Yesterday the US Computer Emergency Readiness Team (US-CERT) issued a warning regarding ransomware. Their goal was to provide the public with information on ransomware, “specifically its main characteristics, its prevalence, variants that may be proliferating, and how users can prevent and mitigate against ransomware.” The warning comes after a number of hospitals have had their computer networks infected with ransomware. 

A number of smartphone apps can monitor the device’s microphone to detect audio signals embedded in TV advertising. The US Federal Trade Commission has sent warning letters to a dozen app developers who have included such software in existing apps. Known as SilverPush, the software is capable of eavesdropping on television audio and identifying the content. 

A large number of popular websites are serving users malicious advertising which attempts to infect them with ransomware. The websites themselves are not serving malicious advertising, referred to as malvertising, instead several high profile advertising networks affiliated with the sites are the source. The websites affected include MSN.com, NYTimes.com, BBC.com, AOL.com, NFL.com, and The WeatherNetwork.com among others. Combined these sites receive over 2 billion visits a month.