks. What happens, for example, if a company accidentally shuts down a foreign government's systems. The possibility could turn an online conflict between companies into a real-world conflict between nations, he said.
"There is a reasonable argument to add this capability to a private actor's menu of options, but there is an ethical question to what degree do we want to enable private actors," Brooks said. "These are not just conflicts between companies, but conflicts between large institutions, government agencies and other groups."
4. Data collection the right way
Cambridge Analytica highlighted the wrong way to do data collection and targeting. Yet, there are arguments for allowing unauthorized collection of information online, such as scraping websites of housing prices or bank loans to determine whether companies are discriminating against certain customers due to race or class.
In a case brought by the American Civil Liberties Union in federal court, researchers are trying to assert their right to scrape information from websites without permission to study whether online algorithms discriminate. These types of ethical and legal questions, coming so soon after the uproar over Cambridge Analytica, underscores the fact that these issues are not easily solved.
"Researchers need good legal support that is focused on risk and business," said Symantec's O'Keefe. "Whether you are a threat intel company or just the security team at a particular company, you should have legal support."
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The Fourth Industrial Revolution
Opportunities and challenges with Internet of Things (IoT) and why you need Threat Intelligence
Over a decade ago when the first iPhone was released in June 2007, cyber security received very little attention in the news. According to the Internet World Stats, which tracks the history and growth of Internet—fewer than 1.2 billion people or 17.8% of the population at the time—were using the Internet. In just a decade that number has dramatically increased to 4.15 billion users, roughly 55% of the world population. However, this the growth of Internet and the number of devices connected to the Internet is accompanied by its own security and privacy challenges.
Today, we are living in the age of a digital revolution, which many experts refer to as the fourth industrial revolution. The first industrial revolution used water and steam to power for mechanized production. Electricity brought about the second industrial revolution enabling mass production. Electronics and information technology facilitated automation, which was the third industrial revolution. The fourth industrial revolution is a digital revolution building on the preceding one, which started in the latter part of the 20th century.
The irreversible integration of technology into our work and play has made it an integral part of our lives. The digital growth and transformation are on such scale, scope, and complexity that is unlike anything else we have ever experienced before.
In 2017, IoT devices increased 31% to 8.4 billion from the previous year. The exponential growth is expected to continue and reach over 20 billion devices by 2020 and one trillion devices by 2035. This is only the early stage of the IoT implementation.
IoT-compatible devices have dramatically improved the lives of consumers and increased businesses productivity. Consumers have been using IoT-compatible devices as part of their everyday lives —from home automation devices such as, Amazon Echo and Ring doorbell to a variety of healthcare and fitness devices such as those sold by, Fitbit, and Garmin.
Businesses have also been using IoT and IoT-compatible devices (e.g. Awarepoint, Aptomar and CargoSense) to streamline the manufacturing process, track and analyze shipments, meet consumer needs and services, and improve overall productivity. Retailers for instance, employ IoT to analyze consumer interactions with products in the retail environment. Manufacturers use IoT to improve how machines and robotics operate and communicate with one another. The healthcare industry applications of IoT are numerous and include anything from remote monitoring to the medical device integration using smart sensors.
The Internet of Things, however, also presents major challenges. Security and privacy are the greatest challenge and cause for major concerns. In recent years, hackers have proven how private data on any device that is connected to the Internet is vulnerable and susceptible to malicious attacks, compromise, tampering, theft, and misuse.
How Can Threat Intelligence Help?
As threat actors make their next moves to exploit new and emerging technologies, organizations must rely on Threat Intelligence services to fully understand the risks of further integration of IoT devices into their homes and businesses. Technical Threat Intelligence that includes indicators of compromise like malicious IP and URLs can provide some insight into the threats but lack broader context of the innovations of the hackers which are redefining the threat landscape as a whole. This is because while at first glance, you might think that techniques used in threat intelligence to gather information do not apply to protecting IoT devices from malware and threat actors. But in fact, nothing could be further from the truth.
Threat intelligence provides organizations with predictions of imminent threats and potential threat indicators, tactics, techniques, and procedures (TTP) based on analysis of the cyber threat landscape. It highlights potential risks to an organization and provides enterprises with solutions to mitigate potential threats posed by cyber crime and cyber espionage actors.
Threat intelligence enables customers to make informed and strategic business decisions. DeepSight’s Adversary Intelligence has helped numerous customers make such decisions where they leveraged our analysis and actionable and anticipatory intelligence to determine adversaries’ capabilities, and their end goals; as a result, they were able to take the correct actions and countermeasures.
IoT devices have changed the cyber security landscape by exponentially increasing the amount of available data that is useful to understand cyber threats. The Managed Adversary Threat Intelligence (MATI) team analyzes these large data sets from IoT devices around the world and identifies relevant threat for our customers. We offer our customer-specific intelligence based on their industry and provide specific insights to potential cyber risks, which enables our customers to make informed decisions in their security posture relative to new and emerging threats.
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The Future of Innovation
Symantec Today & Tomorrow
Symantec hit peak innovation today! And will again tomorrow. To understand this you need to understand our story.
Symantec has been a trusted cybersecurity brand for decades through the purchase, development and integration of leading technologies. But after Symantec’s purchase by Broadcom things changed radically… for the best. Under new guidance Symantec changed priorities away from marketing and promotion, and increased resource allocation for Research & Development.
Today – As soon as the deal closed Broadcom invested millions in moving our cloud infrastructure to the Google Cloud network. Now our customers enjoy the benefits of hyperscale deployments while their end users get lightning-fast connectivity to the resources they need as seen in recent third-party research. We’re also investing in the fulfillment of a vision of bringing our products together with a:
Single security agent
Unified console experience
Simplified product portfolio
And Also Delivered – Beyond the industry best Data & Threat Protection we’re continuing to lead in addressing enterprise security needs for compliance, and remote work. And we’ve pushed the innovation envelope with new technologies like Adaptive Security, Dedicated IP addresses, Threat Intelligence API, agent-based ZTNA, and High Risk Isolation.
Tomorrow – Symantec will continue to innovate, but also advocate for our customers by working with and contributing to the IETF, OCSF, EU GDPR Working Groups, and other organizations that are shaping the future of security.
Frankly, what we’re doing is far too much to capture in a blog. That’s why we’ve put together a White Paper to begin to tell the story of what we’ve been up to. You’ll see why we’re proud of our history of security innovation and look forward to what’s to come in 2023.
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Solution Brief
THREAT PREVENTION INNOVATIONS
• Adaptive Protection: Intelligent,
automated attack surface reduction
without disruption of normal
business operations
• Application Control: Discovery
and control of risky applications,
including detailed risk assessments
and smart recommendations for
administrators
• Active Directory Security:
Protection against initial access,
privilege escalation, and credential
theft used by attackers for lateral
movement leveraging AI-driven
obfuscation of Active Directory
query results
• Threat Hunter: Expert threat
hunters apply machine learning
analytics and expert analysis to
expose and notify customers of the
early signs of stealth attacks that
otherwise would evade detection
• Dedicated IP Addresses: Prevent
the use of unassigned IP addresses
by threat actors who want to gain
unauthorized access to sensitive
applications and conduct malicious
activities
• ZTNA Threat Prevention: Cloudnative, multi-layered threat
inspection and detection for zero
trust network access (ZTNA)
connections
• Mobile Threat Defense: Proactive
protection for mobile devices from
malware, network threats, and
application or OS vulnerability
exploits
DATA PROTECTION INNOVATIONS
• Generative AI Protection: Provide
guardrails for users while enabling
a productive and lower risk work
environment
• ZTNA Data Protection: Enforce
Data Loss Prevention (DLP) policies
against private resources and
corporate assets in the cloud
• Risk-Aware Policies: Create greater
context for DLP policies so access
and control can be adapted to users
with higher risk scores
• Fast File Scanning: Dramatic
increases in the scan rates for large
data repositories ensures that static
data can be scanned regularly with
new and updated DLP policies
• Leading Edge Data Detection:
New detection methods increase
detection accuracy and reduce the
rate of false positives
The Future of Threat Prevention and Data Protection
Mission-Critical Innovations Delivered Today
Overview
The attack surface of organizations continues to increase as the
adoption of cloud applications, including generative AI increases. In
addition, pressures to provide remote access to users continues despite
post-pandemic hybrid work trends. All of these issues around digital
transformation have also increased the pressure to meet new and existing
regulatory requirements across multiple jurisdictions. Organizations must
address all of these challenges in an environment of economic uncertainty
and geopolitical tensions.
Broadcom understands the needs of global organizations and how the
evolving threat landscape requires firms to continuously improve their
threat prevention and data protection, all while simplifying IT and security
staff operations. These two sets of capabilities are key to the success of
enterprises that require the highest levels of security for important data
assets. In addition, global organizations must demonstrate that regulated
data meets multiple compliance standards requiring threat prevention and
data protection that extends everywhere data resides.
Symantec® Enterprise Cloud delivers advanced threat and sensitive data
detection across endpoint, email, web traffic, and cloud applications. This
solution allows customers to discover and block targeted attacks and data
breaches that would otherwise go undetected.
Our solution employs a modern approach that keeps our customers ahead
of threats by protecting what attackers target and enterprises value most,
critical data assets, and the devices and networks used to access this
information.
This document describes the current Symantec software threat prevention
and data protection innovations. These innovations are critical for
customers today, and Symantec software innovations will continue to
address evolving threats in the future.
Customer-Focused Threat Prevention Innovations
Symantec software innovations are reshaping threat prevention strategies
by driving a proactive approach to combat the modern tactics and
techniques that attackers use today. Symantec Enterprise Cloud uses
advanced artificial intelligence and machine learning to predict where the
next attack might occur and block attacks before they are executed. Our
threat prevention solution also provides insights into areas where attack
vectors can be closed, eliminating these options from an attacker’s tool
chest. The combined effect of a reduced attack surface, enterprise-grade
security controls, and our foundational Global Intelligence Network ensures
that threat prevention is implemented with the highest levels of efficacy.
Key innovations for threat prevention within Symantec Enterprise Cloud
include the following features:
• Adaptive Protection – Reduces the attack surface by blocking trusted
application behaviors often used by attackers to execute living-offthe-
land attacks. Attackers are frequently successful when they use an
organization’s known applications to execute an attack because they
can hide their activities. This analytic technology can customize blocking
adaptations based on its ability to continuously learn which apps, tools,
and OS behaviors are used in the customer’s environment—and which are
not used. Adaptive Protection automatically restricts unused behaviors
to reduce the attack surface and protect the organization. This feature is
transformative in blocking threats from entering the environment without
affecting normal business operations.
• Application Control – Discovers installed applications and their
vulnerabilities, reputation and prevalence, and generates a risk score
for addressing the security concerns associated with the broad use of
shadow IT. Delivered with the risk score is a risk assessment, actionable
insights, and smart recommendations for blocking or allowing an
application to run. With Application Control, organizations can specify
the apps they allow, and block the apps that are dangerous and
unnecessary.
• Active Directory Security – Automatically learns about an organization’s
entire Active Directory structure and uses obfuscation to prevent
attackers from stealing credentials and moving laterally within
the organization. With obfuscation, the attacker gives itself away
while interacting with fake assets or attempting the use of domain
administrator credentials. It only takes one compromised endpoint
connected to a corporate domain to jeopardize the entire organization.
Active Directory Security provides critical protection from the endpoint
to stop attackers as early as possible, on their first move.
• Threat Hunter – Assists security operations centers (SOCs) by combining
Symantec’s expert analyst research with advanced machine learning and
global threat intelligence to provide alerts, insights, and guidance to stop
attacks. Threat Hunter empowers security teams to quickly respond to
incidents and stop breaches by bringing together three key elements:
global and organizational data, artificial intelligence for data processing,
and human threat experts and researchers to identify reconnaissance
attempts before the breach has manifested.
Customer-Focused Threat Prevention Innovations
Symantec software innovations are reshaping threat prevention strategies by driving a proactive approach to combat the modern tactics and DATA PROTECTION
techniques that attackers use today. Symantec Enterprise Cloud uses INNOVATIONS
advanced artificial intelligence and machine learning to predict where the
• Generative AI Protection: Provide
next attack might occur and block attacks before they are executed. Our guardrails for users while enabling
threat prevention solution also provides insights into areas where attack a productive and lower risk work
vectors can be closed, eliminating these options from an attacker’s tool environment
chest. The combined effect of a reduced attack surface, enterprise-grade
• ZTNA Data Protection: Enforce
security controls, and our foundational Global Intelligence Network ensures Data Loss Prevention (DLP) policies
that threat prevention is implemented with the highest levels of efficacy.
against private resources and
corporate assets in the cloud
Key innovations for threat prevention within Symantec Enterprise Cloud include the following features:
• Risk-Aware Policies: Create greater
context for DLP policies so access
• Adaptive Protection – Reduces the attack surface by blocking trusted and control can be adapted to users
application behaviors often used by attackers to execute living-off-with higher risk scores
the-land attacks. Attackers are frequently successful when they use an
• Fast File Scanning: Dramatic
organization’s known applications to execute an attack because they increases in the scan rates for large
can hide their activities. This analytic technology can customize blocking data repositories ensures that static
adaptations based on its ability to continuously learn which apps, tools, data can be scanned regularly with
and OS behaviors are used in the customer’s environment—and which are new and updated DLP policies
not used. Adaptive Protection automatically restricts unused behaviors
• Leading Edge Data Detection:
to reduce the attack surface and protect the organization. This feature is New detection methods increase
transformative in blocking threats from entering the environment without detection accuracy and reduce the
affecting normal business operations.
rate of false positives
• Application Control – Discovers installed applications and their vulnerabilities, reputation and prevalence, and generates a risk score for addressing the security concerns associated with the broad use of shadow IT. Delivered with the risk score is a risk assessment, actionable insights, and smart recommendations for blocking or allowing an application to run. With Application Control, organizations can specify the apps they allow, and block the apps that are dangerous and unnecessary.
• Active Directory Security – Automatically learns about an organization’s entire Active Directory structure and uses obfuscation to prevent attackers from stealing credentials and moving laterally within the organization. With obfuscation, the attacker gives itself away while interacting with fake assets or attempting the use of domain administrator credentials. It only takes one compromised endpoint connected to a corporate domain to jeopardize the entire organization.
Active Directory Security provides critical protection from the endpoint to stop attackers as early as possible, on their first move.
• Threat Hunter – Assists security operations centers (SOCs) by combining Symantec’s expert analyst research with advanced machine learning and global threat intelligence to provide alerts, insights, and guidance to stop attacks. Threat Hunter empowers security teams to quickly respond to incidents and stop breaches by bringing together three key elements: global and organizational data, artificial intelligence for data processing, and human threat experts and researchers to identify reconnaissance attempts before the breach has manifested.
Customer-Focused Threat Prevention Innovations (cont.)
• Dedicated IP Addresses – Symantec Enterprise Cloud has added Dedicated IP Addresses to our service. Some cloud-hosted third-party applications and services require a user to come from an IP address that is specifically identified as the customer’s IP address. This feature reduces that attack surface, and it prevents actors from using unassigned IP addresses to gain unauthorized access to sensitive applications and conduct malicious activities.
• ZTNA Threat Prevention – Sophisticated attacks come in many forms. All traffic, even traffic traversing a secure ZTNA connection, should receive thorough interrogation to prevent malicious activity. Symantec utilizes cloud-native, multi-layered threat inspection and detection to reduce the number of alerts that SOC and incident response teams need to address. Symantec Enterprise Cloud provides the following services:
– Analyzes unknown files through advanced machine learning and static code file analysis
– Scans content with dual anti-malware engines for greater detection accuracy
– Detonates unknown files through sophisticated sandboxing
– Provides a single entry point for all threat scanning across the entire Symantec portfolio
– Leverages Symantec File Reputation services to block known threats
• Mobile Threat Defense – Provides predictive technology in a layered approach that leverages crowd-sourced threat intelligence, in addition to device and server-based analysis, to proactively protect mobile devices from malware, network threats, and application or OS vulnerability exploits. Mobile Threat Defense delivers real-time visibility over the threats and attacks originating from public Wi-Fi and mobile networks, OS or app vulnerability exploits, malicious apps, and user behavior that might compromise company-owned and bring your own devices (BYODs). Symantec’s multilevel approach provides mobile security to outpace well-funded, highly socialized hackers.
Customer-Focused Data Protection Innovations
Digital transformation has created myriad Data Protection challenges not the least of which is the emergence of widely available generative AI applications. Legacy solutions that do not address cloud-hybrid environments create risks for customers engaged in the cloud migration of numerous business and in-house applications, even while some business systems and processes remain within an enterprise. With data spread across cloud and on-premises environments, customers seek to simplify their data protection approaches to stop data leaks and demonstrate compliance with global regulations.
Global enterprises want to streamline operations with uniform data protection policies across all control channels (endpoint, network, cloud, and email). They also need adaptive and contextual technologies that give better insight into risk mitigation and data loss prevention. Symantec Enterprise Cloud permits customers to apply a single, risk-aware policy across multiple channels.
Broadcom continually invests in Symantec data protection innovations, including the following features:
• Generative AI Protection – Employees can easily expose sensitive and proprietary information when leveraging generative AI applications. As generative AI use increases, enterprises need to assess the risk of this category of applications and ensure a safe environment to understand how users leverage generative AI. Symantec’s innovative approach to the discovery, analysis, monitoring, and control of these applications means each enterprise can manage the adoption of generative AI applications that conforms to their risk appetite.
• ZTNA Data Protection – Symantec Enterprise Cloud merges ZTNA and DLP capabilities. DLP policies can now be applied to private resources and corporate assets in the cloud to avoid unintentional or malicious data exfiltration, and ensure that your organization meets compliance and data privacy regulations. DLP enforces cloud storage, sharing, and access policies for HIPAA, PCI, PII, and other sensitive data. As organizations look to protect their assets in the cloud, they can ensure that protection with the DLP integration, their security and risk teams can meet those compliance obligations. Moreover, with the advantage of the DLP single-policy engine, you can extend the same DLP policies that you use in on-premises, cloud, and web environments. You can apply the policies to your corporate assets through a secure ZTNA connection to ensure that data is protected and does not leave the organization.
Customer-Focused Data Protection Innovations (cont.)
• Risk-Aware Policies – Customers seeking Adaptive DLP can create DLP policies that take user risk scores to define access and protection controls. For example, high-risk users might be granted read-only access with blocked print and copy functionality, whereas low-risk users get full access.
• Fast File Scanning – Compliance requirements mandate that organizations scan data repositories regularly to ensure that data audits are up to date. With organizations now managing large data repositories containing petabytes of data, the pressure to completely scan these repositories in a specific time window is high.
Customers can now ensure that static data is regularly rescanned against updated DLP policies. Delivering this capability in Symantec DLP was the result of considerable engineering innovation for our grid scanning technology.
• Leading Edge Data Detection – Symantec DLP can further reduce the consequences of false detection with the following new features:
– Structured Data Matching – Symantec DLP 16 introduces a new data discovery technique called Structured Data Matching. Using the insight that many collections of sensitive data (for example, PII, PCI, and PHI) are organized in tabular formats, Symantec DLP scans for data in this form before the deeper inspection to identify sensitive data. This feature not only helps customers find sensitive data accurately, it also simplifies the workflows and policy creation loads on DLP administrators.
– OCR and Form Recognition – Symantec DLP utilizes OCR to find sensitive data in images. It can also identify forms and scan for areas that contain sensitive images.
– Exact Data Matching and Proximity Matching – Symantec DLP includes highly specialized data discovery methods such as Exact Data Matching and Proximity Matching. These features increase the accuracy of detection, and the lower incidence of false positive or false negative alerts alleviates the workload on already stretched information protection teams.
Conclusion
Symantec software products continue to lead the way in the two most critical areas of security capabilities: threat prevention and data protection. At their core, these innovations delivered in Symantec Enterprise Cloud give organizations the flexibility to adjust their threat prevention and data protection deployments for maximum efficiency and efficacy.
Symantec researchers have decades of expertise and global intelligence to decompose attack methods and model how motivated attackers use legitimate and malicious tools to exfiltrate data. Symantec Enterprise Cloud leverages this learning by delivering layered capabilities that allow our customers to secure their data assets with minimal impact on their users or business processes.
Broadcom has delivered Symantec threat prevention and data protection capabilities at an accelerated pace. Unlike other cybersecurity organizations, we focus on the needs of large and complex organizations with strict security and compliance requirements. Our modern approach, using leading-edge innovations, means streamlined security operations and continual improvement in an adopting organization’s risk posture.
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The Future of Trust—No More Playing Catch Up
Broadcom: 2023 Tech Trends That Transform IT
This is a continuation of Broadcom’s blog series: 2023 Tech Trends That Transform IT. Stay tuned for future blogs that dive into the technology behind these trends from more of Broadcom’s industry-leading experts.
It is difficult to overestimate the impact Covid had on the future of work and IT technology.
The pandemic sent the workforce home and technology services followed them out the office door. There was little time to consider and mitigate against all the new security implications. That said, working from home is no different than a lot of other circumstances in business. Conditions change and infrastructure is often put together at warp speed to meet the immediate business need. In this case, it was an immediate need for many employees to work from home. But for many organizations, a modern security infrastructure was never put in place to support hundreds of thousands of employees accessing a business infrastructure from home. There was no time.
Cut to today: employees have spent nearly two years working from home (WFH), and a lot of them like the arrangement and don’t want to return full-time to a physical office. Several major businesses now want to turn back the clock, but efforts to convince employees to return to the way things were, pre-pandemic, are proving to be challenging. Now that businesses can no longer pretend that WFH is going away, they know they must put the security infrastructure in place. They can no longer play catch up.
Managing the Risk of Distributed Trust
Because Covid opened a proverbial Pandora’s Box on remote work and the permanence of a distributed workforce, organizations realize that they will need to manage risk even more carefully, and in new and more different ways, than they had to in the past.
Add to that, how and where technology services have moved (or are moving). For example, before back office software was purchased and installed on servers that were located inside an organization’s office. That is not the case anymore. These services are now cloud-delivered by multiple vendors all around the world.
Decentralized Trust and the Distributed Workforce
The concept of decentralized trust fits hand-in-glove with the realities of a permanently distributed workforce. In a new, permanent remote workforce model, that “trust check” will no longer be at the physical door. It will be everywhere. It will be decentralized, it will be distributed, and it will involve multiple vendors. The trust check will need to happen on the client side, from where and on what device the worker will login from.
Identity security will become even more critical in this new world of decentralized trust and distributed human and machine resources. As enterprises take on more and more cloud applications, cloud access security will also become more critical. The urgency to implement new security systems for both identity and cloud access will drive IT transformation and budgets in 2023.
Identity Security and MFA
The first phase for many organizations will be modernizing identity security by moving beyond passwords to a passwordless future characterized by a form of multi-factor authentication (MFA) augmented by a biometric element, such as a thumbprint, facial recognition, or retina scan.
This is the critical first step as humans enabling access to malicious third parties a key element of most data breaches. This was true pre-pandemic when most workers were office-based. Without more effective, decentralized identity security controls, it will become even more of a vulnerability in our distributed workforce future.
It is easy to see how powerful this trend will be in 2023. As according to one recent survey, only 26 percent of enterprises today have implemented any form of even basic MFA.
Verifying Assets via CASB
While MFA is a good first step—security professionals can “trust” the user accessing sanctioned SaaS applications—how do they make sure users are behaving normally and just doing their job? How do they ensure nothing is uploaded to the application that shouldn't be, and how do they make sure they have full visibility into transactions? That’s why implementing some form of Cloud Access Security Broker (CASB) technology becomes critical to secure all remote, cloud-delivered assets.
CASB will provide organizations with the tools they need to interject security policies as their cloud-based resources are accessed. In essence, CASB defines what decentralized trust is all about: in a future of distributed, cloud-delivered assets, it re-centralizes security controls. It will provide the other most critical component of the security model for the distributed workforce of the future.
As 2023 progresses and more workers remain remote, trust becomes even more distributed. Security professionals cannot remove the risk of distributed trust entirely—bad things will happen—but they can look at how to manage the risk of distributed trust and put plans in place to build resiliency across a distributed infrastructure.
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