VB Blog

TorrentLocker spam has DMARC enabled

Posted by   Virus Bulletin on   Mar 2, 2015

Use of email authentication technique unlikely to bring any advantage.

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Paper: Script in a lossy stream

Posted by   Virus Bulletin on   Mar 2, 2015

Dénes Óvári explains how to store code in lossily compressed JPEG data.

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M3AAWG releases BCP document on dealing with child sexual abuse material

Posted by   Virus Bulletin on   Feb 27, 2015

Subject may make many feel uncomfortable, but it is essential that we know how to deal with it.

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VB2014 paper: Caphaw - the advanced persistent pluginer

Posted by   Virus Bulletin on   Feb 27, 2015

Micky Pun and Neo Tan analyse the banking trojan that is best known for spreading through Skype.

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Coordinated action takes down Ramnit botnet infrastructure

Posted by   Virus Bulletin on   Feb 26, 2015

Malware remains present on infected machines; 2012 Virus Bulletin paper worth studying.

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Hacker group takes over Lenovo's DNS

Posted by   Virus Bulletin on   Feb 26, 2015

As emails were sent to wrong servers, DNSSEC might be worth looking into.

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Almost 50% increase in reported vulnerabilities as non-Windows operating systems lead the table

Posted by   Virus Bulletin on   Feb 25, 2015

Each discovered vulnerability is actually a good news story.

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Vawtrak trojan spread through malicious Office macros

Posted by   Virus Bulletin on   Feb 24, 2015

Users easily tricked, but plenty of opportunity for the malware to be blocked.

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Lenovo laptops pre-installed with software that adds its own root CA certificate

Posted by   Virus Bulletin on   Feb 20, 2015

Shared root certificate makes for easy man-in-the-middle attacks.

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Google relaxes disclosure policy following criticism

Posted by   Virus Bulletin on   Feb 16, 2015

Grace period added for vulnerabilities that are about to be patched.

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VB2019 paper: Spoofing in the reeds with Rietspoof

In a VB2019 paper Avast researchers Jan Sirmer, Luigino Camastra and Adolf Středa revealed full details of the Rietspoof malware. Today we publish their paper and the recording of the presentation given by Jan and Luigino in London.
Spoofing in the reeds with Rietspoof Read the paper (HTML) Download the paper (PDF)     The Call for Papers for VB2020 in Dublin is open! Submit your abstract before… https://www.virusbulletin.com/blog/2020/01/vb2019-paper-spoofing-reeds-rietspoof/

VB2017 video: Spora: the saga continues a.k.a. how to ruin your research in a week

Today, we publish the video of the VB2017 presentation by Avast researcher Jakub Kroustek and his former colleague Előd Kironský, now at ESET, who told the story of Spora, one of of the most prominent ransomware families of 2017.
First discovered at the beginning of the year, the Spora ransomware has become one of of the most prominent ransomware families of 2017, especially in Russia, a region it appears… https://www.virusbulletin.com/blog/2017/12/vb2017-video-spora-saga-continues-k-how-ruin-your-research-week/

Malicious CCleaner update points to a major weakness in our infrastructure

Researchers from Cisco Talos have found that a recent version of the widely used CCleaner tool installed malware on the machine.
For the security community, 2017 might well be called the year of the update: two of the biggest security stories – the WannaCry outbreak and the Equifax breach – involved… https://www.virusbulletin.com/blog/2017/09/malicious-ccleaner-update-points-major-weakness-our-infrastructure/

Avast acquires AVG for $1.3bn

Anti-virus vendor Avast has announced the acquisition of its rival AVG for 1.3 billion US dollars.
There was interesting news in the anti-virus world yesterday, as Avast announced the acquisition of its competitor AVG. Both companies were founded in the Czech Republic and… https://www.virusbulletin.com/blog/2016/07/avast-acquires-avg-13bn/

Avast launches bug bounty programme

Security firm offers reward for info on bugs.
Security firm offers reward for info on bugs. Security firm Avast Software, producer of the popular avast! free anti-virus solution, has announced a bug bounty programme to… https://www.virusbulletin.com/blog/2013/01/avast-launches-bug-bounty-programme/

774,000 Avast! pirates on 14-user licence

Wildly popular free solution not good enough for some.
Wildly popular free solution not good enough for some. Leading provider of free anti-malware products Avast Software has spotted that a single 14-user licence key, issued last… https://www.virusbulletin.com/blog/2010/12/774-000-avast-pirates-14-user-licence/

Sophos joins free home AV crowd with Mac release

Business-focused firm takes first step into home-user arena.
Business-focused firm takes first step into home-user arena.Sophos has announced the release of a home-user edition of its Mac anti-malware solution, which is being given away free… https://www.virusbulletin.com/blog/2010/11/sophos-joins-free-home-av-crowd-mac-release/

Avast gets $100m investment boost

Growth equity firm invests in Czech firm
Growth equity firm invests in Czech firmAvast Software, the Czech anti-malware firm famous for its free avast! software, has announced that growth equity investor Summit Partners… https://www.virusbulletin.com/blog/2010/08/avast-gets-100m-investment-boost/

False positive problem hits avast! users

Human failure blamed for faulty update.
Human failure blamed for faulty update. A relatively small subsection of the massive user base for Alwil's ever-popular avast! products were hit by a string of false positives last… https://www.virusbulletin.com/blog/2009/12/false-positive-problem-hits-avast-users/

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