Ransomware attack halts Argentinian border crossing for four hours

Argentina's official immigration agency, Dirección Nacional de Migraciones, suffered a Netwalker ransomware attack that temporarily halted border crossing into and out of the country.

While ransomware attacks against cities and local agencies have become all too common, this may be a first known attack against a federal agency that has interrupted a country's operations.

According to a criminal complaint published by Argentina's cybercrime agency, Unidad Fiscal Especializada en Ciberdelincuencia, the government first learned of the ransomware attack after receiving numerous tech support calls from checkpoints at approximately 7 AM on August 27th.

https://www.bleepingcomputer.com/news/security/ransomware-attack-halts-argentinian-border-crossing-for-four-hours/

#South #America #Argentina #ransomware #attack

Podcast: COVID-19 is helping turn Brazil into a surveillance state

Latin America's largest democracy was a leader on data governance for years. Now, it’s reversing course.

Leading discussions about the global rules to regulate digital privacy and surveillance is a somewhat unusual role for a developing country to play. But Brazil had been doing just that for over a decade.

Edward Snowden’s bombshell in 2014 detailing the US National Security Agency’s digital surveillance activities changed all that. It included revelations that the agency had been spying on Brazil’s state-controlled oil company Petrobras, and even on then-president Dilma Rousseff´s communications. The leaks prompted the Brazilian government to adopt a kind of digital “Bill of Rights” for its citizens, and lawmakers would go on to pass a data protection measure closely modeled on Europe’s GDPR.

But the country has now shifted toward a more authoritarian path. Last October, President Jair Bolsonaro signed a decree compelling all federal bodies to share the vast troves of data they hold on Brazilian citizens and consolidate it in a centralized database, the Cadastro Base do Cidadão (Citizen’s Basic Register).

https://www.technologyreview.com/2020/09/16/1008495/podcast-covid-19-brazil-surveillance-state/

#South #America #Brazil #surveillance #state

'Deepfake is the future of content creation'

A few months ago, millions of TV viewers across South Korea were watching the MBN channel to catch the latest news.

At the top of the hour, regular news anchor Kim Joo-Ha started to go through the day's headlines. It was a relatively normal list of stories for late 2020 - full of Covid-19 and pandemic response updates.

Yet this particular bulletin was far from normal, as Kim Joo-Ha wasn't actually on the screen. Instead she had been replaced by a "deepfake" version of herself - a computer-generated copy that aims to perfectly reflect her voice, gestures and facial expressions.

Viewers had been informed beforehand that this was going to happen, and South Korean media reported a mixed response after people had seen it. While some people were amazed at how realistic it was, others said they were worried that the real Kim Joo-Ha might lose her job.

https://www.bbc.com/news/business-56278411

#asia #south #korea #deepfake

Right now in #Australia
#south #park

🇿🇦 The President of The South African Medical Association, Angelique Coetzee:

“In South Africa, it [Omicron] Is A Mild Disease, But It’s a Serious, Serious, Serious Illness in Europe, Because Politicians Want Me to Say It”

#sa #South #Africa