Supply Chain Vulnerabilities
This article began with ShadowHammer as the primary topic, a scathing rebuke of ASUS for their total lack of effort in securing an unnecessary utility that they install on every system they ship. However I then saw the news about OfficeDepot’s System Health Checker tool being a complete sham designed to pressure people into purchasing software and services they do not need which triggered memories of other similar betrayals. I can easily recall a dozen times “trusted third party vendors” were responsible for a breach: CCLeaner, a utility designed to improve performance, delivered malware. The malware ShadowPad was baked into popular server management tools. Saks Fifth Avenue and Lord & Taylor: 3rd party provided point of sale system. BestBuy, Sears, Kmart, Delta: customer service vendor. Corporation Service Company: unknown vendor. UnderArmour: MyFitnessPal (Acquired vulnerable environment) UMG: Cloud Storage provider. Target: HVAC contractor. Applebee’s: 3rd party provided point of sale system…