Posts exploring how attackers steal usernames, passwords, and authentication tokens through phishing, keylogging, brute force attacks, and credential stuffing. Includes actionable guidance on multi-factor authentication, password managers, and monitoring for compromised credentials.
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The Phone Call That Cost One Company $25 Million In early 2024, an employee at British engineering firm Arup joined a video call with what appeared to be the company's chief financial officer and several colleagues. Every face on the screen was a deepfake. The employee, convinced by
In September 2023, a teenager used a phone call to trick an MGM Resorts employee into resetting credentials. That single social engineering attack cost MGM an estimated $100 million. No malware exploit. No zero-day vulnerability. Just a convincing voice on the other end of a help desk line. If you
In January 2024, a finance employee at engineering firm Arup wired $25 million to threat actors after joining a video call where every other participant — including the CFO — was a deepfake. The attackers had studied publicly available footage, cloned voices and faces, and orchestrated an elaborate social engineering attack that
In September 2023, MGM Resorts lost an estimated $100 million after a social engineering phone call — just one phone call — gave threat actors the foothold they needed to deploy ransomware across the company's entire infrastructure. Slot machines went dark. Hotel key cards stopped working. Reservation systems collapsed. All
In September 2023, MGM Resorts International lost an estimated $100 million after a threat actor social-engineered a help desk employee with a single phone call. One conversation. That's all it took to cripple slot machines, hotel check-in systems, and digital room keys across Las Vegas for over a
In September 2023, a credential stuffing attack against 23andMe exposed the personal data of nearly 7 million users. The root cause wasn't some exotic zero-day exploit. It was reused, weak passwords. Attackers took credentials leaked from other breaches, tried them on 23andMe accounts, and walked right in. That&
In September 2023, MGM Resorts lost an estimated $100 million after a threat actor social-engineered a help desk employee into resetting credentials — for an account that lacked robust secondary verification. One phone call. One bypassed identity check. Nine-figure damage. If you've ever wondered what is multi-factor authentication and
The 23andMe Breach Started With Recycled Passwords In October 2023, genetic testing company 23andMe confirmed that attackers accessed roughly 6.9 million user profiles. The method wasn't some exotic zero-day exploit. It was credential stuffing — threat actors took username and password combinations leaked from other breaches and simply
The Threat That Already Has a Badge and a Password In January 2023, the FBI arrested a former GE employee and a collaborator for stealing trade secrets related to turbine technology — a scheme that had been running for years. The insider had legitimate access the entire time. No firewall stopped
In January 2023, a former Tesla employee leaked the personal information of over 75,000 people — names, Social Security numbers, financial records — to a foreign news outlet. Tesla confirmed the breach wasn't caused by a sophisticated threat actor or a zero-day exploit. It was an insider. If you&
