21Oct 2016 by nathan

DDOS attack against Dyn Managed DNS service leaves East Coast without access to most of internet

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Reports are coming in about a large scale DDOS attack against Dyn's Managed DNS services that took place this morning. As of currently, most websites have mitigated the issues and access to popular sites like Amazon, Twitter, Reddit, and more are functioning with minimal problems. It is not clear at this time who is responsible for the attack and / or if the attack is still ongoing. For now, users on the East Coast may experience issues loading websites or portions of websites. As of writing, Twitter.com will load only a portion of its content with many elements of the page timing out altogether. We will attempt to keep this post as well as our social media pages updated with more information as it breaks.   [UPDATE]: There appears to…
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17Oct 2016 by nathan

October 2016 News and Updates

Monthly Newsletters, Uncategorized
   Updates Executive Summary - Microsoft released a total of 10 bulletins, most of which are rated critical and most of those can allow an attacker full access to a vulnerable computer remotely (remote code execution, or RCE).  Once again, the first two bulletins address vulnerabilities in Internet Explorer and Edge (Edge is supposed to be a completely separate product from Internet Explorer, but the two seem to share a lot of similar vulnerabilities).  Adobe has patched an impressive 81 vulnerabilities in it's product line (including Acrobat, Reader and Flash, most notably) with several of those listed as critical with successful exploitation leading to remote code execution.   Microsoft - Microsoft released 10 bulletins this month (MS16-118 through MS16-127). Six of the 10 are rated critical, one is rated moderate (information disclosure)…
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22Sep 2016 by nathan

September 2016 News and Updates

Monthly Newsletters, Uncategorized
   What's New DC770 - A quick reminder that DC770 meets the first Tuesday of each month at 7:00pm EDT in the basement at Jefferson's. Updates Executive Summary - This month's Microsoft updates looked oddly familiar to last month, with the descriptions of many of the issues patched sounding eerily similar to last month, which as you may remember was a particularly "exploitable" month of updates. As always, it is extremely important for all available updates to be installed as soon as possible. Adobe is back on the   Microsoft - Microsoft released 14 bulletins this month (MS16-104 through MS16-117). Seven of the 14 are rated critical and the remaining are rated important (by Microsoft).  It should come as no surprise that updates for Internet Explorer and Edge are leading the pack (again)…
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10Aug 2016 by nathan

August 2016 News and Updates

Monthly Newsletters, Uncategorized
   What's New DEF CON 24 - Huge thank you to the folks at Piratica for the invite to DEF CON in Las Vegas, NV.  Definitely an eye opening experience to see things from a different perspective.  DC770 - A quick reminder that DC770 meets the first Tuesday of each month at 7:00pm EDT in the basement at Jefferson's. Updates Executive Summary - No patches for Adobe Flash Player this month.  For the first time since January, the monthly Adobe patch release does not include a patch for Flash Player.  In an interesting bit of irony though, there is a bulletin from Microsoft (MS16-102) that patches a vulnerability in the Microsoft PDF Library that could lead to remote code execution.  Also, MS16-099 affects multiple versions of Office including Office for Mac…
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20Jul 2016 by nathan

July 2016 Quarterly Update from Oracle (276 vulnerabilities patched)

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   Oracle Patches 276 Vulnerabilities with July 2016 Update, including 13 for JavaSE Oracle's official update cycle is quarterly (unofficially, it's been as frequently as daily at times, before Adobe Flash stepped up to the plate as the target du jour for attackers) and the updates for July have just been published.  For most of our customers, the primary impact is JavaSE (which we'll discuss in more detail below) but updates were also released for most everything in the Oracle fleet.  There's a good write-up on ThreatPost here.   Java - The latest version of Java is 8 update 101 and patches 13 vulnerabilities, 9 of which are remotely exploitable without authentication.  If you have JavaSE installed and it is not the latest version (or if you have multiple versions installed),…
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12Jul 2016 by nathan

July 2016 News and Updates

Monthly Newsletters, Uncategorized
   What's New Windows 10 - Microsoft's aggressive push to get every Windows 7 and Windows 8 computer upgraded to Windows 10 has gone from light speed to ludicrous speed.  Per Microsoft, Windows 7 is still supported until January of 2020 and we have had very good results with the Never10 utility from GRC.  If you have Windows 8, Windows 10 may be a better option.  Otherwise, it may be worth delaying the Windows 10 upgrade. DEF CON 24 - Piratica has invited the crew from Cyber Tech Cafe to join them at DEF CON 24 this year (4 August to 7 August) in Las Vegas.  Most of us will be leaving Thursday evening but we will be leaving a skeleton crew behind Friday and Monday to cover things.  Everyone will…
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14Jun 2016 by nathan

June 2016 News and Updates

Monthly Newsletters, Uncategorized
   What's New Windows 10 - Microsoft's aggressive push to get every Windows 7 and Windows 8 computer upgraded to Windows 10 has gone from light speed to ludicrous speed.  Per Microsoft, Windows 7 is still supported until January of 2020 and we have had very good results with the Never10 utility from GRC.  If you have Windows 8, Windows 10 may be a better option.  Otherwise, it may be worth delaying the Windows 10 upgrade. Helpdesk Changes - We are excited to announce that the changes that we mentioned a few months ago to the Cyber Tech Cafe helpdesk are going well.  If all goes well, we should have some exciting news in the next 10 to 14 days. DEF CON 24 - Piratica has invited the crew from Cyber…
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25May 2016 by nathan

Beware, Windows 10 updates now apparently being installed with or without permission

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We are seeing a disturbing trend of Windows 7 computers being involuntarily upgraded to Windows 10 and even trying to trick users into installing Windows 10 by using the red "X" button at the top right of the screen (historically used to close a window with no action but frequently abused by viruses and other malware to confirm an install), documented here by BBC.   Windows 7 is still supported by Microsoft until 14 January 2020, documented here on the Microsoft website. Windows 10 is a significant change from previous versions ('rolling' updates, new user interface and [not the least] privacy concerns) Like any major upgrade, the upgrade to Windows 10 is not flawless or error free and could cause downtime or compatibility problems with hardware and software not designed…
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10May 2016 by nathan

May 2016 News and Updates

Monthly Newsletters, Uncategorized
   What's New DEF CON 24 - Piratica has invited the crew from Cyber Tech Cafe to join them at DEF CON 24 this year (4 August to 7 August) in Las Vegas.  Most of us will be leaving Thursday evening but we will be leaving a skeleton crew behind Friday to cover things.  Everyone will be back for normal business hours Monday. Updates Executive Summary - May delivered several updates from Microsoft to patch critical vulnerabilities in Windows, Internet Explorer, Edge, Office and .NET.  I've noticed it a few times and more frequently lately, but MS16-064 was an update to Adobe Flash Player for Windows 8.1, Server 2012, Server 2012 R2, RT 8.1 and Windows 10.  Two important things to note here is that Microsoft is issuing Flash Player updates…
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