13 Cyber Questions to Better Vet IT Vendors and Reduce Third-Party Risk
Enterprises are increasingly exposed to cyber‑risk through third‑party IT providers, as recent high‑profile breaches—Marks & Spencer’s £300 million loss, a Chinese group stealing OAuth tokens from 700 firms, and a SAP NetWeaver zero‑day—demonstrate. Attackers exploit trusted vendor pathways, bypassing traditional perimeter defenses and leveraging human or integration weaknesses. Security leaders are urged to shift from checklist compliance to continuous, cross‑functional vendor vetting that scrutinizes attestations, token inventories, and incident‑response commitments. The article outlines 13 targeted questions CSOs should ask to embed resilience into contracts and ongoing oversight.
For Cyber Risk Assessments, Frequency Is Essential
Cyber risk assessments function like medical check‑ups, enabling organizations to detect vulnerabilities before attackers exploit them. The article highlights that regular assessments uncover data exposure—one in ten cloud data sets is openly accessible—and reveal that over 99% of compromised accounts...
This Intune Update Isn’t Optional — It’s a Kill Switch for Outdated Apps
Microsoft Intune MAM will enforce a mandatory update by January 19, requiring all iOS‑wrapped, SDK‑integrated apps and the Android Company Portal to run the latest versions. Outdated apps—including Outlook and Teams—will be blocked from launching. Administrators must push the new SDK...
7 Top Cybersecurity Projects for 2026
The 2026 cybersecurity roadmap highlights seven priority projects for CISOs, ranging from AI‑aware identity and access management to advanced email protection, autonomous code‑vulnerability discovery, and enterprise‑wide zero‑trust adoption. Leaders emphasize extending IAM controls to non‑human agents, leveraging small language models...
Google Vertex AI Security Permissions Could Amplify Insider Threats
XM Cyber uncovered two privilege‑escalation flaws in Google Vertex AI where default configurations let a low‑privileged "Viewer" user hijack high‑privilege service‑agent identities. Google responded that the behavior is "working as intended," echoing similar stances from other cloud providers. The issue...
From Typos to Takeovers: Inside the Industrialization of Npm Supply Chain Attacks
The npm ecosystem has moved from simple typosquatting to coordinated credential‑driven attacks that compromise maintainers and CI/CD pipelines. Attackers now hijack trusted packages, inject malicious post‑install scripts, and use stolen tokens as a "master key" to reach millions of downstream...
Iran’s Partial Internet Shutdown May Be a Windfall for Cybersecurity Intel
Iran’s near‑total internet blackout, begun Jan 8, has stripped millions of residential users offline, leaving only government‑controlled networks visible. Cybersecurity analysts say this creates a rare window to fingerprint Iranian state‑linked IPs and map their digital infrastructure. Vendors like Whisper Security...
SpyCloud Launches Supply Chain Solution to Combat Rising Third-Party Identity Threats
SpyCloud unveiled its Supply Chain Threat Protection solution, extending identity‑threat visibility to vendors and other third‑party partners. The platform draws on billions of recaptured breach, malware, phishing and dark‑web data points to deliver real‑time evidence of compromised credentials. It introduces...
Cybersecurity at the State and Local Level: Washington Has the Framework, It’s Time to Act
The March 2025 White House Executive Order calls on states, localities and tribal entities to own their cybersecurity preparedness, while the State and Local Cybersecurity Grant Program (SLCGP) allocates $1 billion over four years to fund those efforts. The bipartisan PILLAR...
US Cybersecurity Weakened by Congressional Delays Despite Plankey Renomination
The White House renominated seasoned cyber veteran Sean Plankey as CISA director after his initial nomination lapsed, but Senate holds tied to a Coast Guard issue and a pending telecom security report are delaying confirmation. Simultaneously, deep budget cuts have...
For Application Security: SCA, SAST, DAST and MAST. What Next?
Application security is moving beyond isolated scanners toward a unified posture, provenance, and proof framework. Gartner and OWASP now emphasize Application Security Posture Management (ASPM) that aggregates SAST, DAST, SCA, MAST and IaC findings into a single, context‑aware view. Provenance...
Top 10 Vendors for AI-Enabled Security — According to CISOs
The CSO 2025 Security Priorities Study reveals that senior security executives continue to favor established, name‑brand vendors for AI‑enabled security solutions despite a flood of AI‑only startups. Cisco and Microsoft lead the list, with reputation, breach history, and integration ease...
Iran-Linked MuddyWater APT Deploys Rust-Based Implant in Latest Campaign
Iran‑linked APT MuddyWater has launched a new espionage campaign using a Rust‑based implant named RustyWater. The group delivered the malware through spear‑phishing emails that contain ZIP archives with decoy PDFs and executable files masquerading as PDFs. RustyWater replaces the group’s...
Cybersecurity at the Edge: Securing Rugged IoT in Mission-Critical Environments
Edge computing is now integral to defense, utilities and public safety, relying on rugged IoT devices that operate in extreme, disconnected environments. These deployments break traditional cybersecurity assumptions such as continuous connectivity and frequent patching, exposing critical infrastructure to heightened...
Holes in Veeam Backup Suite Allow Remote Code Execution, Creation of Malicious Backup Config Files
Veeam disclosed four vulnerabilities in its Backup & Replication suite that let users with Backup Admin, Backup Operator or Tape Operator roles execute remote code or write files as root. The most severe flaw, CVE‑2025‑59470, carries a CVSS score of...
Critical RCE Flaw Allows Full Takeover of N8n AI Workflow Platform
Researchers disclosed a critical unauthenticated remote code execution flaw (CVE‑2026‑21858) in the n8n workflow automation platform. The vulnerability stems from improper Content‑Type validation in the formWebhook function, enabling arbitrary file reads, path traversal, and full system takeover. By stealing configuration...
How to Eliminate IT Blind Spots in the Modern, AI-Driven Enterprise
Enterprises that rely heavily on AI and multi‑cloud environments are confronting new security blind spots that stem from dynamic agent behavior, data‑poisoning, and mis‑configurations. Experts advise CSOs to shift from reactive defenses to unified visibility that normalizes telemetry across AI...
Microsoft Warns of a Surge in Phishing Attacks Exploiting Email Routing Gaps
Microsoft’s Threat Intelligence team reports a sharp rise in phishing campaigns that exploit complex email routing and misconfigured MX, DMARC, and SPF settings. Attackers use these gaps to make malicious messages appear as internal communications, often leveraging phishing‑as‑a‑service platforms such...
8 Things CISOs Can’t Afford to Get Wrong in 2026
CISOs face a rapidly evolving threat landscape in 2026, from AI‑driven identity attacks and complex supply‑chain vulnerabilities to heightened geopolitical cyber aggression. Missteps in AI agent governance, cloud security, and compliance can trigger costly breaches, while human error continues to...
Open WebUI Bug Turns the ‘Free Model’ Into an Enterprise Backdoor
Security researchers have uncovered a high‑severity vulnerability (CVE‑2025‑64496) in Open WebUI, a self‑hosted interface for large language models. The flaw resides in the Direct Connections feature, where unsafe handling of server‑sent events lets a malicious model server inject JavaScript that...
6 Strategies for Building a High-Performance Cybersecurity Team
Veteran security leaders outline six strategies to transform cybersecurity groups from collections of high‑performing individuals into cohesive, high‑performing teams. The approach emphasizes hiring a blend of ambitious innovators and reliable "rock stars," while also seeking diverse backgrounds for broader perspective....
Why Arbor Edge Defense and CDN-Based DDoS Protection Are Better Together
Arbor Edge Defense (AED) complements CDN‑based DDoS mitigation by providing inline, on‑premises protection against low‑volume, application‑layer and state‑exhaustion attacks that cloud scrubbing services often miss. AED leverages AI/ML and NETSCOUT’s ATLAS threat intelligence, which monitors roughly half of global internet...
Why Cybersecurity Needs to Focus More on Investigation and Less on Just Detection and Response
Cybersecurity strategies prioritize detection and response, but over‑reliance limits long‑term protection. The article argues that investigative analysis—examining packet‑level data, attack vectors, and root causes—provides essential insights to prevent repeat incidents. Advanced threats like APTs and zero‑days often evade detection, making...
5 Myths About DDoS Attacks and Protection
The article debunks five common DDoS myths, highlighting that attacks are far more frequent and diverse than many believe. NETSCOUT’s ASERT team recorded over 15 million DDoS incidents in 2024, with a 43 % rise in sub‑gigabit, application‑layer assaults. It explains why...
Stress Caused by Cybersecurity Threats Is Taking Its Toll
Cyber threats are increasingly complex, sparking a mental‑health crisis among IT and security teams. A recent Object First survey of 500 professionals found 84% feel uncomfortably stressed and 78% fear personal blame for breaches. Nearly 60% are actively looking for...