Sunday, November 06, 2022 // (IG): BB // Bubba3dPrints // Coffee for Bob
1,300 SpaceX units went offline, Ukraine worried about losing internet
Analyst notes: This is being talked about as a billing issue, yet these 1.3K units are said to be used in military operations. There currently are no public indicators pointing to system exploitation - but this could also be due to the RU’s efforts to establish a TTP to counter the ground stations.
FROM THE MEDIA: Ukraine’s fears deepened in the past week that its forces may lose access to Elon Musk’s Starlink internet service after 1,300 of the military’s satellite units went offline, according to two sources familiar with the matter cited by CNN. The satellite dishes made by Musk’s SpaceX have been globally hailed as a game-changing communication source for Ukraine’s military, allowing it to fight and stay online even as cell phones and internet have been destroyed in the Ukraine war.
READ THE STORY: Almayadeen
China's $40M shipment of military hardware to the Solomon Islands
Analyst notes: China’s security pact was a strategic play to establish a military presence in the Pacific. This stinks of the similar tactics used with the Spratlys… anti-ship and anti-aircraft missile systems, laser and jamming equipment will more than likely follow in the coming years.
FROM THE MEDIA: Strategic Analysis Australia director Michael Shoebridge said Australia and China were competing to be Prime Minister Manasseh Sogavares 'security partner of choice'. 'It seems our desperation to stop Beijing being Mr Sogavare's major source of arms and training means we have to provide assault weapons to his police, while Beijing provides truck-mounted water cannons,' Mr Shoebridge told The Australian.
READ THE STORY: Daily Mail
Musk’s Twitter takeover comes as the CCP steps up its targeting of smart Asian women
FROM THE MEDIA: Graphic online depictions of sexual assault, homophobia and racist imagery (sometimes involving Australian lawmakers) and life-threatening intimidation (including calling for targets to kill themselves) are a growing part of the Chinese Communist Party’s toolkit of digital transnational repression. Such imagery, and associated threats, characterize ongoing coordinated information operations the CCP is running online against women of Asian descent living in democracies around the world, including in Australia, the UK and the US.
READ THE STORY: ASPI
British government is inspecting all Internet-connected gadgets in UK
FROM THE MEDIA: All devices hosted in the UK open to the Internet are currently being scanned for vulnerabilities. National Cyber Security Centre (NCSC), the government organization in charge of the nation’s cyber security mission, is working on it. To help owners of Internet-connected systems understand their security posture and to determine the UK’s susceptibility to cyberattacks.
READ THE STORY: TechStory
Chip war against China threatens to undermine America
FROM THE MEDIA: The Biden Administration has been expanding sanctions against the electronic industry of China. In turn, Silicon Valley companies are being increasingly viewed as a major instrument of big politics. However, the “geopoliticization” of the IT industry on the part of Washington threatens to further undermine the international positions of the United States in this significant sector of the economy.
READ THE STORY: Modern Diplomacy
Iran says it tests satellite-carrying rocket, U.S. calls move 'destabilizing’
FROM THE MEDIA: Iran's Revolutionary Guards tested a new satellite-carrying rocket on Saturday, state media reported, a move the United States called "unhelpful and destabilizing". Washington fears the same long-range ballistic technology used to put satellites into orbit could also be used to launch nuclear warheads. Tehran has regularly denied having any such intention.
READ THE STORY: Reuters // Magnet
Hacked AU state government contractor says stolen data yet to be posted online
FROM THE MEDIA: A technology company working for the Victorian government says none of the data stolen by hackers on Thursday has been released online so far. PNORS Technology Group works with six state agencies, including the Education and Training Department, and stores sensitive personal information about families with children in primary schools, such as behavioral or alcohol and drug problems.
READ THE STORY: Brisbane Times // SBS News
IRS Ready to Tackle Rising Crypto Cases in Upcoming Tax Season
FROM THE MEDIA: IRS updated crypto taxation guidelines in October 2022. According to the reports of Bloomberg, The United States Internal Revenue Service(IRS) criminal investigation division is ready to crack down on tax evaders in the upcoming tax season. Jim Lee, Chief IRS Criminal Investigation division, noted that the division is building “hundreds” of crypto cases, many of which will be made public soon.
READ THE STORY: The Coin Republic
Misinformation is bad, but ‘solutions’ to stop it are even worse
FROM THE MEDIA: Americans can agree that misinformation is bad. Stopping it, however, is not so easily accomplished. There are no simple fixes to the spread of misinformation in a free society in which expression is constitutionally protected. Further, reckless or ill-advised efforts to bring a stop to misinformation could be more harmful to American democracy than the misinformation itself.
READ THE STORY: The Hill
Twitter launches $8 per month subscription service including verification
FROM THE MEDIA: Twitter launched its updated subscription service on Saturday, charging $7.99/month for a verification checkmark and other features. “Starting today, we’re adding great new features to Twitter Blue, and have more on the way soon,” the company announced on its app’s page in the Apple app store. Twitter said users who sign up will acquire the “blue checkmark” used to visibly verify users on the platform, describing the feature’s inclusion in the service as giving “power to the people.”
READ THE STORY: The Hill // NPR // CNBC
Indian hackers took control of Pakistani military leaders, diplomats' laptops at behest of secret services
FROM THE MEDIA: The Sunday Times in an undercover investigative report said that Indian hackers "seized control of computers owned by Pakistan’s politicians, generals and diplomats and eavesdropped on their private conversations apparently at the behest of the Indian secret services." Hacking gangs in India are at the center of a global hacking scandal after it was discovered that they had illegally gained thousands of dollars by breaking into the emails of hundreds of world leaders and other prominent individuals, TOI reported, some allegedly at the behest of government secret services, as per the report.
Cyberattacks Targeting Enemy States' Infrastructure on the Rise
FROM THE MEDIA: In the past year cyberattacks targeting critical infrastructure jumped from 20% of all nation-state attacks to 40%, per a Microsoft report(Opens in a new window). Microsoft put down the spike to Russia’s goal of hurting Ukrainian infrastructure, as well as the country’s “aggressive” espionage targeting of Ukraine’s allies, including the US. According to a blog post(Opens in a new window) posted by the company, Russia engaged in attempts to compromise IT firms in order to disrupt or gain intelligence from those firms’ government agency customers in NATO member countries.
READ THE STORY: PCMAG
Elon Musk’s Secret Obsession Explains Everything He Does
FROM THE MEDIA: On Thursday, The Guardian published an interview with Olena Zelensky, the first lady of Ukraine, during which she addressed an unlikely topic: Elon Musk’s role in Eastern Europe, where his Starlink internet service has become increasingly central to Ukraine’s war effort. Gently upbraiding the tech-mogul for previously advocating that Ukraine cede territory to Russia in exchange for peace, the first lady expressed gratitude for Starlink, but suggested Musk’s allegedly pro-Kremlin views on Crimea were a product of ignorance.
READ THE STORY: The Daily Beast
Disaster Trolls: what drives the dark world of conspiracy theories
FROM THE MEDIA: It was the worst day of Martin Hibbert’s life. On May 22, 2017, he and his daughter Eve, 14 at the time, narrowly survived the terrorist attack at an Ariana Grande concert at Manchester Arena that killed 22 people. It was a school night, so Martin and Eve had agreed to leave at 10.30pm, during the encore. The bomb was detonated a minute later. Martin and Eve sustained life-changing injuries; he is in a wheelchair, she had a brain injury and has lost the use of her left arm and leg.
READ THE STORY: The Sunday Time
Here’s how lawmakers are tackling rising cyber threats in the health sector
FROM THE MEDIA: “Over the past decade, the American public has witnessed increasingly brazen and disruptive attacks on its health care sector that jeopardize sensitive personal information, delay treatment, and ultimately lead to increased suffering and death,” Sen. Mark Warner (D-Va.), chairman of the Senate Intelligence Committee, noted in a report published this week, before outlining recommendations on ways the federal government can improve security standards in the sector to combat those attacks.
READ THE STORY: Yahoo News
Starlink: The end of unlimited internet by satellite without limitation
FROM THE MEDIA: In the United States, Starlink will limit the start beyond 1 TB of data consumed every month without paying an extra charge. If mobile internet access is often limited to a certain ceiling of useful data per month, fixed packages have the benefit of uncapped access. The days where the users of Internet access paid a subscription for their consumption started to arrive. However, the Internet access by satellite is still a new problem, and this is particularly true for Starlink. READ THE STORY: GN24
Octopus services for Android users in outage over five hours
Analyst notes: Octopus is a contactless payment system used heavily in HK. There is currently no indication of cyberattack or wrong doing. Octopus has been a target for criminal elements in the past but has also had outages due to use… so more to follow on this.
FROM THE MEDIA: Octopus, the most widely used payment method in Hong Kong, is seeing its online Android service crashing down today and remaining unavailable for more than five hours. Individuals and merchants with the Octopus app of Android can not use it for transactions, nor could the app function for topping up the amount of physical Octopus cards. Citizens found the outage started at around 7am and occurred with only the Android version app. Other versions of apps, such as iOS, were not affected.
READ THE STORY: The Standard
US desires multilateral chip fab equipment ban to China
FROM THE MEDIA: A month after rules were announced, Commerce Dept. officials have realized their embargoes may lose effectiveness over time if allies do not join them. Officials have said they are working to co-ordinate export controls with their allies to restrict the flow of foreign chip machinery to China by demanding that any non-US tools that use even the smallest amount of American technology should not be sold to China without Washington’s approval.
READ THE STORY: TechHQ
'Twitter as we know it is dead': Why Elon Musk's plans risk more scams and misinformation
FROM THE MEDIA: "Twitter as we know it is dead," Mark Weinstein, the founder of MeWe, a social networking app with 20 million users, tells Insider. "The company is now owned and run by one person. There is no other example of a mainstream social media company that's owned and controlled by one person." Kit Chapman of Falmouth University's School of Communication in southwest England, tells Insider that the risks of making users pay for verification are far greater than just the right to boast about a blue check.
READ THE STORY: Business Insider
Former Greek prime minister targeted by illegal wiretapping
FROM THE MEDIA: According to the Greek weekly “Documento”, former Prime Minister Antonis Samaras, current Ministers of Foreign Affairs, Finance, Development, Labor and Tourism are among the victims of the illegal tapping. and Nottingham Forest Football Clubs. The case has rocked the government for months. “There is no evidence,” its spokesman Giannis Oikonomo replied, though he asked the courts to open an investigation into the weekly’s revelations. He accused the newspaper of trying to “harm” the government and undermine its stability.
READ THE STORY: Electric City Mag
Liz Truss is on her FOURTH new mobile phone number since July after alleged Russian hacking
FROM THE MEDIA: Liz Truss is on her fourth new mobile phone number since July, as the security services battle to protect her from being further compromised by foreign powers. The Mail on Sunday revealed last week that the former Prime Minister had to change her number during the summer leadership contest after she was hacked by agents suspected of working for Russia.
READ THE STORY: MSN
Long-form text sharing is coming to Twitter
FROM THE MEDIA: Twitter will soon include a feature allowing users to add long-form text to their tweets, company owner and CEO Elon Musk announced on Saturday. Musk didn't say when the functionality would arrive, but promised it would end the "absurdity of notepad screenshots." He added that the company also plans to work on additional tools for creator monetization and enhancements to the platform's search functionality. "Search within Twitter reminds me of Infoseek in '98! That will also get a lot better pronto," he wrote.
READ THE STORY: Yahoo News
Items of interest
More Evidence of CCP Activism at U.S. Universities
FROM THE MEDIA: Dan Cadman noted last month that the infamous Confucius Institutes, operating as propaganda arms of the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) on U.S. campuses, had simply rebranded themselves, and that many American universities decided to engage in business as usual by reconnecting with the “new” organizations, from which no doubt money and influence flow freely.
And this week, George Fishman published a CIS Backgrounder in which he outlined in detail the danger that Chinese students and exchange visitors pose to U.S. national security, given their CCP masters' iron-fisted ability to control their lives even while studying or conducting research on our shores. This renders them particularly open to pressure to engage in theft of information and data about high-end technologies and research that China can put to great advantage, both economically and in its effort to become the predominant global superpower.
READ THE STORY: CIS
Gravitas: Confucius Institutes: China's secret propaganda tool (Video)
FROM THE MEDIA: China has a 'trojan horse', the 'Confucius Institute'. There are 530 such institutes in 6 continents. Beijing uses them for espionage, propaganda, monitoring Chinese nationals & recruiting agents. Palki Sharma Upadhyay tells you why these institutes are back in the news.
How China’s Surveillance Is Growing More Invasive (Video)
FROM THE MEDIA: A New York Times analysis of over 100,000 government bidding documents found that China’s ambition to collect digital and biological data from its citizens is more expansive and invasive than previously known.
These open source products are reviewed from analysts at InfoDom Securities and provide possible context about current media trends in regard to the realm of cyber security. The stories selected cover a broad array of cyber threats and are intended to aid readers in framing key publicly discussed threats and overall situational awareness. InfoDom Securities does not specifically endorse any third-party claims made in their original material or related links on their sites, and the opinions expressed by third parties are theirs alone. Contact InfoDom Securities at dominanceinformation@gmail.com