Election security & AI disinformation | Issue #9

Welcome to issue #9 of the ThreatReady!?

ThreatReady is your source of actionable truth based on the latest industry news. It offers a people-centric perspective that connects deeply with the challenges and triumphs of leading security teams and strategy.

If the cybersecurity landscape were a chessboard, the ThreatReady newsletter would be your strategic guide to staying three moves ahead of bad actors.

Operation secure vote ????

One of the most influential global elections, the U.S. presidential election, can be a target for cyber threats. And it’s a mere month away.?

There's a heightened focus on security this year after concerns over election interference in previous elections.

This means an emphasis on securing voting infrastructure, protecting voter databases, and combating disinformation campaigns.?

On the topic of disinformation, AI has already been exploited as a tool to disrupt the integrity of election campaigns.?

Taylor Swift didn’t endorse the former President. And Ryan Reynolds wasn’t photographed wearing a pro-Kamala Harris shirt.?

Deepfakes are proliferating as they require inexpensive (and accessible) computing power and tools.?

They can have immediate and harmful outcomes including fraud, ransomware execution, data and IP loss, and amplification of aforementioned misinformation.

Of course, disinformation powered by AI & deepfakes aren’t the only threat to election security. Nation-state & supply chain attacks can have devastating consequences if successful.?

Security leaders need to maintain a proactive mindset to secure against them:?

1. Run regular crisis simulations and tabletop exercises focused on nation-state threats.
2. Establish informed defensive measures and incident response plans.
3. Operationalize cyber teams’ intelligence on TTPs and emerging tech.

HTB’s live-fire solution for election readiness: Operation Shield Wall

Operation Shield Wall is a simulated state-side cyber attack experience designed to replicate common industry threats and techniques, tactics, and procedures used by real adversaries.?

This series of exercises is specifically crafted to strengthen threat readiness and prepare cyber teams for real-time breach and crisis simulation, incident analysis, and tactic response.

Operation Shield Wall struck a chord within our community of cyber professionals, igniting enthusiastic engagement with real-world tactics. 206 cyber professionals and 66 organizations have already used the live-fire simulation focused on election security.?

?? Learn more about election security & Ops Shield Wall.?

Dial up the defense of your Active Directory environments ??

Most organizations rely on Active Directory (AD) to manage their resources. However, this comes with a security complication:?

No organization has the same structure, because there is no "one-size-fits-all" solution for configuring Active Directory out of the box.?

Due to extensive configurations that depend on the complexity of a corporate environment, administrators often struggle to securely configure Microsoft Active Directory.

Cybersecurity professionals and administrators need to become familiar with how AD operates.?

Blue team members must be able to identify misconfigurations and attacks, and red team members must understand them to effectively audit these environments.

We created a special series for blue teamers on identifying dangerous active directory misconfigurations.?

Each misconfiguration/attack comes with a dedicated Sherlock and blog post explaining the detection and defensive measures.?

?? Improve your AD defense

Improvement to NIST | NICE reporting HTB

Cybersecurity training often falls short of addressing the real-world skills that organizations need, leaving teams underprepared.?

The NIST | NICE framework bridges this gap by outlining the essential Knowledge, Skills, Abilities, and Tasks (KSATs) required for cybersecurity roles. This ensures that training enhances team performance and aligns with industry standards.

By integrating the NIST | NICE framework into the HTB Enterprise Platform, we’ve categorized all Academy Modules according to these standards.

Managers can now develop skill-focused training by adding tailored content to their Lab, using any keyword, NICE skill code, task, knowledge area, or work role.

Learn more about this NIST NICE framework mapping feature, and plenty of other updates to the HTB Enterprise platform by reading our Q2 release updates.?

Malware: how well does your team know thy enemy??

In recent years, governments, judicial systems, hospitals, schools, and companies have been attacked by malware and ransomware, such as Stuxnet and WannaCry.

Malware analysis is crucial for incident response and defense. it helps security teams understand the behavior, goals, and tactics of malicious software that has infiltrated their systems.?

By analyzing malware, your teams can identify its origin, how it spreads, the vulnerabilities it exploits, and its impact on data and systems.?

This information is vital for containing the malware, mitigating its effects, and developing stronger defenses.?

Our recent post covers the fundamentals of learning malware analysis and recommended resources for beginner blue teamers.?

?? Brush up on malware analysis

Win of the month (let’s celebrate fellow security leaders) ??

Jashin Uddin was included in NASA’s Hall of Fame for identifying a vulnerability. What an achievement!

?? Share your win with the community

Your expertise and insights are invaluable. And we’re eager to share them with our vast audience of over 3 million members.

We’d be honored to feature your top "win" of the month related to your team, department, or security program in the next edition of ThreatReady.

A “win” could be:

• Achieving compliance or industry standards.
• Successfully onboarding new team members.
• Celebrating your team’s performance.

The top wins will be shared in the next month’s edition of ThreatReady (and if it’s really good, may get some additional love on social media). Want to share your win?

Drop a comment below telling us what it is??