Cyber Updates

Hey, Gizmo geeks! It’s World Backup Day, a day to remember the importance of protecting your digital assets. On this 31st of March, take a pledge to back up your valuable data. It’s a simple step that secures your present and future. Your future self will thank you for it! Everything is going digital, from filing documents to storing memories. A single wrong click, a hard drive crash, or a ransomware attack can wipe out everything in seconds. Picture a photographer losing wedding photos due to a laptop failure or a small business owner waking up to lost data. Scary, right? These situations are real, but they can be avoided. That’s why backups are so important.   World Backup Day:…

There’s a certain kind of magic swirling across the internet lately. From dreamy landscapes to whimsical portraits, everyone’s turning their personal photos into what looks like scenes from a Studio Ghibli film. Soft tones, fantastical backdrops, and nostalgic vibes—it’s hard not to get swept up in the charm. AI-generated art in the Ghibli style has taken social media by storm, and people are loving it. So do I. But behind the fun and fantasy, there’s a conversation we need to have—one that’s a little less magical but far more critical: What are we giving up in exchange for those AI-generated visuals?   Where Did It All Begin? It all gained momentum when a Seattle-based software engineer transformed a family photo…

Let’s be real for a second — cyber threats today aren’t just an “IT department issue.” They’re a full-blown business crisis waiting to happen. You might think your business is too small to be on a hacker’s radar or that your remote team has things under control. But here’s the truth: if your website is live, your data is online, and your team uses devices to connect — you’re already a target. And the numbers back it up. According to the 2024 Cybersecurity Almanac, cybercrime will cost the world $9.5 trillion in damages this year — that’s more than the global trade of all major illegal drugs combined. And get this: a cyberattack occurs every 39 seconds. For small and…

A whistleblower at the National Labor Relations Board (NLRB) alleged last week that denizens of Elon Musk’s Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE) siphoned gigabytes of data from the agency’s sensitive case files in early March. The whistleblower said accounts created for DOGE at the NLRB downloaded three code repositories from GitHub. Further investigation into one of those code bundles shows it is remarkably similar to a program published in January 2025 by Marko Elez, a 25-year-old DOGE employee who has worked at a number of Musk’s companies. …

A 23-year-old Scottish man thought to be a member of the prolific Scattered Spider cybercrime group was extradited last week from Spain to the United States, where he is facing charges of wire fraud, conspiracy and identity theft. U.S. prosecutors allege Tyler Robert Buchanan and co-conspirators hacked into dozens of companies in the United States and abroad, and that he personally controlled more than $26 million stolen from victims. …

The U.S. government today imposed economic sanctions on Funnull Technology Inc., a Philippines-based company that provides computer infrastructure for hundreds of thousands of websites involved in virtual currency investment scams, commonly known as “pig butchering.” In January 2025, KrebsOnSecurity detailed how Funnull was being used as a content delivery network that catered to cybercriminals seeking to route their traffic through U.S.-based cloud providers. …

Searching for diet plans at 2 AM? Watching songs on YouTube that you’d never admit to liking? Or maybe just catching up on movie gossip while pretending to work? Be honest—how many times have you popped open Incognito Mode on Chrome thinking, “Ah, now no one will know I’m searching for movie spoilers, that weird health symptom, or my secret guilty pleasure songs on YouTube”? To be frank, we’ve all been there. Incognito feels like our browser’s invisibility cloak. But…is it really? Most of us use Incognito Mode, thinking it’s our little safe zone—where browsing leaves no trail. No history, no cache, no proof. Right? But what if I told you… you’re not really invisible? Here’s the uncomfortable truth: Incognito…

Still think “small business” means “low risk”? Think again. You’ve hustled hard to build your business — from late nights managing accounts to early mornings closing deals. But ask yourself this: Is your business protected from cyber threats? You may be running a manufacturing unit in Pune, a logistics service in Delhi, or a boutique in Bengaluru. You’ve got employees to pay, customers to satisfy, and bills that never stop piling up. Amid all this hustle, you tell yourself, “Why would hackers care about my business? I’m too small to be on their radar.” Most Indian small business owners believe that cyberattacks only target large corporations. But here’s the harsh truth — your size is exactly what makes you a…