Some attacks take real skill. Others just need someone to leave a door open. This week has both. Exposed passwords, old bugs still getting exploited, and trusted software doing things it shouldn't. There's a strange mix of clever tricks and careless mistakes. Hackers are borrowing trust from familiar apps, websites, and AI tools. Some are using AI to speed things up. Others are leaving their
42 publicly listable cloud buckets containing 18 billion files, including exposed credentials, database dumps and backups. The Ransomnews research team counted 484,142 publicly listable cloud storage buckets in October 2026, holding 18.05 billion files. They built the count from the search engines that index open cloud storage and published it as the Ransomnews Cloud Exposure Index, written by Mantas Sasnauskas. “No file was opened for this index. Every number below comes from bucket names, file extensions, file counts and last-modified timestamps. That is a deliberate limit. It keeps the research on the right side of the line, and it turns out to be enough to see where the sensitive material concentrates.” Ransomnews states. “We are calling it the Ransomnews Cloud Exposure Index, and we will rerun it quarterly so the numbers can be compared over time.” The researchers used bucket names, file types, file counts and last-modified dates to collect their data. They did not open any files, allowing them to identify where sensitive information might be stored without accessing the content. They plan to repeat the research every three months to track changes over time. Amazon S3 accounts for 72% of the exposed buckets, roughly in line with its share of the market. This does not mean S3 has weaker security than other providers. Azure Blob, however, appears 2.5 to 3.6 times more often than expected among buckets named for backups, data exports and payroll records. The researchers also found 321,058 files related to credentials and keys. Of the exposed .env files, 67% were last modified in 2026. Below is the split by provider, from a snapshot taken on October 7: ProviderOpen bucketsShareAmazon S3347,98471.9%Azure Blob68,53214.2%Google Cloud Storage53,13111.0%DigitalOcean Spaces11,0692.3%Alibaba OSS3,4260.7%Total484,142100% A lot of these buckets are public on purpose, holding website assets, CDN mirrors, open datasets and podcast archives. So the index isn’t 484,142 breaches. It’s the pool where breaches hide, and the rest of the report narrows it down to the stores that should never have been listable. “Azure, by a wide margin relative to its size. Azure Blob holds 14.2% of open buckets, but 37% of the 1,459 buckets with “backup” in the name, 42% of the 399 named for exports, and 51% of the 505 carrying HR or payroll terms.” continues the report. “Buckets named for logs, customers and databases sit at 35% to 36%, all around two and a half times Azure’s baseline.” The skew only shows up for operational data. Buckets named “dev” sit at Azure’s baseline of 15 percent, and “test” and “staging” fall below it, at 9 and 7 percent. The authors suspect Azure storage accounts more often hold line-of-business data such as backups, exports and HR systems that enterprises run on Microsoft, while S3 and Google Cloud carry more application assets. They call it a hypothesis the counts suggest and don’t prove, and it’s the first thing they want to test next time. By sector, retail and e-commerce names lead with 5,666 buckets, mostly storefront assets. The more worrying number is that names tied to regulated sectors (finance, healthcare, education, government, legal and HR) appear on 10,891 unique open buckets. Those are the places where a stray file most likely holds personal, health or financial records, and where regulators expect to hear about it. Sector (by bucket name)Open bucketsFiles in themRetail and e-commerce5,666269.9MFinance and insurance3,50858.0MHealthcare2,70947.9MMedia and entertainment2,696136.2MEducation2,39360.6MGaming2,29679.0MTravel and hospitality1,714118.7MReal estate1,13760.7MGovernment and public sector1,00036.2MLegal97811.3MCrypto63011.9MHR and payroll5058.4M Healthcare-related names appear in 2,709 buckets containing 47.9 million files. The researchers identified them using terms such as “hospital” (135 buckets), “patient” (135), “clinic” (277) and “dental” (331). HR and payroll is the smallest sector, with 505 buckets, 259 of which are hosted on Azure. These figures are based on names, not proof of ownership. The search matches parts of words, so “store” can refer to object storage as well as shops. A single bucket can also appear in two sectors. The exposed buckets also list about 4.7 million database and dump files, 15,130 mailbox archives, and tens of millions of spreadsheets and documents. Credential files are particularly concerning because they can turn a cloud misconfiguration into a real intrusion. File typeWhat it isFiles listed.pemCertificates and private keys113,285.envApp secrets and API keys80,495.p12Certificate bundles with keys33,268.keystoreJava and Android keystores27,229.ppkPuTTY SSH private keys24,302.pfxWindows certificate bundles23,352.ovpnOpenVPN client configs15,079.jksJava keystores2,421.htpasswdWeb server password files695.tfstateTerraform infrastructure state475.kdbxKeePass password vaults457 Each of these exists to grant access. A .env file is where developers keep database passwords and API keys. A .tfstate file is Terraform’s record of a whole cloud setup, often with secrets in plain text, and a .kdbx vault is encrypted but now open to anyone who wants to guess passwords offline. Some .pem files are public certificates and some files are test fixtures, so the counts are a ceiling on live secrets and not a measure of them. It’s still a big ceiling. Database files make up most of the sensitive material by volume: File typeWhat it usually holdsFiles listed.sqliteEmbedded app databases2,561,807.bakDatabase and server backups752,055.sqlDatabase dumps687,446.sqlite3Embedded app databases488,176.dumpDatabase dumps176,603.mdb / .accdbMicrosoft Access databases36,467.dmpMemory and crash dumps12,809.pst / .ost / .mboxMailbox archives15,130.emlSaved emails4,549,665.csvData exports and recordsat least 69,580,112.xlsx / .xlsSpreadsheets42,544,997.docxWord documents24,936,788.pdfDocuments, invoices, scansat least 106,191,393.logApplication and server logsat least 61,310,809 The exposed buckets contain thousands of virtual disk images, including VMware, Hyper-V and QEMU files. A single disk image can contain an entire server, including credentials. Some exposures involve active systems. Of 80,495 .env files, 67% were last modified in 2026. Certificates and SQLite databases include both recent and older files. Backups appear older, with 89% of the 752,055 .bak files last modified before 2025. Almost all PuTTY key files date from 2024. Recent leaks need urgent attention, while long-standing exposures point to poor security management. The problem is ongoing: at least 113.6 million files were added to publicly listable buckets in the seven days before September 9. Over the previous 30 days, these included more than 21,000 SQL dumps, nearly 21,000 backup files, 4,477 .pem files and 1,298 .env files. Public .env files can expose database passwords that ransomware affiliates and initial access brokers look for. Similar credentials appear in stolen-data logs, but in this case, attackers do not need to infect a device. They only need to search for exposed files. Cloud providers already offer settings to prevent public access. Organizations should enable S3 Block Public Access, disable anonymous access to Azure Blob storage, and enable public access prevention in Google Cloud. These controls should apply at account or organization level to prevent new storage buckets from becoming public. Organizations should also scan their storage for sensitive files such as .env, .sql, .bak, .pem, .ppk, .tfstate and .kdbx. Terraform state files and virtual disk images should be treated as secrets, stored privately, encrypted and monitored. Backups should never be publicly accessible, and recovery procedures must be tested. One exposed bucket may be a mistake, but many often indicate a wider process failure. Organizations need to fix the underlying security controls, not just individual buckets. The research has some limitations. The team queried search engines on October 25, while the bucket list was current to October 7 and the newest indexed file dated September 9. File-level data may therefore be about a month old. Counts are also capped at one million per query, so researchers split larger categories into date ranges and added the results. Some limits apply. The team queried the search engines on October 25. The bucket list was current to October 7 and the newest indexed file was dated September 9, so file-level figures lag by about a month. The index caps any single count at one million, so larger types were split into date windows and summed. A last-modified date shows when a file was written, not when it was exposed, and a listed file isn’t proof that its contents can be read. No bucket is named in the report. Exposures with a known owner in regulated sectors are going through responsible disclosure, with national CERTs copied where the owner is public sector or doesn’t respond. “Rotate any secret that has ever sat in a public bucket. Closing the bucket does not un-leak the key. Assume anything that was listable was copied.” conlcudes the report. Follow me on Twitter: @securityaffairs and Facebook and Mastodon Pierluigi Paganini (SecurityAffairs – hacking, Cloud Buckets)
A massive search-hijacking campaign involving 319 Chrome extensions with a combined 13.4 million reported installations redirected users' searches through tracking servers to generate advertising revenue from Bing and Yahoo. A new report by Socket's John Tuckner expands on the researcher's April 2025 discovery of 57 Chrome extensions with 6 million users, adding 264 newly identified add-ons with another 8.7 million users. "These extensions were created by a handful of organized operators all working from the same idea: quietly take over the browser's default search engine, route every query through a suspicious proxy server, and collect partner referral payments from Yahoo or Bing under a syndication partner ID," explained Tuckner. The extensions, with the full list shared at the bottom of Socket's report, pretend to be PDF converters, manual finders, safe search, and AI search tools. However, for the most part, the extensions simply redirect users' searches through a series of sites until they land on Bing or Yahoo.
AI agents can control authenticated browsers, interact with corporate applications, and access sensitive data while appearing to act as legitimate employees. Keep Aware examines three ways agents operate inside browsers and why traditional security tools may struggle to distinguish their activity from human users.
26,400 credentials that developers left in public code on Gitee, a Chinese code-hosting service, still worked when a researcher tested them. Anyone who copied one from that code could have used it. Independent researcher Ben Zimmermann found them by scanning 7.25 million public Gitee repositories and reported the results on October 28. Most were keys for cloud and AI services, led by
Cisco released security updates to patch a denial-of-service zero-day in Adaptive Security Appliance (ASA) and Threat Defense (FTD) software that attackers are exploiting to remotely crash vulnerable firewall devices. Tracked as CVE-2026-76418, this high-severity vulnerability affects devices running ASA and FTD software with configurations containing the 'webvpn' keyword and SSL VPN enabled on at least one interface. Successful exploitation allows unauthenticated, remote attackers to trigger a denial-of-service (DoS) condition, causing the device to reload unexpectedly. Cisco advised customers to patch vulnerable firewalls after its Product Security Incident Response Team (PSIRT) discovered evidence that the flaw was being exploited in the wild earlier this month. However, the company didn't provide indicators of compromise and hasn't shared additional information about the attacks, including which organizations are being targeted or who is exploiting the flaw.
Cisco has released patches to address a high-severity security flaw in Secure Firewall Adaptive Security Appliance (ASA) Software and Secure Firewall Threat Defense (FTD) Software that it said has been exploited in the wild. The vulnerability, tracked as CVE-2026-76418, is rated 8.6 on the CVSS scoring system. Successful exploitation could allow an unauthenticated, remote attacker to cause the
Volt Typhoon used disposable relay chains to hide zero-day attacks on critical systems. Lumen linked Silent Train to at least four zero-days. Lumen’s Black Lotus Labs has spent three years tracking a covert network it calls Silent Train, which it ties to Volt Typhoon, the China-linked APT group. The cybersecurity firm says the network hid exploitation of software flaws the vendors didn’t know about yet. Black Lotus sent hundreds of victim notifications along the way, and the investigations that followed revealed the exploitation of at least four confirmed zero-days and one likely. “Volt Typhoon’s Silent Train is a covert network designed to gain and maintain access to the technologies businesses rely on to manage devices, networks and critical operations.” reads the report published by Lumen. “Black Lotus Labs® tracked how the group used rapidly changing chains of compromised infrastructure to conceal its activity while exploiting previously unknown vulnerabilities in centralized management platforms.” Silent Train first showed up in November 2023, shortly before the first takedown of the KV-botnet, Volt Typhoon’s earlier network of hijacked routers. Activity rose after the second disruption. The group dropped persistent infrastructure and moved to disposable chains of compromised devices that it could rebuild whenever it wanted. Each session began on a rented server outside the United States. It then passed through another server and compromised small-office routers, home devices and IoT equipment in other countries. Finally, the traffic passed through a compromised device in the U.S., close to the target. This helped the attackers make their activity look like normal local traffic and bypass location-based blocks and IP reputation filters. On average, the chains passed through about four devices before reaching a U.S. IP address. Some used as many as six. Lumen identified more than 27 types of devices used in the network, including TP-Link routers and Fortinet appliances. Some of these devices had no known vulnerabilities, suggesting that Volt Typhoon may have used previously unknown exploits to compromise them and create relay points. “We observed more than 27 device classes exploited and used in Silent Train operations, ranging from SOHO and IoT devices like TP-Link routers and Netgear Orbi devices to enterprise platforms like Fortinet appliances and CyberPanel servers.” the report continues. “Some relay device types lack known vulnerabilities, suggesting Volt Typhoon leveraged undisclosed zero-day exploits to set up a single relay in a four-to-six hop chain and indicating a willingness to commit significant resources to protecting future access capabilities.” The attackers exploited exposed web interfaces and installed only the tools needed to connect the devices through SSH. These included temporary SSH services, keys, configuration files and tools already available on the systems. At the end of each session, they removed all traces of their activity and dismantled the relay chain. Sessions lasted about four hours on average, although some lasted only minutes. The attackers could also build a new chain in less than two minutes, suggesting that they had partly automated the process. The group worked with strict discipline. New device types arrived about one per quarter, and about one per month during the 2023 and 2024 build-out, always tested outside the U.S. first. Roles never changed: Intelbras modems served only as overseas relays, Netgear Orbi devices only as the U.S. hops facing victims, and the server providers stayed separated by layer too. By early 2025, enterprise platforms like Fortinet, Cisco, PRTG, Mirth Connect and CyberPanel joined as final hops. They stayed up one to three months and supported several intrusions. The group also added reverse tunnels using the open-source proxies Chisel and FRP, and the old and new methods ran in parallel. Volt Typhoon used Silent Train only during key stages of its attacks, including exploiting vulnerabilities, stealing credentials and data, and maintaining access to compromised systems. Each session targeted between one and five victims, often just one organization. The activity was carried out by human operators, mainly from Monday to Friday, between 9 a.m. and 10 p.m. China Standard Time. The group also paused operations for several weeks around Chinese New Year. The group targeted tools used to manage endpoints and networks, as well as SD-WAN systems and other control platforms. These systems can manage hundreds or thousands of devices, allowing attackers to reach many systems without moving through the network in the usual way. This approach also helped them leave fewer traces. After the attacks, investigators found webshells running in memory, stolen credentials, misuse of built-in features such as remote file transfers, and deleted logs. The four confirmed zero-day campaigns hit Versa Director in 2024, N-able N-central through CVE-2025-8875 and CVE-2025-8876, Cisco Catalyst SD-WAN through CVE-2026-20127, and VeloCloud Orchestrator through CVE-2026-16812. The Cisco bug is a CVSS 10.0 flaw, and the group kept exploiting it well after Cisco disclosed it in February 2026. In the Versa case, the group used an in-memory JAR webshell to limit forensic evidence and reach downstream customers. The likely fifth is Quest KACE. The campaign hit more than 30 victims and faded after Quest’s October 2025 security updates. “The campaign affected more than 30 victims, followed vendor remediation timelines and declined after Quest’s October 2025 security updates.” the report states. “Despite limited forensic evidence, the available data supports a moderate-confidence assessment that Volt Typhoon exploited a zero-day vulnerability.” The actor stayed on the KACE server and used its admin features to take credentials. Victims include telecoms, government agencies, defense contractors, satellite and emergency communications, universities with ROTC programs, managed service and IT firms, and critical infrastructure such as water, energy, transportation, maritime, rail and aviation. What they share is access to bigger networks or customers. Hawaii, California and Texas were the top locations for several years. Lumen can’t say why, but the pattern fits pre-positioning for a crisis in the Indo-Pacific. “For enterprise leaders, the lesson is clear: systems with broad administrative reach can become high-value gateways to the entire organization and its customers. Reducing internet exposure, accelerating patching, strengthening access controls and preserving security telemetry are essential to detecting threats earlier and limiting their impact.” Lumen concludes. Follow me on Twitter: @securityaffairs and Facebook and Mastodon Pierluigi Paganini (SecurityAffairs – hacking, China)
GitHub has announced that it's introducing a new package firewall as a preview to block installation of suspicious npm packages during installation time. "The firewall inspects both metadata requests and package downloads for signs of malicious activity, acting as an install-time policy gate," GitHub said. The feature, which currently supports only npm packages, is available in public preview
US election websites show improved security, but weak email protection, non-.gov domains and third-party tracking still expose voters to risks. Millions of Americans will use websites to check their registration, find polling places or track ballots before the November 3 election. However, a new study finds that many county election websites still have security weaknesses involving domain names, email authentication, encrypted connections and third-party tracking. Mysterium VPN’s 2026 County Election Website Security Census examines 2,081 county election websites across the United States. “42% of county election websites aren’t on .gov (869 of 2,081 identified). That’s down from 57% in 2024.” states the report. “Weighted by population, it’s 28% because the big counties moved first.” That’s an improvement from 57% in the company’s 2024 census. However, the findings reveal persistent weaknesses that could expose voters to impersonation, misleading websites and unnecessary data collection. These findings concern public information websites and their contact domains. They do not establish that voting machines, ballot-counting systems or election results have been compromised. The researchers started with 3,144 US counties and county equivalents but identified county-run election information pages for 2,081. Of these, 869 used domains outside .gov. Only verified US government organizations can register a .gov domain, making it a useful way for voters to identify official government websites. The study found that larger counties had made more progress: when weighted by population, 28% of residents lived in counties whose election pages used non-.gov domains. Texas accounted for 169 non-.gov sites, including 134 using the older co.<county>.tx.us structure. Arizona and Nebraska had no identified non-.gov county election sites. The FBI and CISA previously warned that criminals were using fake election websites to spread false information and collect personal data. Moving to .gov and redirecting older addresses can reduce confusion, although the domain alone cannot guarantee that every aspect of a website is secure. Election offices communicate with voters about registration, identification requirements and missing ballots. Weak email authentication can make it easier for attackers to impersonate these offices. Of 1,977 readable election pages, 965 displayed a contact address. After excluding consumer email services, researchers examined 942 county-controlled domains. “Of the 1,977 election pages whose content we could read, 965 display a contact address. Twenty-three of those are at consumer providers like Gmail. As in 2024, we set them aside, because Gmail’s security policy is Gmail’s, not the county’s.” states the report. “That leaves 942 county-controlled election email domains.” The study reported that 23% had no DMARC record, while 28% used p=none, a monitoring-only policy that does not request quarantine or rejection of unauthenticated messages. Another 30% requested quarantine and 19% rejection. Together, the first two groups account for roughly 51% of domains without an enforced DMARC policy. The report’s underlying counts total 941 rather than the stated 942, a discrepancy that requires clarification. The share of domains without DMARC fell from 41% in 2024 to 23% in 2026. SPF, another email authentication mechanism, was present on 98% of checked domains. Smaller counties performed worse. Among the third of counties with the fewest residents, 34% of election contact domains lacked DMARC, compared with 12% among the largest counties. Non-.gov domains also showed weaker protection: 32% lacked DMARC, compared with 16% of .gov domains. These findings indicate an association, not proof that adopting .gov automatically improves email security. DMARC enforcement can reduce certain forms of domain spoofing, but it cannot prevent every impersonation attempt, lookalike domain or attack involving compromised accounts. The researchers found 28 websites with consistent HTTPS failures among the 2,081 tested. Fifteen lacked a working HTTPS service, seven presented certificates for the wrong domain, and others had expired or untrusted certificates or failed to establish a secure connection. Another 178 websites would serve election pages over unencrypted HTTP if visitors requested them that way. Only 34% sent an HSTS header, which instructs compatible browsers to insist on encrypted connections. Sixty-three certificates were due to expire within 30 days of Election Day. A separate test examined third-party connections when election pages loaded in a clean browser, without clicks or scrolling. Of 1,930 measured pages, 84% contacted at least one company identified as a tracker by Disconnect or DuckDuckGo. The median page contacted six third-party domains. Google Analytics or Tag Manager appeared on 60% of websites, while Meta Pixel appeared on 3%. Mysterium suggests that some tracking results from default settings in website platforms rather than deliberate decisions by election officials. The presence of third-party code does not, by itself, establish unlawful tracking or prove exactly what information was collected. Still, counties should review whether these connections are necessary on pages designed to provide basic voting information. The study examined recognizable election-related domain names across several extensions, including .gov, .com, .org, .net, .us and .vote. Researchers identified 2,074 matching names that resolved to an address. Of these, 121 were registered outside government control. Thirty-eight hosted unrelated websites, eight were offered for sale, 73 displayed basic server or hosting pages, and two served gambling or spam content. The researchers also found 73 counties with a working .gov version of the name used by their non-.gov election website, suggesting that some had secured the official address without completing the migration. A separate test generated 14,456 single-character misspellings of 77 state and large-county election domains. Researchers found 245 registered variants and identified 26 that served parked, placeholder or unrelated pages after excluding potentially coincidental matches. The study does not establish that these registrations were malicious or identify their owners. However, a voter who mistypes an address or guesses the wrong domain ending could reach a third-party website instead of an official source. Across the seven states that decided the 2024 presidential election, 43% of identified county election websites were outside .gov, down from 55% in 2024. In these states, 26% of election contact domains lacked DMARC, compared with 39% two years earlier. However, 55% still lacked an enforced policy. The nine states whose 2026 Senate races were rated toss-up or lean in mid-October showed similar concerns: 53% of identified county election sites were outside .gov, while 44% of election contact domains lacked enforced DMARC. These figures measure website and email configurations. They are not evidence that an election has been compromised. Mysterium recommends that eligible government organizations complete the move to .gov, redirect old addresses, enforce email authentication policies and configure HTTP-to-HTTPS redirects and HSTS. Counties should inventory legitimate email senders before tightening DMARC policies to avoid disrupting valid communications. They should also review advertising pixels and unnecessary third-party connections, monitor certificate expiration dates and consider registering defensive versions of their domains. For voters, the report recommends starting with the state election office listed on USA.gov and following its link to the relevant county website. Voters should avoid trusting unsolicited messages or plausible-looking search results without checking the destination. If an election-office email comes from an unexpected address, voters should verify it using an independently obtained official telephone number. An unusual address is a reason to check, not proof of fraud, since the study found that some legitimate offices still use consumer email services. The researchers combined Census Bureau county data with official websites recorded in Wikidata and checked them against CISA’s .gov registry. They tested displayed contact addresses, email authentication records, certificates, redirects, tracking requests and lookalike domains. The study identified 2,081 election pages, compared with 2,913 in the 2024 manual survey. Automated discovery favored larger counties with better-structured websites, leaving smaller counties underrepresented even though some had weaker protections. The comparisons indicate progress but are not a perfectly matched before-and-after assessment. Different tests also used different sample sizes, and the tracking analysis measured a single page load from one location. The observations reflect October 17, 2026, rather than continuous monitoring. The findings provide a useful snapshot of public-facing election website security, but individual results should be rechecked before drawing conclusions about a specific county. Follow me on Twitter: @securityaffairs and Facebook and Mastodon Pierluigi Paganini (SecurityAffairs – hacking, Election Website)
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