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What Is a CSIRT vs. CERT vs. CIRT???
CSIRT—Computer Security Incident Response Team is a concrete organizational entity (i.e., one or more staff) that is assigned the responsibility for coordinating and supporting the response to a computer security event or incident. CERT—Computer Emergency Response (Readiness) Team CERT should not be generically used as an acronym because it’s a registered trademark in the United States Patent and Trademark Office, as well as other jurisdictions around the world. Alternative names fur such groups include computer emergency readiness team and computer security incident response team (CSIRT). The name “Computer Emergency Response Team” was fist used in 1988 at Carnegie Mellon University (CMU). CERT is registered as a trademark by Carnegie Mellon…
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How Was Colonial Pipeline Hacked/Breached? Because of One Single Employee’s Compromised Password
That’s all it takes, and usually what it comes down to. Passwords. As the founding contemporary lyrical wordsmith members of Wu-Tang would say, “Protect ya neck!“. Because without it, you’ll lose your head. Same with passwords! Protect ya passwords!!! All a malicious actor would need is a password to an account, and just like that (*finger snap!*), you’ve invited them in, like welcoming Count Dracula through your front door for Sunday dinner. So, Colonial, right…here’s the latest. After an analysis of the cyberattack on Colonial Pipeline, investigators suspect that hackers obtained the password from the dark web (think a marketplace for illicit activity) where such info is available for the…
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What is Attack Surface?
Attack surface. First thing I start thinking is the surface area, or the exposed area that is susceptible to a cyber onslaught by threat actors, or bad people with malicious intent. According to Wikipedia: “The attack surface of a software environment is the sum of the different points (for “attack vectors”) where an unauthorized user (the “attacker”) can try to enter data to or extract data from an environment. Keeping the attack surface as small as possible is a basic security measure.” via Wikipedia “KEEPING THE ATTACK SURFACE AS SMALL AS POSSIBLE IS A BASIC SECURITY MEASURE.” **clap, clap** Does that last line stick out to anyone else?? It should.…
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What is Remote Code Execution?
What is Remote code execution (RCE)? A simple web search brings up a Wikipedia page on Arbitrary code execution (ACE). According to Wikipedia: In computer security, arbitrary code execution (ACE) is an attacker’s ability to execute arbitrary commands or code on a target machine or in a target process. An arbitrary code execution vulnerability is a security flaw in software or hardware allowing arbitrary code execution. A program that is designed to exploit such a vulnerability is called an arbitrary code execution exploit. The ability to trigger arbitrary code execution over a network (especially via a wide-area network such as the Internet) is often referred to as remote code execution…