Category Archives: Cybersecurity

Live Webinar: Cybersecurity and the recent attacks

The ITP New Zealand is hosting this week a live webinar about cybersecurity and the recent cyber attacks.

The Background

Last year CertNZ issued an alert that emails were being sent to financial firms threatening DDoS attacks unless a ransom was paid.

The emails claimed to be from a well known Russian hacking group called Fancy Bear that appears to be liked to the GRU.

This is not a new problem, and cyber-attacks have been taking place for a long time.

The Webinar

From the ITP: Cybersecurity has always been important, but never more important than right now. So how do we protect ourselves when the wolves come knocking?

While some have criticised some of the victims for not being able to repel a significant DDOS attack, the reality is that what we’ve seen in the last week or so are the largest DDOS attacks in New Zealand’s history. While many of the sites and services were behind DDOS shields, the attackers were able to overwhelm other upstream pipes, diversify the attacks, and continually bring services down.

While protecting your organisation from such a significantly large and complex attack requires very specialised skills, there are some core things we should all be doing as a starting point. Join senior security expert Andy Prow from RedShield as he talks through recent patterns of attacks (ransomware, DDOS, etc) and the foundational things that can be done to best protect you and your clients.

There’ll also be plenty of time for Q&A, with ITP CEO Paul Matthews putting your questions to Andy.

Register

Registration is opened on the ITP site

ZOOM.US

Zoom has been heralded as the solution to use for online meetings during the COVID19 lockdown, but When looking more in depth, Zoom presents multiple security risks.

Its use has been approved for use by government and business. Cabinet meetings are using this tool at least in the UK and New Zealand.

Security issues

However the use of Zoom services seem to expose users to many security issues:

How Zoom.us is organised
How Zoom is working
source: https://theintercept.imgix.net/wp-uploads/sites/1/2020/04/zoom-enc.jpg

Precautions

Zoom is exceptionally usable and a very convenient way to hold meetings. However the participants need to be aware that their privacy is likely to be compromised, and that the content of the meeting is probably accessible by other people.

More information

CitizenLab has conducted an in-depth analysis of the service, advising not to use the services of Zoom if you need privacy and confidentiality, especially for

Governments worried about espionage

Businesses concerned about cybercrime and industrial espionage

Healthcare providers handling sensitive patient information

Activists, lawyers, and journalists working on sensitive topics

Alternative Solutions

There are alternative solutions available, and you might be interest at the analysis conducted by Computerworld.

Found on Twitter: a UK cabinet meeting on Zoom
UK Cabinet meeting on Zoom
source: https://pbs.twimg.com/media/EUcf6P7WkAETelu?