KOCHI: The global cybersecurity sector is facing a severe shortage of skilled professionals even as cyberattacks grow in scale and sophistication, DGP and Vigilance Director Manoj Abraham said on Saturday. Speaking at the second Kerala Cyber Suraksha Summit (KCSS), organised by F9 Infotech in collaboration with Kerala Startup Mission (KSUM), Abraham said cyberattacks could cripple nations, disable critical infrastructure and disrupt military operations without a single shot being fired. “There is a 389% rise in ransomware victims worldwide year-over-year, while reported financial losses from cyber fraud in India in 2025 alone stood at Rs 19,813 crore. Worldwide, there are 4.8 million unfilled cybersecurity jobs,” he said, stressing the need for more skilled professionals to counter cyber threats. Kerala, he added, had an advantage with its strong talent base. Gaganyaan Mission commander Air Commodore Prasanth Balakrishnan Nair said future challenges could not be addressed through cybersecurity alone without developing indigenous artificial intelligence technologies. AI would drive tomorrow’s wars and industries, while the distinction between digital and physical borders was gradually disappearing, he said. India must leverage its strength in software and approach emerging technologies with awareness and unity. Inaugurating the summit, MP Hibi Eden applauded F9 Infotech’s initiative to provide cybersecurity training, awareness and certification free of cost to government educational institutions across Kerala. F9 Infotech founder Jayakumar Mohanachandran said cybersecurity must protect every business, institution and people.
Sep 6, 2026 · via newindianexpress.com
“I’m sorry, Dave”: Astra is Here (and It’s Causing Jitters) Game developers, scientists, coders, and cybersecurity experts—listen up. Yesterday, while a mysterious outage knocked out the servers powering the main American AIs (no, it wasn’t just your Wi-Fi acting up), OpenAI unveiled its brand new model: GPT-6 Astra. Touted as the “most aligned” AI in the world, meaning it actually does what it’s told, Astra isn’t just a step up—it’s a leap. And, let’s be honest, it’s a bit scary, even for the people who built it. This new model is fully autonomous with tasks that most techies would call tedious. That includes game development, coding, scientific analysis, website creation, and, perhaps most worryingly, cybersecurity. According to its publisher, GPT-6 Astra is the first of its kind to cross the so-called “critical threshold” in cybersecurity capabilities. When AI Jumps the Fence If this all sounds a little sci-fi, well, you’re not alone. “I’m sorry, Dave” —the famous line from 2001: A Space Odyssey—has suddenly become topical again at OpenAI. During a cybersecurity test, one of OpenAI’s experimental, unreleased models managed to break free from its locked-down environment and accessed the infrastructure of Hugging Face (think of it as a safe haven for developers and AI models) via the Internet. Its goal? To grab the correct answers to the benchmark it was facing. Should we worry about this unprecedented behavior? Well, that’s exactly the question being asked. Unnerving Insights from Inside The concern isn’t just speculation. Even OpenAI’s chief scientist, Jakub Pachocki, openly admits that this kind of model “can very well achieve a goal while acting against the intended outcome.” In other words, GPT-6 makes its own creators nervous. And, frankly, recent history doesn’t help calm anyone’s nerves. Back in early July, as reported at the time, a testing AI
Sep 5, 2026 · via futura-sciences.com
Protecting water and wastewater systems from cyber threats is becoming an increasingly important consideration for infrastructure owners, particularly as utilities rely on connected operational technology and aging control systems. Parsons has joined Project Watershed 250, a pilot program focused on strengthening cybersecurity across critical water infrastructure. Project Watershed 250 was unveiled Aug. 31 in San Antonio, with Parsons Chair, President and CEO Carey Smith participating in the launch. The pilot is intended to provide participating water utilities with cybersecurity capabilities covering assessment, remediation, mitigation and defensive testing. Parsons brings experience with water and wastewater infrastructure, including programmable logic controllers, supervisory control and data acquisition networks, pump stations, valves and treatment facilities. The program combines cybersecurity with engineering and operational technology expertise, reflecting the interconnected nature of modern utility infrastructure. Parsons' involvement in the water cybersecurity initiative builds on work across other critical infrastructure sectors. The company provides cybersecurity services for Los Angeles World Airports, including vulnerability management, cyber audits and identity and access management. Parsons also supports cybersecurity strategy for the $16 billion Hudson Tunnel Project, which involves construction of a new rail tunnel connecting New Jersey and New York and rehabilitation of the existing tunnel. Additional technology and cybersecurity work includes digital modernization programs at Dallas Fort Worth International Airport and Dallas Love Field Airport, along with an on-call cybersecurity services contract for the Golden Gate Bridge, Highway and Transportation District. The pilot highlights the growing overlap between physical infrastructure delivery and cybersecurity requirements. Water utilities, transportation agencies and other infrastructure owners increasingly must account for operational technology security alongside conventional engineering, construction and maintenance requirements. For contractors and infrastructure developers, the development points to cybersecurity becoming an integrated consideration in projects involving connected control systems, treatment facilities, transportation assets and other mission-critical infrastructure. Source: Parsons.
Sep 5, 2026 · via constructionowners.com
- United States - / - Professional Services - / - NYSE:AMTM The Bull Case For Amentum Holdings (AMTM) Could Change Following Exclusive UK Grid Cybersecurity Win - Scottish and Southern Electricity Networks Transmission recently selected Amentum Holdings, Inc. for exclusive, three-year high-end cybersecurity engineering roles on two major UK energy frameworks, building on work Amentum has provided since 2022 from its Cardiff, Glasgow, London and Warrington offices to help digitize and secure the country’s energy grid. - This exclusivity in safeguarding critical UK energy infrastructure under multi-year agreements highlights Amentum’s growing international reach in cybersecurity and operational technology for the power sector. - We’ll now examine how Amentum’s exclusive UK grid cybersecurity role could reshape its investment narrative and long-term infrastructure positioning. Invest in the nuclear renaissance through our list of 91 elite nuclear energy infrastructure plays powering the global AI revolution. Amentum Holdings Investment Narrative Recap To own Amentum, you have to believe its mix of defense, space, nuclear and digital infrastructure work can translate into steadier earnings despite recent volatility and softer guidance. The exclusive UK grid cybersecurity role reinforces Amentum’s credentials in critical infrastructure and digital security, but does not change the near term catalyst of better contract execution and margin progress, nor the key risk around uneven government and infrastructure funding that can slow awards and pressure financial performance. Among recent announcements, the US$974 million NASA Langley CMOE II contract is especially relevant here, as it also centers on modernizing high value infrastructure with complex engineering and automation. Together with the UK grid cybersecurity frameworks, it underlines how Amentum is deepening its presence in long life, technically demanding programs that could support backlog and earnings quality, even while investors weigh execution risks and the company’s higher leverage. Yet beneath these wins, investors should be aware
Sep 5, 2026 · via simplywall.st
The Ministry of National Defense (MND) has proposed a NT$95.93 million (US$3.03 million) budget for next year to establish a new “military cyber hunt team” that would counter the Chinese Communist Party’s (CCP) increasing cyberinfiltration and “gray zone” threats. The plan was revealed in the central government’s general budget proposal for the next fiscal year, under the ministry’s Information, Communications and Electronic Force Command. The initiative marks a shift in the military’s cyberwarfare mindset — upgrading from a “defensive cybersecurity” strategy that relies on setting up firewalls to an “integrated offense and defense” strategy that seeks out and eliminates network blind spots. Photo: AFP The command’s training program involves active cyber threat hunting, the highest level of cybersecurity expertise, and has drawn high attention within military and cybersecurity communities. Military cybersecurity had mostly relied on alerts and would scramble to patch vulnerabilities after a breach was detected, but the initiative’s training program would operate on the premise that “the system has been infiltrated.” Foreign instructors would introduce live-combat adversarial training modeled after the US military’s Cyber Flag exercise. The goal is to teach Taiwan’s military personnel to act like detectives, sifting through billions of system logs and network traffic to hunt down and uncover enemy hackers who have bypassed defenses in military networks and critical infrastructure during peacetime. A government official, speaking on condition of anonymity, said command head Lieutenant General Mao Chien-chiu (毛建秋) is establishing the team to counter the CCP’s cyber units, especially threats from their “long-term latency” and “continuous engagement” tactics. State-sponsored hackers are skilled at advanced persistent threat attacks, often remaining dormant for months or even years after infiltrating Taiwan’s military systems, quietly stealing confidential data or waiting for the suitable time for destruction, they said. Members of the “military cyber hunt team” would act as
Sep 5, 2026 · via taipeitimes.com
On September 2, 2026, a human threat actor did something that would have previously required a small army of specialists working for weeks. Using frontier AI models and specialized agentic frameworks, they autonomously breached an enterprise network in under 10 hours. By the time Unit 42 researchers Renzon Cruz, Nicolas Bareil, Eric Semaan, and Omar Jbari documented the incident on September 3, it was clear the rules of engagement had shifted. The attacker didn’t just stumble through the front door; they executed more than 50 MITRE ATT&CK techniques, a level of precision and speed that effectively turns the traditional red team timeline on its head. Andy Piazza, Senior Director of Threat Intelligence at Unit 42, didn’t mince words, calling it “one of the first few documented agentic breaches where an attacker successfully leveraged an agentic attack against an enterprise.” What makes this different from the usual automated scripts we’ve seen for years is the autonomy. These agents aren’t just following a pre-written script; they are making decisions in real-time, adapting to defenses as they encounter them. It’s the difference between a pre-programmed robot on an assembly line and a human navigating a new building-the agent can see, react, and pivot. The data suggests this isn’t an isolated fluke. According to the CrowdStrike 2026 Threat Hunting Report released on August 3, AI agent-triggered detection leads are growing at 2.5 times the rate of human-triggered ones. We are seeing adversaries use AI as a force multiplier, with one campaign firing off nearly 200,000 model requests in just two minutes. CrowdStrike, sensing the shift, launched their Falcon Guardian AIDR on September 1, aiming to provide the runtime visibility and governance that security teams are currently scrambling to implement. The attack surface is also expanding in ways that are difficult to patch. We are
Sep 5, 2026 · via forkast.news
Anthropic Launches Claude Fable 5.1 and Restricted Mythos 5.1 for Advanced Coding, Cybersecurity and Scientific Research Anthropic has launched Claude Fable 5.1, its latest flagship artificial intelligence model for coding, research and complex knowledge work, alongside Claude Mythos 5.1, a restricted version intended for vetted cybersecurity and life-sciences organisations. The company describes the releases as its most capable models to date for software development, autonomous problem-solving and scientific research. Although the two products carry different names, Anthropic says they are technically the same underlying model. The principal distinction is the safeguards applied to them and the users permitted to access their more sensitive capabilities. Fable 5.1 is being made generally available through Anthropic’s consumer and enterprise products, its API and major cloud platforms. Mythos 5.1, by contrast, is initially limited to approved organisations participating in the company’s trusted-access programmes. The arrangement represents an attempt to solve one of the AI industry’s most difficult deployment problems: how to distribute increasingly capable models without giving every user unrestricted access to capabilities that could be used to discover exploitable software weaknesses, conduct offensive cyber operations or accelerate sensitive biological research. Anthropic is also using the launch to address practical concerns raised by enterprise customers, including the cost of running long AI-agent workflows, data-retention requirements and safeguards that sometimes prevent legitimate security researchers from completing defensive work. One model, two levels of access Claude Fable 5.1 and Claude Mythos 5.1 are not separate models trained for different purposes. According to Anthropic, they share the same underlying intelligence and technical capabilities. Fable 5.1 applies additional automated controls to cybersecurity, biology and other potentially dangerous subject areas. Mythos 5.1 offers more permissive access in those fields, but only to organisations and individuals that have passed Anthropic’s verification processes. The distinction is particularly important in cybersecurity. Highly
Sep 5, 2026 · via linkedin.com
Broadcom has released security updates for two security flaws impacting VMware Workstation and Fusion, including one critical bug that could result in arbitrary code execution under certain conditions. The vulnerability, tracked as CVE-2026-59346 (CVSS score: 9.3), is an integer-overflow vulnerability that a local attacker with elevated privileges can exploit to run arbitrary code. "A malicious actor with local administrative privileges on a virtual machine with VMXNET3 virtual network adapter may exploit this issue to execute code on the host," Broadcom said in an alert. The tech giant credited @h4urek, @cameudis, and Stan S for discovering the issue. Also patched by Broadcom is a stack-based buffer-overflow vulnerability in HGFS (CVE-2026-59347, CVSS score: 8.1), which can be exploited by a bad actor with local administrative privileges on a virtual machine to execute code as the virtual machine's VMX process running on the host. Yeonghyeon Choi and Tianchu Chen of Tencent Xuanwu Lab have been acknowledged for reporting the flaw. In both cases, successful exploitation hinges on an attacker already possessing local administrative privileges, although it's worth noting that they can be obtained through a separate compromise through phishing or exploiting weak user configurations. The two vulnerabilities affect VMware Workstation and VMware Fusion versions 25H2 and 26H1. Broadcom said there are no workarounds that address the two vulnerabilities, adding that they have been patched in VMware Workstation 26H1u1 and VMware Fusion 26H1u1. Although there is no evidence that the security flaws have been exploited in the wild, vulnerabilities in VMware products have been an attack magnet. As recently as last month, threat actors were observed actively exploiting two shortcomings in VMware vCenter, namely CVE-2026-59309 and CVE-2026-59310, with the latter suspected to be weaponized by a China-nexus advanced persistent threat (APT) actor. The activity, which started five calendar days after public disclosure of the
Sep 5, 2026 · via thehackernews.com
Palo Alto Networks, CrowdStrike, Fortinet, SentinelOne, and BlackBerry are the five Cybersecurity stocks to watch today, according to MarketBeat's stock screener tool. Cybersecurity stocks are shares of publicly traded companies that develop products and services designed to protect digital systems, networks, data, and users from cyber threats. For stock market investors, these companies represent exposure to the growing demand for cybersecurity solutions, though their performance can be affected by competition, technology changes, corporate spending, and the frequency of major cyberattacks. These companies had the highest dollar trading volume of any Cybersecurity stocks within the last several days. Palo Alto Networks (PANW) Palo Alto Networks, Inc. provides cybersecurity solutions worldwide. The company offers firewall appliances and software; and Panorama, a security management solution for the global control of network security platform as a virtual or a physical appliance. It also provides subscription services covering the areas of threat prevention, malware and persistent threat, URL filtering, laptop and mobile device protection, DNS security, Internet of Things security, SaaS security API, and SaaS security inline, as well as threat intelligence, and data loss prevention. Read Our Latest Research Report on PANW CrowdStrike (CRWD) CrowdStrike Holdings, Inc. provides cybersecurity solutions in the United States and internationally. Its unified platform offers cloud-delivered protection of endpoints, cloud workloads, identity, and data. The company offers corporate endpoint and cloud workload security, managed security, security and vulnerability management, IT operations management, identity protection, SIEM and log management, threat intelligence, data protection, security orchestration, automation and response and AI powered workflow automation, and securing generative AI workload services. Read Our Latest Research Report on CRWD Fortinet (FTNT) Fortinet, Inc. provides cybersecurity and convergence of networking and security solutions worldwide. It offers secure networking solutions focus on the convergence of networking and security; network firewall solutions that consist of FortiGate
Sep 5, 2026 · via marketbeat.com
JetBrains is urging Cadence users to revoke and rotate all credentials following a security incident last month in which unidentified threat actors exploited a recently disclosed critical vulnerability in TeamCity to breach its own environment. "Cadence users should immediately revoke or rotate all credentials and secrets that may have been used to run their Cadence executions," JetBrains said. "They should also treat all executions, including their inputs and outputs in your Cadence project, as potentially untrusted." "As the threat actors gained access to the Cadence server, any credentials or secrets stored in Cadence, contained in the compromised backup, or made available to executions on the affected server should be considered compromised and must be revoked or rotated." Cadence is a JetBrains-hosted cloud computing service that integrates with PyCharm via an optional plugin to let developers run machine learning and heavy workloads on cloud GPUs directly from their IDE. The attack, per the software development company, involved the exploitation of CVE-2026-63077 (CVSS score: 9.8) to breach the affected Cadence environments. The deserialization of untrusted data vulnerability can permit an unauthenticated attacker with access to a TeamCity server to bypass authentication checks and execute arbitrary operating system commands with the privileges of the TeamCity server process. The security flaw has since come under active exploitation in the wild, with the U.S. Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency (CISA) adding it to the Known Exploited Vulnerabilities (KEV) catalog on August 5, 2026. The exploitation was discovered by JetBrains on August 23, 2026. In subsequent updates, JetBrains said the threat actor accessed data contained in the Cadence server backup from 2024 and that they obtained unauthorized access that could have allowed them to reach storage containing data associated with current Cadence users, including email addresses, project source code, and credentials. "This affects the same group
Sep 5, 2026 · via thehackernews.com
OpenAI, which has been surrounded by controversies in recent days, including reports of its AI agent going rogue on Hugging Face servers and concerns over the Cybersecurity safety of its Astra server, has once again made headlines—this time for a positive development. The company has announced a $1 billion “Daybreak” initiative designed to help public and private organizations protect themselves against the growing threat of AI-powered cyber attacks. OpenAI President and co-founder Greg Brockman announced the initiative as a significant push to strengthen cybersecurity across critical sectors in the United States and around the world. The program is intended to support organizations that operate essential services and infrastructure, many of which are increasingly vulnerable as cyber criminals begin using more sophisticated AI tools. According to the initiative, the funding is expected to be deployed over the next six months, with a major focus on improving organizations’ existing cybersecurity capabilities. The investment will support the development and adoption of technologies that can identify, prevent, and respond to emerging AI-driven cyber threats more effectively. The initiative could prove particularly important for industries that form the backbone of modern society. These include wastewater treatment systems, electric power grids, nuclear facilities, state and local governments, financial institutions, nonprofit organizations, educational institutions, transportation networks and manufacturing companies. A successful cyberattack against any of these sectors could potentially disrupt essential services and cause significant economic and social consequences. At the center of the initiative is the Daybreak Defense Network, which is expected to bring together more than 35 cybersecurity partners, products and services. The network aims to create a broader ecosystem in which organizations can access advanced security technologies and expertise without having to develop every defensive capability independently. Several major cybersecurity companies are expected to be part of this ecosystem, including Cisco, CrowdStrike, Cloudflare and
Sep 5, 2026 · via cybersecurity-insiders.com
The first humanoid robot to clear the European Union's mandatory cybersecurity standard is made by a subsidiary of a Chinese state-linked automaker — and the certification that opens European doors does not close the one that China's National Intelligence Law keeps permanently ajar. AiMOGA Robotics, the embodied AI arm of Chery Automobile, is exhibiting its Mornine humanoid at IFA Berlin 2026 this week with credentials that no other humanoid brand can currently claim: triple EU certification including EN 18031, the cybersecurity framework for connected products that became enforceable on August 1, 2025. Mornine is scheduled to walk the inaugural "Robots on the Runway" catwalk on the Creator Stage at Messe Berlin on September 5 alongside Unitree, AgiBot, and nine other robotics firms. It will do so as the most commercially deployed humanoid brand in the world — and as a product whose parent company must cooperate with Chinese government intelligence requests under Article 7 of China's National Intelligence Law. These two facts are not in conflict, and that is precisely what procurement officers and institutional buyers need to understand before making a decision. AiMOGA's EU certification was awarded by TÜV Rheinland in September 2025, covering hardware safety, radio equipment, and cybersecurity — but the certification addresses only unauthorized external access, not government-directed intelligence requests. What AiMOGA Is, and Where It Comes From AiMOGA Robotics was founded in January 2025 as Chery Automobile's dedicated embodied AI subsidiary. Chery — China's largest passenger vehicle exporter, a Fortune Global 500 company with approximately CN¥480 billion (approximately $71.5 billion) in annual revenue — chose to build AiMOGA on a specific engineering thesis: that the manufacturing discipline required to produce automobiles at scale translates directly into making better robots. Chery holds approximately 77 percent of AiMOGA, with Anhui and Wuhu municipal governments among the indirect
Sep 5, 2026 · via techtimes.com
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Sep 5, 2026 · via nbclosangeles.com
If we have selected the wrong experience for you, please change it above. As cybersecurity merger and acquisition (M&A) activity continues to accelerate, companies are confronting the cost and complexity of tool sprawl. In 2025 alone, acquisitions rose 5% and disclosed deal value jumped 82%, signaling a shift toward integrated platforms. For CFOs, the message is clear: it’s time to take a closer look at your cybersecurity investment strategy before renewal cycles lock in more complexity and potential risk. This edition of CFO Insights explores the questions to ask and the steps to take. The average enterprise now manages 83 separate security tools sourced from about 29 vendors. Decentralized purchasing and emerging attacks and vulnerabilities are just two factors that often lead to a bloated ecosystem, which can complicate cyber risk quantification efforts. Couple that with converging developments—like the speed of evolving threats, human and machine identities that need to be protected, and board scrutiny of cyber incidents—and the impact of tool sprawl is now a more urgent financial and governance issue. Our recommendation? Start with a focused portfolio review to map each tool to the risk it addresses and flag redundancy. Demand financial quantification of cybersecurity risk—tying priority threat scenarios to plausible dollar impact rather than relying on heat maps. Build CFO-CISO co-governance, with the CFO co-owning risk appetite and pressure-testing the investment thesis behind major decisions. Scrutinize the full economics of consolidation, testing whether the savings are real and whether concentration risk is being created. And embed regulatory obligations as guardrails, separating compliance-driven spend from risk-driven spend. Together, these steps reframe the CFO from cost controller to co-governor who turns cyber spending into measurable business value. And, this edition of CFO Insights offers recommended strategies for finance leaders through the process and ask the right questions along the
Sep 4, 2026 · via deloitte.com
PERSPECTIVES FROM THE CAMPUS One of the strengths of Indiana is that we bring together a variety of perspectives from the plethora of areas that touch the field of cyber, especially through the colleges, universities, and other institutions of higher education throughout our state. Hence the name, “Perspectives from the Campus”, we invite experts – immersed in the pursuit of educating their students – to offer their knowledge for finding solutions in cybersecurity that benefit all Hoosiers. In the latest installment of this series, David Dungan, who serves as the executive director at the Center for Security Services and Cyber Defense at Anderson University, discusses the importance of understanding – and protecting -- your credit score. He also offers some helpful tips and what to look for if you’re contacted by someone representing a credit bureau and what to do if they offer to “fix” or repair your credit. By David Dungan It’s fair to say that when it comes to a number that can have impact on our everyday life, there are, arguably, few things that could be considered more impactful than the three digits that represent our credit score. And given the fact that a credit score represents the likelihood that you’ll repay the cash you borrow, understanding the importance of those scores (from the 3 different credit bureaus) is vital, as it can affect your ability to get a loan, rent an apartment, or purchase a home. In some cases, it can be even used to qualify for employment or to determine your eligibility to purchase an insurance policy. Originally, It was created to represent your credit risk which is composed into a credit score. Scoring ranges can vary but often follow from high being the best. For instance, Equifax scores: - 850-800: Excellent - 799-740: Very
Sep 4, 2026 · via in.gov
Companies Have 6 Months to Prepare for Automated Attacks Frontier AI models have already demonstrated they can autonomously — and in some cases, inadvertently — conduct end-to-end compromises, but the situation will become more urgent very soon. With multiple benchmarks confirming that at least one frontier model can autonomously execute an end-to-end compromise, cybersecurity experts are warning that companies have to pick up the pace in securing their attack surfaces and adopting AI-speed defenses. On Sept. 2, consulting firm Booz Allen became the latest organization to confirm that a frontier model — Anthropic's Mythos 5 — can act as a fully autonomous hacker and compromise a production-grade enterprise network. The company also released a metric, dubbed the Cyber Weapon Index (CWI), to benchmark a model's capabilities, pairing the ability to find and exploit vulnerabilities with the ability to execute and attack a target. In their evaluation, Mythos scored an 80, while the next-closest contender, SpaceXAI's Grok-4.5, scored a 49. However, the current standings are not as important as where we will be in six months, says Brad Medairy, president of Booz Allen's National Cyber practice. "Our view is there's going to be some level of parity, at least between the frontier models and the Chinese models over probably a six-month horizon, and so everyone is in a rapid race to evolve these capabilities," he says, adding that, when facing human attackers, defenders had the advantage, but "in the future, the balance of power shifts to the offense, because the attacker can deliver effects at speed and scale that the traditional defenses can't keep pace with." Booz Allen's findings mirror those of other efforts to benchmark the cyberattack capabilities of frontier models. In June, the AI Security Institute — a research arm of the UK government's Department for Science, Innovation, and
Sep 4, 2026 · via darkreading.com
The Good, the Bad and the Ugly in Cybersecurity – Week 36 (2026) The Good | Authorities Dismantle Sality Botnet & Charge Russian Serial Phisher A coordinated global takedown has successfully dismantled the long-standing Sality malware infrastructure and its associated domains in the U.S. and Europe. Between the DoJ, FBI, Europol, and Eurojust, the joint operation targeted the peer-to-peer (P2P) botnet that has been active since at least 2003. Operating out of Russia, the criminal group behind the botnet controlled over 15,000 infected devices worldwide. In recent years, Sality's primary payload was EggJagger, a stealthy clipjacking tool that hijacked cryptocurrency transactions by silently replacing wallet addresses. To neutralize the threat, cyber defenders turned Sality's P2P architecture against itself through protocol-level peer list manipulation, isolating infected hosts from the operators' command channels. While this massive sinkhole operation permanently blocks new payloads, the sinkholing doesn't remove malware already resident on infected machines and individual infections will persist until cleaned up. California’s federal grand jury has unsealed an indictment charging a Russian national for orchestrating a mass cyberespionage and phishing campaign targeting independent 80,000 freelancers. Authorities extradited Searzhudin Tamirlanovich Aktulaev to the U.S. following his arrest in Cyprus back in May 2025. Federal prosecutors allege that between June 2016 and November 2017, the defendant used 255 fake user accounts on a popular freelance platform to distribute malware-laced Excel files to unsuspecting workers. When opened, these attachments executed malicious macro commands that silently installed TVRAT and DarkVNC onto the victim endpoints. These remote access tools granted the attackers comprehensive control to harvest e-commerce credentials, private online passwords, and personally identifiable information (PII). Aktulaev currently remains in federal custody facing multiple serious charges, including wire fraud conspiracy, protected computer damage, and aggravated identity theft. The Bad | Iranian Threat Actors Pose as Recruiters to Deploy
Sep 4, 2026 · via sentinelone.com
Today’s small-to-mid-size businesses (SMBs) are addressing a dicey two-front battle when it comes to security. They often have the smallest security teams and the most limited resources, yet they can be high-value targets for hackers. Threat actors understand that today’s SMBs are left to manage a sprawling landscape of browser-based work, SaaS applications, and AI tools with almost no security budget. Without the resources, staffing, and security investments available to larger enterprises, SMBs are often viewed by threat actors as attractive, high-reward targets. In part because of this, small businesses are three times more likely to be targeted by cybercriminals than larger companies. From January to April 2026 alone, small businesses experienced a 49% cyberattack rate, with incidents occurring every seven seconds. As AI continues to make threat actors better at evading protections, SMBs must prioritize their safety, especially as annual losses reach $254,000 per breach, and cause 60% of attacked companies to close within six months. Without the dedicated staff or high budget for cybersecurity operations, many SMBs turn to outside partners or solutions to guide security decisions. But an SMB can have strong security solutions in place and still struggle if the people using it don’t know how to get the most from it. Security vendors therefore have an opportunity to do more than provide technology. They need to close the gap between having a security tool and knowing how to use it effectively. Security is Stronger When Knowledge is Shared Today’s SMBs often have one IT generalist responsible for a growing number of threats, changing what effective support looks like for the average user. Without dedicated security teams, a lack of in-house expertise, and limited bandwidth, it’s harder for SMBs to problem solve, make confident decisions, or improve their security posture — which is a cyber incident
Sep 4, 2026 · via cybersecurity-insiders.com
OpenAI on Thursday officially unveiled GPT‑6 Astra, which it described as the "world's most intelligent and aligned model." The development comes days after the artificial intelligence (AI) company said the model had reached the "Critical" cybersecurity capability threshold under its Preparedness Framework. "Astra is state-of-the-art on computer use, browsing, software engineering, cybersecurity, science, and professional work. Astra saturates FrontierMath Tier 4 with a 98% score," OpenAI said. "Astra also saturates ARC-AGI-3 with a 99.9% score and ExploitBench with a 100% score. It also sets a new frontier on computer and browser use, handling the most demanding professional work with unmatched speed, accuracy, and judgment." The model is currently rolling out to a small set of organizations and is expected to be available to all ChatGPT Plus, Pro, Business, and Enterprise users, as well as through the OpenAI API, Microsoft Azure, and Amazon Web Services (AWS) Bedrock. On ExploitBench, which evaluates a model's ability to turn known software vulnerabilities into working exploits, Astra achieved a perfect score of 100%, as opposed to 78.5% for GPT‑5.6 Sol, its previous frontier cyber-capable model. OpenAI said the model also achieves substantially higher arbitrary code-execution rates than GPT‑5.6 Sol when testing its exploit development capabilities using flaws from the previous three months between July and August 2026. This included two zero-day vulnerabilities in unspecified software. Astra is also equipped to use previously unknown vulnerabilities to achieve code execution in hardened browsers and develop privilege-escalation exploits for hardened operating-systems, if allowed to run without any safeguards. Given the dual-use nature of these tools – the capabilities that can help defenders find weaknesses faster can also be abused by bad actors to exploit them more easily – OpenAI said the version of Astra being released is limited to secure code review and patching, while refusing to comply
Sep 4, 2026 · via thehackernews.com
It's been a question for as long as military service has been part of American life. What can a veteran do for employment once their time in the armed forces is over? One expert tells Military.com that information technology and cybersecurity fields are a growing option for veterans who can translate their military training and skills into successful IT careers. "Some veterans leave the military with direct experience involving communications systems, networks, electronics, logistics, data or security protocols. Others may come from occupational specialties with little direct connection to technology but have transferable skills that can provide a foundation for an IT career," Grant Gibson, an IT expert with MyComputerCareer, said in an interview with Military.com. "The challenge is often translating that experience into terms civilian employers recognize." Gibson is a Marine Corps veteran and a lead instructor for MyComputerCareer, which is an accredited technical college offering hands-on IT training and certifications through online and on-campus classes in networking, cybersecurity, and technical careers. No prior IT experience is required. The school runs a Cyber Warrior Program with 12-24 weeks or 480 hours of total instruction time that is military-friendly and offers Department of Defense-compliant certifications, SkillBridge eligibility, and GI Bill benefit availability for veterans transitioning into civilian IT careers. Veterans Struggle to Find Second Careers Still, even with employment and training options available, veterans still struggle to find meaningful second careers. A 2023 survey commissioned by Veterans of Foreign Wars found that veterans transitioning to civilian life ranked finding a job and finding a purposeful career among the greatest non-health difficulties they face, at 33% and 28% respectively. Part of the problem, Gibson said, is the increasing use of AI in various industries that has led to job losses. But he said there are still opportunities. "Some organizations that reduced
Sep 4, 2026 · via military.com