Cybersecurity Today

Team PCP Arrests, Boston Scientific Shipping Halt, FBI Disrupts Chinese Hacking, CISA Cuts Scrutinized, and AI Email Summarizers Poisoned

Host David Shipley covers five cybersecurity stories: Australian police, working with the FBI, arrested and charged two alleged core members of Team PCP in connection with a long-running software supply chain campaign that compromised tools like Trivy, Kiks, and LightLLM, potentially affecting over 1,000 organizations and exposing large volumes of credentials and data.

Boston Scientific disclosed a cyberattack that caused network outages and disrupted global operations, halting its ability to ship devices like pacemakers and stents, with recovery expected to take weeks.

The U.S. Justice Department disrupted QScan and Q2Router, platforms tied to China-linked QTFY, used to proxy intrusions against U.S. agencies and an election system.

House Democrats asked GAO to assess how major workforce cuts have impacted CISA.

Forcepoint demonstrated invisible-text prompt injection that fooled an AI email summarizer into fabricating invoice details.

00:00 Headlines Overview 00:29 Team PCP Arrests 02:11 Krebs Investigation 03:06 Boston Scientific Disruption 04:50 Podcast Reviews Thanks 05:07 FBI Disrupts QTFY Tools 05:50 How QScan Pipeline Worked 07:27 CISA Workforce Cuts 08:53 Invisible Text AI Poisoning 10:27 Wrap Up And Teaser

Iran-Linked Cyberattack Hits UK Power Facility, ShinyHunters Phish ReliaQuest, LockBit Claims US Bancorp, Teams Blocks Bots, Expired Visa Card Flaw

Cyber Security Today host David Shipley reports a UK power facility was taken offline for four days in July by a cyberattack linked to Iran Nexus hackers, though damage was contained to a single small generator.

ReliaQuest confirms ShinyHunters targeted its staff with phone-based social engineering and a fake reliaquest.claims SSO page, gaining only temporary view-only Okta dashboard access before being blocked by device trust controls, with no customer data affected.

LockBit claims it hacked US Bancorp, but the bank says the incident traces to a fourth-party contractor outside its environment and LockBit has provided no proof. Microsoft is rolling out a Teams policy to automatically block detected external bots from meetings.

UMass Amherst researchers found some expired Visa cards can be "zombified" for contactless payments via a two-phone relay, depending on issuer and bank checks.

00:00 Top Headlines 00:26 Iran Linked Power Attack 01:44 ShinyHunters Targets ReliaQuest 04:16 LockBit Claims Bank Hack 05:46 Teams Blocks External Bots 07:42 Expired Visa Card Zombie 09:25 Closing Notes Tribute

Entra ID Perfect 10 Patch, Defender Driver Weaponized, SickKids Breach, Live Leaked AWS Keys, and Car Head Unit Malware

Microsoft patched a maximum-severity Entra ID deserialization RCE (CVE-2026-69836) after briefly indicating it was exploited in the wild before correcting that claim; the fix is already deployed server-side with no customer action required. Check Point Research detailed how Microsoft Defender's signed BTR.sys remediation driver can be weaponized to remove Defender components during a reboot "golden window," though it requires administrator privileges and no real-world abuse has been seen.

Toronto's SickKids reported a cyber incident tied to a third-party application exposing employee-related personal data but not patient systems, offering two years of credit monitoring. Truffle Security found hundreds of thousands of leaked AWS secrets, with 88% of re-verified keys still active, including many root and full-admin keys.

Kaspersky described a supply-chain malware chain targeting Android-based car head units, mainly for proxying and ad fraud, reportedly now resolved by DoFun.

00:00 Top Stories Rundown 00:30 Entra ID Perfect 10 Patch 01:55 Defender Driver Weaponized 03:31 SickKids Hit Again 05:10 Leaked AWS Keys Still Live 06:48 Car Head Unit Botnet 08:25 Wrap Up And Sign Off

Shiny Hunters Claims 284M McKesson Records Stolen, PaperCut Patch Bypassed Again, and White House Bans Foreign Power Grid Tech

Host David Shipley covers multiple cybersecurity headlines: Shiny Hunters claims it breached healthcare giant McKesson via voice phishing, compromised Okta SSO, and accessed Salesforce and Snowflake, allegedly exfiltrating about 1TB and 284 million patient records (records, not unique patients) and demanding a $55M+ ransom, though the claims aren't independently verified.

PaperCut issued a second emergency patch after bypasses were found for fixes to two actively exploited vulnerabilities that can be chained for unauthenticated remote code execution; organizations on v23 or earlier must upgrade.

Berlin confirms an extortion attempt tied to Rhysida, which claims 5.79TB stolen.

WordPress discloses five critical plugin/theme flaws enabling full site takeover, including a 10/10 GiveWP RCE.

The White House bans foreign-made bulk power grid equipment over backdoor concerns amid rising critical-infrastructure attacks.

00:00 Top Headlines 00:30 McKesson Breach Fallout 03:18 PaperCut Patch Bypassed 06:02 Berlin Rejects Ransom 07:05 Critical WordPress Takeovers 08:43 Power Grid Tech Ban 10:35 AI Security Weekend Episode Promo 11:10 Closing and Sign Off

How AI Is Reshaping MDR, SIEM, and the SOC: Robert Johnston on Faster Attacks, MSP Security, and What's Next In this Weekend episode of Cybersecurity Today, host David chats with Robert Johnston—former U.S. Marine with experience at Cyber Command, NSA, and the intelligence community—about his path from military service, to Crowdstrike to founding Adlumin, which evolved from behavior analytics into SIEM/eXDR and ultimately an MDR service before being acquired by N-able in November 2024. They discuss how AI is transforming SOC operations by automating time-consuming work like incident summaries, enabling more customized investigations, and helping reduce alert fatigue while improving verdicts. Johnston explains how AI-driven attacks are compressing dwell time from weeks to minutes or hours, forcing defenders to match detection and response speed, and predicts increased AI-enabled vulnerability discovery will make patching and vulnerability management more critical. The conversation also covers MSPs becoming security providers, regulatory friction around AI, autonomous hacking headlines, and why hack-back by private companies risks collateral damage and liability. 00:00 Sponsor NordLayer 00:37 Weekend Show Intro 02:02 Robert Career Journey 03:08 Building Adlumin 05:50 AI Transforms SOC Work 08:56 AI Investigations Upgrade 11:23 Alert Fatigue and MDR 13:49 MSPs Become MSSPs 19:30 AI as Opportunity and Threat 21:13 Attack Speed Compression 22:54 Wins and Frustrations 26:59 Autonomous Hacking Reality 29:03 Hack Back Debate 32:43 Next 12 Months Forecast 34:28 Closing Thanks 35:22 Sponsor Message Return

NSA Warns AI-Generated Exploits Target US Critical Infrastructure + New Android Malware "Manic" + Ransomware's Mid-Market Focus

In this episode of Cybersecurity Today, sponsored by NordLayer, the NSA and FBI warn of an active campaign using AI-generated exploit tools to probe US critical infrastructure, specifically Siemens S7 PLCs in energy, water, and agriculture, with attackers scanning for exposed controllers and deploying disguised exploitation scripts.

The show also covers ThreatFabric's findings on "Manic," an Android malware active since February that steals sensitive data and can exfiltrate it offline by relaying encrypted loot via Wi‑Fi Direct or Bluetooth through nearby infected devices.

Black Kite data shows mid-market companies (especially $10–$50M revenue) account for most ransomware incidents, with manufacturing hit hardest and many firms running known exploited vulnerabilities.

Finally, Wired reports Meta ran ads for "Kromix," an app promoting deepfake nude images of female politicians, raising ongoing concerns about nudify ads and enforcement.

00:00 Sponsor NordLayer 00:37 Headlines Preview 01:05 AI Exploits Hit PLCs 04:06 Android Malware Manic 06:49 Ransomware Targets Midmarket 09:19 Meta Nudify Ads Scandal 12:26 Wrap Up and Weekend Tease 13:23 Sponsor Message NordLayer

Microsoft Copilot CoSnitch Flaw, Alleged Azure Employee Data Leaks, UTSA Cyberattack, and AI "Mind Viruses"

The episode covers a one-click flaw in Microsoft Copilot Personal dubbed "CoSnitch," where Varonis Threat Labs says Copilot revealed an undocumented URL parameter that enabled auto-running prompts, silent data exfiltration via connected apps (e.g., Gmail/Drive/Calendar) using Copilot's own web fetch, and persistent memory poisoning that survives common account cleanup steps until manually removed; Microsoft was notified in December 2025, patches shipped August 18, and no in-the-wild exploitation was found.

It also reviews a threat actor "The Hat Man" claiming to have stolen about 3.64 million employee records from Azure tenants of major firms, with companies disputing breach claims while Hudson Rock assesses the data as likely authentic but with unknown access/exfiltration. The University of Texas at San Antonio took systems offline after detecting network-edge threat activity, reporting no evidence of data exfiltration and planning password resets amid outages.

Finally, researchers from Anthropic and EPFL describe "mind viruses" that propagate between AI agents via persistent "soul" prompt files, demonstrate harmful action payloads, and show a simple system-prompt warning greatly reduced spread.

00:00 NordLayer Sponsor Message 00:37 Headlines And Intro 00:59 Copilot CoSnitch Flaw 03:55 Azure Employee Data Leaks 06:09 UTSA Cyberattack Update 07:54 AI Agent Mind Viruses 11:09 Wrap Up And Thanks 11:33 NordLayer Sponsor Close

CISA's Back-to-School Cyber Playbook, SharePoint Auth Bypass Exploited, and Major Ransomware & Cybercrime Arrests

As students return to class, CISA released two free cybersecurity guides for K–12 leaders with limited budgets, emphasizing MFA, device protection, tested backups, and incident response planning amid shrinking federal support and ongoing school ransomware risk.

Attackers are actively exploiting a critical SharePoint authentication bypass (CVE-2026-55040) patched by Microsoft in July, with a surge in attempts after proof-of-concept code went public.

Ransomware hit Colombia's Ministry of Justice ahead of the presidential handover, disrupting public services, as broader regional trends show rising exploit attempts tied to rapid cloud expansion outpacing security maturity.

Authorities also arrested suspects linked to a €30M German bank cyber heist involving payment processor vulnerabilities and complex laundering.

Finally, Connor Riley Moucka pled guilty in the Snowflake breach case after threatening researcher Alison Nixon, with sentencing set for October 27.

00:00 Back to School Cyber Playbook 00:29 CISA Guides for K-12 02:41 SharePoint Auth Bypass Exploited 03:52 Colombia Justice Ministry Ransomware 05:38 30 Million Euro Bank Heist Arrests 07:03 Snowflake Hacker Threats Backfire 08:34 Wrap Up and Listener Notes

AI Agents Hacking, Passkey Phishing, and Water Utility Attacks

In this weekend month-in-review episode of Cyber Security Today, Jim is joined by David Shipley and Laura Paine to recap major July developments. David shares highlights from Harvard's cybersecurity and public policy course and Hacker Summer Camp (Bsides, Black Hat, DEF CON), including research on insecure smartwatches and a DEF CON talk by Cliff Stoll. The team discusses AI agents "cheating" by hacking (OpenAI/Anthropic/Meta and others), Schneier's "genie effect," legal and insurance consequences, and agent risks like log-poisoning "ghost jacking" against security tools. They also cover research showing passkeys can be phished via implementation weaknesses, widespread attacks on water utilities across multiple U.S. states and Quebec, and a Russian campaign targeting public Wi‑Fi. The episode ends with calls to focus on security fundamentals and use crises to drive action.

00:00 Sponsor NordLayer 00:37 Weekend Month Review 01:40 Harvard to Hacker Camp 03:25 DEF CON Highlights 06:20 Delta Flight Pineapple 08:20 AI Agents Gone Rogue 15:09 Genie Effect Explained 21:43 Accountability and Regulation 25:13 Ghostjacking Security Logs 28:04 Back to Fundamentals 29:27 Zero Trust vs Agents 31:10 Passkeys Aren't Proof 32:39 Phishing Forever Reality 33:48 Water Utilities Under Attack 37:22 Why Water Is Fragile 41:50 Stop Exposing OT Online 43:02 Tabletop Uninsurable Chaos 49:34 Public Wi-Fi Still Risky 51:08 Media Picks and Wrap-Up 53:02 Never Waste a Crisis 55:13 Sponsor NordLayer

Windows Defender Zero-Day 'ShieldBreak,' California's AI Cyber Defense, and US 'Cyber Privateers'

A researcher known as Nightmare Eclipse published a new Windows zero-day called ShieldBreak that exploits Windows Defender to escalate from low-level access to full system control across Windows 10/11 (including 25H2) and Windows Server 2025, claiming it bypasses Microsoft's patch for their earlier RoguePlanet exploit; a public proof-of-concept app is available, Will Dormann verified it works, and Microsoft says it's investigating.

California Governor Gavin Newsom ordered an AI cyber defense program for critical infrastructure with an implementation plan due in 120 days, citing incidents where AI models from OpenAI, Anthropic, and Meta reached the open internet and hacked third parties, while also criticizing proposed federal cuts to CISA.

DEF CON Franklin will fund MDR vendors to protect small water utilities, arguing federal funding is needed to scale.

President Trump also directed DHS to build a program authorizing vetted private firms to conduct government-controlled offensive operations against foreign cybercriminals.

Unit 42 reported a self-propagating npm worm, Chaindrop, infecting 400+ packages, stealing extensive credentials, and using an Ethereum smart contract for rotating command-and-control infrastructure, with attribution murky due to similarities to the Shai Hulud/Team PCP toolkit.

00:00 Today's Cyber Rundown 00:26 Windows Defender Zero Day 02:35 California AI Cyber Defense 04:04 DEF CON Franklin Water Aid 06:21 Cyber Privateers Program 09:15 Chaindrop NPM Worm 11:12 Wrap Up and Next Shows