The Defender's Advantage Podcast

159 Episodes

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Using LLMs to Analyze Windows Binaries

2024-10-0436:40

Vicente Diaz, Threat Intelligence Strategist at VirusTotal, joins host Luke McNamara to discuss his research into using LLMs to analyze malware. Vicente covers how he used Gemini to analyze various windows binaries, the use cases this could help address for security operations, technical challenges with de-obfuscation, and more.For more on this topic: https://blog.virustotal.com/2023/04/introducing-virustotal-code-insight.htmlhttps://blog.virustotal.com/2024/04/analyzing-malware-in-binaries-a...

How Threat Actors Bypass Multi-Factor Authentication

2024-09-2627:20

Josh Fleischer, Principal Security Analyst with Mandiant's Managed Defense organization sits down with host Luke McNamara to discuss trends in MFA bypass and how threat actors are conducting adversary in the middle (AiTM) attacks to gain access to targeted organizations. Josh walks through a case study of MFA bypass, how token theft occurs, the increasing amount of AiTM activity with more features being added to phishing kits, and more.

TAG's Work Tracking Commercial Surveillance Vendors

2024-09-0423:58

Host Luke McNamara is joined by Clement Lecigne, security researcher at Google's Threat Analysis Group (TAG) to discuss his work tracking commercial surveillance vendors (CSVs). Clement dives into the history and evolution of the CSV industry, how these entities carry out operations against platforms like mobile, and the nexus of this problem into the increasing rise of zero-day exploitation. For more on TAG's work on CSVs:https://blog.google/threat-analysis-group/state-backed-attackers-...

What Iranian Threat Actors Have Been Up To This Year

2024-07-2536:13

Mandiant APT Researcher Ofir Rozmann joins host Luke McNamara to discuss some notable Iranian cyber espionage actors and what they have been up to in 2024. Ofir covers campaigns from suspected IRGC-nexus actors such as APT42 and APT35-related clusters, as well as activity from TEMP.Zagros. For more on this topic, please see: https://blog.google/technology/safety-security/tool-of-first-resort-israel-hamas-war-in-cyber/https://cloud.google.com/blog/topics/threat-intelligence/un...

Mandiant's Approach to Securely Using AI Solutions

2024-06-2732:00

Mandiant Consultants Trisha Alexander, Muhammed Muneer, and Pat McCoy join host Luke McNamara to discuss Mandiant's recently launched services for securing AI. They discuss how organizations can proactively approach securing the implementation of AI workloads, red-team and test these security controls protecting generative AI models in production, and then also employ AI within the security organization itself. For more, please see: https://cloud.google.com/security/solutions/mandiant-ai...

Lessons Learned from Responding to Cloud Compromises

2024-06-0330:16

Mandiant consultants Will Silverstone (Senior Consultant) and Omar ElAhdan (Principal Consultant) discuss their research into cloud compromise trends over 2023. They discuss living off the land techniques in the cloud, the concept of the extended cloud attack surface, how organizations can better secure their identities, third party cloud compromise trends, and more. Will and Omar's talk at Google Next: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Fg13kGsN9ok&t=2s

The ORB Networks

2024-05-2229:54

Michael Raggi (Principal Analyst, Mandiant Intelligence) joins host Luke McNamara to discuss Mandiant's research into China-nexus threat actors using proxy networks known as “ORBs” (operational relay box networks). Michael discusses the anatomy and framework Mandiant developed to map out these proxy networks, how ORB networks like SPACEHOP are leveraged by China-nexus APTs, and what this all means for defenders. For more, check out: https://cloud.google.com/blog/topics/threat-intel...

Investigations Into Zero-Day Exploitation of the Ivanti Connect Secure Appliances

2024-05-1627:47

Mandiant Principal Analysts John Wolfram and Tyler McLellan join host Luke McNamara to discuss their research in the "Cutting Edge" blog series, a series of investigations into zero-day exploitation of Ivanti appliances. John and Tyler discuss the process of analyzing the initial exploitation, and the attribution challenges that emerged following the disclosure and widespread exploitation by a range of threat actors. They also discuss the role a suspected Volt Typhoon cluster play...

M-Trends 2024 with Mandiant Consulting Vice President Jurgen Kutscher

2024-04-2925:53

Jurgen Kutscher, Mandiant Vice President for Consulting, joins host Luke McNamara to discuss the findings of the M-Trends 2024 report. Jurgen shares his perspective on the "By the Numbers" data, the theme of evasion of detection in this year's report, and how Mandiant consultants have been leveraging AI in purple and red teaming operations. For more on the M-Trends 2024 report: http://cloud.google.com/security/m-trends

Assessing the State of Multifaceted Extortion Operations

2024-04-1140:54

Kimberly Goody, Head of Mandiant's Cyber Crime Analysis team and Jeremy Kennelly, Lead Analyst of the same team join host Luke McNamara to breakdown the current state of ransomware and data theft extortion. Kimberly and Jeremy describe how 2023 differed from the activity they witnessed the year prior, and how changes in the makeup of various groups have played out in the threat landscape, why certain sectors see more targeting, and more.

Hunting for "Living off the Land" Activity

2024-03-2942:32

Host Luke McNamara is joined by Mandiant consultants Shanmukhanand Naikwade and Dan Nutting to discuss hunting for threat actors utilizing "living off the land" (LotL) techniques. They discuss how LotL techniques differ from traditional malware based attacks, ways to differentiate between normal and malicious use of utilities, Volt Typhoon, and more.

Director of NSA's Cybersecurity Collaboration Center on Trends in 2024

2024-03-1425:48

Morgan Adamski, Director of the NSA's Cybersecurity Collaboration Center (CCC) joins host Luke McNamara to discuss the threat posed by Volt Typhoon and other threat actors utilizing living off the land (LotL) techniques, zero-day exploitation trends, how the CCC works with private sector organizations, and more.

The North Korean IT Workers

2024-02-2134:40

Principal Analyst Michael Barnhart joins host Luke McNamara to discuss Mandiant's research into the threat posed by the Democratic People's Republic of Korea's (DPRK) usage of IT workers to gain access to enterprises. For more on Mandiant's analysis of North Korea's cyber capabilities, please see: https://www.mandiant.com/resources/blog/north-korea-cyber-structure-alignment-2023

Prescriptions for a Healthy Cybersecurity Future with Google Cloud's OCISO

2024-02-0744:27

Taylor Lehmann (Director, Google Cloud Office of the CISO) and Bill Reid (Security Architect, Google Cloud Office of the CISO) join host Luke McNamara to discuss their takeaways from the last year of threat activity witnessed by enterprises within healthcare and life sciences. They discuss applying threat intelligence to third-party risk management, threat modeling, and more. For more on the work of Google Cloud's Office of the CISO: https://cloud.google.com/solutions/security/board-of-d...

Is The CTI Lifecycle Due For An Update?

2024-01-2528:08

Mandiant Intelligence Advisor Renze Jongman joins host Luke McNamara to discuss his blog on the CTI Process Hyperloop and applying threat intelligence to the needs of the security organization and larger enterprise. For more on this topic, please see: https://www.mandiant.com/resources/blog/cti-process-hyperloop

Threat Trends: Hacktivists' Continued Use of DDoS

2024-01-1044:50

For our first episode of 2024, host Luke McNamara is joined by Mandiant Senior Technical Director Jose Nazario and Principal Analysts Alden Wahlstrom and Josh Palatucci, to discuss the hacktivist DDoS activity they tracked over the last year.

Threat Trends: Tales from the 2023 Trenches

2023-12-1237:47

Doug Bienstock and Josh Madelay, Regional Leads for Mandiant Consulting, join host Luke McNamara to walk through some of the trends they have witnessed responding to breaches in 2023. Josh and Doug cover what is happening with business email compromise (BEC), common initial infection vectors, social engineering tactics, and more.

Threat Trends: DHS Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas in Conversation with Kevin Mandia

2023-10-2520:44

Host Luke McNamara is joined for this special episode highlighting October as Cybersecurity Awareness Month by Kevin Mandia and DHS Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas. Secretary Mayorkas and Kevin discuss the threat landscape, collaboration between the private sector and government, improving the talent gap in cyber, and ongoing DHS initiatives to foster greater cyber security. For more on the Department of Homeland Security and their work, please see: Cybersecurity | Homeland Security ...

Threat Trends: Addressing Risk in the Cloud with Wiz

2023-10-1937:05

Host Luke McNamara is joined by Amitai Cohen, Attack Vector Intel Lead at Wiz to discuss trends in cloud security, managing risk, and more. For more on Wiz's research, please see: https://www.wiz.io/blog and https://www.wiz.io/crying-out-cloud

Threat Trends: Unraveling WyrmSpy and DragonEgg Mobile Malware with Lookout

2023-09-2032:42

Host Luke McNamara is joined by Kristina Balaam, Staff Threat Researcher at Lookout, to discuss her work attributing two new mobile malware families to APT41. For more on Lookout's report on WyrmSpy and DragonEgg: https://www.lookout.com/threat-intelligence/article/wyrmspy-dragonegg-surveillanceware-apt41Follow Kristina on X @chmodxx_

#box-pro-ellipsis-172922869155651{-webkit-line-clamp:2;}The Defender's Advantage Podcast