Risky Bulletin

Iran attempts to hack security cameras to support its missile strikes, Israel bombs Iran’s cyber headquarters, authorities take down LeakBase and Tycoon 2FA, and TikTok says ‘no’ to encrypted private messaging.

Tom Uren and Amberleigh Jack talk about how cyber operations were used in the first hours of the US-Israeli attack on Iran. They were instrumental in the attack on Iranian Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei, but they didn’t last long. The Iranian regime implemented an internet blackout within four hours of the first bombs.

They also discuss how threat actors are using AI. It’s not game-changing so far, but it is very much altering the balance between attack and defence.

This episode is also available on Youtube.

The US conducted cyberattacks ahead of strikes on Iran, Russia aims for internet independence by 2028, Google finds a new iOS exploit kit in the wild, and Chrome moves to a two-week release cycle.

In this edition of Between Two Nerds Tom Uren and The Grugq how the use of cyber operations in the war in Ukraine has evolved over time.

This episode is also available on Youtube.

LLMs can deanonymize internet users based on their comments, CISA gets a new acting director, hackers steal 15 million records from the French Ministry of Health, and Google takes down an ad fraud botnet.

In this sponsored interview Casey Ellis chats to Harish Peri, SVP and general manager for AI security at Okta, a cloud-based identity and access management company. The pair chat about the fact that AI is forcing enterprises to relearn the basics around identity security, and how Okta for AI Agents can help.

A Russian man prosecuted for extorting the Conti ransomware group, Google takes down a Chinese cyber-espionage operation, Anthropic tells Department of War to pound sand over AI restrictions, and a Cisco zero-day was exploited in the wild for three years.

Tom Uren and Amberleigh Jack talk about the argy-bargy between the Pentagon and AI company Anthropic. US Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth is demanding that all safeguards are lifted from Claude, while Anthropic CEO Dario Amodei is insisting on protections against mass surveillance of Americans and use in lethal autonomous weapons.

They also discuss the return of Volt Typhoon, the Chinese hacker group prepositioning in critical infrastructure for sabotage in the event of a conflict over Taiwan. The group is still around, even though the US government declared victory against it last July.

This episode is also available on Youtube.

Russia launches a criminal probe into Telegram’s founder, two teenagers arrested for a South Korean bike share hack, Anthropic accuses Chinese AI firms of distillation attacks, and the US Treasury sanctions a Russian exploit broker.

In this edition of Between Two Nerds Tom Uren and The Grugq talk about how ‘professional’ Five Eyes cyber espionage agencies like NSA will use AI. These agencies place a premium on stealth and won’t yolo AI.

This episode is available on Youtube.