All news with #data leak tag

London police arrest teenagers after nursery data doxing

🔒 Two 17-year-old suspects were arrested in Bishop's Stortford on suspicion of blackmail and computer misuse after an investigation into the doxing of children following a ransomware attack on a chain of London nurseries. The incident aligns with a September 25 breach affecting Kido nurseries, where a group known as Radiant Group claimed to have stolen sensitive data and photos of over 1,000 children. Attackers posted some images and addresses on a dark web leak site and later removed the files on October 2 after failing to extort the company and making threatening calls to parents. Nursery software provider Famly said its infrastructure was not breached, while UK authorities described the case as deeply distressing and said investigations continue.

Defend the Target, Not Just the Door: Google Workspace

🛡️ Modern cloud work lives across email, files, chat, and a mesh of integrations, and attackers increasingly exploit trusted OAuth grants rather than compromising accounts directly. In early August the actor behind recent Salesforce intrusions used stolen Drift email tokens to access a small set of Google Workspace mailboxes; Google revoked the tokens and disabled the integration on August 9. Material Security advocates shifting from perimeter-only defenses to content-centric controls such as message-level MFA, OAuth governance, and automated containment to make stolen tokens far less damaging.

LockBit, Qilin and DragonForce Form Ransomware Alliance

🔒 Three major ransomware groups — LockBit, Qilin, and DragonForce — have announced a strategic alliance aimed at sharing techniques, infrastructure, affiliates, and operational resources to amplify extortion campaigns worldwide. The announcement follows LockBit's resurgence and the unveiling of LockBit 5.0, which is advertised to target Windows, Linux, and ESXi systems. Security firms warn the partnership could rebuild affiliate trust, increase attacks on critical infrastructure and diversify threats across multiple industry sectors.

Met Police Arrest Two Teens Over Nursery Ransomware

🔒 Two teenage boys were arrested in Bishop's Stortford on suspicion of computer misuse and blackmail following a ransomware attack on the Kido nursery group, the Metropolitan Police said. Referred to the Met by Action Fraud on 25 September, investigators allege attackers demanded £600,000 in Bitcoin after stealing names, addresses, contact details and photos of around 8,000 children via a Famly account. The group, which called itself "Radiant," reportedly contacted parents directly and posted some images on the dark web before blurring and later claiming deletion; the app provider says its infrastructure was not breached. The Met described the arrests as a significant step while inquiries continue alongside partner agencies.

Salesforce Refuses Ransom After Massive Data Theft

🔒 Salesforce confirmed it will not engage with or pay extortion demands after a large-scale theft of customer data this year. Threat actors calling themselves Scattered Lapsus$ Hunters published a data-leak site to extort 39 companies, claiming nearly one billion records stolen. The breaches stemmed from two campaigns: late-2024 social engineering using malicious OAuth apps and an August 2025 campaign abusing stolen SalesLoft/Drift tokens to exfiltrate CRM and support-ticket data. The leak site appears to have been shut down and its domain redirected to nameservers previously associated with law enforcement seizures.

ShinyHunters Launch Extortion Site Targeting Corporates

🔓 A cybercrime collective known as ShinyHunters has launched a public extortion blog threatening to publish data stolen from dozens of major companies if ransoms are not paid. The group claims to have harvested Salesforce customer records via a May voice-phishing campaign, and also says it exfiltrated terabytes of files from a Red Hat GitLab server and Discord user data tied to a third-party provider. Security firms and affected vendors including Salesforce, Red Hat and Discord are investigating, while Google and other investigators link the activity to several related UNC clusters and warn of additional token thefts tied to Salesloft. Victim shaming, published exploit scripts for an Oracle E-Business Suite zero-day, and malware-laced threats have amplified the incident’s severity.

Oracle EBS Zero-Day Exploited by Clop Since August

🔒 CrowdStrike reports the Clop ransomware gang has been exploiting an Oracle E-Business Suite zero-day, CVE-2025-61882, since early August to steal sensitive documents. The flaw resides in the BI Publisher Integration of Concurrent Processing and allows unauthenticated remote code execution via a single HTTP request. Oracle issued a patch and warned customers to apply updates immediately as extortion emails tied to stolen EBS data are being circulated.

Qilin Claims Responsibility for Asahi Cyber Attack

🔒 The Qilin ransomware group has claimed responsibility for a cyber-attack on Japan's Asahi Group, asserting it exfiltrated about 27 GB of files containing employee personal data and sensitive business documents. Consumer site Comparitech listed the data on Qilin's leak site on October 7, and Asahi has confirmed an earlier ransomware incident involving an 'unauthorized transfer of data'. The breach disrupted order, shipment and call-centre operations as the brewer implemented manual processes while investigating.

North Korean Hackers Stole Over $2 Billion in Crypto 2025

🔒 North Korean-linked hackers stole an estimated $2 billion in cryptocurrency in 2025, the largest annual total on record and lifting confirmed thefts to over $6 billion. Blockchain firm Elliptic attributes much of the total to the February Bybit breach (~$1.46 billion) and linked 30 crypto-heists to North Korean actors using blockchain analysis and intelligence. Analysts note a shift to social engineering targeting individuals and exchange staff and increasingly complex laundering—mixers, cross-chain transfers, obscure chains and custom tokens—though blockchain transparency still aids tracing.

Avnet Confirms Breach; Stolen EMEA Sales Data Unreadable

🔒 Avnet confirmed unauthorized access to externally hosted cloud storage that supported an internal sales tool used in the EMEA region. The company says most stolen files are not easily readable without access to Avnet's proprietary sales tool, which it says was not impacted, while attackers claim they exfiltrated 1.3TB of compressed (7–12TB raw) data. Avnet detected the activity on September 26, rotated secrets across Azure/Databricks, notified authorities, and will contact affected customers and suppliers; the number of potentially impacted individuals remains unknown.

Qilin Ransomware Disrupts Mecklenburg County Schools

🔒 A Russian-linked ransomware group, Qilin, has claimed responsibility for a September 2, 2025 attack that disrupted Mecklenburg County Public Schools and said it exfiltrated 305 GB of data, including financial records, grant documents, budgets and children’s medical files. The attack forced teachers offline for about a week while internet systems were restored. Superintendent Scott Worner said the district does not currently intend to pay the ransom and is still assessing the scope, urging other districts to review cyber-insurance and preparedness.

From Ransom to Revenue Loss and Recovery Costs for Business

🔒 Ransomware now inflicts costs far beyond ransom payments, driving operational downtime, reputational damage, and regulatory exposure that directly erode the bottom line. The 2025 Unit 42 report shows median initial extortion demands rose to $1.25M and commonly equate to about 2% of perceived annual revenue. While roughly 48% of victims paid in 2024, Unit 42 negotiation reduced median paid demands to about 0.6% of PAR, yet attackers’ disruptive tactics increasingly amplify recovery costs. Strengthening backups, segmentation, and an incremental zero trust posture are key to limiting impact and shortening recovery timelines.

Enterprise AI Now Leading Corporate Data Exfiltration

🔍 A new Enterprise AI and SaaS Data Security Report from LayerX finds that generative AI has rapidly become the largest uncontrolled channel for corporate data loss. Real-world browser telemetry shows 45% employee adoption of GenAI, 67% of sessions via unmanaged accounts, and copy/paste into ChatGPT, Claude, and Copilot as the primary leakage vector. Traditional, file-centric DLP tools largely miss these action-based flows.

XWorm 6.0 Returns with 35+ Plugins and Enhanced Theft

🛡️ Trellix researchers detail the return of XWorm 6.0, a modular Windows malware now supporting more than 35 in‑memory DLL plugins and expanded data-theft and persistence capabilities. The actor associated with earlier releases, known as XCoder, is of uncertain status, but v6.0—advertised on forums in June 2025—appears to address a prior RCE flaw while enabling credential theft, keylogging, screen capture, and optional ransomware. Campaigns use phishing, malicious JavaScript, LNK-based PowerShell chains, and process injection to evade detection and execute plugins directly in memory.

Discord Confirms Customer Data Breach via Third-Party

🔒 Discord has disclosed a data breach after a third-party customer support provider was compromised, allowing a ransomware actor to access limited customer information. Potentially exposed data includes names, Discord usernames, contact details, last four digits of payment cards, IP addresses, messages with support agents and a small number of government ID images submitted for age appeals. Discord says no passwords, full card numbers or CVVs were accessed and is contacting affected users and authorities.

Why Successful Businesses Are Built on Cyber Protection

🔒 Company leaders must treat cyber risk as a strategic priority rather than a discretionary cost. The piece highlights a persistent budget-perception gap between CISOs and boards and notes SMBs often remain reactive, prioritizing firefighting over prevention. It cites high-profile breaches and the IBM Cost of a Data Breach to quantify losses and recommends technologies such as SIEM and SOAR, alongside governance measures like board oversight and appointed CISOs. Practical advice stresses framing security as business risk, using financial metrics, and reporting regularly to embed security-by-design.

ShinyHunters Joins Extortion Effort After Red Hat Breach

🔐 Red Hat is facing renewed extortion after a breach of its GitLab instance used by Red Hat Consulting was claimed to have exposed nearly 570GB of compressed data across thousands of repositories, including about 800 Customer Engagement Reports (CERs). The Crimson Collective initially claimed the theft and says it received no ransom response. The group announced a collaboration with Scattered Lapsus$ Hunters and has used the newly launched ShinyHunters leak site to press extortion demands, publishing CER samples and setting an October 10 deadline. Red Hat did not respond to inquiries.

Cl0p Exploits Critical Oracle E-Business Suite Flaw

🔒 Oracle released an emergency patch to address a critical unauthenticated vulnerability in E-Business Suite (CVE-2025-61882) with a CVSS score of 9.8. The flaw allows remote code execution against the Oracle concurrent processing component over HTTP and has been actively exploited by the Cl0p group in large-scale data theft. Security firms report mass email-based distribution from hundreds of compromised accounts and recommend immediate patching and forensic checks for listed IoCs and suspicious GET/POST activity.

Trinity of Chaos Launches TOR Data Leak Site, Exposes Data

🔓 The Trinity of Chaos collective has opened a data leak site on the TOR network, publishing previously undisclosed records tied to past breaches and listing 39 major global firms. Resecurity says the group claims more than 1.5 billion records across 760 companies and has set an October 10 negotiation deadline. Samples reportedly contain substantial PII and appear to stem from compromised SaaS environments via stolen OAuth tokens and vishing; the FBI has issued a flash alert. The group also threatened to leverage existing litigation and regulatory complaints against Salesforce, which has denied new vulnerabilities.

LinkedIn Sues ProAPIs Over Use of 1M Fake Accounts

⚖️ LinkedIn has filed suit against Delaware-based ProAPIs Inc. and its founder, Rehmat Alam, alleging the company created more than one million fake accounts to scrape member data using a product called iScraper API. The complaint, filed in California, accuses ProAPIs of violating LinkedIn’s terms of service and of using invalid credit cards to obtain premium access. LinkedIn seeks a permanent injunction, deletion of scraped data, and payment of damages and attorney fees.