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Ben Nahorney

Threat Intelligence Analyst

Cisco Security

Ben Nahorney is a Threat Intelligence Analyst focused on covering the threat landscape for Cisco Security. With more than a decade and a half of experience in the Internet security field, Ben has weathered threat outbreaks reaching back to the early 2000s and helped develop and report on breaking research such as the Stuxnet virus.

A firm believer in “the right tool for the job,” Ben has been an avid producer of written, graphical, video, and data-driven content to help convey how threats operate, and authored papers on security topics ranging from email threats to detecting IoCs to annual reports on the state of the threat landscape.

Articles

May 28, 2020

SECURITY

Remote work and the threat landscape

4 min read

This month, we decided to take a look at some of the trends we’ve seen in a shifting threat landscape, including attackers who are adapting their techniques to take advantage of new opportunities. When you understand what they’re doing, it’s easier to mount a better defense against new trends in the threat landscape. 

April 27, 2020

SECURITY

Securing the remote work environment

6 min read

As organizations adopt remote working, how should they evaluate their security posture? And what are the top threats they may face?

March 31, 2020

SECURITY

Stealing passwords with credential dumping

6 min read

What is “credential dumping” and why should security professionals be paying attention? Find out more in this Threat of the Month.

February 25, 2020

SECURITY

Explorations in the spam folder

7 min read

Everyone has a spam folder. It’s often disregarded as a dark, bottomless pit for fake emails from FedEx, pharmacy offers, and introductory emails from women far too amorous to be anything but fantastical. You’d be right to largely ignore this folder. Yet each day new emails end up in it. Most of us have learned […]

January 29, 2020

SECURITY

Securing Industrial IoT

6 min read

It’s hard to ignore the ubiquity of the internet of things (IoT). Even if you’re one of those holdouts that doesn’t own consumer IoT devices such as a smart speaker, internet-connected thermostat, or a smart watch, industrial IoT (IIoT) devices—a subset of the IoT landscape—are already playing a part in your daily life. From the […]

November 25, 2019

SECURITY

Malvertising

6 min read

Online advertising is an integral part of today’s internet experience. In many ways, ads are the lifeblood behind many websites, providing the necessary funding to keep sites running, as well as supporting the creation of new content. While it may appear as though the ads that are displayed are just a component of the site […]

October 30, 2019

SECURITY

Remote Access Trojans

6 min read

You’re working for a high-profile technology company, close to releasing a market-changing product to the public. It’s a highly contested space, with many competitors, both domestic and international. There’s also...

September 30, 2019

SECURITY

Threats in encrypted traffic

5 min read

There was a time when the web was open. Quite literally—communications taking place on the early web were not masked in any significant fashion. This meant that it was...

September 9, 2019

SECURITY

The Value of Threat Hunting

4 min read

Threat hunting, i.e. looking for threats that somehow got past your defenses, is featured in our Cisco Cybersecurity Series, "Hunting for Hidden Threats: Incorporating Threat Hunting Into Your Security Program."

July 25, 2019

SECURITY

DNS under attack

7 min read

Attacks against DNS is of significant concern. But what exactly is DNS? How is it being attacked? And what can be done to protect against these attacks?

May 29, 2019

SECURITY

Office 365 phishing

5 min read

Let’s be honest: administering email is a pain. Routing issues, disk quotas, bouncebacks, the times when users can send but not receive emails, receive but not send, or they flat...

April 5, 2019

SECURITY

Social media and black markets

3 min read

Cybercrime happens in hidden corners of the Internet, but also in social networks: Cisco Talos uncovered 74 criminal groups on Facebook. Fortunately, Cisco has a layered defense against cybercriminals.

March 14, 2019

SECURITY

Your money or your life: Digital extortion scams

5 min read

An insidious targeted phishing scam is growing in popularity: scammers leveraging threats against your reputation, your relationships, or even your life. Witness the transition from carrot to stick.

February 14, 2019

SECURITY

Today’s critical threats: A Cisco Security threat report

2 min read

Download a copy of our first 2019 Threat Report, Defending against today’s critical threats today and start prepping for the things that are likely to come.

January 14, 2019

SECURITY

SMB and the return of the worm

5 min read

Watch the threat landscape long enough, and you’ll see that some things are cyclical. Threat types and attack methods fall in and out of fashion. As the use of one...

December 11, 2018

SECURITY

Cryptomining: A sheep or a wolf?

7 min read

One of, if not the, most prominent motivators for threat actors is money. Whether it’s botnet owners renting out their services for DDoS attacks, tech support scammers cold-calling people to...