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  • Dec 21, 2021

Last month, CISA (Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency) published its Cybersecurity Incident

& Vulnerability Response Playbooks: Operational Procedures for Planning and Conducting Cybersecurity Incident and Vulnerability

Response Activities in FCEB Information Systems . An appendix to this guide provides a checklist to use in responding to a security breach incident.



A bare description of the checklist can be boiled down to these steps:

  1. Report the incident (to CISA) within one hour

  2. Assess the operational and information impact.

  3. Collect data about the incident.

  4. Identify the technical basis of the incident - the IOC (indicators of compromise - such as a file hash or IP address) and the TTPs (tactics, techniques, and procedures - which describe why and how the attack took place).

  5. Use a third party for intrusion detection.

  6. Tune tools to mitigate the attack.

  7. Implement a containment strategy - system backups; close ports and servers; prevent domain name resolution for attackers.

  8. Eradication - reimage systems from backups.

  9. Reset passwords and install updates and patches.

  10. Post-Incident action - after action hotwash to evaluate the incident response.

  11. Coordinate with the CISA and receive a CISA National Cyber Incident Scoring System (NCISS) priority level.



Beware of the recent BazarBackdoor exploit. The malware works by sending an email which contains a link to a PDF file. The email may reference a customer complaint.


According to Sophos the link may appear like this and be to a URL referencing Adobe:


The link actually leads to the Win 10 application installer (used by the Microsoft store) and the recipient will be prompted to install an ‘Adobe PDF Component’.



The app installer file comes with its own doctored digital certificate.



Amongst other things BazarBackdoor runs PowerShell to get the IP address of your network.

The Pro edition of Windows 10, the EFS (Encrypting File System) system is designed to support file encryption. You can encrypt any file by right clicking on it, selecting 'Properties', on the 'General' tab, clicking on 'Advanced' and then checking off 'Encrypt contents to secure data'.


If this checkbox is grayed out, open the Registry Editor, and at: Computer\HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Control\FileSystem set the value of 'NtfsDisableEncryption' to 1. Then reboot your PC.



If this does not work, in admin mode of command prompt run this command:

fsutil behavior set disableencryption 1




Also run 'sevices.msc', and find Encrypting File System in the menu. Right click on it and select Properties. Then select the startup type to 'Automatic'.



Reboot your PC after making these changes.


Sean O'Shea has more than 20 years of experience in the litigation support field with major law firms in New York and San Francisco.   He is an ACEDS Certified eDiscovery Specialist and a Relativity Certified Administrator.

The views expressed in this blog are those of the owner and do not reflect the views or opinions of the owner’s employer.

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