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Crypto Mining – Gov IT contractor charged

May 29, 2019 in Cryptocurrency

The Australian Federal Police have charged a Sydney man for the alleged offence of using Government assets for his own Crypto mining venture. This follows an unrelated incident where two members of the IT department at the Bureau of Meteorology were questioned by police over the alleged use of the agency’s IT infrastructure to mine cryptocurrency.

Needless to say.. this is a ‘No-No’!

The 33 year old man was employed as a Government contractor and is to face Sydney’s Downing Centre Local Court on the charge of unauthorised modification of data to cause impairment and unauthorised modification of restricted data.

The charges were files following the search of the man’s Killara residence on Sydney’s North Shore in March in which the Police were able to seize a laptop, mobile phone and other items presumably related to the man’s employment and subsequent offences.

The AFP have alleged that the man “abused his position as an IT contractor to manipulate program to use the processing power of the agency’s computer network for cryptocurrency mining”.

For his efforts, it’s estimated that the man profited approximately $9,000.

Stay tuned to M1 IT Systems for more related content.

What is Crypto Mining?

Cryptocurrency mining, or cryptomining, is a process in which transactions for various forms of cryptocurrency are verified and added to the blockchain digital ledger. Also known as cryptocoin mining, altcoin mining, or Bitcoin mining (for the most popular form of cryptocurrency, Bitcoin), cryptocurrency mining has increased both as a topic and activity as cryptocurrency usage itself has grown exponentially in the last few years.

NBN – Internet providers again called out on speed claims

May 23, 2019 in Uncategorized

Well then, it appears we are still not getting those promised ‘high speeds’ from the Australian National Broadband Network (NBN)

Internet providers are under pressure to scale back their advertised “typical” evening speed claims for NBN services following the release of a new report that effectively shames those alleged ‘under-performers’.

The latest installment of the Australian Competition and Consumer Commission’s (ACCC) NBN speed monitoring report [pdf], included a new chart showing the “proportion of busy hours where advertised speed was achieved” for each of the major retail service providers.

TPG was by far the winner, and was shown to meet its advertised busy hour speeds an impressive 83.4 percent of the time, while the major providers, Telstra and Optus, achieved the advertised speeds 76.3 percent and 74.6 percent of the time respectively.

Whilst those respectable numbers may be somewhat expected of Australia’s biggest providers of NBN services, some of the smaller providers fall shockingly short of their own advertised typical speeds. These instances were highlighted by 2 very notable examples.

Example #1: Aussie Broadband users in the ACCC speedtest sample hit advertised evening NBN peak speeds just 25.9 percent of the time.

Example #2: MyRepublic also fared relatively poorly on the measure, achieving 37.1 percent.

These numbers came with little context from the ACCC, particularly to explain why two sizable ISPs could allegedly under-perform their rivals by such a massive margin. The first explanation – and indeed the one the ACCC is pushing – is that the measure exposes truth in NBN advertising.

Certainly, some of the typical busy hour claims made by ISPs on their websites are hard to practically correlate with reality. Comparison sites have been chronicling these speed claims and their movements over the past couple of years, but of course practical examples require more specific user feedback and/or tracking which are not really feasible on a large scale today.

There is typically no explanation from ISPs about how the numbers were reached and to what extent they represent the common user experience on the network.

It is hoped that the ACCC’s introduction of a standardised measure on ISP speed claims could reduce any residual uncertainty in NBN advertising as we move into the next decade.

“This additional report was introduced to further encourage ISPs to align their typical busy hour speed claims with what their plans deliver on average when their networks are under most stress,” an ACCC spokesperson.

Not all ISP’s are the same. The best practice is to do your research when choosing an NBN Plan, read consumer forums and ask for advice from existing user’s of a particular ISP’s service. Do not simply follow the ISP’s guidelines and promises, but dig a little deeper and demand better.

If you are looking to change service providers, as a proud TPG/AAPT wholesale provider, we are able to assist with any number of NBN and Fibre Internet services. For enquiries please contact us today.

Urgent Microsoft Security Updates for Windows XP, Windows 7

May 21, 2019 in Security

Microsoft are warning all those with devices still running older versions of Windows to apply an urgent Windows update or else face the prospect of being a victim of a Cyber Attack, and as such they are releasing urgent Microsoft security updates to address these critical vulnerabilities.

Microsoft have identified a critical security flaw in the Remote Desktop Services protocol which affects the Windows XP, Windows 7, Windows Server 2003, and Server 2008 operating systems.

As you may already know, the Windows XP and Windows Server 2003 operating systems are actually no longer supported or patched by Microsoft except in the case of very critical and potentially damaging flaws being discovered. If your business is still using workstations running the Windows XP operating system, or servers running the Windows 2008 server operation system, you are at risk and should seek assistance from an IT professional to upgrade immediately.

“This vulnerability is pre-authentication and requires no user interaction,” explains Simon Pope, director of incident response at Microsoft’s Security Response Center. “In other words, the vulnerability is ‘wormable’, meaning that any future malware that exploits this vulnerability could propagate from vulnerable computer to vulnerable computer in a similar way as the WannaCry malware spread across the globe in 2017.”

Microsoft have noted that there have not yet been reported attacks based on this newly discovered vulnerability, and they strongly advice that the urgent security update of CVE-2019-0708 patch be installed ASAP.

If you are unsure of your update schedule for your Windows Servers or desktops, we highly recommend you review this with your IT partner ASAP.

If you are currently running an older version of the Microsoft Windows or Microsoft Windows Server operating systems, and you are unsure if you are protected contact us at support@m1it.com.au or by calling us on 1300 331 041 today.