Stolen credentials can enable account takeover and lateral movement; phishing-resistant MFA, password managers, and rapid revocation reduce the risk.
Search across headline titles and summaries.
Background for this topic.
Credentials are the data used to verify a user's identity to a system, commonly including usernames, passwords, security tokens, or biometric identifiers. They serve as gatekeepers for access to accounts, applications, and sensitive information. Attackers target credentials to impersonate users, escalate privileges, or gain unauthorized system access.
Compromise of credentials can occur through phishing, credential stuffing, or theft from insecure storage. Effective defenses include enforcing strong, unique passwords, implementing multi-factor authentication (MFA), and securely storing credentials using hashing or encryption. Monitoring for unusual login patterns and promptly revoking compromised credentials are also critical to limit attacker impact.
A suspected Chinese threat actor tracked as UNC3886 uses publicly available open-source rootkits named 'Reptile' and 'Medusa' to remain hidden on VMware ESXi virtual machines, allowing them to conduct credential theft, command execution, and lateral movement. [...]
Cyber espionage groups associated with China have been linked to a long-running campaign that has infiltrated several telecom operators located in a single Asian country at least since 2021
The US passenger rail giant said attackers used previously compromised credentials to crack accounts and access a freight train of personal data.
Push Fatigue Attacks Succeed 5% of the Time, Surge in the Morning, Researchers FindMultifactor authentication is a must-have security defense for repelling outright credential stuffing and password spraying attacks. But no defense is foolproof. Attackers have been refining their tactics for bypassing MFA, including using technology and trickery.
A Barracuda report found that 92% of organizations experienced an average of six credential compromises caused by email-based social engineering attacks in 2023
Court Filing: Threat Actor Stole Admin Credentials From IT Service Desk ContractorMedibank's lack of MFA on its global VPN allowed a hacker to use credentials stolen from an IT services desk contractor to access the private health insurer's IT systems in 2022, leading to a dark web data leak affecting 9.7 million individuals, Australian regulators said in court documents.
Who needs ransomware when you can scare techies into coughing up their credentials? Notorious cyber gang UNC3944 – the crew suspected of involvement in the recent attacks on Snowflake and MGM Entertainment, and plenty more besides – has changed its tactics and is now targeting SaaS applications…