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In July 2023, South Africa hosted a “Friends of BRICS” two-day meeting to discuss various global security challenges affecting their regions with cybersecurity topping the agenda. BRICS is a term to coined by Goldman Sachs to refer to the fast-growing and emerging economies of Brazil, Russia, India, China, and South Africa, whose low labor costs, favorable demographics, and…
There is nothing like that one data point, needle in the haystack, kernel of research that sits – and sits – and just does not track (in this case, for well over a calendar year. A post from March 2021 is just such a piece of intelligence – and we have not reviewed or received…
“Once is happenstance. Twice is coincidence. Three times is enemy action.” – James Bond More pattern recognition and sensemaking efforts here – following up our recent spotlight on The City of Dallas, Over a Month After A Ransomware Attack, Still not at Full Functionality and the U.S. Turning its Strategic Focus Towards Cyber Threat Vectors…
In an update to our recent analysis of the continued expansion of cyber incidents by non-state actors in the war in Europe, the following are just a sampling of the most recent major cyber incidents and non-state actor activity (mainly centered around the conflict in Ukraine).
Boardrooms face seemingly unending governance, disclosure, regulatory and legal challenges related to digital systems risk (see, for example, the latest SEC requirements for board cybersecurity). This is exacerbated by the rapid adoption of AI; a digital technology that society is just beginning to grapple with and understand. AI is a powerful capability being added to the digital tool arsenal which businesses must employ to compete and win. These tools have evolved…
Connect with top cybersecurity experts from around the world while experiencing the excitement of cybersecurity-oriented esports. Eight teams of cyber athletes ages 18-25 will represent over 65 nations in a final championship. In addition to the 600-700 expected attendees, the games will be live-streamed on Twitch to thousands of fans.
OODA hosts a monthly video call to help members optimize opportunities and reduce risk to discuss items of common interest to our membership. To encourage openness of discussion, these sessions take place with Chatham House rules, where participants are free to use the information in the meeting but are asked not to directly quote or…
“The U.S. Department of Defense and the Indian Ministry of Defense launched the India-U.S. Defense Acceleration Ecosystem (INDUS-X)…against the backdrop of Prime Minister Modi’s [June 2023] State Visit to the White House, [with India poised to take over China and the world’s most populous nation], and at a time of historic momentum for the relationship…
We continue our series on the Future of Blockchain with the adrenaline rush that is a U.S. Government Accountability Office (GAO) report on Blockchain in Finance:Legislative and Regulatory Actions Are Needed to Ensure Comprehensive Oversight of Crypto Assets. Joking aside, while GAO reports are in fact some of the drier fare that crosses our desk…
A Chinese press has recently published Excerpts of Xi Jinping’s Discourse on Cyberspace Superpower, a book on Xi Jinping’s views on making China into an Internet powerhouse, and how such an endeavor is a necessary component to bolstering the country’s industries, economy, and ideological security. The book is a comprehensive deep dive into Xi’s thinking about cyberspace and…
This report provides insights for corporate directors and the C-Suite including CISOs on the new SEC rules on cybersecurity.
DCVC has released a “report from the front, as seen by our partnership” capturing where they see the future of deep tech – including an additional $1 billion in DCV C investment fund focused on deep tech, including national security (NatSec) investment and American competiveness.
Synthetic biology is a field that involves the engineering of biological systems to create new organisms or modify existing ones for various applications, such as healthcare, agriculture, and industrial processes. We continue our efforts to understand the risks and opportunities in this exponential industry sector by taking a look at the role blockchain technology will…
In 2021, the information threat vectors and attack surfaces of the agriculture sector were further exposed after a ransomware attack on meat producer JBS Foods disrupted the nation’s food supply chains. Two pieces of legislation were introduced in the Senate last week to strengthen agricultural and rural communities against the growing number of cyberattacks on…
Soon after Russia pulled out of the Black Sea grain initiative, wheat prices soared and Russia followed up with kinetic threats along the Black Sea, updates of which can be found below. Russia strikes grain terminals, port and apartment blocks in Odesa “Russia launched an extensive air attack on the Ukrainian city of Odesa on…
Self-scans of phones show that Pegasus spyware is far more common than expected. Self-scans of mobile phones have shown that Pegasus spyware is far more common than expected. Scans have shown that 2.5 per 1,000 phones have been infected with the spyware. The spyware gives third parties extensive access to user’s mobile phones. The scans…
Chemonics International was the victim of a data breach. Chemonics International, a major USAID contractor, was the vicitm of data breach. The breach exposed the information of 263,000 people. An investigation has reveled that the attackers had access to the company systems for several months. At this time it is known who was behind the…
A UK led operation has dismantled a large scale Russian cyber crime network. A UK led international operation has dismantled a large scale Russian cyber crime network. The network was connected to drug gangs in the UK, Russian money laundering operations, sanctioned Russian Oligarchs, and other cyber gangs. The UK and its partners have arrested…
Millions of Iraqi phone numbers were stolen by an unknown group. The data of over 14 million Iraqis was found in an unsecured data base by cyber security researchers. The data appears to have been stolen from the major Iraqi telecom providers. The data base was either taken offline or destroyed shortly after its discovery.…
When a prominent Indonesian financial institution reported a deepfake fraud incident impacting its mobile application, threat intelligence specialists at Group-IB set out to determine exactly what had happened. Despite this large organization having multiple layers of security, as any regulated industry would require, including defenses against rooting, jailbreaking and the exploitation of its mobile app,…
Massachusetts-based VC shop Atlas Venture has drawn together another $450 million fund to be channeled toward innovative biotechs. The firm’s fourteenth fund is the same amount to the cent as Atlas’ thirteenth fund back in March 2022. The firm has been busy since then, launching 16 new biotechs and recruiting “approximately 100 executive leaders across…
Waymo is setting its sights on its next location: the Sunshine State. The Alphabet -owned company announced Thursday that it will be hitting the roads in Miami. Waymo said it will first begin cruising through the Florida city with human safety drivers in 2025 before opening doors to riders for its robotaxi service through its…
Meta is turning to nuclear energy to power its AI ambitions with the release a request for proposals to partner with nuclear energy developers. It’s the latest announcement in a string of recent deals Big Tech companies have made to secure nuclear energy for their data centers. Developing new AI tools is an energy-intensive endeavor…
Great strides have been made in technology and artificial intelligence, making humanoid robots seem like a not-so-distant reality. In a recent episode of Opening Bid, Citi Global Insights analysts Rob Garlick and Wenyan Fei discussed their research on the advancement of humanoid robots over the next 25 years. “Robots are hardly new, but there’s a…
Timing is everything. Just as Apple’s adoption of RCS had seemed to signal a return to text messaging versus the unstoppable growth of WhatsApp, then along comes a surprising new hurdle to stop that in its tracks. While messaging Android to Android or iPhone to iPhone is secure, messaging from one to the other is…
In the 1960s, weather scientists found that the chaotic nature of Earth’s atmosphere would put a limit on how far into the future their forecasts might peer. Two weeks seemed to be the limit. Still, by the early 2000s, the great difficulty of the undertaking kept reliable forecasts restricted to about a week. Now, a…
China has imposed sanctions on 13 U.S. defense firms in response to recent U.S. arms sales to Taiwan. Sanctions were additionally enacted on several American defense industry executives. Drone makers RapidFlight and BRINC Drones are included in the sanctions. These sanctions forbid these companies from doing business in China and the executives from traveling there.…
South Korea’s defense minister, Kim Yong-hyun, has resigned from his position. He is the first member of President Yoon Suk Yeol’s cabinet to step down since Yoon declared martial law on Tuesday night. Kim took responsibility for the crisis that the declaration of martial law had caused. There are allegations that Kim suggested the idea…
Millions of Cubans are without power again as the Cuban national power grid has collapsed. Cuba’s top electricity producer, the Antonio Guiteras power plant in Matanzas, shut down early Wednesday morning. This prompted the country’s entire power grid to collapse. The Ministry of Energy and Mines stated that it is currently working to restore power.…
As protests continue in Georgia, police are raiding the offices of several opposition parties in attempts to stop them. Protests broke out after Georgia’s government party, the Dream party, decided to suspend talks about joining the European Union. The protests have continued for almost a week. The opposition Coalition for Change party said that on…
Researchers have discovered a new Android remote access trojan (RAT) called the “DroidBot”. The trojan has been used to target 77 different banks, cryptocurrency exchanges, and national organizations. The RAT has primarily been used in Europe, but there is evidence that the campaign could expand to Latin America soon. DroidBot contains capabilities such as spyware,…
A Russian hacking operation spent around two years with secret access to Pakistani cyberspies’ computer systems. The operation is known as Turla or Secret Blizzard and involved the control of 33 command servers. These servers were operated by Pakistani hackers who had accessed targets in the Afghan and Indian government. The Russian hackers were able…
Cybersecurity researchers have discovered a backdoor in the popular @solana/web3.js library. The backdoor is being used in a software supply chain attack. Attackers are attempting to access users’ cryptocurrency wallets by obtaining their private keys. The library is very popular and has around 400,000 weekly downloads. However, only versions 1.95.6 and 1.95.7 feature this backdoor.…
For decades, the labs of Illinois and surrounding states have nurtured breakthroughs in nanotechnology, the life sciences and the internet itself. Time and again, the researchers behind those developments have gone elsewhere to commercialize their ideas. But business and political leaders in the region are determined to break that pattern by putting a bear hug…
China’s race to develop smarter-than-human artificial intelligence may put it ahead of the U.S., but such ground-breaking technology could also risk lessening the stronghold that the ruling Communist Party has over the world’s second-largest economy. That’s the view of prominent AI scientist Max Tegmark, who told CNBC artificial general intelligence (AGI) is closer than we…
Venture firm Cadenza closed its first fund for early-stage artificial intelligence startups with $50 million last week. It is also raising its third blockchain-focused fund, according to Managing Partner Max Shapiro. Some crypto entrepreneurs turned to the booming AI sector as an alternative during tough times in the most recent crypto downturn. Others saw efficiencies…
By now we’ve all seen videos of Boston Dynamics’ unnerving robots, whether styled to resemble a human or some four-legged animal. With the recent surge in interest in various types of robots, Hyundai’s purchase of the startup four years ago now seems more prescient, even if real-world applications remain modest for now. But humanoid and…
Happy holidays from OpenAI. The AI startup plans to kick off a “shipmas” period of new features, products, and demos for 12 days, starting on December 5th. The announcements will include OpenAI’s long-awaited text-to-video AI tool Sora and a new reasoning model, sources familiar with OpenAI’s plans tell The Verge. OpenAI CEO Sam Altman confirmed…
On the south side of Austin, Texas, engineers at the semiconductor maker Advanced Micro Devices designed an artificial intelligence chip called MI300 that was released a year ago and is expected to generate more than $5 billion in sales in its first year of release. Not far away in a north Austin high-rise, designers at…
Amazon (AMZN.O), opens new tab announced a new slate of artificial intelligence platforms, known as foundation models, at its annual AWS conference, allowing for text, image and video generation, among other things. The new offerings pit it against rivals like Adobe and Meta , which are racing to serve customers who want to automate more…
The Pentagon confirmed that on Tuesday, the U.S. carried out a strike against an “imminent threat” in Syria. The strike was carried out after a rocket attack came near a U.S. military base. The U.S. military struck the threat’s weapons systems, including a tank and rocket launchers. A Pentagon spokesperson said that it is not…
South Korea’s opposition party has submitted an impeachment bill against South Korea’s President Yoon Suk-yeol. The impeachment motion comes after Yoon’s declaration of martial law. The opposition party had threatened to begin the process if Yoon did not step down after ordering martial law. After Yoon declared martial law on Tuesday, protests broke out and…
NATO has announced plans to increase its action against sabotage by Russia and China. Over the past few months, critical infrastructure in several NATO states has been damaged, and sabotage is suspected. Recently, a data cable linking Sweden and Finland was damaged in what appears to be a deliberate attack. Mark Rutte discussed the plan…
The U.S. has enacted additional sanctions against Iran’s oil tankers in attempts to disrupt Iran’s income from oil. The sanctions are targeting 35 vessels part of Iran’s “shadow fleet of vessels” which transport oil. The U.S. is hoping to hinder Iran’s oil revenue, which finances the country’s nuclear program. Iran uses these funds for its…
The FBI and the Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency (CISA) have released new guidance with the goal of preventing cyberespionage. The announcement comes in response to a recent Chinese hacking campaign during which Chinese officials gained access to private conversations of Americans. The FBI and CISA hope that the new guidance will help to root…
Venom Spider, a malware-as-a-service (MaaS) threat actor, has expanded its capabilities with a new backdoor and loader. Researchers discovered that two recent attacks over the past two months have used these new tools. The backdoor is known as RevC2 and it uses WebSockets to steal information, proxy network traffic, and allow remote code execution. The…
A new regulation enacted by the European Union will establish a cybersecurity shield for member states. The cybersecurity package contains two new laws aimed at increasing cybersecurity in the EU. The first law will create a European Cybersecurity Alert System to coordinate cybersecurity between member states. It will also establish a Cybersecurity Emergency Mechanism and…
ENGlobal Corporation, an energy sector contractor, is currently being affected by a ransomware attack. The company has taken some systems offline, and discovered the attack on November 25. In the attack, a hacker was able to access ENGlobal Corporation’s information technology (IT) system. The attacker was also able to encrypt some of the company’s data…
Tokamak Energy announced it had raised $125 million to accelerate ambitious plans to commercialize fusion energy and grow its transformative high-temperature superconducting (HTS) technology solution, TE Magnetics. The funding round was co-led by East X Ventures and Lingotto Investment Management with participation from new investors including Furukawa Electric Company, British Patient Capital, global maritime company…
ChatGPT, OpenAI’s text-generating AI chatbot, has taken the world by storm since its launch in November 2022. What started as a tool to hyper-charge productivity through writing essays and code with short text prompts has evolved into a behemoth used by more than 92% of Fortune 500 companies. That growth has propelled OpenAI itself into…
Equal1, a company focused on silicon-powered quantum computing, announced advances in its quantum technology, showcasing performance improvements in silicon qubit arrays and introducing a new quantum controller chip. The developments aim to support scalable quantum computing using existing silicon infrastructure, according to a company blog post. The company reported achieving the following metrics on a…
China announced Tuesday it is banning exports to the United States of gallium, germanium, antimony and other key high-tech materials with potential military applications, as a general principle, lashing back at U.S. limits on semiconductor-related exports. The Chinese Commerce Ministry announced the move after the Washington expanded its list of Chinese companies subject to export…
Autonomous vehicle (AV) technology has made its way into Atlanta and is about to expand even more. Rideshare provider Lyft and AV tech firm May Mobility are partnering to bring driverless cars to users in 2025. May will soon deploy a fleet of its driverless Toyota Sienna minivans as an option for Lyft users, the…
Blockchain technology was first introduced in 2008 for cryptocurrency transactions in the financial industry. Its core features include transparency, tokenization, traceability, security and reliability. These unique characteristics have enabled organizations to create a tamperproof record of transactions that is decentralized and accessible to all participants in an ecosystem. Thus, blockchain technology soon gained traction as…
Hackers are using artificial intelligence to mine unprecedented troves of personal information dumped online in the past year, along with unregulated commercial databases, to trick American consumers and even sophisticated professionals into giving up control of bank and corporate accounts. Armed with sensitive health information, calling records and hundreds of millions of Social Security numbers,…
The International Court of Justice has begun proceedings in a case about the impacts of climate change. The International Court of Justice has begun proceedings in a case concerning the impacts of climate change. The case began after a request by the UN General Assembly for the Court’s opinion on member states’ obligations to combat…
A Belgian court has ruled that the country committed crimes against humanity with its colonial policies. A Belgian appeals court has ruled that the country’s separation of mixed race children from their parents in oversees colonies was a crime against humanity. The case had previously been dismissed by a lower court based on a finding…
Turkey has called on the various factions within Syria to open negotiations. The Turkish government has called on the various sides of the Syrian Civil War to restart negotiations. The calls comes as opposition forces across the country have made steady advances against government positions. Turkey has long sought to bring an end to the…
French government faces a no confidence vote after forcing the approval of the budget. The French government faces a no confidence vote later this week after forcing through the budget using Article 49.3 of the French Constitution. Article 49.3 allows for legislation to enacted without a parliamentary vote but allows for no confidence votes to…
Russian authorities have arrested Mikhail Pavlovich Matveev for cybercrimes. Russian authorities have announced that Mikhail Pavlovich Matveev was arrested in Kaliningrad. Matveev is wanted by the United States for various his involvement in ransomware attacks. Matveev has previously been involved with the LockBit group. Russian authorities have charged him with crimes related to intending to…
Researchers have developed the first malware capable of infecting the boot process of Linux systems. Students in South Korea have developed the first malware capable of infecting the boot process of Linux systems. Other researchers and analyst have said that “Bootkitty” is more of a proof of concept than an active threat, but it shows…
Meta has begun a large scale crack down on accounts linked to pig-butchering. Meta has announced that is has taken down millions of accounts linked to pig-butchering. Pig-butchering refers to the tactic of building up a relationship with a victim over time and gradually defrauding them. Pig-butchering accounts are typically run by criminal organization that…
The UK’s cybersecurity chief has warned that the country is facing a large increase the number of cyberattacks. The UK’s cyber security chief has warned that the country is seeing an increase in the number of cyber attacks. He also warned that threat actors are using the UK’s technological dependence against. The National Cyber Security…
From Sun South Korea’s president has declared martial law in the country to flush out pro-North Korean elements. In a late-night emergency television address, President Yoon Suk Yeol declared the move “essential to safeguarding the nation’s constitutional order.” He accused the opposition of dominating the parliament, aligning with North Korea, and undermining the government through…
Alex Martinez has worn many hats throughout his career. As CEO and co-founder of Intrinsic Medicines, he’s leading the Seattle-based biotech’s development of human milk oligosaccharide (HMO) drugs to treat a range of gut immune microbiota brain axis disorders, with programs in Parkinson’s disease and irritable bowel syndrome entering phase 2 trials. But for the…
The U.S. will launch on Monday its third crackdown in three years on China’s semiconductor industry, curbing exports to 140 companies including chip equipment maker Naura Technology Group, among other moves, said two people familiar with the matter. The effort to hobble Beijing’s chipmaking ambitions will also hit Chinese chip toolmakers Piotech and SiCarrier Technology…
KNDS France Robotics announced a contract to deliver 10 NERVA-LG robotic systems to the US Special Forces, describing the order as an example of its ability to meet the specialized needs of military units. In recent years, KNDS’s robotics division, through Nexter Robotics, has broadened its range to include advanced unmanned ground vehicles (UGVs) designed…
Matt Garman, the new chief executive of Amazon’s cloud unit, says artificial intelligence is a race without a finish line. “It is such a foundational technology,” Garman said. “It’s just a thing that’s going to happen forever.” Garman, who became CEO of Amazon Web Services in June, is about to headline his first re:Invent, the…
Payment protocol Aeon has introduced an authorization payment feature built on the TON blockchain. “By contributing to the TON ecosystem’s infrastructure, Aeon enhances the usability of blockchain technology in everyday scenarios,” the Singapore-based company said in a news release Friday (Nov. 29). “The first real-world application of this innovation is in ShareX’s Telegram mini-app, where…
Quantum robotics, a field that merges quantum computing with artificial intelligence to enhance robotic systems, seems to be a natural convergence of technological trends in quantum computing and artificial intelligence. Now, an international team of researchers report in Quantum Machine Intelligence that advances in architecture, perception and potential applications, could address the limitations of classical…
Amazon.com Inc. founder Jeff Bezos joined Samsung in a $700 million bet on Tenstorrent, valuing the AI chip startup with ambitions of taking on Nvidia Corp. at about $2.6 billion. Tenstorrent, which hopes to create a chip to try and break Nvidia’s stranglehold on the AI business, raised capital in a funding round led by…
Syrian and Russian jets have intensified air attacks in Idlib City and positions in Aleppo as the government of President Bashar al-Assad tries to slow the advance of opposition fighters. The raids on Monday followed big gains by the opposition over the past few days that have greatly shifted the front line in Syria’s long-running…
North Korea’s leader has assured steadfast support for Russia’s war in Ukraine and agreed to boost military ties with Moscow. Kim Jong Un said Ukraine’s use of long-range weapons is the result of direct military intervention by the United States, and, therefore, Russia has a right to self-defense. Kim pledged that his country “will invariably…
China has pledged “resolute countermeasures” following the United States’ decision to approve more arms sales to Taiwan, just hours before the island’s President William Lai Ching-te made a transit through the state of Hawaii, which further angered Beijing. China’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs said the US arms sale to Taiwan sends “a wrong signal” to…
On Saturday, the Israeli military said that it had struck several Hezbollah sites in Lebanon, keeping the country on edge over a fragile cease-fire. The Israeli military said it hit a site at the Lebanon-Syria border that was “actively being used” by Hezbollah to transport weapons to Lebanon from Syria, in what it called a…
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