A big finish to 2025 in December’s Patch Tuesday
A month with no Critical-severity Windows bugs is overshadowed by a mass of Mariner mop-up
Categories: X-ops
Tags: threat research, featured, Microsoft, Patch Tuesday, zero days
Penetration testing helps organizations ensure IT systems are secure, but it should never be treated in a one-size-fits-all approach. Traditional approaches can be rigid and cost your organization time and money – while producing inferior results. The benefits of pen testing are clear. By empowering “white hat” hackers to attempt to breach your system using…
Cybersecurity researchers have shed light on a new phishing-as-a-service (PhaaS) platform that leverages the Domain Name System (DNS) mail exchange (MX) records to serve fake login pages that impersonate about 114 brands. DNS intelligence firm Infoblox is tracking the actor behind the PhaaS, the phishing kit, and the related activity under the moniker Morphing Meerkat….
Cybersecurity researchers have flagged a previously undocumented Linux backdoor dubbed Plague that has managed to evade detection for a year. “The implant is built as a malicious PAM (Pluggable Authentication Module), enabling attackers to silently bypass system authentication and gain persistent SSH access,” Nextron Systems researcher Pierre-Henri Pezier said. Pluggable Authentication Modules
OpenAI on Tuesday unveiled GPT-5.4-Cyber, a variant of its latest flagship model, GPT‑5.4, that’s specifically optimized for defensive cybersecurity use cases, days after rival Anthropic unveiled its own frontier model, Mythos. “The progressive use of AI accelerates defenders – those responsible for keeping systems, data, and users safe – enabling them to find and fix problems
Maxwell Zeff, Zoë Schiffer, and Lily Hay Newman report: Meta has paused all its work with the data contracting firm Mercor while it investigates a major security breach that impacted the startup, two sources confirmed to WIRED. The pause is indefinite, the sources said. Other major AI labs are also reevaluating their work with Mercor as they……
He’s 20 years old and has just been sentenced to 6 1/2 years in prison. The U.S. Attorney’s Office for the District of Columbia announced today: WASHINGTON – Marlon Ferro, 20, of Santa Ana, California, was sentenced today in U.S. District Court to 78 months in prison in connection with his role in a sprawling social engineering conspiracy that stole well over $250 million……