A Black Day for Finastra, Israeli retailers, and Google.
This Black Friday, it has definitely been a Black Time for:
3 – A US fintech firm
2 – Israeli retailers
1 – And a small company called Google ?
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3 – US Fintech Firm Finastra
“The financial technology firm Finastra is investigating the alleged large-scale theft of information from its internal file transfer platform.”
Summary: Finastra, a leading financial technology company serving 45 of the world’s top 50 banks, is investigating a significant data breach involving its internal file transfer system. Earlier this month, the company alerted customers after a cybercriminal began selling what was claimed to be over 400GB of Finastra data on the dark web. Apparently, the attacker took copies of the data without deploying any other malicious software (e.g ransomware).
So what? While ransomware continues to be a plague, some attackers don’t even bother with that step, as they know stolen data is probably more valuable than encrypted data.
Source: Krebs on Security (via Risky Biz)
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2 – Israeli Retailers
“Devices used across Israel to read credit cards malfunctioned due to a suspected cyberattack.”
Summary: Earlier this month, a suspected distributed denial-of-service (DDoS) attack targeted a payment gateway in Israel, causing widespread credit card reader malfunctions across the country for about an hour. While the attack disrupted communications between card terminals and the payment system, it did not result in data theft. The incident follows a similar attack in October on another Israeli payment firm, indicating an increase in cyberattacks on Israeli civilian infrastructure amid regional conflicts.
So what? It’s just another reminder about the vulnerability of online systems to cyberattacks. Sometimes, the easiest way to be operationally resilient is to remove or reduce our dependence on technology. And that’s why we should all do more to ensure Cash remains King!
Source: The Record (via Secure The Village)
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1 – A small IT company called Google
“U.S. regulators want a federal judge to break up Google to prevent the company from continuing to squash competition through its dominant search engine.”
Summary: The U.S. Department of Justice (DOJ) is recommending significant measures against Google after a federal court determined that the company has unlawfully maintained its search engine monopoly. Proposed actions include the forced sale of the Chrome browser and restrictions on Android’s promotion of Google’s search engine. The DOJ is also seeking block Google from securing default search engine positions through exclusive deals (like the one it has with Apple) and to force Google to allow competitors to gain access to its search data. Google contends that the DOJ’s proposals are extreme and potentially harmful to consumers. A decision is unlikely before late-2025.
So what? While this is a serious threat to Google’s dominance, I think a bigger threat is Google Search itself. Maybe it’s only me, but my recent experience is that search results are full of ads and generic AI-generated content. Meanwhile, ironically, AI-driven search engines from upstarts like ChatGPT and Perplexity AI provide better and faster results.