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Category — Qr Code
Russian Star Blizzard Targets WhatsApp Accounts in New Spear-Phishing Campaign

Russian Star Blizzard Targets WhatsApp Accounts in New Spear-Phishing Campaign

Jan 16, 2025 Spear Phishing / Threat Intelligence
The Russian threat actor known as Star Blizzard has been linked to a new spear-phishing campaign that targets victims' WhatsApp accounts, signaling a departure from its longstanding tradecraft in a likely attempt to evade detection. "Star Blizzard's targets are most commonly related to government or diplomacy (both incumbent and former position holders), defense policy or international relations researchers whose work touches on Russia, and sources of assistance to Ukraine related to the war with Russia," the Microsoft Threat Intelligence team said in a report  shared with The Hacker News. Star Blizzard (formerly SEABORGIUM) is a Russia-linked threat activity cluster known for its credential harvesting campaigns. Active since at least 2012, it's also tracked under the monikers Blue Callisto, BlueCharlie (or TAG-53), Calisto (alternately spelled Callisto), COLDRIVER, Dancing Salome, Gossamer Bear, Iron Frontier, TA446, and UNC4057. Previously observed attack ...
New QR Code Phishing Campaign Exploits Microsoft Sway to Steal Credentials

New QR Code Phishing Campaign Exploits Microsoft Sway to Steal Credentials

Aug 28, 2024 Phishing Attack / Data Breach
Cybersecurity researchers are calling attention to a new QR code phishing (aka quishing) campaign that leverages Microsoft Sway infrastructure to host fake pages, once again highlighting the abuse of legitimate cloud offerings for malicious purposes. "By using legitimate cloud applications, attackers provide credibility to victims, helping them to trust the content it serves," Netskope Threat Labs researcher Jan Michael Alcantara said . "Additionally, a victim uses their Microsoft 365 account that they're already logged-into when they open a Sway page, that can help persuade them about its legitimacy as well. Sway can also be shared through either a link (URL link or visual link) or embedded on a website using an iframe." The attacks have primarily singled out users in Asia and North America, with technology, manufacturing, and finance sectors being the most sought-after sectors. Microsoft Sway is a cloud-based tool for creating newsletters, presentations...
Entra ID Data Protection: Essential or Overkill?

Entra ID Data Protection: Essential or Overkill?

May 06, 2025SaaS Security / Identity Management
Microsoft Entra ID (formerly Azure Active Directory) is the backbone of modern identity management, enabling secure access to the applications, data, and services your business relies on. As hybrid work and cloud adoption accelerate, Entra ID plays an even more central role — managing authentication, enforcing policy, and connecting users across distributed environments. That prominence also makes it a prime target. Microsoft reports over 600 million attacks on Entra ID every day. These aren't just random attempts, but include coordinated, persistent, and increasingly automated campaigns designed to exploit even small vulnerabilities. Which brings us to the core question: Are Entra ID's native protections enough? Where do they fall short — and what steps should you take to close the gaps and ensure you're covered? Understanding Entra ID At its core, Microsoft Entra ID is your enterprise identity and access management system. It defines how users prove who they are, what resources...
QR Code Bug in Apple iOS 11 Could Lead You to Malicious Sites

QR Code Bug in Apple iOS 11 Could Lead You to Malicious Sites

Mar 28, 2018
A new vulnerability has been disclosed in iOS Camera App that could be exploited to redirect users to a malicious website without their knowledge. The vulnerability affects Apple's latest iOS 11 mobile operating system for iPhone, iPad, and iPod touch devices and resides in the built-in QR code reader. With iOS 11, Apple introduced a new feature that gives users ability to automatically read QR codes using their iPhone's native camera app without requiring any third-party QR code reader app. You need to open the Camera app on your iPhone or iPad and point the device at a QR code. If the code contains any URL, it will give you a notification with the link address, asking you to tap to visit it in Safari browser. However, be careful — you may not be visiting the URL displayed to you, security researcher Roman Mueller discovered . According to Mueller, the URL parser of built-in QR code reader for iOS camera app fails to detect the hostname in the URL, which allows at...
cyber security

The State of GRC 2025: From Cost Center to Strategic Business Driver

websiteDrataGovernance, Risk and Compliance
Drata's report takes a look at how GRC professionals are approaching data protection regulations, AI, and the ability to maintain customer trust.
QRLJacking — Hacking Technique to Hijack QR Code Based Quick Login System

QRLJacking — Hacking Technique to Hijack QR Code Based Quick Login System

Jul 28, 2016
Do you know that you can access your WeChat, Line and WhatsApp chats on your desktop as well using an entirely different, but fastest authentication system? It's SQRL , or Secure Quick Response Login, a QR-code-based authentication system that allows users to quickly sign into a website without having to memorize or type in any username or password. QR codes are two-dimensional barcodes that contain a significant amount of information such as a shared key or session cookie. A website that implements QR-code-based authentication system would display a QR code on a computer screen and anyone who wants to log-in would scan that code with a mobile phone app. Once scanned, the site would log the user in without typing in any username or password. Since passwords can be stolen using a keylogger, a man-in-the-middle (MitM) attack, or even brute force attack, QR codes have been considered secure as it randomly generates a secret code, which is never revealed to anybody else. ...
Windows 10 Blue Screen of Death Gets QR Code

Windows 10 Blue Screen of Death Gets QR Code

Apr 13, 2016
If you are a Microsoft's Windows user, you may have encountered the infamous Blue Screen of Death (BSOD) . The Blue Screen of Death generally appears when Windows encounters any critical error due to software or hardware issues, displaying a sad face and no information other than "Your PC ran into a problem." However, now the company is apparently giving its infamous Blue Screen of Death a makeover. With the Microsoft's Anniversary Update, the company is making the Blue Screen of Death a little helpful for its users. Microsoft is adding QR code to its Blue Screen of Death (BSOD) in Windows 10 that will make it easier for users to identify potential issues with their devices. The new QR codes are featured in the Redmond's latest Windows 10 Preview, Build 14316, which will debut this summer as the Windows 10 Anniversary Update. Must Read:   Step-by-Step Tutorial to Run Ubuntu on latest Windows 10 Preview Build . Now, when your operating...
Hacking Google Glass with QR Code to sniff user data

Hacking Google Glass with QR Code to sniff user data

Jul 17, 2013
Researchers at mobile security firm Lookout discovered a security flaw in Google Glass which allowed them to capture data without the user's knowledge, when the user merely took a photo that captured a malicious QR code. Lookout was able to force Google Glass to silently connect to a Wi-Fi access point, which let the researchers view all of the data flowing to and from the device. When combined with an Android 4.0.4 web vulnerability , the hack apparently gave researchers full control of the Glass headset. The problem was that Google Glass could be told to execute a QR code without the user having to give permission. Because of Glass's limited user interface, Google set up the device's camera to automatically process any QR code in a photograph. In a video posted on YouTube, Lookout Security described the vulnerability: " That access point in turn allowed us to spy on the connections Glass made, from web requests to images uploaded to the Cloud ." said Mar...
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