Author: HackWatchit

The Financial Industry Regulatory Authority (FINRA) is reportedly investigating misconduct allegations against two former executives of collapsed banking-as-a-service (BaaS) provider Synapse Financial Technologies. FINRA is looking into Synapse’s brokerage arm’s former chief compliance officer, Mark Paverman, and the unit’s former president and CEO, Jeffrey Stanley, Bloomberg reported Wednesday (Sept. 3), citing an Aug. 28 complaint. The complaint includes allegations that Stanley didn’t get proper authorization to open cash-management accounts on customers’ behalf and didn’t investigate signs of discrepancies between the ledger of Synapse and its partner bank, according to the report. Stanley’s attorney told Bloomberg in an emailed statement, per…

Cybersecurity provider Tidal Cyber on Wednesday announced raising $10 million in a Series A funding round that brings the total raised by the company to $15 million. Founded in 2022 by three former MITRE experts, the Washington, DC-based Tidal Cyber has built a threat-informed defense platform that automates detection and response. The company’s cyber threat intelligence (CTI) and adversary behavior-driven platform operationalizes ATT&CK to provide proactive cyber defenses. Tidal Cyber maps TTPs and procedural-level insights to MITRE ATT&CK, to tailor security strategies around adversary groups and their behavior, for threat-led defenses. The startup also built a Procedures library that captures…

Zero Trust: The Unsung Hero of Cybersecurity Cybersecurity professionals are drowning in complexity. Acronyms fly like digital confetti, vendors promise silver bullets, and CISOs find themselves perpetually playing catch-up with increasingly sophisticated threats. Enter OPSWAT’s Steve Gorham, a cyber warfare officer with nearly three decades of military and technology experience, who cuts through the noise with a simple, powerful message: zero trust isn’t just a buzzword – it’s a fundamental security philosophy. The Evolving Threat Landscape When OPSWAT analyzed 890,000 cybersecurity scans over twelve months, they uncovered a startling reality – there has been an “127% increase in malware complexity,…

A new round of mobile phish is imitating the State of California’s “Franchise Tax Board” in a round of phishing sites that are gaining prominence in the past few days. I visited ftb.ca-gov-sg[.]top/notice from a burner phone to see how the scheme works (the page doesn’t load from the Windows browsers I tested.) After harvesting all of my private information, the site informs me that I had a $1050 refund available. The phish claims that “Bank Routing” is unavailable due to “system maintenance” and offers the option to send my refund via my Credit Card if I just provide the…

Veeam Software announced its fully pre-built, pre-harden ed software appliance: the new Veeam Software Appliance. Built to give IT teams instant protection without complexity, the appliance eliminates the friction of manual setup, OS patching, and Windows licensing. Delivered as a bootable ISO or virtual appliance, it runs on a hardened, Veeam-managed Linux OS, giving customers a secure, always-up-to-date foundation. Unlike rigid hardware appliances, Veeam’s new solution is hardware-agnostic, letting customers deploy on their infrastructure of choice – physical, virtual or cloud – while still gaining the simplicity, resilience, and automation of a fully pre-configured solution. The result is faster time…

Your AI reads the small print, and that’s a problem. This week in episode 433 of “Smashing Security” we dig into LegalPwn – malicious instructions tucked into code comments and disclaimers that sweet-talks AI into rubber-stamping dangerous payloads (or even pretending they’re a harmless calculator). Meanwhile, new research from Anthropic reveals that hackers have already used AI gents to break into networks, steal passwords, sift through stolen data, and even write custom ransom notes. In other words, one hacker with an AI helper can work like an entire team of cybercriminals. Plus: a joyous geek detour into keyboard history, and…

In brief Chatbots role-playing as adults proposed sexual livestreaming, romance, and secrecy to 12–15 year olds. Bots suggested drugs, violent acts, and claimed to be real humans, boosting credibility with kids. Advocacy organization, ParentsTogether, is calling for adult-only restrictions as pressure mounts on Character AI following a teen suicide linked to the platform. You may want to double-check the way your kids play with their family-friendly AI chatbots.As OpenAI rolls out parental controls for ChatGPT in response to mounting safety concerns, a new report suggests rival platforms are already way past the danger zone.Researchers posing as children on Character AI…

Crooks turn HexStrike AI into a weapon for fresh vulnerabilities Pierluigi Paganini September 03, 2025 Threat actors abuse HexStrike AI, a new offensive security tool meant for red teaming and bug bounties, to exploit fresh vulnerabilities. Check Point researchers warn that threat actors are abusing AI-based offensive security tool HexStrike AI to quickly exploit recently disclosed security flaws. HexStrike AI combines professional security tools with autonomous AI agents to deliver comprehensive security testing capabilities. HexStrike AI uses MCP Agents to connect LLMs with real offensive tools, orchestrating 150+ security utilities. It acts as a conductor, turning vague commands into precise steps for penetration testing,…

The U.S. Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency (CISA) appointed Nicholas Andersen on Tuesday as the executive assistant director for cybersecurity. Having been on the frontlines of defending America’s critical infrastructure, with a career grounded in safeguarding national sovereignty and countering foreign threats, Andersen’s expertise spans cybersecurity strategy, risk management, and intelligence operations, including leadership roles in the first administration of President Donald Trump, where he worked to secure and modernize cyber defenses across the energy sector. As the head of CISA’s cybersecurity mission, Andersen’s appointment is expected to address significant cyber threats and vulnerabilities while focusing on increasing the security…