In the news…

1.  https://pix11.com/news/local-news/what-a-shame/instagram-hacks-get-sophisticated-how-bad-actors-target-everyday-accounts/ 

It does raise red flags, and may have been sent by a hacker, according to Ondrej Krehel, who owns Lifars, a New York cybersecurity company.  

“There’s a very famous Turkish group right now that’s exploiting these accounts and they are very sophisticated,” he said. 

2.  https://www.insurancejournal.com/news/national/2021/08/18/627579.htm 

Dr. Ondrej Krehel, founder and CEO of LIFARS – a New York City-based incident response and digital forensics firm – says that when hackers enter a company’s system, it can create an environment of “chaos and fear.” 

“It’s the same like you see in the movies,” he says. 

3https://searchsecurity.techtarget.com/news/252503170/DarkSide-ransomware-funded-by-cybercriminal-investors 

Ondrej Krehel, CEO and founder of incident response vendor Lifars, said some of the biggest new ransomware gangs, including the now-infamous DarkSide group, have been launched on the back of investments from older, more established operations. These investors provide backing in the form of bitcoin or other cryptocurrency, then get a share of the payouts. 

The most notable example of this, Krehel said, is DarkSide 

4. https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2021-05-13/colonial-pipeline-paid-hackers-nearly-5-million-in-ransom 

“They had to pay,” said Ondrej Krehel, chief executive officer and founder of digital forensics firm LIFARS and a former cyber expert at Loews Corp., which owns Boardwalk Pipeline. “This is a cyber cancer. You want to die or you want to live? It’s not a situation where you can wait.” 

5. https://www.csoonline.com/article/3631534/how-ransomware-runs-the-underground-economy.html 

According to Ondrej Krehel, the founder and CEO of incident response and digital forensics firm LIFARS, ransomware operations were not impacted by the forum bans because most of the actors involved in such activities were already communicating via private groups on Telegram and Threema that had existed for two or three years. 

6. https://www.forbes.com/sites/edwardsegal/2021/05/18/how-bidens-american-jobs-plan-seeks-to-increase-cybersecurity/?sh=3a4d18a25b82 

Ondrej Krehel, CEO of cyber security company LIFARS, said, “A focus on cybersecurity from our country’s leadership is long overdue. The proposed plan should appropriate federal funds that will make cybersecurity preparedness a reality. 

7. https://abc7ny.com/7-on-your-side-consumer-selfie-identity-theft/1771546/ 

Digital Forensics expert Ondrej Krehel says your innocent digit display can be cropped, edited, printed, and lifted into a clear fingerprint – an exact replica of your unique ID. 

8. https://www.forbes.com/sites/laurencebradford/2017/04/29/6-skills-required-for-a-career-in-digital-forensics/?sh=4aeb9b7f7fa6  

Want to know what it takes to become a digital forensics examiner? Here are some key skills needed for the career, with insight from Ondrej Krehel, the founder and CEO of the cybersecurity company LIFARS

9. https://www.fox5ny.com/news/app-allows-uers-to-make-deepfake-videos-of-friends-or-celebrities  

“Your phone number, your contacts–whatever you allow this app to do on your phone is going to do–so that’s free comes with some price,” says Ondrej Krehel, COO and founder of NYC-based cybersecurity and research firm, LIFARS.  

10. https://www.cnbc.com/2016/03/01/retail-businesses-face-big-new-hack-liability.html  

“There has to be more significant damages for someone to start conducting an investigation,” said Ondrej Krehel, founder and CEO of digital forensics and cybersecurity firm Lifars. 

11. https://abcnews.go.com/Business/secure-swipe-credit-card-cab/story?id=15783074  

Wow. That sounds really bad. But is it? That’s hard to say, according to Ondrej Krehel, information security officer at Identity Theft 911. The real answer may be the simplest, Krehel says: many taxi drivers simply prefer their fares to pay with cash instead of credit. “My first thought is whether this is just the driver trying to get people to use cash,” Krehel says. 

12. https://www.csoonline.com/article/2935584/cybersecurity-first-responders.html  

Ondrej Krehel, managing director and founder at LIFARS, LLC, a New York City digital forensics and cybersecurity intelligence firm that provides data breach incident response – chimes in on his best practices for first-responder work. “The primary objective is to provide intelligence about the technical skill-set and the motivation of the attacker, along with immediate steps to remediate and protect critical assets.” 

13. https://www.forbes.com/sites/sungardas/2015/03/25/data-breach-the-cisos-worst-nightmare/?sh=2db1d0d7baee  

That’s why Ondrej Krehel, a former CISO of IDT911 who now runs his own security company, LIFARS, believes there are two specific issues regarding a data breach that keep CISOs awake at night. 

14. https://www.bankinfosecurity.com/facing-cyber-extortion-step-1-dont-panic-a-9308  

Too often when organizations get shaken down by online criminals, they panic, and in the process make the predicament they’re facing even worse, warns Ondrej Krehel, digital forensics lead and CEO of New York-based LIFARS, a digital forensics and cybersecurity intelligence firm. 

15. https://www.inc.com/joseph-steinberg/sec-investigation-raises-terrifying-question-could-your-employees-go-to-prison-f.html  

As Ondrej Krehel, CEO at cyber-forensics firm, LIFARS, told me “Notifying and declaring a data compromise in a timely manner to those who have been affected and, in some instances, to the general public, has been a challenge for many enterprises.”