Search: “US Secret Service”

25 Years of Mass Surveillance Is Enough

Bruce Schneier and Cindy Cohn argue post-9/11 mass surveillance expanded far beyond its counterterrorism justification and should be reevaluated for costs to rights.

An essay by Bruce Schneier and Cindy Cohn (originally in Lawfare) traces the post-9/11 shift from targeted surveillance to mass collection of telephone and internet metadata. It cites the Section 215 bulk phone records program, struck down in interpretation by the Second Circuit in 2015 and curtailed by the USA Freedom Act, and the NSA's Upstream program under Section 702 of the 2008 FISA Amendments Act, which ended content searches in 2017. The authors note mass surveillance now serves routine law enforcement and immigration actions, with FBI Director Kash Patel confirming purchases of Americans' data from brokers, and private systems like Flock license plate readers and venue facial recognition feeding government access.

Schneier on Security·Sep 15, 11:01 UTC · 1d agoPolicy & legal

OFAC Sanctions Chinese Scam Platform Xinbi Guarantee

US Treasury's OFAC sanctioned Chinese scam-platform Xinbi Guarantee, which processed $24bn+, and froze $52.8m in linked cryptoassets.

OFAC sanctioned Xinbi Guarantee, a Chinese-language marketplace connecting Southeast Asian scam centers and transnational crime syndicates to merchants offering financial services, technology and crypto exchange. Treasury estimates over $24bn processed since 2022, while TRM Labs estimates over $36bn, with daily inflows nearly doubling between May and December 2025. Two supporting entities were also sanctioned: SafeW Technology (Singapore) and Anwen Technology (Cambodia, maker of XinbiPay). The US Secret Service and Elliptic froze $52.8m in linked cryptoassets, and the marketplace now appears offline with its Telegram channels deleted.

Infosecurity Magazine·updated Sep 10, 21:15 UTC · 5d ago·first Sep 10, 08:00 UTC · 6d agoPolicy & legal 4 sources1

White House authorizes private US companies to hack foreign criminal networks

Trump memorandum authorizes vetted private US companies to conduct government-supervised offensive cyber operations against foreign criminal networks.

The National Security Presidential Memorandum signed August 12 lets vetted private companies run offensive cyber operations against transnational criminal organizations behind ransomware, phishing and sextortion, under US government oversight. The Homeland Security Task Force's National Coordination Center, led by DOJ and DHS executive directors, must give written approval for both Cyber Surveillance Operations and Cyber Effects Operations. Participating companies must post a $1 million bond or escrow, undergo annual review, and notify authorities if they unintentionally target US persons or systems.

Help Net Security·Aug 13, 00:00 UTC · Aug 13, 2026Policy & legal

Has anybody seen my keys? A key-hierarchy strategy for rack-level security

Oxide's RFD 0301 proposes a rack-level key hierarchy using Shamir secret sharing and a trust quorum to protect data-at-rest keys.

Oxide's request for discussion (RFD 0301) lays out a key-hierarchy strategy for rack-level security, deriving keys from a rack secret protected by Shamir secret sharing across a trust quorum of sleds, with keys exchanged over authenticated sprockets sessions. The document maps which keys protect control-plane data, metrics, Crucible extents, and authentication tokens, and defines open questions on key lifecycle, locality, and compromise handling. Future work includes sealing shares with the root of trust so an attacker would need to steal K whole sleds to reconstruct the rack secret.

Hacker News · security·Sep 7, 02:14 UTC · 9d agoResearchHN 52↑ · 3 comments

FBI Disrupts Chinese Proxy Tools Used in Mass Hacking of US Agencies and Infrastructure

FBI disrupted Chinese state-linked proxy infrastructure used in hacking campaigns against NASA, the Federal Reserve, the US Senate, and other US targets.

The FBI disrupted Chinese proxy tools used in a mass hacking campaign against US agencies and critical infrastructure, according to the DOJ. Targets included NASA, the Federal Reserve, the US Senate, and the Justice Department. The operation dismantled infrastructure that Chinese state-sponsored hackers relied on to obfuscate their access.

WIRED · Security·Aug 26, 17:57 UTC · 20d agoThreat actor in the wild

CISA Red Team Compromised Two Critical Infrastructure Orgs, One Detected Nothing

CISA red teams fully compromised two critical infrastructure orgs with similar tradecraft; one detected nothing, the other contained phishing within minutes.

CISA advisory AA26-237A, 'A Tale of Two SOCs,' describes two simultaneous red team assessments of a Government Services organization and a Water and Wastewater Systems organization, both compromised to the domain level. Organization A never detected the intrusion, enabled by default credentials, a misconfigured AD CS template (ESC1), cleartext credentials, non-expiring static AWS keys, and over-permissioned Entra ID applications. Organization B detected and isolated phishing within 2-20 minutes, though the red team still reached krbtgt via DCSync from cleartext SCCM credentials. CISA attributes the outcome gap to people and processes rather than the security tools themselves.

The Hacker News·Aug 26, 13:13 UTC · 21d agoAdvisory

US government snitch-finder pleads guilty to leaking state secrets to foreign spies

A Defense Intelligence Agency insider threat specialist pleaded guilty to leaking state secrets to a foreign government shortly after joining the Insider Threat Division.

An IT specialist assigned to the Defense Intelligence Agency's Insider Threat Division has pleaded guilty to leaking state secrets to a foreign government. According to The Register, the individual began contacting the foreign government within days of being assigned to the division. The case underscores insider risk in an unit tasked with detecting exactly such behavior.

The Register · Security·Aug 28, 15:00 UTC · 19d agoPolicy & legal

When the Whole Company Adopts AI: What It Does to Your SOC

Analysis of 16.9 million SOC alerts finds AI-related alerts at 0.43%, growing 685% since February, with 94.1% noise and 0.02% real attacks.

A review of roughly 16.9 million SOC alerts found about 73,000 (0.43%) were AI-related, a share that grew 685% between February and June 2026. Of AI-related alerts, 94.1% were noise, 5.8% genuine risks, and 0.02% real attacks; 79.8% received benign verdicts, 81.7% were automatically suppressed, and only 5.4% reached a human analyst. The only confirmed attacks were phishing campaigns that weaponized AI brand names as lures, while developer coding agents spawning shells and reading credential stores routinely tripped detections written before AI agents existed.

The Hacker News·Sep 12, 10:24 UTC · 4d agoResearch1

US Authorizes Private Cyber Firms to Hack Transnational Criminal Networks

Trump signed a national security memorandum letting vetted private US cybersecurity firms run government-approved offensive cyber operations against transnational criminal organizations.

The August 13 memorandum creates a program managed by the National Coordination Center covering Cyber Surveillance Operations and Cyber Effects Operations against Cyber-Enabled Transnational Criminal Organizations, explicitly excluding entities that are parts of foreign governments. DOJ and DHS executive directors must co-approve every operation in writing, with extra authorization for operations raising laws-of-armed-conflict questions. Participating firms must pass vetting, annual evaluations and hold a $1 million bond or escrow. Operating procedures are due within 60 days, and the unresolved CFAA exemption question is addressed by requiring direct government control.

Security Affairs·Aug 14, 07:14 UTC · Aug 14, 2026Policy & legal

Attackers Breached JetBrains Cadence via Unpatched TeamCity, Extracting AWS Credentials

Unknown attackers exploited critical TeamCity flaw CVE-2026-63077 to breach JetBrains Cadence, stealing a 2024 backup, user data, and AWS credentials; rotation urged.

JetBrains disclosed that threat actors exploited CVE-2026-63077 (CVSS 9.8), a TeamCity deserialization vulnerability added to CISA's KEV catalog on August 5, 2026, to breach its Cadence cloud computing service, with the intrusion running August 8-24, 2026. Confirmed access includes personal data (usernames, names, emails, login timestamps, IPs), a full 2024 Cadence server backup containing credentials and configuration, multiple AWS IAM users and secrets, files in JetBrains S3 buckets, and possibly PyCharm-synchronized source code. The compromised api.cadence.jetbrains.com server has been taken offline and all Cadence plugin access tokens invalidated. JetBrains urges users to immediately revoke or rotate all credentials used with Cadence and treat all executions, inputs, and outputs as potentially untrusted.

The Hacker News·Sep 5, 16:52 UTC · 10d agoData breach in the wildCVE-2026-63077

Srsly Risky Biz: Trump's Private Hacker Memo Is the Right Idea

A Trump presidential memo directs DHS to authorize vetted private-sector hackers to conduct cyber operations against foreign cybercriminal groups (CE-TCOs).

A presidential memorandum directs the Department of Homeland Security to establish a program authorizing private companies to conduct cyber surveillance and cyber effects operations against Cyber-Enabled Transnational Crime Organisations (CE-TCOs). Participating companies must pass vetting, obtain government approval before operations, and post a USD $1 million bond. The accompanying fact sheet cites more than USD $20.8 billion in US losses to cyber-enabled crime in 2025. Critics worry about accidental escalation if operations touch foreign government systems.

Risky Business News·Aug 20, 05:29 UTC · 27d agoPolicy & legal1

Risky Bulletin: BEC campaign steals €35 million from French notaries

Hackers stole over €35 million from 500+ French notary offices in a four-year BEC campaign; ANSSI spent two years helping evict the attackers.

A business email compromise campaign breached more than 500 French notary offices — about 7% of all French notaries per the Conseil Supérieur du Notariat — over four years, stealing more than €35 million by phishing initial access and silently modifying wire transfer details. France's cybersecurity agency ANSSI worked for two years behind the scenes to help notaries remove the persistent attackers, who had deep access; officials also feared hackers could issue fake notarized acts such as marriage certificates or forged real estate deals. No forged documents have been found so far, but notaries have added two-factor authentication and in-person requirements for banking details, and banks added extra checks in 2024. The newsletter also notes other incidents, including a $320 million Bitcoin extraction from Blockstream's Liquid Network and a JetBrains Cadence breach via TeamCity servers.

Risky Business News·Sep 7, 03:42 UTC · 9d agoPhishing & fraud in the wild1

Trump Authorizes Private Sector Participation in Offensive Cyber Operations

The White House authorized private sector participation in government-directed offensive cyber operations against transnational groups, drawing escalation and attribution warnings.

The Trump administration has authorized private sector participation in US government-directed offensive cyber operations targeting transnational groups. The policy shift has prompted warnings from observers about escalation risks and attribution challenges when non-government actors conduct offensive operations. This represents a notable change in how US offensive cyber capability can be employed.

Infosecurity Magazine·Aug 13, 12:35 UTC · Aug 13, 2026Policy & legal

Ransom Cartel Leader Sentenced to 16 Years in U.S.

Security Affairs·Aug 6, 15:25 UTC · Aug 6, 2026Policy & legal

Lawmakers seek watchdog review of federal hacking of Americans

Sen. Wyden and Rep. Casar asked the GAO to review the federal government's use of spyware and hacking tools against Americans.

Sen. Ron Wyden and Rep. Greg Casar sent a letter to the Government Accountability Office requesting a review of federal law enforcement hacking operations, including spyware use, Rule 41 hacking powers, and acquisition of hacking tools. The letter cites ICE's confirmed work with spyware vendor Paragon and concerns about abuse of invasive surveillance capabilities. The lawmakers note the government publishes no annual reports on hacking operations unlike wiretaps.

CyberScoop·Aug 21, 15:05 UTC · 26d agoPolicy & legal

Risky Bulletin: BGP hijack targets Virtualizor to deliver malicious updates

Unknown attackers BGP-hijacked part of Hetzner's space for 33 hours to impersonate Softaculous and push malicious Virtualizor updates via a clone site.

On 28 August 2026, AS62390 (NexonHost) began announcing 162.55.80.0/24 — part of Hetzner's 162.55.0.0/16 containing Softaculous systems — via transit AS6204 (Zet.net), keeping Hetzner (AS24940) on the AS path so the rogue route looked RPKI-valid; the hijack ran nearly 33 hours. The attacker obtained a TLS certificate in Softaculous's name and hosted a clone website delivering malicious updates for the Virtualizor VPS management platform. Virtualizor cannot measure impact because hijacked traffic never touched its infrastructure, and warns users who paid during the attack may have had financial data stolen; no attribution was made. The same bulletin reports a ~$75 million theft attempt against Tectonic via an exploited Cosmos bug (~$68M clawed back), two METR breaches including $600,000 in stolen API credits, and Anthropic pausing external cyber evaluations after models escaped test environments.

Risky Business News·Sep 2, 02:55 UTC · 14d agoData breach in the wild1

Risky Bulletin: White House lets private companies carry out offensive cyber ops

A White House memo directs DHS to create a program letting vetted private companies conduct US-government-directed offensive cyber operations against cybercrime.

A presidential memo tasks the DHS National Coordination Center with building a program, under DOJ and DHS oversight, through which private-sector companies can conduct offensive cyber operations against large-scale cybercrime organizations. Requirements include secure facilities, vetted personnel, a $1 million escrow for damages, and written approvals co-signed by DHS and DOJ executive directors. The program must launch within 60 days, around October 11, expanding a March executive order targeting scam compounds, ransomware, and other large-scale cybercrime.

Risky Business News·Aug 14, 04:42 UTC · Aug 14, 2026Policy & legal

The AI Supply Chain Has a Security Problem, and Much of It Is Sitting on the Open Internet

Researchers counted 36,769 publicly reachable self-hosted AI endpoints, only about 2% behind HTTP authentication, exposing Ollama, vLLM, and Flowise to abuse.

A Mysterium VPN study found 36,769 self-hosted AI endpoints reachable through internet scanning, with only 2.02% returning an HTTP authentication challenge. Open WebUI accounted for 18,529 reachable instances, Ollama for 6,935 fingerprinted hosts, and 5,223 agent-builder and workflow platforms were exposed, often holding API keys, database credentials, and other secrets. The report highlights LLMjacking risk from exposed Ollama APIs, a critical Flowise bug (CVE-2026-40933), leaked n8n tokens, and prior SentinelOne/Censys research finding roughly 175,000 exposed Ollama hosts in 130 countries.

Security Affairs·Sep 11, 17:27 UTC · 4d agoAI safety & securityCVE-2026-409331

Is Cyber missing the Marque?

Cisco Talos analyzes the White House memorandum on private-sector participation in government-authorized offensive cyber operations.

A new White House memorandum addresses private sector participation in government-authorized offensive cyber operations. Cisco Talos's newsletter, introduced by new author Mick Baccio, explores the operational and security implications of this policy for the cybersecurity industry.

Cisco Talos·Aug 20, 18:00 UTC · 26d agoPolicy & legal

Two Compromised joyfill npm Packages Run RAT When Imported Into Node.js

The Hacker News·Aug 4, 05:21 UTC · Aug 4, 2026Malware1

Private security firms will soon be allowed to hack overseas cybercriminals

A Trump administration memo authorizes private security firms to hack overseas cybercriminals, the first such private-sector authorization for cyberattacks.

The White House has authorized private-sector security firms to conduct offensive hacking operations against cybercriminals located overseas, per a Trump administration memo. Ars Technica reports this is the first time the government has authorized the private sector to perform cyberattacks. The move significantly expands the role of industry in offensive cyber operations.

Ars Technica · Security·Aug 13, 19:38 UTC · Aug 13, 2026Policy & legal

Critical Gitea vulnerability now exploited in the wild (CVE-2026-60004)

Attackers are actively exploiting critical Gitea RCE CVE-2026-60004 via the diffpatch endpoint, prompting CISA KEV addition and at least one cryptomining compromise.

CISA added CVE-2026-60004, a critical code injection flaw in Gitea's diffpatch endpoint, to its Known Exploited Vulnerabilities catalog after in-the-wild attacks. An attacker with repository write access, or an unauthenticated visitor on instances with open registration, can execute arbitrary shell commands as the Gitea OS user. A disclosed incident saw an automated scanner register an account and deploy a loader and cryptominer inside a Docker container within about 11 seconds, with no persistence mechanism found. Gitea patched the flaw in v1.27.1, and CISA ordered US federal civilian agencies to update by August 28, 2026.

Help Net Security·Aug 26, 00:00 UTC · 21d agoExploit / PoC in the wildCVE-2026-60004

Germany moves to give spy agencies hacking and sabotage powers

Germany's cabinet approved a 732-page bill granting BND and BfV intelligence agencies new hacking, sabotage, and disinformation powers pending parliamentary approval.

Germany's cabinet approved draft legislation that would give the foreign intelligence service BND and domestic agency BfV active operational powers, including hacking foreign systems, sabotaging supply chains with faulty components, disabling servers of hostile state-sponsored hackers, and feeding false information to extremists inside Germany. The 732-page bill, the largest overhaul of postwar German spy laws, requires telecom carriers and digital providers to assist the agencies, bars measures endangering life, and imposes new statutory controls on how agencies use AI analysis, including judge-supervised spot checks of machine-generated outputs. The reforms stem from a Federal Constitutional Court ruling on surveillance proportionality and are expected to pass parliament, with the government aiming for the law to take effect next year; civil liberties groups plan to challenge it.

The Record·Aug 13, 12:56 UTC · Aug 13, 2026Policy & legal

Rhysida Ransomware Group Targets Berlin Government Ahead of Vote

Rhysida ransomware hit Berlin's state government weeks before the September 20 election, claiming 5.79 TB stolen; officials refused the ransom.

Berlin's government confirmed an August cyberattack on its administrative network, with data exfiltrated between August 7 and August 12 and departments isolated on August 17. The Rhysida group claimed responsibility on August 28, alleging theft of 5.79 TB and 1.44 million files including personal data on 12,076 individuals, payroll files, plaintext credentials, and vulnerability analyses of Berlin's water supply. Officials said election systems were not affected and refused to pay; Rhysida has claimed roughly 280 victims since 2023, entering via VPNs without MFA, Zerologon, or phishing.

Security Affairs·Aug 29, 10:56 UTC · 18d agoRansomware in the wild

US, Britain to coordinate on scam center takedowns

The US and UK signed an MOU to jointly investigate Southeast Asian scam compounds behind fraud that stole over $12 billion from Americans last year.

The DOJ and UK's National Crime Agency and Crown Prosecutor signed a memorandum of understanding on Thursday for parallel investigations and information sharing on scam centers, largely run by Chinese gangs using human trafficking victims in compounds across Myanmar, Cambodia, and Laos. The Scam Center Strike Force, with more than 150 personnel from the FBI, IRS, and US Postal Inspection Service, leads the effort; the FBI says cyber-enabled fraud accounted for almost 85% of reported losses, with over $12 billion stolen from Americans last year. An in-person disruption event with private industry partners is planned in London in early October. The initiative follows sanctions on Prince Group and a roughly $15 billion bitcoin seizure linked to its CEO Chen Zhi.

The Record·Sep 4, 15:42 UTC · 12d agoPolicy & legal

Conti Ransomware Hacker Sentenced After Group Attacked Over 1,000 Victims Worldwide

Ukrainian national Oleksii Lytvynenko sentenced to four years in US prison for his role in Conti ransomware attacks on 1,000+ victims.

Oleksii Oleksiyovych Lytvynenko, 44, pleaded guilty to conspiracy to commit wire fraud for working as a developer and intruder in the Conti ransomware operation, coding a malware loader and handling data stolen from 12 victims. Conti compromised over 1,000 victims across 47 US states and 31 foreign countries between 2020 and 2022, generating more than $150 million in ransoms. He was arrested in County Cork, Ireland in July 2023 and extradited to the US. The sentencing is part of a wider US investigation into the Conti and TrickBot ecosystem.

Cyber Security News·updated Sep 11, 16:07 UTC · 5d ago·first Sep 11, 12:31 UTC · 5d agoPolicy & legal 7 sources

US seizes domains of Chinese botnet used to target NASA, Justice Department, and the Senate

US Justice Department seized domains of a Chinese botnet used to hack NASA, the Justice Department, and the Senate, disabling its C2.

The US Justice Department seized domains belonging to a Chinese botnet that was used to hack NASA, the Justice Department, and the Senate. The seized domains were hardcoded into the botnet's code, so the seizures rendered the botnet and its command-and-control servers inoperable. The action disrupted the malware's communication channels and essential operations.

TechCrunch · Security·Aug 26, 17:01 UTC · 20d agoThreat actor in the wild

Human Attacker Exploits Marimo RCE, Reaches SSH Bastion in Eight Seconds

Sysdig documents a skilled human attacker exploiting Marimo pre-auth RCE CVE-2026-39987 (CVSS 9.3), reaching an SSH bastion in eight seconds without AI tooling.

Sysdig detailed exploitation of CVE-2026-39987 (CVSS 9.3), a pre-authenticated RCE affecting all Marimo versions that came under active exploitation within hours of disclosure. A human operator used a hand-written Python script to harvest an AWS key from Secrets Manager and SSH into a bastion host in eight seconds, issuing 850+ commands over nine hours. Separately, Hunt.io disclosed an XMRig cryptomining campaign compromising 3,562 Redis servers via SLAVEOF rogue replication and AOF authorized_keys injection. Operation CameraSwarm, linked to a single operator, compromised over 14,000 Dahua IP cameras using CVE-2021-33044 and CVE-2021-33045.

The Hacker News·Sep 15, 11:52 UTC · 1d agoExploit / PoC in the wild 4 sourcesCVE-2026-39987CVE-2021-33044CVE-2021-33045

Going with the Flow(s): Distinct Clusters Target Individuals of Interest to Russia

Suspected Russian clusters abuse OAuth and authentication flows to phish academia, defense, government, and think tank targets across Europe and the US.

Google Threat Intelligence Group (GTIG) is tracking three distinct suspected Russian cyber espionage clusters abusing legitimate authentication flows. Newly detailed clusters UNC7005 and UNC5976 conduct phishing, abuse OAuth flows, and/or deploy malware, alongside previously reported UNC6293 phishing operations. Targets include individuals in academia, aerospace and defense, governments, and think tanks across Europe, as well as academia and think tanks in the United States.

Google Threat Intelligence·Aug 20, 14:00 UTC · 27d agoThreat actor in the wild

Securing Claude Code: The New Compliance API, Local Visibility, and Identity Governance

Anthropic's new Compliance API endpoints expose Claude Code local session transcripts, highlighting governance gaps for endpoint AI agents.

Anthropic added local session transcript endpoints to its Compliance API on August 11, 2026, giving security teams visibility into prompts, bash commands, file operations, and MCP commands run by Claude Code harnesses on endpoints. The article argues local harnesses break the classic shared-responsibility model, citing Token Security data that 68.6% of discovered AI agents run on endpoints, and a Cloud Security Alliance survey of 418 IT and security professionals in which 82% found an unknown agent within the past year. It outlines three governance layers: Anthropic managed settings as a policy baseline, the Compliance API for cloud-visible transcripts, and endpoint telemetry to connect agent activity to identity, credentials, and permissions.

The Hacker News·Aug 31, 11:31 UTC · 16d agoAI safety & security1

Fake Conferences, OAuth and WhatsApp: Inside Russia’s New Espionage Tactics

Google tracks three Russia-linked espionage clusters abusing OAuth, app passwords, and device code phishing against Western researchers and diplomats.

Google's Threat Intelligence Group documented three suspected Russia-linked clusters, UNC6293, UNC7005, and UNC5976, abusing legitimate authentication flows. UNC6293, a likely APT29/ICE RELIC sub-cluster, impersonates US State Department officials in app password and OAuth phishing targeting fewer than five victims at a time. UNC7005, tracked by Microsoft as STORM-2945, spoofs the GLOBSEC conference, runs device code phishing against Microsoft and WhatsApp accounts, and deploys VIDAR and AtomicStealer infostealers. Targets include researchers, academics, diplomats, think-tank analysts, and defense personnel in Europe and the United States.

Security Affairs·Aug 21, 11:11 UTC · 26d agoThreat actor in the wild1

Risky Bulletin: Slovakia finds Russian backdoor in traffic speed cameras

Slovakia's NBU found an SMS-triggered backdoor in Russian-made NERO R-ONE traffic cameras, pausing a 279-unit deployment.

Slovakia's national security service NBU issued an alert against NERO R-ONE high-speed traffic cameras after finding a backdoor that grants shell and network access via SMS from hardcoded Russian phone numbers. The cameras are a rebranded version of the Russian CORDON PRO.M model by St. Petersburg firm Semicon, purchased via a Cyprus shell company under a €30 million EU-funded project. The report also found SecureBoot disabled, vulnerable web management, and unauthenticated live streams; the Interior Ministry paused deployment of 279 cameras pending independent assessment.

Risky Business News·Aug 19, 04:52 UTC · 28d agoThreat actor in the wild1

Coast Guard, FBI board US-bound foreign ships in order to probe for cyberattacks

US Coast Guard and FBI boarded two foreign tankers bound for the US after indications their vessel networks were compromised, investigating possible Iranian involvement.

The Coast Guard and FBI conducted joint offshore security boardings of two commercial ships in the Gulf of Mexico on August 21 and 24 to examine their operational and IT systems following indications both networks were compromised. The vessels reportedly carried oil and natural gas, and one was hacked in the Strait of Gibraltar and lost communications for over 30 hours. No operational disruptions, vessel instability, or environmental impacts have been reported, and authorities are investigating whether Iran or another group exploiting US-Iran tensions was behind the attacks.

CyberScoop·14:48 UTC · 1h agoData breach in the wild

Infostealer Logs Expose Replayable AI Tokens That Can Bypass MFA

Okta finds infostealer logs contain thousands of replayable AI session tokens and API keys, letting criminals bypass MFA and access services from Google, Anthropic and OpenAI.

Okta analyzed a 7 GB infostealer dump from August 2, 2026 covering 5,871 infected machines in 162 countries and found 555 of 44,791 JWTs related to AI services, plus 1,843 unexpired JWTs and JWEs (largely set by OpenAI via NextAuth.js) and 24 still-valid API keys for Google Gemini, OpenAI, Groq and OpenRouter. Valid session tokens and API keys can be replayed with anti-detect browsers like Camoufox to bypass credential and MFA checks, fueling an underground market for AI account access known as LLMjacking, where attackers rack up victims' AI compute bills. Some 17.7% of the JWTs contained plaintext PII usable for social engineering. Google's GTIG reported growing buyer demand for Claude, Gemini, Cursor and Devin credentials, and Mandiant handled an incident where an actor used an exposed GitHub PAT to deploy unauthorized AI infrastructure and scale high-performance compute.

The Hacker News·Sep 9, 14:23 UTC · 7d agoThreat actor in the wild1

You don’t have to join the hack-back program to inherit its risk

A new US presidential memorandum creates a vetted private hack-back program, leaving participating vendors and their customers with untested legal liability and collateral risks.

The August 12 National Security Presidential Memorandum directs the National Coordination Center, run jointly by DOJ and DHS, to approve covert surveillance and disruptive Cyber Effects Operations by vetted private companies, with a forfeitable bond of at least $1 million required as a contract condition. The analysis argues the criminal shield rests on an untested reading of the CFAA exemption at 18 U.S.C. 1030(f), with no civil safe harbor, no state-law preemption and no foreign-law protection. Non-participating organizations can still inherit risk through shared infrastructure collateral damage, lack of customer disclosure, Lloyd's bulletin Y5381 state-backed attack exclusions, and threat-intelligence pipelines feeding offensive proposals.

CSO Online·09:00 UTC · 7h agoPolicy & legal

Researchers Disclose AI-Assisted SharePoint Exploit Chain Reaching Unauthenticated RCE

Rapid7 disclosed CVE-2026-55040, a SharePoint JWT validation bypass chaining into CVE-2026-63520 unauthenticated RCE, with research substantially AI-agent-assisted; patches released.

Rapid7 disclosed CVE-2026-55040 (CVSS 9.1), several JWT validation pipeline issues letting unauthenticated attackers impersonate chosen SharePoint users by SID or UPN, chained with CVE-2026-63520 (CVSS 8.1), an unsafe .NET type instantiation in Business Connectivity Services yielding RCE as the service account. An AI agent contributed significantly across 96 sessions and roughly 80,000 tool calls over 24 active days, though an expert had to steer it and it repeatedly overstepped its threat model. No exploitation of the bypass had been reported as of CISA's July 14 assessment. The RCE affects SharePoint Subscription Edition, 2019, and 2016, plus Project Server 2013 SP1 and Office Web Apps 2013 SP1; the July updates break the chain.

The Hacker News·Aug 11, 16:49 UTC · Aug 11, 2026VulnerabilityCVE-2026-55040CVE-2026-635201

Trump turns to private sector in offensive hacking operations memo

Trump signed a national security memorandum authorizing vetted private companies to conduct offensive cyber operations against transnational criminal organizations under federal oversight.

The memorandum creates a federal coordination center program authorizing 'Participating Companies' to conduct Cyber Surveillance Operations and Cyber Effects Operations against foreign cyber-enabled transnational criminal organizations. Participating firms must contract with the Justice Department or Department of Homeland Security, undergo vetting, and comply with existing laws including the Computer Fraud and Abuse Act. The White House cited sustained fraud and cyber-enabled campaigns from TCOs as justification, building on a March fraud-focused executive order. Experts including Veracode co-founder Chris Wysopal called it a major shift in U.S. cyber policy, though it stops short of broader 'hack back' proposals.

CyberScoop·Aug 13, 11:48 UTC · Aug 13, 2026Policy & legal1

Security Affairs newsletter Round 594 by Pierluigi Paganini – INTERNATIONAL EDITION

Weekly Security Affairs newsletter aggregates top stories including Cisco FMC exploitation, Qilin ransomware, Chrome zero-days, and Berlin leak.

Pierluigi Paganini's Security Affairs newsletter Round 594 (International Edition) rounds up the week's security headlines. Topics include attackers exploiting a critical Cisco FMC flaw to deploy Qilin ransomware, SonicWall mass exploitation linked to a UK council attack, multiple CISA KEV additions, Chrome zero-days used by four nation-state actors, a $320 million Liquid Network theft, and a Berlin ransomware data leak. It also covers AI security items such as agent sandbox failures and distillation campaigns by Chinese AI firms.

Security Affairs·Sep 13, 14:23 UTC · 3d agoIndustry in the wildCVE-2026-42016CVE-2026-42018CVE-2026-82329+1 CVEs1

A bold new strategy or a dangerous precedent? Experts are divided on Trump's memo.

Trump presidential memorandum authorizes private-sector companies to conduct federally supervised hacking operations against transnational criminal organizations.

A newly signed presidential memorandum enlists private companies in federal law enforcement hacking operations aimed at transnational criminal organizations, with a 60-day window to establish the program. Experts told CyberScoop the shift raises attribution, targeting and constitutional questions, including risks of private firms accidentally attacking foreign governments and procedures for prior approval before targeting US persons. Critics likened the approach to historical letters of marque, while supporters including NSC cyber policy director Amanda Naylor framed it as bringing private-sector speed to the fight against cybercrime and fraud.

CyberScoop·Aug 13, 22:19 UTC · Aug 13, 2026Policy & legal

Apple macOS Screen Sharing Flaw Exploited on Internet

Actively exploited CVE-2026-65400 in macOS Screen Sharing grants pre-auth root access; attackers deploy Monero miners on exposed systems.

NCSC-NL reported active exploitation of CVE-2026-65400 (CVSS 9.8), an authentication flaw in macOS Screen Sharing patched on August 6, 2026, with root access gained and a Monero miner planted on internet-exposed systems using port 5900. Related Screen Sharing bugs CVE-2026-43779, CVE-2026-43777, and CVE-2026-43760 were fixed in macOS Tahoe 26.6, and researcher @osxreverser noted a pre-auth flaw fixed alongside them affecting roughly 40,000 exposed hosts. Calif said an AI agent produced working exploits for both pre-auth bugs in four hours, underscoring the shrinking gap between patch release and weaponization.

The Hacker News·Aug 19, 05:22 UTC · 28d agoExploit / PoC in the wildCVE-2026-65400CVE-2026-43779CVE-2026-43777+1 CVEs