Information security

Information security

Google has issued a patch for a high‑severity Chrome zero‑day, tracked as CVE‑2026‑2441, a memory bug in how the browser handles certain font features that attackers are already exploiting. CVE-2026-2441 has the questionable honor of being the first Chrome zero-day of 2026. Google considered it serious enough to issue a separate update of the stable channel for it, rather than wait for the next major release.

Researchers have discovered that a compromised npm publish token pushed an update for the widely-used Cline command line interface (CLI) containing a malicious postinstall script. That script installs the wildly popular, but increasingly condemned, agentic application OpenClaw on the unsuspecting user's machine. This can be extremely dangerous, as OpenClaw has broad system access and deep integrations with messaging platforms including WhatsApp, Telegram, Slack, Discord, iMessage, Teams, and others.

An FBI informant helped run the Incognito dark web market and allegedly approved the sale of fentanyl-laced pills, including those from a dealer linked to a confirmed death, WIRED reported this week. Meanwhile, Jeffrey Epstein's ties to Customs and Border Protection officers sparked a Department of Justice probe. Documents say that CBP officers in the US Virgin Islands were still friendly with Epstein years after his 2008 conviction, illustrating the infamous sex offender's tactics for cultivating allies.

Axonius has laid off approximately 40 employees, representing less than 4% of its global staff, with the majority of cuts in marketing and sales. Co-founder Dean Sysman has stepped down from his role as CEO to become executive chairman, with company president Joe Diamond appointed as interim CEO. The workforce adjustment aims to refine the company's organizational structure and improve operational efficiency as it prepares for a potential IPO.

The methodology involved assessing Comparitech's Most Common Password report and NordPass's Top 200 Most Common Passwords list, then leveraging KeywordTool to determine search volumes to find the 25 most common passwords based on global popularity. According to the research, higher search volumes could suggest higher public interest, which could lead to higher password usage. Therefore, this places those passwords at a greater risk of being hacked.

Your mobile phone is a treasure trove of personal and confidential information. That's why it's a prime target for hackers who want to compromise or steal your data. Through malicious apps and websites, phishing attacks, and other threats, an attacker can gain control of your device through spyware. But how can you tell if your phone has been hacked or tapped?

NIST has developed a chip that reliably emits a single photon on demand. This ability will improve the efficiency of QKD (quantum key distribution) as we prepare for the arrival of quantum computers. Quantum computers will upend current cryptology by using Shor's algorithm to rapidly negate the current public/private key secure encryption methods. This has largely been solved by NIST's post quantum cryptology (PQC) algorithms.

PayPal has notified about 100 customers that their personal information was exposed online during a code change gone awry, and in a few of these cases, people saw unauthorized transactions on their accounts. All of these customers have been fully refunded, according to a PayPal spokesperson. "When there is a potential exposure of customer information, PayPal is required to notify affected customers," the spokesperson told The Register. "In this case, PayPal's systems were not compromised. As such, we contacted the approximately 100 customers who were potentially impacted to provide awareness on this matter."

Two former Google engineers and a third alleged accomplice are facing federal charges after prosecutors accused them of swiping sensitive chip and security technology secrets and then trying to cover their tracks when the scheme began to unravel. According to the Department of Justice, sisters Samaneh and Soroor Ghandali, both former Google employees, along with Mohammadjavad Khosravi, who worked at another unnamed technology company, have been charged with conspiracy, theft of trade secrets, and obstruction of justice.

2FA or two-factor authentication is a specific type of multi-factor authentication. As the name suggests, 2FA requires two distinct forms of user verification factors to access a specific protected, registered user-only software system. In the past, software teams used only a one-factor authentication strategy with users' passwords, but nowadays, with growing security concerns and user authentication evolution, every digital product uses 2FA with password-based authentication, starting from simple SMS OTPs (One Time Tokens) to futuristic AI-powered adaptive 2FA methods and high-security hardware keys.

The campaign exploits recent geopolitical developments to lure victims into opening malicious .LNK files disguised as protest-related images or videos, researchers Subhajeet Singha, Eliad Kimhy, and Darrel Virtusio said in a report published this week. These files are bundled with authentic media and a Farsi-language report providing updates from 'the rebellious cities of Iran.' This pro- protest framing appears to be intended to increase credibility and to attract Farsi-speaking Iranians seeking protest-related information.

We've excised the text, but suffice it to say that the whiteboard contains usernames and passwords for system access. It's a change from a Post-it note stuck to the screen, but it's no less likely to make a security professional shriek in horror. After all, not only is the account exposed, but anyone can use it, which renders an access log somewhat redundant.

Web browsers are among the top targets for today's cybercriminals, playing a role in nearly half of all security incidents, new research reveals. According to Palo Alto Networks' 2026 Global Incident Response report, an analysis of 750 major cyber incidents recorded last year across 50 countries found that, in total, 48% of cybercrime events involved browser activity. Individuals trying to connect to the web, including business employees, are exposed to cyberthreats on a daily basis.

Hoang: My background sits at the intersection of enterprise IT, data protection, and cybersecurity. I've spent much of my career working with CIOs and CISOs on resilience - how organizations protect, recover, and govern their most critical data in the face of cyber threats, outages, and operational risk. Today, as CIO at Commvault, I see security not as a standalone function, but as a core business capability.

We had already heard of 'next-gen SIEM'. This is a system that replaces traditional rule-based logging with automatic recognition of complex threats. It was designed to reduce noise on the line for SecOps personnel by reducing the number of false positives. However, according to Abstract CEO and co-founder Colby DeRodeff, this was only the beginning. He believes that a real 'reset' is needed, in the form of an 'AI-Gen Composable SIEM'.

Security, IT, and engineering teams today are under relentless pressure to accelerate outcomes, cut operational drag, and unlock the full potential of AI and automation. But simply investing in tools isn't enough. 88% of AI proofs-of-concept never make it to production, even though 70% of workers cite freeing time for high-value work as the primary AI automation motivation. Real impact comes from intelligent workflows that combine automation, AI-driven decisioning, and human ingenuity into seamless processes that work across teams and systems.

Researchers at Kaspersky have analyzed a recently discovered Android malware that enables its operators to remotely control compromised devices. Dubbed Keenadu, the backdoor has been found in the firmware of various Android device brands, particularly tablets. While in some cases the malware appears to have been injected into the firmware during development, it has also been delivered to devices via OTA firmware updates.

On February 3rd, we identified evidence of a problem with our systems that allowed an unauthorized third party to access limited user data without permission, including email addresses, phone numbers, and other internal metadata,

Microsoft has confirmed that a bug allowed its Copilot AI to summarize customers' confidential emails for weeks without permission. The bug, first reported by Bleeping Computer, allowed Copilot Chat to read and outline the contents of emails since January, even if customers had data loss prevention policies to prevent ingesting their sensitive information into Microsoft's large language model. Copilot Chat allows paying Microsoft 365 customers to use the AI-powered chat feature in its Office software products, including Word, Excel, and PowerPoint.