Latest cybersecurity reporting from selected sources.

Hackers Constantly Break 'Confirmation of Data Destruction' PromisesWhen a business that stores children's personal data gets hit by data-leaking extortionists, what should it do? For Instructure, which develops online learning platform Canvas, the answer was to pay a ransom, and tell victims, straight-faced, to have "digital confirmation of data destruction."

Internal Communications Dumped Online, Revealing Fresh Victims, Repeat TacticsRansomware group The Gentlemen, a relative newcomer to the cybercrime scene, suffered a leak of its internal communications, revealing previously non-public victims, a variety of tactics, techniques and tools, and a relentless focus on popping backup and storage infrastructure.

Prolific ShinyHunters Extortion Group Made 'Pay or Leak' Threat to VictimHome security giant ADT has suffered a data breach that appears to have exposed personally identifiable information tied to 5.5 million customers. Prolific extortionist group ShinyHunters claimed credit for the attack, saying it stole Salesforce data after socially engineering an ADT employee.

Newcomer 'Insomnia' Appears to Favor US Healthcare-Related EntitiesA new cybercriminal gang, Insomnia, appears to have its eyes wide open for potential healthcare-related targets. Since surfacing on the darkweb in recent weeks, the apparent data theft group has chalked up 18 alleged victims on its data leak site, with more than half having ties to healthcare.

Bitcoin Joining Fee for Affiliates and No Proven Victims Cited by ResearchersNewcomer ransomware group 0APT is being branded a "likely scam operation," not least after a list of over 200 supposed victims turned out to be bogus, if not entirely AI-generated - never mind a 1 bitcoin joining fee for would-be affiliates and outdated crypto-locking malware.

Leaked Financial and Admissions Data Includes Contact Details for 'Top Donors'Harvard University has been named as a victim and doxed by hack-and-leak group ShinyHunters, apparently as a result of the cybercrime group's ongoing "live phishing" attacks that often attempt to trick IT help desks into giving attackers direct access to a victim's network and cloud-based data.

Leaked Financial and Admissions Data Includes Contact Details for 'Top Donors'Harvard University has been named as a victim and doxed by hack-and-leak group ShinyHunters, apparently as a result of the cybercrime group's ongoing "live phishing" attacks that often attempt to trick IT help desks into giving attackers direct access to a victim's network and cloud-based data.

Revenue From Supply-Chain Attacks by Clop Group Sharply Fell, Report InvestigatorsOnce lucrative steal-and-leak campaigns pioneered by Russian ransomware group Clop look set to go the way of the dinosaurs. While an estimated 25% of victims paid a ransom in the inaugural campaign five years ago, the number of victims that paid fell to zero by 2023, report ransomware responders.

Cybercrime Gang Rhysida Still Lists the Practice on Its Leak Site Among Its VictimsA Kansas medical group will pay $1.2 million to settle proposed class action litigation involving an attack that compromised the sensitive data of nearly 256,000 individuals. The Rhysida ransomware operation claimed responsibility and said it stole 3 terabytes.

Criminals Claim Leak of Customer Data From Six Victims, Including Qantas AirlinesA ransomware group that's been extorting Salesforce customers leaked some stolen data, following the FBI disrupting its shakedown sites. ShinyHunters, part of the rebranded Scattered Lapsus$ Hunters group, after leaking data from six victims, declared its Salesforce customer shakedown over.

Scattered Lapsus$ Hunters Claims 1 Billion Stolen Records, Pressures Victims to PayContinuing its ongoing extortion of Salesforce customers, the Scattered Lapsus$ Hunters ransomware operation has launched a data leak site, claiming to have stolen 1 billion records from hundreds of organizations that integrated Salesforce with the Salesloft Drift AI chatbot.

Now-Dormant Gang Claimed North Carolina, Florida Groups on Data Leak Site This YearTwo medical practices - in North Carolina and Florida - are notifying a total of more than 700,000 patients whose information was potentially stolen in separate hacks earlier this year. The now-dormant ransomware gang BianLian had claimed both organizations as victims on its dark website.

Ransomware Gang Nova Poised to Leak Patient Data, Lab Stays Mum on NegotiationsWith ransomware gang Nova threatening to leak patient data on the darkweb, a Dutch laboratory that performs cervical cancer tests for a government screening program is mum about the ransom negotiations, but it says the cyberattack in July has affected 941,000 patients.

Extortionists Detail Fresh Victims, Although Sensitivity of Stolen Data UnclearExtortionists tied to the Scattered Spider and ShinyHunters hacking collectives have begun naming victims and leaking data via a new, dedicated Telegram channel. Many of the breaches appear to trace to social engineering attacks that gained attackers access to a victim's Salesforce instance.

Also: ToolShell Hits South Africa, Most Americans Are Online Fraud VictimsThis week: Did China sneak a peek into ToolShell? ToolShell hacking in South Africa, Cisco flaws, an Arizona woman sentenced for aiding North Korea. Most Americans scammed online, a NASCAR data breach and a claimed data leak at France's Naval Group. Orange telecom disrupted. Dating app Tea breach.

Exposes Details of Victims, 'Aggressive' Negotiations, Cryptocurrency AddressesOne year to the day after an international law enforcement operation unmasked and indicted the leader of the notorious LockBit ransomware group, a hacker has sent the group another love letter.

After Disrupting Ascension Health, Black Basta Forecast Reprisals From FBI, Moscow"We are pentesters, not murderers," ransomware group Black Basta claimed in its negotiations with victim Ascension Healthcare in May 2024, after its attack led to widespread disruptions and patient safety alerts. Leaked chat logs reveal the group feared resulting reprisals from the FBI and Moscow.

Group Cross-Referenced Open-Source Victim Intelligence With Infostealer HaulsThe leak of 200,000 internal chat messages for the Black Basta operation provides an overview of how a modern ransomware group organizes itself to take down victims in the most efficient, profit-maximizing manner possible, using a variety of tactics that should be, in theory, easy to repel.

'He Is an Idiot,' Dissatisfied Hacker Writes of BossTwo hundred thousand internal chat messages from the Russian ransomware group Black Basta have been leaked online, supposedly in reprisal for the operation targeting Russian banks. The partial logs, spanning 13 months, detail negotiations with victims, ransoms paid, internal disagreements and more.

RansomHub, Play and Akira Appear to Dominate; Numerous Newcomers Join the FrayWhile ransomware groups' data-leak sites regularly lie, if taken at face value, in December 2024 they collectively listed the largest number of victims ever seen in a one-month period, dominated by RansomHub, Play and Akira operations, plus a bevy of newcomers, researchers report.