Latest news and updates about Security.
Microsoft used Black Hat USA 2026 to spotlight how attackers are abusing trusted software, identities, cloud services, and AI systems to scale attacks. The company also highlighted ongoing npm supply chain investigations, new Microsoft Defender Experts capabilities, and research sessions that give security teams practical guidance for defending trust paths.
Microsoft reports increased ACR Stealer activity targeting enterprises through ClickFix social engineering, with two intrusion chains using WebDAV, Python loaders, MSHTA, obfuscated PowerShell, and steganography. The campaigns focus on stealing browser credentials, session tokens, and sensitive documents, making early detection and user awareness critical for defenders.
Microsoft is urging organizations to treat AI agents as first-class identities with tightly scoped access, explicit role assignments, and controlled tool bindings. The guidance matters because agentic workflows can span multiple systems, increasing the blast radius of misconfigured permissions, weak audit trails, and unclear accountability.
Microsoft Threat Intelligence uncovered a coordinated compromise of the AsyncAPI npm organization that republished five package versions with malicious code that runs when packages are imported, not just installed. The incident matters because common mitigations like npm install --ignore-scripts do not stop this technique, putting developer workstations, CI/CD pipelines, and production services at risk if they resolved the affected versions.
Microsoft has launched Defender Experts Threat Intelligence and expanded Defender Experts MDR with third-party and multi-cloud coverage powered by Microsoft Sentinel. The update helps security teams turn threat intelligence into action faster by combining expert-led guidance, unified Defender portal workflows, and broader cross-platform incident response.
Microsoft detailed how threat activity associated with ShinyHunters abused trusted OAuth relationships in Salesforce to gain persistent access, exfiltrate CRM data, and evade traditional sign-in detections. The company also announced improved Salesforce telemetry and near-real-time detection in Defender for Cloud Apps, giving security teams better visibility into connected apps, OAuth scopes, and suspicious SaaS activity.
Microsoft will make passkeys the default authentication experience in Entra ID starting September 1, 2026, automatically prompting users currently using SMS or voice MFA to register a passkey. The change matters because Microsoft-provided SMS and voice authentication will be retired on February 1, 2027, pushing organizations toward phishing-resistant authentication and requiring admins to plan migrations now.
Microsoft’s July 2026 Secure Future Initiative progress report highlights major security gains across identity, cloud resource isolation, vulnerability remediation, and AI-driven defense. The update matters to IT and security teams because it pairs measurable hardening progress with practical guidance on phishing-resistant MFA, secure defaults, composite attack paths, and post-quantum readiness.
Microsoft Threat Intelligence has published a deep analysis of GigaWiper, a Golang-based backdoor that combines command-and-control features with multiple destructive payloads, including disk wiping, fake ransomware, and system sabotage. The research matters because it shows attackers consolidating several malware families into a single modular implant, increasing flexibility while reducing deployment footprint.
Microsoft detailed an internal multi-agent AI system built under its Secure Future Initiative (SFI) to proactively evaluate and harden live cloud services. The approach speeds up deep security analysis from weeks to hours by correlating code, identity, network, configuration, and runtime signals to uncover composite risks that single-tool reviews can miss.
Frost & Sullivan’s 2025 Frost Radar shows cloud security posture management is shifting from periodic compliance checks to continuous, risk-based governance within CNAPP platforms. For IT and security teams, the key takeaway is clear: prioritize tools that unify posture, identity, workload, and data signals to reduce risk faster across multicloud environments.
Microsoft outlined how it is strengthening security across its Cloud Solution Provider ecosystem to reduce partner-led attacks on customer environments. The update focuses on tighter partner vetting, mandatory tenant security requirements, least-privilege access through GDAP, and stronger monitoring and response capabilities.