August 1, 2023

Good morning, everyone!

This week’s critical vulnerabilities: Apple released fixes for a new zero-day and other stuff on all current OSes (and a special update for the older 15.7.x) AMD has released firmware updates for its Ryzen and Epyc Zen 2 CPUs Ivanti has released a critical fix for its Endpoint Manager Mobile (formerly MobileIron) (the vulnerability is under active exploit) MikroTik has released firmware updates with critical fixes for all its routers Zimbra has released an update for a vulnerability in its Collaboration Suite Version 8.8.15 Patch All the Things!

Be alert for skimmers

Who knows what a skimmer is? Anyone? Anyone? Bueller?

It's a small device, inserted into the slot of a credit card reader, which captures the card info as it's being transferred to the reader for processing. Recent research by FICO revealed that credit card skimming increased 368% in 2022. It used to be that skimmers were found mainly on ATM machines and gas pumps, but increasingly they are being found in retail locations.

Target became so concerned about the problem that they developed a detection device, called EasySweep, that is used daily in all their stores to check for skimmers. They have released the design free of charge for any retailer that wants to have some of their own made. (Instructions to obtain the design in this article -- and it's just a generally good read.)

As an individual, how do you protect yourself against skimmers?"Skimmers can usually be spotted by doing quick visual or physical inspections before swiping or inserting a card." quoting from a recent Forbes Advisor article on this very subject. Lots of good info in there, and I highly recommend you read the entirety of it.

Stay cyber safe this week!

Remember, you can read past editions of this newsletter on our website, along with tons more information under the Resources tab.

Glenda R. Snodgrass
grs@theneteffect.com
(251) 433-0196 x107
https://www.theneteffect.com
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