Have you ever had one of those days where you blink and it’s 5:00 pm and you feel like you haven’t even started to make a dent in all the tasks you had on your To-Do list for the day? That’s been my week, friends. There’s a lot that goes on behind the scenes before pushing the agenda live for RSA Conference 2024, and it’s easy to get sidetracked from a daily schedule when also trying to ensure that all ‘I’s are dotted and ‘T’s are crossed on a massive project. Alas, the Full Agenda is available, and attendees are already building out their schedules for the week.

As we get closer to Conference, look for special livestream events on RSAC’s social channels. Today we were joined by the Program Committee members for the Human Element track, and it was such a fun conversation where attendees were able to hear session information and personal highlights directly from the industry influencers who made the selections for the track. 

Another squirrel that grabbed my attention yesterday was a special CISA Live! event on K-12 School Safety. A topic of great importance to so many across the nation, the education sector is a part of our critical infrastructure that remains particularly vulnerable. 

Lowell, Massachusetts was the victim of a second cyberattack in less than 12 months. While there was no data breach, this particular event left Lowell Public Schools without access to the Internet for a week. For those of us who didn’t grow up on the Internet, it’s easy to dismiss this as “no big deal,” but teachers couldn’t even print or make photocopies because everything in today’s modern classroom relies on Internet access.

Incorporating legacy systems into a security posture is a topic that will be covered in an RSA Conference 2024 session titled, Everything Old Is New Again: Protecting Legacy Systems with Modern Security.”  To learn more about protecting critical infrastructure, explore the RSAC Library. 

 Now let’s take a look at what else made industry headlines this week.

Mar. 1: Reuters reported, “UnitedHealth's unit Change Healthcare said on Friday it has enabled a new instance of its ePrescribing service for all its customers, more than a week after it reported a hack that had a knock-on effect on players across the U.S. healthcare system.”

Mar. 1: Researchers have identified a phishing kit dubbed CryptoChameleon, being used by sophisticated attackers who are leveraging social engineering tactics to victimize Apple iOS and Google Android device users.

Feb. 29: CISA issued an advisory warning that threat actors are exploiting multiple vulnerabilities in Ivanti Connect Secure and Policy Secure Gateways.

Feb. 29: “The White House has launched a new effort to stop data brokers lawfully selling Americans’ personal data to entities in hostile states, arguing it represents a major privacy and national security risk,” Infosecurity Magazine reported.

Feb. 28: CyberScoop reported, “A notorious ransomware and extortion group tied to dozens of cyberattacks against health care entities claimed responsibility Wednesday for an ongoing attack that’s disrupting payment processing at pharmacies and other care-related entities across the country.”

Feb. 27: The National Security Agency/Central Security Service in collaboration with the Federal Bureau of Investigation has published an advisory detailing the tactics, techniques, and procedures used by Russian actors to facilitate cyber operations. 

Feb. 27: An Atlantic Council blog post asserted the US needs to forge an Indo-Pacific intelligence coalition if it expects to combat cyberthreats from China. 

Feb. 27: Walmart issued a breach notification letter to individuals whose sensitive information was accessed in a cyberattack on Spark, Walmart’s crowdsourcing delivery service.

Feb. 26: The White House released a joint statement in collaboration with multiple foreign governments endorsing 6G technologies that are, “secure, open, and resilient by design.”

Feb. 26: According to The Record, “Meta, the owner of Facebook and Instagram, is ramping up its efforts to protect users from disinformation ahead of the European Parliament elections in June.”