October is finally here, the month many people love—the start of spooky season and fall activities like apple picking. But for many cybersecurity professionals, October holds a special significance: it's Cybersecurity Awareness Month.
The Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency (CISA) has officially launched the 21st Cybersecurity Awareness Month, offering valuable resources and tools to help secure our world. CISA isn't the only one celebrating Cybersecurity Awareness Month. Microsoft has released their free Be Cybersmart Kit to educate everyone on best practices for going passwordless. And many other companies are honoring this month by offering free resources to educate users on how to secure our world.
October is the month to highlight cybersecurity and the resources and tools for users and organizations to educate themselves on, but cybersecurity education and training should be occurring year-round.
Cybersecurity professionals deserve recognition for their vital role in building a resilient digital world against hackers and those working to develop innovative and resilient systems in the US to safeguard against external threats. As President Biden stated, "Defending our digital world is essential to ensuring the safety and security of our Nation and the American people." That's why October is a truly special month for the cybersecurity community.
To continue celebrating Cybersecurity Awareness Month, explore our library, where you'll find a vast collection of presentations, seminars, webcasts, podcasts, and blogs.
Now let’s take a look at what else made industry headlines this week.
Oct. 4: Universal Music Group discloses a data breach, resulting in the exfiltration of some of its data.
Oct. 3: “Two students at Harvard University have hooked Meta’s Ray-Ban smart glasses up to a facial recognition system that instantly identifies strangers in public and finds their personal information,” Forbes reported.
Oct. 3: A cyber incident shut down some systems in Wayne County, Michigan, including the county’s website.
Oct. 2: Meta has partnered up with UK banks in an attempt to arrest a growing social media fraud epidemic.
Oct. 2: A large fraud campaign leveraged fake trading apps published to the Apple Store and Google Play store to defraud victims.
Oct. 1: An Indiana resident has been charged with conspiracy to commit wire fraud and to launder monetary instruments.
Sept. 30: Senator Ben Cardin, who serves as the Democratic chair of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, was targeted in an advanced deepfake operation.
Sept. 30: Bleeping Computer reported, “The US Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) charged a UK citizen with hacking into computer systems of five US public companies to access confidential earnings information and conduct insider trading.”