It is not a surprise or a coincidence that every time there is a major news event happening in the world, scammers are targeting and preying on the public to spread malware. This time these tricksters are using and impersonating the World Health Organization to do it.
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HawkEye Malware
Researchers at IBM X-Force have reported that the HawkEye malware is being distributed to the public using a World Health Organization e-mail address from Director-General Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus.
These victims are then asked to click and open up a link that is attached to the e-mail which launches a password-and-bitcoin harvesting malware on Windows.
X-Force had then stated in the report that "One thing worth mentioning is that the attackers put some effort into hiding the real intention of it. The environmental awareness of our sample was quite good and average users would most likely not notice an info-stealer being installed."
Pwn2Own Results
Pwn2Own is a hacking competition in which elite developers are being challenged to try and find vulnerabilities and try to compromise big-name brands for a prize. People tend to overlook this event ever since the coronavirus outbreak.
The winners this year were STAR LABS hacking team, Fluroacetate, and Georgia Tech Systems Software and Security Lab.
There are various kinds of software that these hackers or contestants are capitalizing on and it includes Apple macOS, Microsoft Windows, Oracle VirtualBox, and Ubuntu Linux. All bugs that were found will be privately reported to the vendors and will be shared when updates and patches are then available to be installed.
Mozilla to walk back TLS 1.0, 1.1 cuts
Mozilla had said they will be reverting the change for an unidentified amount of time to try and better access to critical government sites that have been sharing COVID-19 information.
The company had planned on dialing back support for the weak TLS 1.0 and 1.1 web encryption protocols to maintain support amid the coronavirus outbreak.
FCC gives out a warning about Coronavirus scams
The FCC has already spoken about the phishing, robocall and other scams that involve the coronavirus pandemic. These have been rounded up to HVAC cleaning, test kits, and fake cures.
According to The Register, FCC consumer and government affairs chief Patrick Webre, said that the FCC has stated that they are trying to track scams and advising the public to help them look the other way and warn them about these imposters that are tiring to steal their money and identity.
Rogers Data Leak
Rogers, a Canadian telecom giant have admitted that they had some customer information and data left exposed in database that was unprotected.
Canuck ISP has stated that this database was solely used by one of its partners in marketing and did not provide or contain any kind of password nor card numbers.
In this time and situation that the entire world is currently experiencing, it is frightening that these scammers would even think about spreading fake news about the COVID-19, expose personal data and information of the public and even cures that are not even real.
