Tencent Yujian Threat Intelligence Center says that a Ryuk ransomware virus has been spotted in China. The intelligence center released information on the outbreak in a report on July 16. According to the report, Ryuk viruses are a family of malware aimed at infecting government and enterprise machines holding valuable data. According to the report, a Ryuk virus derives from the Hermes virus, with code that is directly modified off of the latter. As noted in the report, Ryuk is the name of a death spirit in the popular manga Death Note. As per its title, Ryuk possesses a notebook …

The Ethereum (ETH) smart contract of 0x (ZRX) decentralized exchange (DEX) protocol has been suspended after a vulnerability has been uncovered in its code, the project’s team announced in a Medium post published on July 13. Per the announcement, third-party security researcher samczsun warned the 0x team about the vulnerability in the exchange smart contract and, after evaluating it, the team suspended the exchange’s contract and the AssetProxy contracts. The vulnerability would have allowed an attacker to fill certain orders with invalid signatures. The announcement reassures that one has exploited this vulnerability and no users have lost their funds. The …

When people outside of crypto think of John McAfee, they think computers, cybersecurity, anti-virus software. But in the world of crypto and blockchain, you think of a yacht in tropical waters, passionate — and sometimes, admittedly, inebriated — tweets on tech and crypto... and an enviable amount of partying. When I called McAfee to talk on record, he was sitting at a table outside a cafe in Cuba with palm trees and patches of blue sky behind him. We talked about McAfee’s presidential campaign in the United States, his relationship with the U.S. government, cryptocurrency mass adoption and why he’s …

The United States Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) and the Financial Industry Regulatory Authority (FINRA) outlined regulatory compliance issues for cryptocurrency custodians in an announcement on July 8. According to the joint statement, the organizations have yet to discover a set of circumstances in which a crypto custodian could comply with the SEC’s Customer Protection Rule, which is described as follows: “Put simply, the Customer Protection Rule requires broker-dealers to safeguard customer assets and to keep customer assets separate from the firm’s assets, thus increasing the likelihood that customers’ securities and cash can be returned to them in the event …

The Bitcoin (BTC) hash rate reached a new all-time high today, according to data from monitoring resource Blockchain.com on July 7. The previous record was broken in the second half of June, when bitcoin’s hashrate reached 65.19 TH/s and growth has steadily continued since then. Hash rate is the number of calculations that a given hardware or network can perform every second. It is a very important parameter for miners, as a higher hash rate will increase their chances of solving the mathematical problem, sealing off the block and collecting their reward. A higher network hashrate also increases the amount …

One of the most prominent crypto cybercrimes in recent years took a dramatic turn on June 23, when two Israeli brothers were arrested in connection with the 2016 Bitfinex hack and other crypto-related phishing attacks. Just shy of 120,000 Bitcoin (BTC) were stolen in the attack back in 2016, an amount initially worth $72 million, though after Bitcoin’s meteoric rise in the summer of 2019, the value of the stolen funds now amount to around $1.4 billion. Speaking to Finance Magnates, an Israeli police spokesperson said that Eli and Assaf Gigi bagged tens of millions of dollars from their activities. …

A new survey by Moscow-based cybersecurity firm Kaspersky Lab introduced on June 17th revealed that 19% of people globally have purchased cryptocurrency. The survey, titled “The Kaspersky Cryptocurrency Report 2019,” was carried out in October and November 2018, with a total of 13,434 respondents in 22 countries. According to the report, 81% of global population have never purchased cryptocurrencies, while only 10% of respondents said they “fully understand how cryptocurrencies work.” Meanwhile, just 14% of those who haven’t ever used cryptocurrencies would like to do so in the future, the report notes. Key findings of The Kaspersky Cryptocurrency Report 2019. …

The cybersecurity company behind major antivirus software NOD32, ESET, reported on June 17 that new Android malware sidesteps Google’s SMS permissions restrictions to get hold of two-factor authentication (2FA) codes received via SMS. Per the report, some malicious apps are capable of accessing one-time-passwords sent to users via SMS by circumventing the restrictions recently implemented by Google. Furthermore, the same technique reportedly also allows for accessing email-based codes. According to the author, the apps in question impersonate Turkish cryptocurrency exchange BtcTurk and phish for login details to the service. The malware, “instead of intercepting SMS messages to bypass 2FA protection …

Cybersecurity company Trend Micro claims to have detected a web address spreading a botnet featuring a monero (XMR) mining component alongside a backdoor. The malware was described on Trend Micro’s official blog on June 13. Per the report, the firm attributes the malware to Outlaw Hacking Group, as the techniques employed are almost the same used in its previous operations. The software in question also holds Distributed Denial of Service (DDoS) capabilities, “allowing the cybercriminals to monetize their botnet through cryptocurrency mining and by offering DDoS-for-hire services.” Trend Micro also believes that the creators of the malware in question are …

Digital asset cybersecurity startup Fireblocks announced its launch out of stealth mode with $16 million in funding, according to a press release shared with Cointelegraph on June 11. Per the release, Fireblocks obtained the capital during its Series A funding round from Cyberstarts, Tenaya Capital, EightRoads (Fidelity INTL), Swisscom Ventures and MState. The startup reportedly counts crypto merchant bank Galaxy Digital, over-the-counter digital trading platform Genesis Global Trading and others among its customers, with the company declaring: “Currently, Fireblocks is integrated with 15 digital asset exchanges and offers support for over 180 cryptocurrencies, tokens, and stablecoins.” The author of the …

Cybersecurity firm Trend Micro has confirmed that attackers have been exploiting a vulnerability in the Oracle WebLogic server to install monero (XMR) mining malware, while using certificate files as an obfuscation trick. The news was revealed in a Trend Micro blog post published on June 10. As previously reported, forms of stealth crypto mining are also referred to with the industry term cryptojacking — the practice of installing malware that uses a computer’s processing power to mine for cryptocurrencies without the owner’s consent or knowledge. According to Trend Micro’s post, a security patch for theOracle WebLogic vulnerability (“CVE-2019-2725”) — reportedly …

Crypto wallet provider Komodo effectively hacked itself to prevent fraudsters from accessing its users’ funds, the company confirmed in a blog post on June 5. Security researchers had alerted the company to a vulnerability in its Agama wallet. Realizing that hackers could strike any moment, Komodo’s cybersecurity team decided to use the same exploit to move compromised crypto to safety. Explaining to users what happened, Komodo said: “We were able to sweep around 8 million KMD and 96 BTC from these vulnerable wallets, which otherwise would have been easy pickings for the attacker.” Komodo’s actions mean that, at current market …