The European Parliament’s civil liberties committee (LIBE) has voted for the parliament to move ahead with ratifying the Second Additional Protocol to the Budapest Convention on Cybercrime. More specifically, LIBE voted in favour of a draft European Parliament resolution that will give the parliament’s consent to a draft Council decision that allows EU member states to ratify the Additional Protocol.
Among other provisions, the Protocol introduces the possibility of emergency mutual assistance between signatories in addressing cybercrime, creates a legal framework for joint investigations, and makes it possible to collect evidence via videoconference where necessary.
The Protocol was criticised by civil society organisations citing incompatibilities with the EU’s Charter of Fundamental Rights. At the same time, a January 2022 opinion from the European Data Protection Supervisor (EDPS) underscored the “many safeguards” contained in the text despite the fact that some data transfers between the EU and the US would be facilitated under the agreement.
Following an unspecified ‘cyber-incident’, the UK’s Royal Mail has warned customers of ‘severe service disruption’ for items sent abroad. The National Cyber Security Centre in the UK acknowledged this, stating that they are aware of an incident affecting Royal Mail Group and are working with the company, as well as the National Crime Agency, to fully understand the impact.
Attacks using distributed denial of service (DDoS) techniques have affected the central bank and seven private banks in Denmark and disrupted their business activities. The attack also affected IT financial industry solutions developer Bankdata, which led to temporary access restrictions in the case of the websites of private banks.
According to data released by Check Point Research, the number of cyber-attacks recorded globally in 2022 was nearly two-fifths (38%) higher than the total volume observed in 2021. Attacks peaked in the fourth quarter of 2022, with an average of 1168 weekly attacks per organisation. The sectors most affected by cyber-attacks were education/research (2314 average weekly cyber-attacks), government/military (1661), and healthcare (1463). The highest volume of attacks was recorded in Africa (1875 weekly attacks per organisation), followed by Asia-Pacific, Latin America, Europe, and North America.
Check Point Research also indicated several trends observed during 2022: (a) the ransomware ecosystem continuously evolving, with smaller and more agile criminal groups; (b) hackers widening their aim to target business collaboration tools such as Slack and Teams with phishing exploits; (c) academic institutions becoming a popular target for cybercriminals.
US-based cyber threat intelligence research team Check Point Research (CPR) found that cybercriminals have been using the artificial intelligence-based tool ChatGPT for malicious purposes. The team described three examples of such misuses of ChatGPT:
- Recreating malicious strains and techniques described in research publications and write-ups about common malware.
- Creating encryption tools
- The second thread is found to perform cryptographic combinations of different signing, encryption, and decryption functions.
- Creating dark web marketplaces.
As CPR notes, although the examples given in the report are relatively basic, ‘it is only a matter of time until more sophisticated actors enhance the way they use AI-based tools for bad’.
Iran’s Infrastructure Communications Company announced on 6 January 2023 that it had prevented a cyberattack on the country’s central bank. Amir Mohammadzadeh Lajevardi, head of the company, was quoted by local media as saying that the bank was targeted by a distributed denial of service (DDoS) attack. In October, Anonymous and other global hacking groups threatened to launch cyberattacks against Iranian institutions and officials in support of anti-government protests and to thwart internet censorship in Iran.
A report by Reuters indicates that Russian hackers affiliated with the Callisto (Cold River) group targeted three US nuclear research laboratories during the summer of 2022.
The hacking team targeted the Brookhaven, Argonne, and Lawrence Livermore National Laboratories, created fake login pages for each lab, and then emailed scientists with the intent of stealing their passwords.
Reuters did not determine why the three labs were targeted or if the attempted intrusions were successful. Neither of the three labs responded to requests for comments.
US-based cyber threat intelligence research team Check Point Research (CPR) identified cybercrime campaigns orchestrated by the threat group APT-C-36 (also known as Blind Eagle) in recent months. According to CPR, Blind Eagle is a financially motivated group that has been coordinating attacks against citizens across South America since 2018.
In one example of a recent campaign, Blind Eagle has been sending phishing emails to citizens pretending to be from the Colombian government. Essentially, these emails threatened citizens with facing problems when leaving the country if certain bureaucratic matters were not settled. In another campaign targeting Ecuador-based organisations, the group used an advanced toolset to coordinate a new infection chain.
CPR characterised Blind Eagle as a ‘strange bird among APT groups’: ‘Judging by its toolset and usual operations, it is clearly more interested in cybercrime and monetary gain than in espionage; however, unlike most such groups that just attack the entire world indiscriminately, Blind Eagle has a very narrow geographical focus, most of the time limited to a single country.’
The Guardian newspaper revealed that it was subject to a ‘serious IT incident which is believed to be a ransomware attack’. The problem started late at night on 20 December 2022 and impacted elements of the company’s IT infrastructure and behind-the-scenes services. Online publishing was largely unaffected.
Most staff was required to work from home for the remainder of the week unless otherwise notified.
US cybersecurity company Palo Alto Networks’ Unit 42 (a threat intelligence group) issued a report outlining continuous operations by the advanced persistent threat (APT) group Trident Ursa – a group attributed to Russia’s Federal Security Service by the Security Service of Ukraine. According to Unit 42’s assessments, Trident Ursa has remained ‘one of the most pervasive, intrusive, continuously active and focused APTs targeting Ukraine’.
Following ten months of monitoring indicators of the group’s operations, Unit 42 announced that it had identified, among other issues:
- ‘An unsuccessful attempt to compromise a large petroleum refining company within a NATO member nation on 30 August 2022’ (neither the country nor the company concerned was named).
- ‘An individual who appears to be involved with Trident Ursa threatened to harm a Ukraine-based cybersecurity researcher immediately following the initial invasion.’
- ‘Multiple shifts in [the group’s] tactics, techniques and procedures.’
