On July 19, 2024, organizations around the world began to experience the “blue screen of death” in what would soon be considered one of the largest IT outages in history. Early rumors of a mass cyberattack were quickly squashed: it seemed a minor software update was to blame for countless shopping excursions cut short, airline flights grounded and critical surgeries postponed.

It’s that time of year. Back to school preparation is in full swing, from last minute shopping lists and school supplies to pick-up schedules and extracurricular activities.

No executive wants to be blindsided by risks that should have been reasonably anticipated, especially the CEO, CFO, and board members. In the CISO Desk Reference Guide, Gary Hayslip, Bill Bonney, and I wrote extensively about how CISOs play a critical role in contextualizing digital and cyber risks to the organization’s broader enterprise risk management practices.

At RSA Conference 2024, Cato Networks introduced Cato CTRL (Cyber Threats Research Lab), which is our cyber threat intelligence (CTI) team. Cato CTRL protects organizations by collecting, analyzing and reporting on external and internal threats, utilizing the data lake underlying the Cato SASE Cloud Platform. For 2024, Cato CTRL is publishing quarterly threat reports that provide an overview of the threat landscape.

The pressure on security teams has never been greater. With an ever-evolving threat landscape, resource constraints, and now the rapid adoption of artificial intelligence (AI) technologies, Chief Information Security Officers (CISOs) are facing unprecedented challenges. This was one of the clear takeaways from our recent report CISO perspectives: separating the reality of AI from the hype, in which 53 CISOs shared their opinions and experiences of AI’s impact on their security operations.

Securing your API ecosystem is increasingly complex, leaving organizations unsure where to begin. Gartner's 2024 Market Guide for API Protection offers clear guidance: Understanding your API attack surface and prioritizing your security efforts is crucial. Once you have visibility into your API landscape, you can implement appropriate security measures to protect your APIs from abuse and access violations.

For the fifth year in a row, we've been honored with the TrustRadius Tech Cares Award! This recognition is a testament to our unwavering commitment to corporate social responsibility (CSR) and the incredible efforts of our team. What makes this recognition so special is that it celebrates companies that go above and beyond in their CSR programs. At KnowBe4, we've always believed that our responsibility extends far beyond our products and services.

Researchers at Menlo Security warn that a phishing campaign is exploiting Google Drawings to evade security filters. The phishing emails inform the user that their Amazon account has been suspended, instructing them to click on a link in order to update their information and reactivate their account. The phishing page is crafted with Google Drawings, which makes it more likely to fool humans while evading detection by security technologies.

Researchers at ThreatFabric warn that a phishing campaign is distributing the Chameleon Android malware by impersonating a Customer Relationship Management (CRM) app. The campaign is currently targeting users in Canada and Europe, but may expand to other regions. “The naming used for the dropper and the payloads clearly shows that the intended victims of the campaign are hospitality workers and potentially B2C business employees in general,” ThreatFabric says.

Cross-Site Request Forgery (CSRF) is a serious web security vulnerability that allows attackers to exploit active sessions of targeted users to perform privileged actions on their behalf. Depending on the relevancy of the action and the permissions of the targeted user, a successful CSRF attack may result in anything from minor integrity impacts to a complete compromise of the application.