Re: [Dataloss] SecurID breach cost RSA $66m - In 2nd quarter alone

[Jeffrey Walton <noloader () gmail com>]

> In a Tuesday conference call to discuss EMC's financial results, executive
> vice president David Goluden said the company spent the $66m to cover a
> variety of costs, including transaction monitoring for nervous customers and
> offering replacement tokens for those who asked for them.
Fortunately for EMC/RSA, risk is democratized while reward is
privatized. Rest assured the executives will receive a bonus for a job
well done; and the customers are share holders will ultimately bear
the burden of EMC's negligent security practices.

> RSA has instead offered customers generic security advice,
> such as “enforce strong password and pin policies,” and “re-educate
> employees on the importance of avoiding suspicious emails.”
Heck, I bite: that's kind of like "do as I say, not as I do". Perhaps
EMC/RSA should have followed best practices themselves. "Advanced
Threat" - my ass.

Jeff

On Thu, Jul 28, 2011 at 2:53 AM, Jake Kouns
<jkouns () opensecurityfoundation org> wrote:
> http://www.theregister.co.uk/2011/07/27/rsa_security_breach/
> The security breach that targeted sensitive data relating to RSA's SecurID
> two-factor authentication product has cost parent company EMC $66m in the
> second quarter, The Washington Post has reported.
>
> The king's ransom was spent after RSA issued a vaguely worded letter in
> March warning that undisclosed information had been stolen from its network
> that “could potentially be used to reduce the effectiveness of a current
> two-factor authentication implementation as part of a broader attack.”
>
> The company came under blistering criticism for not providing additional
> details to customers, which include some of the world's biggest banks, media
> companies, government agencies and government contractors.
>
> In a Tuesday conference call to discuss EMC's financial results, executive
> vice president David Goluden said the company spent the $66m to cover a
> variety of costs, including transaction monitoring for nervous customers and
> offering replacement tokens for those who asked for them.
>
> “We incurred an accrued cost associated with investigating the attack,
> hardening our systems and working with customers to implement our
> remediation programs,” Goluden was quoted as saying.
>
> EMC also said it alerted customers within hours of the breach and believes
> that the company was targeted for data on its defense and government
> agencies, rather than financial information, The Washington
> Post article said.
>
> Since the breach, reports have emerged that attacks on at least two defense
> contractors -Lockheed Martin and L3 Communications - were aided by
> information stolen from RSA.
>
> RSA has yet to say precisely what information was stolen, leading to
> speculation it includes the seeds used to generate one-time passwords on
> SecurID tokens. RSA has instead offered customers generic security advice,
> such as “enforce strong password and pin policies,” and “re-educate
> employees on the importance of avoiding suspicious emails.”
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