Washington Works Blog

2016 saw many notorious data breaches, along with developments in malware and other threats to security. It’s always helpful to reflect on these developments so that the knowledge can be used in the future to aid in developing new strategies for taking on the latest threats. How will your business learn from the mistakes of others in 2017?

In both the home and the business, security cameras are becoming more and more commonplace as a means of preserving security. However, some malware can turn these devices, and others, into cyber security threats.

Data might be the most important aspect of your organization, but how well do you protect it throughout your network? Every organization has data like personally identifiable information and financial credentials stashed away somewhere on the network, so security isn’t something that you can ignore. One of the best ways you can safeguard your data is through the use of encryption.

Computing systems are always vulnerable to some obscure hack or another, and researchers are always trying to find ways to shore them up and prevent future attacks. One previously undiscovered hack literally sounds far-fetched. It uses the sounds that your hard drive makes to help a hacker steal data from your machine, including encryption keys designed to keep your data safe and secure.

Social media is a great way for organizations to share information about their products and services, but while it’s great for those who want to reach a new audience, it’s also exposing you to another audience that you may not want to be familiar with: hackers. Believe it or not, there are hackers who are trying to take advantage of the personal information you share on your social media accounts.

Hackers are always getting their hands into sticky situations, but one of the hot topics in world politics--the 2016 United States presidential election--is one of the nastier ones in recent years. In the past few months alone, hackers have reportedly breached not only the Democratic National Committee, but have also infiltrated at least two state election databases.

Halloween is a time when people of all ages dress up as something spooky that they’re really not. For the scariest of hackers, every day is like a reverse Halloween as they try to scam victims by pretending to be someone safe and trustworthy--a persona that they’re really not. This Halloween, don’t get tricked by the haunted hack!

One of the biggest hacks of 2016 was the United States National Security Agency, by a hacking group calling themselves the Shadow Brokers. This hack came to light after tools belonging to the NSA were discovered on the black market. How could a data breach of this magnitude happen to one of the most secure IT systems in the world? Newly released evidence may provide the answers.

Do you find yourself traveling for your business? Be it for a conference, a series of meetings that require your attendance, or some other reason, you may very likely need to spend some time on the road; time that could be spent on tasks your business needs to function. Despite the lack of a traditional workspace, this time spent traveling doesn’t necessarily need to be time wasted. Thanks to the technology of today, you have the ability to remain productive while mobile.

The idea of speaking to your device and having it perform tasks is hardly a new one. Siri and Google Now have long dominated this industry. Microsoft released Cortana in an attempt to enter the voice assistant race, but with Windows 10’s anniversary update, more harm than good could come from using Cortana.

Do you remember how your bank issued you a new debit or credit card with a built-in, security-enhancing chip? There are now ATMs specially designed for use with these chips. Unfortunately, the same technology that was originally meant to secure your finances can also be used against you in the form of fraudulent cash withdrawals.

Technology grows more mobile with each passing moment, and emojis have popped up in places that nobody could have dreamt of. In particular, business communications have experienced a surge of emojis, but how (and why) is this the case? Aren’t emojis unprofessional? Shouldn’t they have no place in the business world? Well, let’s explore this a bit.

The ransomware machine keeps moving forward, despite significant opposition. In particular, the ransomware tag-team duo of Petya and Mischa have steamrolled most attempts to block them from accessing critical systems, always finding ways to outsmart security professionals. Now, these ransomwares have adopted a Ransomware as a Service model, which has made significant changes to the way that this ransomware is distributed.

Businesses these days practically need to expect disaster, as even the most careful and calculated security practices could result in a data disaster. Some businesses don’t fear for their data enough, and this leads them to neglect planning for threats such as hackers, natural disasters, and user error. As the business owner, you need to stay informed about how best to handle these situations.

In the latest round of security patches released by Microsoft, 27 vulnerabilities were fixed. Affected software includes major titles like Windows, Microsoft Office, Internet Explorer, and the new Edge browser. It’s imperative that you apply these security patches as soon as you can, or else your system will be exposed to some serious threats.

The short, yet devastating, history of ransomware is littered with what amounts to individual horror stories. As you may well know, ransomware, is a particularly devious and potentially devastating strain of malware that, when enacted, locks a computer’s files down so that the user can’t access them. In their stead, a message is relayed that instructs them to contact a third party to pay a ransom for access to the files. This is where the threat gets its name.

Cyber security professionals and Internet users rejoice, for the “Spam King,” Sanford Wallace, has finally been sentenced for his longtime use of stolen Facebook credentials to spam other users. Between 2008 and 2009, he had stolen credentials for Facebook accounts, and then used the accounts to send credential-stealing web links. Now, he gets to spend the next two and a half years in prison, and pay an oddly-specific fine of $310,629.

Cloud computing may be a great asset to your business, but there are still plenty of executives that remain quite reluctant about implementing it. One of the big reasons is that security breaches are often covered with high exposure on the news, and this makes it seem like the cloud isn’t a good way to store sensitive data. Now, however, cloud computing security has reached a high point, and you can bet that the cloud has ways of enhancing IT security for your business, too.

Online threats against healthcare organizations are currently one of the biggest cybersecurity issues. A reported 100-million-plus total medical records have been compromised, according to IBM’s 2016 Cyber Security Intelligence Index. How could a hacker profit off of accessing someone’s medical records? Simply put: ransomware.

There aren’t many instances of hackers targeting physical infrastructure, but the few that make themselves known tend to be quite catastrophic. Take, for example, the devastating cyber attack on the Ukrainian power infrastructure, which left thousands of citizens powerless. Now, several months later, authorities believe that other major countries could also become a target of similar attacks.