Showing posts with label Hacking. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Hacking. Show all posts

Saturday, December 16, 2017

16/12/17: Remember the Russian Attack on the Internet?


In 2016, a bot, named Mirai, wrecked havoc over the global internet with massive waves of DoS attacks on anything, from French telecoms, to U.S. web services, to Russian banks, to African airports and beyond. Per Wired, "As the 2016 US presidential election drew near, fears began to mount that the so-called Mirai botnet might be the work of a nation-state practicing for an attack that would cripple the country as voters went to the polls."

Of course, the minute there is any suspicion of the 'nation-state' actors behind the attack, we know that is the code word for 'the Russians'. And, of course, given the sheer number of 'security research' lackeys eagerly awaiting for the U.S. or UK or EU dollars/pounds/euros in grants and subsidies, the 'Russian' spectre loomed large in the wake of Mirai havoc. Here's a snapshot:

  • http://www.itsecurityguru.org/2016/10/12/research-shows-russian-hackers-could-be-behind-the-mirai-botnet/
  • https://www.nbcnews.com/news/us-news/who-shut-down-u-s-internet-friday-n671011
  • https://twitter.com/hackerfantastic/status/782840355116969984
  • https://www.networkworld.com/article/3130504/security/record-iot-ddos-attacks-raise-bar-for-defenders.html
  • https://www.csoonline.com/article/3144200/security/expect-more-iot-botnet-attacks-mirai-source-code-now-freely-available.html
  • https://www.nytimes.com/2016/10/22/business/internet-problems-attack.html


But, in the end, the famous DoS attack was down to just three U.S. students: https://www.wired.com/story/mirai-botnet-minecraft-scam-brought-down-the-internet/?mbid=social_twitter. Which, sort of, begs a question: how many 'security experts' of the 'Russian spectre looms large over everything' variety have lost their lucrative contracts with the Government, the media and the think tanks that provide platforms to the endless Russophobic hysteria? My bet is: none. Like in the good old days of the Soviet empire, you can't get fired for lying in Pravda... 


Tuesday, November 28, 2017

28/11/17: Hacking the market: Systemic contagion from cybersecurity breaches


Our article for LSE Business Review is now live on the site: http://blogs.lse.ac.uk/businessreview/2017/11/28/hacking-the-market-systemic-contagion-from-cybersecurity-breaches/.

You can read (free) our paper, on which this article is based, in full here: Corbet, Shaen and Gurdgiev, Constantin, What the Hack: Systematic Risk Contagion from Cyber Events (September 7, 2017). Available at SSRN: https://ssrn.com/abstract=3033950.

Enjoy.

Monday, October 24, 2016

24/10/16: Hacktivism on the rise? Welcome to the well-predicted future


Given a rising prevalence and impact of the cyber attacks in recent weeks, here are some slides from my February 2016 course notes on ERM with warnings about the same back at the end 2015 - start of 2016: