Welcome to the Transatlantic Cable - a podcast that dives into hot topics in the security news and industry each week. Episode 242 of the Transatlantic Cable starts with Conti ransomware gang’s internal chat logs, day-to-day operations leaked. Then we jump to a REvil ransomware gang update as a member was extradited to U.S. to stand trial for Kaseya attack!

And then a surprising return of Limewire! But now it's selling NFTs! And the NFT frenzy continues when a $1 million clipart rock NFT accidentally sold for less than a cent.

To finish today's episode we talk about Roblox, where apparently players are mining cryptocurrency and then automatically exchanging that for Robux, Roblox's in-game currency. And finally how cybercriminals are stealing from children on Roblox, the gaming platform worth $68 billion!

• Working for a ransomware gang is surprisingly mundane, according to these leaks.
• REvil ransomware member extradited to U.S. to stand trial for Kaseya attack.
• Limewire is back from the dead - and it's selling NFTs.
• NFT Collector Accidentally Sells $1 Million Drawing Of Rock For Less Than A Cent.
• Roblox Players Are Mining Crypto Just to Get Robux.
• How Roblox ‘Beamers’ Get Rich Stealing from Children.

Episode 241 of the Transatlantic Cable kicks off with two ransomware stories.  The first looks at what happened when two ransomware gangs attacked the same victim, at the same time.  The second looks at the recent news around Samsung and Nvidia, allegedly hacked by the Lapsus$ gang.

From there, the team talk about NFTs and the metaverse, with the first story sure to raise the frustrations of petrol-heads as an artist blew up a $250,000 Lamborghini to create NFTs to sell digitally – yes, we’re scratching our heads on that one as well. 

The other NFT / metaverse stories look at an NFT vending machine in New York and WingStop filing a multi-class trademark to enter the metaverse and sell virtual chicken wings.

To wrap up, the team look at a story around Second-Life and plans to add tax to most in-game items. 

Episode 240 of the Transatlantic Cable crash lands with 3 stories on NFTs. The first looks at a recent attack on NFT site OpenSea, which was the target of a phishing scam – the total damage is reported to be close to $2 million. The second story is around the EU and its drive to ‘de-anominize’ crypto payments. The final NFT/crypto-related story looks at how a university in South Korea is exploring how to turn faeces into cold hard crypto.   

To wrap up, the closing story is around the U.S.’s drive to tackle spyware in and around its shores, with recent arrests in Mexico. If you liked what you heard, please consider subscribing!

• NFT Investors Lose $1.7M in OpenSea Phishing Attack
• EU wants to completely ban anonymous payments with crypto assets
• South Korean toilet turns excrement into power and digital currency
• The US Crackdown on Spyware Vendors Is Only Beginning

When you think you have seen it all, the Internet comes back and proves you wrong. That is also the case when it comes to this week’s episode of the Transatlantic Cable.

To start off the podcast, Ahmed, Dave and I discuss a new problem that Roblox is facing. Now, we aren’t talking bugs or trivial threats, but rather some adult conversations and content happening on the platform for kids. While the company notes that there are problems that they are going to address, it still begs to the question as to <b>HOW</b> and <b>WHY</b> this is happening. From there, we stay on the question of <b>WHY</b> as another platform has some seedy happenings. In this case, we discuss a sexual assault on the Metaverse.

https://youtu.be/-H_zeJ2c3Eg

From there, we revisit the topic of Apple’s Air Tags that we discussed two episodes back. It seems they are adding more safety measures in place for users to protect themselves from unauthorized tracking. Our final story of the episode looks into the hackers who are helping users who’ve forgotten their digital wallet passwords access their “missing” cryptocurrency.

If you liked what you heard, please consider subscribing and sharing with your friends. For more information on the stories we covered, see the links below:

• Roblox: The children's game with a sex problem
• Woman recalls 'gang rape' in metaverse; concerns grow over making VR platforms safe from sexual predators
• Apple moves to stop AirTag tracking misuse
• ‘Hackers helped me find my lost Bitcoin fortune’

For the 238th episode of the Transatlantic Cable, Dave, Jeff and Ahmed peruse some of the more interesting cyber-related stories of the week. They start by looking at a light-hearted story around Facebook’s metaverse, weddings and Covid.

From there, they focus on two cryptocurrency stories. The first one looks at a notorious influencer who allegedly scammed his followers out of $500,000 via a rug-pull, and now won’t return the funds. The second story is perhaps a little more light-hearted as it looks at recent research that suggests having ‘crypto’ or ‘NFT’ in your dating profile gives you the edge in the dating scene – call me sceptical on this one.

The last two stories look at North Korea. The first is an interview with an alleged hacker who says they took down North Korea’s internet (all of it); and the second, from the BBC, looks at a UN report suggesting the Democratic People's Republic of Korea (DPRK) is using stolen crypto to fund their nuclear missile program.

Read all the stories below 👇

➡️ My big fat digital wedding: Couple plan India's 'first metaverse marriage'

➡️ Notorious YouTube Streamer Stole $500,000 From Fans In Crypto Scheme

➡️ Owning cryptocurrency may make you more desirable on the dating scene

➡️ One American Hacker Suddenly Took Down North Korea’s Internet

➡️ North Korea: Missile programme funded through stolen crypto

For the 237th episode of the Kaspersky Transatlantic Cable podcast, Ahmed and I ask Dave to dive back into the NFT sea for a pair of stories, both of which center around OpenSea.

The first story comes to us from Vice where Joseph Cox looks into an issue where NFTs may be running third party code without the user’s awareness – in some instances obtaining a IP address for people viewing an NFT. The second story discusses a bug in OpenSea where hackers are able to buy NFTs for previous prices and then flip them for more – all without the current owner’s knowledge.

We then shift focus to Apple to discuss the company’s new response to Air Tags being used for stalking purposes. The question is though, why wasn’t this safety guide already around?

https://youtu.be/jjt9Qx9MBPk

We then jump into the metaverse and debate whether or not this is something that the world really needs to happen. To close out the podcast, we discuss Signal’s new move to incorporate anonymous payments into their future products. 

If you liked what you heard, please consider subscribing and sharing with your friends. For more information on the stories we covered, see the links below:

• This NFT on OpenSea Will Steal Your IP Address
• OpenSea Bug Opens Platform To Hack
• Apple unveils AirTag safety guide amid stalker fears
• Big Tech Needs to Stop Trying to Make Their Metaverse Happen
• How Signal is playing with fire

To kick off the latest edition of the Kaspersky Transatlantic Cable podcast, Ahmed and I ask Dave the status of his Covid-19 NFT. Unfortunately, he was too busy recovering from the actual virus to create his own NFT.

However, we stay on the topic of NFTs for a pair of articles. The first is with our friends on Twitter and how users can now have their profile picture be of an NFT that they have purchased. If that wasn’t enough, we then head to Britain where Julian Lennon is selling off some Beatles historical relics, well at least a digital version of them. While we debate the merits of the auction, we head into another story that is not really up for debate. Instead, we discuss a move from the Russian Federation to ban cryptocurrencies.

From Russia, we head back to the UK where lawmakers are taking the battle to weaken encryption to a new level. In a new campaign, those attacking encryption are using the guise of weakening encryption to protect the children. To close out the podcast, we discuss a report of rising fear within the ransomware community following the REvil arrests.

To start off this week’s episode of the Transatlantic Cable podcast, Ahmed, Dave, and I talk cryptocurrency. Unlike most of our chats on the digital currency, we focus on the criminal aspect of it.

More accurately, our conversation centers on a new report of the nearly $400 million North Korea is alleged to have stolen in the past year. We have some fun going through the report, but we also discuss its implications.

Staying in the world of cybercrime, we then discuss the further-ranging implications of an FBI honeypot operation that involved rather more “anonymous” phones than initially reported.

Our third story heads over to Eastern Europe, where Russia’s FSB has arrested members of the REvil gang after getting good intel from the FBI. This story has been a long-time coming but is also somehow surprising.

We then head to a weird story that might as well have come from The Quibbler. A lawsuit claims that Facebook, being free, is a monopoly. Of all the things to sue Facebook over! Ahmed and I have a bit of fun at David’s expense with this story. We close out the podcast with a pair of stories discussing some more bad news for the world of NFTs.

With the New Year firmly behind us, Dave, Jeff and Ahmed start to look at some of the more quirky stories of the last few days in the latest episode of the Transatlantic Cable.

To kick things off, we look at the roller-coaster that is the price of bitcoin (and to a larger extent, crypto prices in general) and wonder how much further things can slide, from there we discuss the recent news that SEGA isn’t going to pursue NFTs (for now) due to the negative feedback from gamers. Following that, we look at a story that beggar’s belief: it involves passing wind, NFTs (Non-Fungible Tokens) and thousands of dollars – no, I’m not making this up – go check it out yourself with the link below.

From there we look at a story that hackers are trying to penetrate U.S government institutions by posting USBs loaded with malware in the hopes that employees will insert them into computers to find out what’s inside.

Also on this week’s episode is an exclusive interview with Fabio Assolini and Santiago Pontiroli from Kaspersky GReAT to talk about financial predictions in 2022.

Don't forget you can follow us on Twitter @Kaspersky! 

Happy New Year and welcome to the first Transatlantic Cable podcast of 2022. With Dave still out, Ahmed and I take on this episode as a two-man show.

To kick things off, we reflect on the Christmas holiday and this year’s “it” toy, the Chatter Bluetooth Telephone from Fisher-Price. This toy is pretty cool, and it lets users actually talk with it over Bluetooth. Unfortunately, the connection is not as secure as one would hope.

From there, we head to the world of mobile chat apps for a story about a malicious downloader tied to Telegram and people downloading from unofficial sources.

The third story we talk about has to do with Spiderman No Way Home — no spoilers here, just the predictable malware, this time of the crypto-mining variety.

To close out the podcast, we discuss a new vulnerability affecting some people who connect to Apple HomeKit.