As this recent article illustrates, many ransomware operators are now collecting information from victims before encrypting their data, and then threatening to release what they’ve collected – or actually releasing some of it – to increase the chance they’ll get paid. There have been many cases already where at least a portion of data has … Continue Reading
Scammers are always seeking new ways to target victims for Business Email Compromise (BEC) scams, where they leverage email to try to convince you to give them credentials, send them confidential information like W2s, send them money by changing things like direct deposit instructions, or give any other data that can help them profit from … Continue Reading
For Cybersecurity and Privacy, “What Are the Industry Standards? Are We Meeting Them?” These are questions the FTC Chairman, Joseph Simons, strongly suggested a CEO must ask before a data breach occurs to avoid the prospect of personal liability. These questions and statements by other commissioners emphasizing the FTC’s role – to bring about a … Continue Reading
In late January, the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services’ Healthcare & Public Health Sector Coordinating Council issued a new cybersecurity guidance document for healthcare businesses of all sizes. The guidance document, entitled “Health Industry Cybersecurity Practices: Managing Threats and Protecting Patients,” available at https://www.phe.gov/Preparedness/planning/405d/Pages/hic-practices.aspx, provides concrete and practical guidance for addressing what the … Continue Reading
The Yahoo! class action over the 2013-2014 hacks, affecting 1 billion (later updated to 3 billion) accounts, is poised to settle for $85 million – and the provision of free credit monitoring services for 200 million account holders for 2 years. While $85 million may seem like a relative bargain compared to the $350 million Verizon … Continue Reading
The Office of Civil Rights (OCR) announced in a press release this week that Anthem, Inc. (Anthem), one of the nation’s largest health benefit companies, has agreed to pay $16 million and take substantial corrective action to settle potential violations of the Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act (HIPAA) Privacy and Security Rules. This settlement … Continue Reading
A presentation at Black Hat recently revealed that the creators of the “SamSam” ransomware have netted over $6M to date, attacking mostly medium-to-large public and private sector organizations. And they’re showing no signs of slowing down. In the most recent SamSam attacks, the attackers concentrated their efforts on brute-force hacking of weak passwords on devices accessible … Continue Reading
While we have yet to see much in the way of major changes (or punishment) following the massive Equifax data breach last year, there are many changes being introduced at the state level with regard to breach notification, penalties, whether or not credit reporting agencies can charge you for freezing your credit, and consumer rights … Continue Reading
See European Regulation on the Protection of Personal Data Guide Sub-Contractor Edition, September 2017. Are you a contractor within the meaning of European Regulation on data protection? Are you subject to EU regulation on data protection? What is the main change introduced by the European regulation for contractors? What are your obligations as of May … Continue Reading
Per the Freedom of Information Act, US citizens have the right to access information from the federal government. We can visit Data.gov to search the more than 197,000 current datasets currently indexed on the site. While the intent is to leverage that data for the public good, there’s also an enormous amount of information available … Continue Reading
We received a proposed data breach bill (available here) recently circulated in Salem. This draft is a variant of Oregon House Bill 2581 that died in committee. That bill would have required, among other things, merchants impacted by security breaches to notify issuing banks of all the credit cards subject to the breach. Compared to … Continue Reading
Should I Place A Fraud Alert vs. Security Freeze? As a privacy professional, almost all your fellow employees were affected by the Equifax data breach. You may be asked about whether to place a fraud alert or a security freeze. You can send this guidance from the FTC on the difference between fraud alerts and … Continue Reading
Yawn – Another Company Failed to Patch. Wait! 144 Million Affected? A PR Disaster? Failure to promptly patch is an incredibly common cause of data breaches. Learn from Equifax’s situation about patching and communication. Boards, Senior Management and privacy personal should confirm that patches are applied promptly. Also, when breaches occur, hire and listen to … Continue Reading
