Weekly web security warning: do you want fries with your malware?

A recap of recent Canadian cybersecurity news and a preview of CIRA’s 2018 Cybersecurity Report.

While at CIRA we make our best effort to raise awareness of cybersecurity issues every month, we have an especially significant amount going on in October (deemed Cybersecurity Awareness Month) to highlight this important issue.

A new Hamburglar?

It is a dangerous thing to get in between a hangry Canadian and their beloved quarter chicken meal, but then again, being a hacker is an inherently dangerous undertaking in and of itself. This week Recipe Unlimited, a 40,000 person Canadian organization that runs popular restaurant brands such as Harvey’s, Swiss Chalet and East Side Mario’s announced that several stores had to be closed due to a successful ransomware infiltration. This was a Canada-wide problem that began on September 28^th. 

These types of hacks have costs far exceed any ransom that has to be paid. Downtime, closed stores and loss of trust are all expensive.

Canadian Centre for Cyber Security launches

Earlier this week, the Canadian Centre for Cyber Security, part of the Communications Security Establishment, officially launched in Ottawa.

The Canadian Centre for Cyber Security is a key initiative of the federal government’s new National Cyber Security Strategy and we at CIRA welcome them to the world of protecting Canada online.

This new initiative is part of the federal government’s efforts to make cybersecurity a priority which was given a big boost in the last budget with a $500 million investment over five years.

Scott Jones, head of the Canadian Centre for Cyber Security kicked off the week with a great blog post on what the new organization is all about.

CIRA cybersecurity survey results: coming soon!

As unplugging completely from the internet is no longer a realistic prospect for Canadian small businesses, it is important to try to provide them with as much information as possible to help. Malware isn’t just for traditional computer systems anymore, it can affect everything from a store’s point-of-sale system to the kiosk your doctor uses to check you in before your appointment.

With that in mind, CIRA has just completed a survey of 500 small- to medium-sized businesses in Canada. These are organizations with 10-500 employees; businesses which don’t typically end up on the front of the national newspaper when they are hit by hackers and cyber thieves. Full 40 per cent reported being the victim of a cyberattack in the last 12 months while 11 per cent indicated that the attack was successful in causing damage to their business.

The full report will cover how they are protecting themselves, the types of attacks, their cybersecurity investment plans and their level of concern versus their perceived level of preparedness. There were a few surprises and some instances where (it is possible) the IT managers and business owners had their heads buried in the proverbial snow as to the extent of their business exposure. All in all – it will be a must-read for anyone interested specifically on Canadians’ reality in the cyber threat world. 

To get the report as soon as it is published, visit our cybersecurity resources where you can sign up to have it delivered to your inbox.  

Weekly top D-Zone DNS Firewall blocks

This week we focused on user attempts to click on bad domains for our top ten list (to the exclusion of botnet activity). It is an interesting potpourri of “realauthenticator” third-level domains and one of our usual suspects, domains with the .xyz TLD. Both are something to watch out for in your email filters.