News Corp, one of the world’s media agencies, has confirmed that its systems were compromised by what they defined as a “persistent cyberattack“ detected in mid-January and that would have resulted in unauthorized access to confidential emails and documents. Among the main brands associated with News Corp are Fox News, New York Post and The Wall Street Journal.
In the notice filed with the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC), the company noted that malicious activity had persisted for a couple of weeks and led to the leaking of confidential information, in addition to its teams attributing these attacks to a state-level threat actor. News Corp is collaborating with a leading cybersecurity firm in the investigation of the incident.
The incident would have affected the company’s main news branches, including the aforementioned Wall Street Journal, New York Post and its divisions in the United Kingdom. Unauthorized access would also have allowed malicious hackers to access newspaper notes and reports that had not yet been published.
Mandiant, the security firm collaborating on the investigation, theorizes that the attack was carried out by agents of the Chinese government: “We believe that these actors are involved in espionage activities for the collection of information for the benefit of China’s interests,” the company’s report states.
On the recovery process, News Corp fears that their insurance policy is not enough to cover the losses arising from the incident: “Cybersecurity risk insurance has become more complicated to obtain, no one can be sure even with the support of a policy like these,” says News Corp’s quarterly report.
To learn more about information security risks, malware variants, vulnerabilities and information technologies, feel free to access the International Institute of Cyber Security (IICS) websites.
He is a well-known expert in mobile security and malware analysis. He studied Computer Science at NYU and started working as a cyber security analyst in 2003. He is actively working as an anti-malware expert. He also worked for security companies like Kaspersky Lab. His everyday job includes researching about new malware and cyber security incidents. Also he has deep level of knowledge in mobile security and mobile vulnerabilities.
