Tag Archive for: Guardian

DVIDS – News – Semper supra: Guardian instructor steps above the rest

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Sgt. Anastacia Lange, 333rd Training Squadron Cyber Warfare Operator (CWO) course instructor, is breaking barriers as the first Guardian and the first female instructor in the course’s history.

The 333rd TRS at Keesler provides officer communications and cyber warfare initial skills training, enlisted cyber warfare initial skills training, as well as initial and advanced training on spectrum operations. The squadron is also responsible for the development, revision and instruction of network courses supporting global command and control operations.

The CWO course teaches students to develop, sustain and enhance cyber warfare capabilities in order attack adversary interests while at the same time defending U.S. national interests from attack. Airmen and Guardians alike must be able to flex and change as rapidly as the cyber field changes.

Shortly after the Space Force was officially founded in 2019, members of the newest branch began to attend cyber warfare courses within the 333rd TRS. The squadron identified a need to give new Guardians representation in the course, as well as have someone who could unite new Space Force operational needs with current technical training structures.

One individual stood out amongst her peers.

“I asked the Instructor Supervisors if we had any rockstar Guardians and they unanimously suggested Sgt. Lange,” said Master Sgt. Kyle Griffin, former 333rd TRS flight chief. “She could already tie concepts in CWO back to Guardian objectives and was intelligent, motivated and well-spoken. I asked her if she had an interest in being an instructor someday, and she said yes.”

Joining the 333rd TRS instructor cadre isn’t the first time Lange has embraced uncharted territory. While she originally enlisted in the Air Force, she knew she couldn’t pass up an opportunity to be a part of the newest branch.

“How often do we get to see a whole new force structure being established?”, said Lange. “It got me thinking that there is no other opportunity to make a difference and establish the kind of force that I want to see than by…

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Criminals attack manufacturers with ransomware | The Guardian Nigeria News

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Cybersecurity firm, Sophos, has revealed in its new sectoral survey report, ‘The State of Ransomware in Manufacturing and Production 2023’, that in more than two-thirds (68 per cent) of ransomware attacks against this sector, the adversaries successfully encrypted data.

Sophos described this as the highest reported encryption rate for the sector over the past three years and is in line with a broader cross-sector trend of attackers more frequently succeeding in encrypting data.

The report however, said in contrast to other sectors, the percentage of manufacturing organisations that used backups to recover data has increased, with 73 per cent of the manufacturing firms surveyed using backups this year versus 58 per cent in the previous year. It said despite this increase, the sector still has one of the lowest data recovery rates.

Field Chief Technical Officer, Sophos, John Shier, said: “Using backups as a primary recovery mechanism is encouraging since the use of backups promotes faster recovery. While ransom payments cannot always be avoided, we know from our survey response data that paying a ransom doubles the costs of recovery.

“With 77 per cent of manufacturing organizations reporting lost revenue after a ransomware attack, this added cost burden should be avoided, and priority placed on earlier detection and response.”

In addition, the report found that despite the growing use of backups, manufacturing and production reported longer recovery times this year. In 2022, 67 per cent of manufacturing organizations recovered within a week, while 33 per cent recovered in more than a week. This past year, only 55 per cent of manufacturing organisations surveyed recovered within a week.

“Longer recovery times in manufacturing are a concerning development. As we’ve seen in Sophos’ Active Adversary reports, based on incident response cases, the manufacturing sector is consistently at the top of organizations needing assistance recovering from attacks.

This extended recovery is negatively impacting IT teams, where 69 per cent report that addressing security incidents is consuming too much time and 66 per cent are unable to work on other projects,” the report…

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Guardian staff forced to work out of former brewery after ransomware attack

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Staff at The Guardian have been forced to work out of a former brewery as a crippling ransomware attack heads into its third month.

The newspaper has taken up office space at the Phoenix Brewery in west London as its King’s Cross headquarters remains shuttered following the cyber attack.

Staff are said to be frustrated following an extended period of enforced working from home. 

But one journalist said the temporary offsite location, next to Westfield shopping centre, was inconvenient for the majority of staff who are used to commuting into north London.

Editor Kath Viner lives in west London after marrying Adrian Chiles, a broadcaster and Guardian columnist, last year. 

A source said Ms Viner and a small number of other employees had been working from the headquarters in King’s Cross for the vast majority of the time.

The Guardian has taken over the temporary office space from telecoms provider TalkTalk.

Chief executive Anna Bateson and her husband Max are personal friends with TalkTalk executive chairman Sir Charles Dunstone. One industry insider said the group had holidayed together on Sir Charles’ yacht.

The makeshift office arrangements come two months after The Guardian was hit by a ransomware attack that shut down many of the newspaper’s computer systems and forced it to close its building at Kings Place.

Hackers gained access to payroll data, meaning employees’ names, addresses, salaries and passport details have been exposed.

The Guardian has said hackers are most likely to have gained access to the information through a so-called phishing attack, which attempts to trick staff into clicking booby-trapped links.

While the company was initially concerned about an “attack on journalism” by a foreign state, it is understood this scenario is now considered unlikely.

It is not clear whether bosses have paid the ransom, but the incident has been reported to the Information Commissioner’s Office. The data watchdog has the power to fine The Guardian up to £17.5m if any failings are discovered in relation to the breach.

A source at the newspaper said the print team had been working “like madness” since the attack and had been forced to…

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Guardian newspaper hit by suspected ransomware attack

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The Guardian newspaper has come under a suspected ransomware attack.

It said there had been a “serious incident” affecting its IT systems in the last 24 hours, with disruption to “behind the scenes services”.

The company said it was continuing to publish globally to its website – one of the most visited news sites in the world – and was “confident” it could still print the physical paper.

Staff have been told not to go into the office and to work from home.

In a statement, the Guardian said: “Our technology teams have been working to deal with all aspects of this incident, with the vast majority of our staff able to work from home as we did during the pandemic.

“We believe this to be a ransomware attack, but are continuing to consider all possibilities.”

Ransomware is malicious software used by hackers – and often sent via attachments in emails – to gain access to an organisation’s or individual’s computer systems.

The criminals then find and encrypt important or sensitive files – and demand a ransom for them to be unlocked.

A huge range of targets – from schools and hospitals to government agencies and media organisations – have fallen victim to ransomware, with research indicating hackers are paid in the majority of cases, especially in the UK.

According to the Press Gazette, the Guardian is the ninth most-read news site in the world, with almost 390 million visits in November.

In its own reporting of the incident, the Guardian said online publishing was “largely unaffected”.

It said Guardian Media Group chief executive Anna Bateson and editor-in-chief Katharine Viner had sent a message to the company’s workforce.

“Thank you to everyone working hard throughout this incident to keep us publishing,” they said.

“We will continue to keep our staff and anyone else affected informed.

“With a few key exceptions, we would like everyone to work from home for the remainder of the week unless we notify you otherwise.”

Jake Moore, global cyber-security adviser at security software company ESET, said the Guardian being targeted was not a surprise.

“News organisations have become a regular target for cyber-attacks this year, and these attacks often have even more damaging effects on the…

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