News & Commentary

Washington Post hit by targeted cyberattack 🎯

The Washington Post is investigating a cyberattack that breached the Microsoft email accounts of journalists, particularly those reporting on national security, economics, and China. (👀)

The intrusion was discovered on June 12, and it’s suspected to be the work of a foreign government actor—especially since the tactics used are eerily similar to those we saw in the 2022 News Corp incident.

A full investigation is underway, and it sounds like credential resets for targets have already happened. I haven’t seen any reports that a broader system compromise happened, but the attack highlights the persistent risks journalists face as they naturally handle sensitive info.

Anubis ransomware campaign encrypts and wipes files 😖

A rare and ruthless ransomware strain has emerged, packing one heck of a punch.

Anubis, first discovered in the ransomware-as-a-service scene in December 2024, is a dual-threat vector. It’s able to encrypt data or trigger a wipe mode that reduces files to zero bytes, making recovery virtually impossible—even if the ransom is paid. (!!!)

Anubis’s wipe mode (/WIPEMODE) doesn’t stop at just locking files. It erases content while leaving file names intact, ratcheting up the pressure on victims. So far, it’s been widely deployed against healthcare, hospitality, and construction sites across Australia, Canada, Peru, and the US.

Anubis isn’t just encrypting your data. It’s daring you to pay up before everything’s gone (because we know how much hackers love rushing victims into taking action). If you see shadow copies vanish, think fast, act faster, and hope your backups are locked down off the grid.

Use Nessus Agent for Windows? Time to patch. 🩹

A fresh (as of June 16) set of high-severity vulnerabilities in Tenable’s Nessus Agent prompted a quick patch in version 10.8.5 for Windows hosts. These flaws could allow a local attacker to escalate privileges to System, overwrite or delete arbitrary files, or even execute code remotely—all while masquerading as legitimate agent activity.

The patch addressed three core issues: improper file handling that enabled data tampering, a privilege escalation pathway, and unchecked code execution—all bundled into a risk cluster that could be exploited by anyone with local access. If you're running Nessus Agent on Windows and haven’t moved to 10.8.5 yet…you know what to do.

No biggie here—just a security scanner becoming a threat itself. 😅 Seriously though, if you use Nessus Agent, patch ASAP.

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Email being clipped?

Here’s some actually helpful advice: You can view the email in your browser: https://johnhammond.beehiiv.com/p/cybersecurity-shenanigans-013.

(And as always, thanks for nothing, Clippy. 💙)

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June Announcements

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Additional Releases This Month:

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• Free UC – Space Security by Adam Scheuer

• Free UC – Google Dorking by Bailey Marshall

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• Blog – Mind Over Malware – The Psychology of CTI by Jennifer Funk

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• WMD Advanced, MADS Vol 4

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• Lots of Hack-Alongs and Free Upskill Challenges

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I just got back from an overseas trip where I met up with the People’s Call Center: a group of folks (including my friends Pierogi and Jim Browning) who love giving scammers a taste of their own medicine.

For obvious reasons, I can’t share much of what happened at the call center, so instead, I’ll share a collage of photos from London and Paris.

And of course, I had to goof off a bit. 😜

And I found the random piece of technology that needs to be turned off and on again.

Ready for a conference that doubles as a hands-on workshop? Join me and my friends over at Level Effect for ContinuumCon, the conference that doesn’t end. (Seriously.)

Check out the schedule, grab your ticket, and see you Friday, June 20!

We’re 13 issues into this newsletter, and I’d love to check in with you: Is this thing helpful? Mildly entertaining? Awkward?

I can’t promise to make it less awkward, but I would love your ideas on how to make it more entertaining and helpful as a resource.

Please reply to this email and let me know what you’re loving — and what you’d like to see in this thing.

Thank you!