Precisely speaking, the heading is related to two different articles with different stories. The first one goes as follows: According to a study conducted by Digital Shadows Photon research team, and their report dubbed “Account Takeover in 2022,” about 25 billion email addresses and phone numbers, along with an equivalent number of credit card details and related logins, are available on the web. Surprisingly, most of the data has been sold and used in multiple cyber attack campaigns, with only a small number of bank account credentials and healthcare data being utilized.
Websites embedded with scanning tools and various mobile applications are paving the way for hackers to collect and harvest data as per their needs, and website URLs like ID Security and Have I Been Pwned can be used by concerned people and authorities to check whether their email or phone number is being used or sold on the dark web.
For those who are extremely concerned about their data leak, they can use other services such as Aura, LifeLock, and ID Watchdog by paying $10 a month. These services, and others like them, can keep a constant tab on the dark web and check whether your data is being used for any criminal activity or such.
No matter how much you try, one thing is for sure: we cannot do anything if the credentials leak onto the dark web. However, changing our password at regular intervals like 7-10 days and generating a password with a mixture of at least 15-18 alphanumeric characters, along with one or two special characters, can help prevent criminals from breaking into our accounts.
Coming to the second news, the UK’s National Cyber Security Centre has issued an official cyber threat notice that Kremlin-aligned hacking groups, such as Killnet, will try their best to disrupt the power utilities operations in and around the UK. The threat notice was extended to other countries in Europe, as Putin has put them at the top of his country’s foe list.
Posting the same on a prominent social media platform, Oliver Dowden, the Cabinet Minister of Britain’s Infrastructure, confirmed the news that ‘Wagner’s’ will launch devastating attacks to disrupt and destroy the entire energy sector across the UK, but assured that the country’s cyber army was well prepared for such invasions and is excellently equipped to thwart such attacks to the core.
The highlight is that Britain now has the potential not only to defend its infrastructure but also to launch retaliation-filled attacks leading to dismantling Russia from all spheres.
