Wednesday, November 4, 2015



Complete DHS Report for November 4, 2015

Daily Report                                            

Top Stories

 • The U.S. Department of Justice reported November 2 that Netcracker Technology Corp., agreed to pay $11.4 million and Computer Sciences Corp., agreed to pay $1.35 million for allegedly using individuals on a Defense Information Systems Agency contract without proper security clearances. – U.S. Department of Justice

1. November 2, U.S. Department of Justice – (National) Netcracker Technology Corp. and Computer Sciences Corp. agree to settle Civil False Claims Act allegations. The U.S. Department of Justice announced November 2 that Netcracker Technology Corp., agreed to pay $11.4 million and Computer Sciences Corp., agreed to pay $1.35 million to settle charges that the companies allegedly used individuals on a Defense Information Systems Agency (DISA) contract without proper security clearances, violating the False Claims Act from 2008 through 2013. Source: http://www.justice.gov/opa/pr/netcracker-technology-corp-and-computer-sciences-corp-agree-settle-civil-false-claims-act

 • The Fairfax County superintendent announced November 2 the suspension of all science experiments involving open flames until further notice after an October 30 incident at W.T. Woodson High School injured 5 students and a teacher. – Washington Post

12. November 2, Washington Post – (Virginia) School system bans open-flame science experiments after accident. The Fairfax County superintendent announced November 2 the suspension of all science experiments involving open flames until further notice following an October 30 incident at W.T. Woodson High School where a teacher used a flammable liquid during a science demonstration, prompting a fire that hospitalized 5 students, injured the teacher, and evacuated the school. Source: https://www.washingtonpost.com/local/education/school-system-bans-open-flame-science-experiments-after-accident/2015/11/02/ac5aad7a-8163-11e5-8ba6-cec48b74b2a7_story.html

 • The U.S. Department of Justice will release 6,000 inmates from Federal prisons between October 30 and November 2 as part of its plan to reduce prison crowding and long punishments given to drug offenders. – WBIR 10 Knoxville

15. November 2, WBIR 10 Knoxville – (National) Inmates set free in largest one-time release from federal prison. The U.S. Department of Justice will release 6,000 inmates from Federal prisons between October 30 and November 2 as part of its plan to reduce prison crowding and long punishments given to drug offenders. Source: http://www.wbir.com/story/news/local/2015/11/02/inmates-set-free-in-largest-one-time-release-from-federal-prison/75061044/

 • Trend Micro researchers reported the Moplus software development kit offered by Baidu includes a functionality that can be abused to install backdoors on users’ devices via a Hypertext Transfer Protocol server on the targeted smartphone. – Softpedia See item 16 below in the Information Technology Sector

Financial Services Sector

2. November 2, Reuters – (California) JPMorgan settles California debt collection charges. JPMorgan Chase & Co., agreed to pay $50 million in a settlement with the State of California to resolve allegations that the company tried to collect incorrect sums, sold bad credit card debt, engaged in “robosigning” of thousands of court documents never reviewed, and improperly obtained default judgements against military personnel November 2 after withholding from a July JPMorgan’s $216 million settlement for related charged by the Federal government. Source: http://www.reuters.com/article/2015/11/02/us-jpmorgan-california-settlement-idUSKCN0SR2AU20151102

Information Technology Sector

16. November 3, Softpedia – (International) 100 million Android users may have a backdoor on their devise thanks to the Baidu SDK. Researchers from Trend Micro reported the Moplus software development kit (SDK) being offered by Chinese search engine, Baidu includes a functionality that can be abused to install backdoors on users’ devices via an Hypertext Transfer Protocol (HTTP) server on the targeted smartphone, allowing attackers to send HTTP requests to port 6259 or 40310 and execute malicious commands. The vulnerability has been included on an estimated 14,112 Android applications, potentially impacting over 100 million Android users. Source: http://news.softpedia.com/news/100-million-android-users-may-have-a-backdoor-on-their-device-thanks-to-the-baidu-sdk-495673.shtml

17. November 3, Softpedia – (International) Windows legacy layer used to bypass EMET security measures. Security researchers from Duo Labs discovered that the Windows WoW64 subsystem used to support older or newer 32-bit applications on 64-bit architectures can be leveraged to bypass security measures added by Microsoft with the introduction of the Enhanced Mitigation Experience Toolkit (EMET) that was specifically designed to inspect 32-and 64-bit processes, allowing for more targeted attacks. Source: http://news.softpedia.com/news/windows-legacy-layer-used-to-bypass-emet-security-measures-495691.shtml

18. November 3, Softpedia – (International) Google researchers find 11 zero-day bugs in Samsung Galaxy S6 Edge. Google’s Project Zero security team identified 11 zero-day vulnerabilities in Samsung’s Galaxy S6 Edge phone after the team began investigating new flaws when Samsung adapted the Android operating system (OS) to its custom hardware setup. Samsung fixed 8 of the vulnerabilities during its October Maintenance Release, and the other 3 vulnerabilities are scheduled to be resolved by November. Source: http://news.softpedia.com/news/google-researchers-find-11-zero-day-bugs-in-samsung-galaxy-s6-edge-495694.shtml

19. November 2, Securityweek – (International) Flaw in SAP firm’s XSS filter exposed many sites to attacks. A security researcher identified a reflective cross-site scripting (XSS) flaw on SuccessFactors, a SAP-owned company, and discovered that about 100 Web sites were exposed to the XSS filter, potentially allowing attackers to easily bypass Web pages due to the developers’ failure to escape certain strings when sanitizing user input. Source: http://www.securityweek.com/flaw-sap-firms-xss-filter-exposed-many-sites-attacks

20. November 2, IDG News Service – (International) Google patches critical media processing flaws in Android. Google released security patches for Nexus devices running both Android 5.1 (Lollipop) and 6.0 (Marshmallow) versions addressing seven vulnerabilities, two of which are critical and can be exploited remotely via specially crafted media files including sending multimedia messaging service (MMS) messages and deceiving users to play media in the browsers. The flaws are located in the mediaserver, libstagefright, Bluetooth, Telephony, and libutils components of Android. Source: http://www.computerworld.com/article/3000492/security/google-patches-critical-media-processing-flaws-in-android.html

Communications Sector

See item 16 above in the Information Technology Sector