Hackers in Ransomware Attack Demand $70M

The group of Russian hackers who have claimed responsibility for what is being called the biggest ransomware attack ever have demanded $70 million to unlock computers affected by the breach.The REvil group made the demand late Sunday, offering in a posting on its dark web site a universal decrypt...

By Matthew Heller • July 6, 2021

Sunburst Hack Costs SolarWinds At Least $18M

SolarWinds disclosed Tuesday that it took a hit of at least $18 million from the massive Russian malware attack that compromised its flagship Orion technology management software. In releasing preliminary first-quarter results, SolarWinds said it spent $18 million to $19 million to “investigate a...

By Matthew Heller • April 14, 2021

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The CFO Strategy for Artificial Intelligence

Artificial intelligence’s impact on the office of the CFO continues to evolve, and finance chiefs must be aware of the opportunities it will create for growth. 

By CFO.com staff

Russia Hack Targeted Specific Microsoft Customers

The massive Russian malware attack targeted more than 40 Microsoft customers with “narrower and more focused” measures, the company said, calling it “a broad and successful espionage-based assault.”Investigators have traced the hack to updates of the Orion technology management software that were...

By Matthew Heller • Dec. 18, 2020

Twitter to Shut Down Periscope Five Years After Launch

Twitter is shutting down Periscope as a separate live video streaming app after incorporating most of its core capabilities into the Twitter Live feature within the main app.Twitter said in a blog post Tuesday that it made the “difficult decision” to discontinue Periscope by March 2021 in part be...

By Matthew Heller • Dec. 16, 2020

Hack of U.S. Agencies Tied to Software Updates

Hackers who breached the computer systems of U.S. government agencies including the Treasury Department appear to have hidden malicious code in the body of legitimate software updates, according to cybersecurity experts.Investigators have traced the hack — which one U.S. official said is “probabl...

By Matthew Heller • Dec. 15, 2020

Nation-State Hackers Breach Cybersecurity Firm

Sophisticated hackers have turned the tables on FireEye, one of the world’s premier cybersecurity firms, stealing digital tools that it uses to test its customers’ cyber defenses.The New York Times said the “stunning theft,” which FireEye disclosed on Tuesday, was “akin to bank robbers who, havin...

By Matthew Heller • Dec. 9, 2020

Cloud Security: A Work In Progress

Mountain View, Calif.-based Egnyte provides file sharing via the cloud to its customers, so its security practices have to be top-notch. But the company also has all of its internal finance applications in the cloud, including those handling employee expenses and payment processing for contractor...

By Bob Violino • Oct. 13, 2020

Ransomware Hackers Hit UHS Hospital Chain

A suspected ransomware attack shut down the computer systems at Universal Health Services, one of the largest U.S. hospital chains, and raised fears that the hackers gained access to patient and employee data.As Wired reports, “Ransomware attacks on large organizations have been prevalent since t...

By Matthew Heller • Sept. 29, 2020

Chinese Nationals Charged With Hacking Attacks

U.S. authorities announced that five Chinese nationals linked to a China-backed hacking group have been charged with breaking into the computer systems of more than 100 companies in the U.S. and abroad.Two of the five alleged hackers — Zhang Haoran, 35, and Tan Dailin, 35 — were indicted by a gra...

By Matthew Heller • Sept. 17, 2020

Trump Orders TikTok Owner to Sell U.S. Assets

President Donald Trump has made another move against TikTok, giving the Chinese owner of the video-sharing app until Nov. 12 to divest its U.S. operations.In an order issued on Friday, the president cited “credible evidence” that Bytedance “might take action that threatens the national security o...

By Matthew Heller • Aug. 17, 2020

Major Twitter Accounts Hacked for Bitcoin Scam

Twitter temporarily disabled broad swaths of its service on Wednesday after suffering an unprecedented hack that used high-profile accounts to spread a cryptocurrency scam.The accounts of Barack Obama, Joe Biden, Warren Buffett, Jeff Bezos, and Bill Gates were among those targeted by what Twitter...

By Matthew Heller • July 16, 2020

Microsoft Scraps Game Streaming Platform

Microsoft is shutting down its Mixer live-streaming gaming platform after struggling to compete with rivals such as Amazon’s Twitch and YouTube Gaming.Microsoft bet heavily on Mixer after acquiring the service, then known as Beam, in 2016, making exclusive deals with content creators such as Ninj...

By Matthew Heller • June 23, 2020

Smartphone Market Seen Falling 11.9% in 2020

The global smartphone market will decline sharply this year due to the macroeconomic impact of the coronavirus pandemic though sales of new 5G phones may spark a rebound toward the end of 2020, according to International Data Corp.The research group said Wednesday it expects smartphone shipments ...

By Matthew Heller • June 3, 2020

Facebook Zooms in on Videoconferencing

Facebook is moving into the videoconferencing market, offering another option for locked-down consumers who have sparked a surge in demand for video chats.Facebook’s new Messenger Rooms tool is similar to Zoom and Houseparty, which have seen usage take off since the coronavirus pandemic forced pe...

By Matthew Heller • April 27, 2020

Apple, Google Add Tech Muscle to Virus Fight

The coronavirus pandemic has inspired a rare collaboration between Apple and Google to add technology to their smartphones that will alert users if they have been in contact with an infected person.The two tech giants said they will initially release application programming interfaces (APIs) in M...

By Matthew Heller • April 13, 2020

Digital Transformation: Obsolete Concept or Rare Feat?

Does the phrase “digital transformation” mean anything anymore? If it ever did, it probably doesn’t now. If every company is digitally transforming, saying that a company is undergoing digital transformation doesn’t impart information.“It’s basically lost its luster,” acknowledges David Clarke, g...

By David McCann • Feb. 20, 2020

U.S. Facing Threats to AI Tech Leadership

The U.S. will need to step up investment and reduce immigration barriers if it is to maintain its lead in developing AI and machine learning technologies, according to two MIT researchers.Speaking at the World Economic Forum in Davos, Switzerland, Erik Brynjolfsson and Andrew McAfee noted how the...

By Matthew Heller • Jan. 23, 2020

Can Companies Come to Grips With AI Hype?

Companies are using more artificial intelligence and starting to realize some quantifiable benefits. At the same time, the wild proliferation of technology firms claiming to offer AI tools is hindering companies’ efforts to attain game-changing ROI.That’s one conclusion of a new KPMG study of 751...

By David McCann • Jan. 17, 2020

Ring Suit Alleges Cameras Vulnerable to Hackers

Home security service Ring provides customers with a false sense of security by failing to protect its Wi-Fi cameras from hackers, according to a class-action lawsuit.A Ring customer in Alabama filed the suit on Thursday against Ring and parent company Amazon, citing a breach of a system he had i...

By Matthew Heller • Dec. 27, 2019

What Kind of Problems Can Machine Learning Solve?

This article is the first in a series of articles called “Opening the Black Box: How to Assess Machine Learning Models.” The second piece, Selecting and Preparing Data for Machine Learning Projects, and the third piece, Understanding and Assessing Machine Learning Algorithms, were both published ...

By Chandu Chilakapati and Devin Rochford • Oct. 28, 2019

PayPal Pulls Out of Facebook’s Crypto Project

PaypPal has become the first company to withdraw from Facebook’s Libra cryptocurrency project, dealing a potential setback to the social media giant amid regulatory scrutiny of its plan.PayPal announced its withdrawal after pulling out of a key meeting of the Libra Association in Washington on Th...

By Matthew Heller • Oct. 7, 2019

Siloed Usage of New Technologies Thwarts Innovation

Silos have long been a common bane for companies. That remains true today — even when it comes to deploying technologies enabling innovation that could provide significant added value if they were scaled across the enterprise instead of merely being used in pockets.It creates what Accenture calls...

By David McCann • Oct. 7, 2019

Digital Transformation, One Step at a Time

Several years ago, an international utility in North America with millions of customers set out to become more digitally adept. On paper, it was about as big and as ambitious a “digital transformation” as a CFO could face. It was going to be expensive — and as it turned out, frightfully risky.The...

By David McCann • Oct. 4, 2019

PayPal Investment Positions It for China Entry

PayPal has broken through a digital payments barrier as the Chinese government approved its acquisition of 70 percent of a domestic payments provider.PayPal’s investment in GoPay makes it the first foreign payment platform to provide online payment services in China, a market currently dominated ...

By Matthew Heller • Oct. 1, 2019

5 Tests for Deciding Whether to Use Blockchain

Like all emerging technologies, blockchain is going through the ups and downs of the hype cycle. Depending on the month, it’s either a hopeless fad or the next big thing (for which are you are already late!).Much of the technology we use every day went through that cycle, from disappointing clums...

By David McCann • Sept. 17, 2019