Russian Ransomware Gangs on the Hunt for Pen Testers

Ransomware gangs reminiscent of Apos, Lynx, and Rabbit Gap are searching for pen testers to affix their ransomware affiliate packages and help of their malicious operations.

Penetration testing, i.e., simulating an assault with a view to determine gaps and vulnerabilities inside a system, is an important cyber follow to gauge the power of a system, program, or operation. Now, based on researchers at Cato Networks in its “Q3 2024 Cato CTRL SASE Menace Report,” a number of Russian job listings have sprung up detailing necessities for a similar talent set, ideally pen testers with expertise in Russian language boards. It’s the newest instance of the professionalization of Russian cybercriminal groups.

“Ransomware is without doubt one of the most pervasive threats within the cybersecurity panorama,” Etay Maor, chief safety strategist at Cato Networks, wrote in a statement. “It impacts everybody — companies and customers — and risk actors are continuously looking for new methods to make their ransomware assaults simpler.”

Different findings within the Cato cyber-threat report embody rising threats from Shadow AI, i.e., unauthorized synthetic intelligence packages; and the dearth of utilization of Transport Layer Safety (TLS), a software that enables organizations to decrypt, examine, and re-encrypt site visitors, however which poses some dangers that immediate organizations to forgo it altogether.