Friday, April 22, 2016



Complete DHS Report for April 22, 2016

Daily Report                                            

Top Stories

• Federal officials announced April 20 that a group of 66 companies agreed to spend an estimated $70 million to clean up contaminated groundwater, install wells, and operate a groundwater treatment system at the Omega Chemical Corporation Superfund Site in Whittier, California. – U.S. Department of Justice

9. April 20, U.S. Department of Justice – (California) Department of Justice and EPA announce $78 million superfund settlement to clean up groundwater contamination at southern California superfund site. The U.S. Department of Justice and the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) announced April 20 that a group of 66 companies agreed to spend an estimated $70 million to clean up contaminated groundwater, install wells, and operate a groundwater treatment system at the Omega Chemical Corporation Superfund Site in Whittier, California. The parties will also reimburse the EPA $8 million and the California Department of Toxic Substances Control $70,000 for past cleanup actions at the former Omega Chemical Corporation facility that contaminated soil and groundwater with high levels of trichloroethylene, perchloroethylene, Freons, and other contaminants. Source: https://www.justice.gov/opa/pr/department-justice-and-epa-announce-78-million-superfund-settlement-clean-groundwater

• Two Michigan State regulators and one Flint employee were charged April 20 with tampering with evidence, misconduct, and several other felonies related to the city’s lead-tainted water crisis. – Associated Press

10. April 20, Associated Press – (Michigan) 3 charged with several crimes in Flint water crisis. Michigan officials announced that the district engineer and the supervisor of the Michigan State Department of Environmental Quality, as well as Flint’s utilities administrator were charged April 20 with tampering with evidence, misconduct, and several other felony and misdemeanor counts related to the city’s lead-tainted water crisis.

• Crews worked April 20 to complete emergency repairs on a broken sewer line in Memphis that released about 1 million gallons of wastewater per day into the Loosahatchie River. – Associated Press

11. April 20, Associated Press – (Tennessee) 3rd sewage line breaks in Memphis, spills waste into river. Crews worked April 20 to complete emergency repairs on a broken sewer line in Memphis that began releasing approximately 1 million gallons of wastewater per day into the Loosahatchie River which flows into the Mississippi River, after a break was discovered April 17 in a 42-inch sewer line that ruptured when nearby soil eroded and gave way due to heavy rains. Source: http://abcnews.go.com/US/wireStory/3rd-sewage-line-breaks-memphis-spills-waste-river-38541914

• A German researcher discovered a vulnerability in Signaling System Seven that could allow an attacker to keep track of a device’s location or eavesdrop on conversations by utilizing the individual’s phone number. – SecurityWeek See item 19 below in the Communications Sector

Financial Services Sector

4. April 20, WKRN 2 Nashville – (National) Man arrested in Tenn. accused of skimming 1,800 credit cards. Officials reported April 20 that a man was arrested and charged with criminal simulation April 7 after police found thousands of merchandise in the culprits’ vehicle along with the stolen identity of 150 people during a traffic stop violation. Investigators reported that the man stole the credit card data of 1,800 people across several States by secretly installing a skimming device on gas pump stations. Source: http://wkrn.com/2016/04/20/man-arrested-in-tenn-accused-of-skimming-1800-credit-cards/

5. April 20, SecurityWeek – (International) “FIN6” cybergang steals millions of cards from PoS systems. FireEye reported that the cybercriminal group, dubbed “FIN6” which has been targeting thousands of retail and hospitality Point-of-Sale (PoS) systems was increasing its revenue by stealing millions of credit card information and selling the information on an underground market, as well as possessing valid credentials for each of the target’s companies’ networks. Researchers were unsure how each attacker compromises a system due to the lack of forensic evidence.

Information Technology Sector

17. April 21, SecurityWeek – (International) Cisco patches severe flaws in Wireless LAN controller. Cisco released software updates for its Wireless LAN Controller (WLC) products which patch several critical flaws and high severity denial-of-service (DoS) vulnerabilities including an issue related to the Hypertext Transfer Protocol (HTTP) Universal Resource Language (URL) redirection feature of WLC software that can allow an unauthenticated attacker to remotely trigger a buffer overflow and cause affected devices to enter a DoS condition.

18. April 20, SecurityWeek – (International) New tool aims to generically detect Mac OS X ransomware. Security researcher from Synack developed a tool, named “RansomWhere?” that will detect and block all types of file-encrypting ransomware on Apple Mac OS X systems with the aim to constantly monitor file systems for the creation of encrypted files by suspicious processes. The tool was developed after researchers received several reports of ransomware targeting Mac OS X users within the past year.

Communications Sector

19. April 20, SecurityWeek – (International) Vulnerability in mobile networks allows easy phone tracking. A German researcher discovered a vulnerability in Signaling System Seven or Signalling System Number 7 (SS7), a telephony signaling protocol developed in 1975 and used in global cellular networks to exchange billing information, short message service (SMS), roaming, and other services, that could allow an attacker to keep track of the device’s location or eavesdrop on conversation and SMS messages through the utilization of the individual’s phone number. The vulnerability has not been patched by wireless carriers who were first notified of the issue in 2014.