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Once considered a hallmark of flexible working, bring your own device (BYOD) policies are now under renewed scrutiny. While BYOD was initially hailed as a productivity booster, offering convenience and cost savings, it is increasingly viewed as a potential liability.

Recent research shows that over half of UK businesses are now considering banning personal devices altogether. Laptops, smartphones, tablets, and even webcams are being re-evaluated in light of rising security risks.

Yet a blanket ban may do more harm than good. In reality, BYOD is not inherently the problem; outdated security frameworks are. Rather than reverting to rigid device controls, IT leaders should focus on modernizing their approach to managing personal devices in the workplace.

The goal must be to strike a balance: securing sensitive data without compromising employee flexibility or efficiency.

How BYOD became a risk

The rapid adoption of BYOD policies was largely driven by necessity. During the pandemic, organizations needed to maintain continuity while enabling remote work at scale. Encouraging, or simply allowing employees to use personal devices, was a practical solution - in many cases, it was the only viable one.

However, speed often came at the expense of governance. In the rush to maintain operations, security controls were not always properly enforced. Many personal devices lacked basic protections such as encryption, up-to-date antivirus software, or mobile device management tools. As businesses migrated to the cloud and digital workflows accelerated, these unmanaged devices began accessing increasingly sensitive systems and data.

This has significantly expanded the attack surface. Personal devices are more likely to be shared within households, connected to unsecured networks, or left unpatched. IT teams often lack the visibility or control to respond to incidents in real time. The result is a growing risk profile that many organizations now find untenable.

Where traditional policies fall short

Conventional BYOD policies have not kept pace with the complexity of hybrid work. Static, one-size-fits-all rules may have sufficed when office attendance was the norm. Today, however, employees operate across multiple locations, roles, and sometimes even organizations. Legacy policies rarely account for this level of fluidity.

Moreover, the proliferation of “shadow IT” (where staff bypass official channels to access tools or services) further complicates matters. Employees often turn to personal email accounts or unauthorized file-sharing platforms when corporate systems feel restrictive. While often well-intentioned, this behavior can introduce significant security vulnerabilities.

This growing sense of lost control is prompting some organizations to consider eliminating BYOD entirely. But such measures risk driving issues underground rather than resolving them. Prohibiting personal device use without offering viable alternatives may frustrate employees and hinder productivity, particularly in fast-paced or mobile-first roles.

A modernized approach to BYOD

Rather than eliminating BYOD, organizations should focus on enabling it securely and sustainably. A Zero Trust framework offers a strong foundation, built on the principle that no user or device should be inherently trusted.

This model emphasizes identity-based access controls, multi-factor authentication, and the continuous assessment of device health and context before granting access to systems or data. It enables a more dynamic and risk-aware security posture that is far better suited to hybrid environments.

Endpoint management solutions, such as Microsoft Intune, play a central role in putting this strategy into practice. These tools enable organizations to define and enforce compliance requirements, such as device encryption, patch status, or anti-malware installation, before granting access to corporate resources.

Crucially, these controls can be applied to personal devices without infringing on the user’s privacy or personal data and include the ability to remotely wipe corporate data in case a device is lost or stolen.

Policy alone is not enough. Employees need to understand and buy into the organization's expectations. Clear, well-communicated guidance on how personal devices should be used for work, including rules on permitted applications, password management, and how to report suspicious activity, can help embed a culture of shared responsibility for security. Importantly, transparency is key: when employees understand why these rules exist, they are far more likely to comply.

Segregating personal and professional environments on the same device can also help reduce risk while maintaining user convenience. Solutions such as virtual desktops or containerized applications create clear boundaries between corporate and private data. This ensures that sensitive information is protected and auditable, while employees can continue using familiar devices and workflows.

Finally, BYOD strategies must remain agile. Security threats evolve constantly, and employee behavior shifts with changing work patterns. Organizations should monitor usage, review threat intelligence, and regularly update their policies to remain aligned with risk and business need.

Looking forward

The debate around BYOD reflects a broader challenge: how to secure the modern workplace without sacrificing the flexibility that employees now expect. Hybrid work is here to stay, and so too is the need for more sophisticated, nuanced approaches to endpoint security.

Rather than reverting to outdated policies or resorting to blanket bans, organizations should focus on implementing intelligent, scalable solutions that protect data while enabling productivity. With the right combination of technology, policy, and user engagement, BYOD can remain a viable part of a secure and resilient digital workplace.

We list the best mobile device management (MDM) software solutions.

This article was produced as part of TechRadarPro's Expert Insights channel where we feature the best and brightest minds in the technology industry today. The views expressed here are those of the author and are not necessarily those of TechRadarPro or Future plc. If you are interested in contributing find out more here: https://www.techradar.com/news/submit-your-story-to-techradar-pro

Imagine the world’s most capable intern. Someone who can read thousands of documents overnight, make inferences from complex problems instantly, and work 24/7 without complaints. But there's a catch: this intern is also incredibly gullible and will believe almost anything you tell them, making them the perfect target for manipulation by bad actors.

This analogy perfectly illustrates the current state of agentic AI. It’s simultaneously the most sophisticated tool ever created and the most vulnerable to simple deception.

This is made more challenging by how differently people view AI. The features that excite some terrify others, creating a divide between the builders and users.

Builders – aka engineers and researchers – focus on foundational challenges like data quality, algorithmic bias, and existential risks. Their concerns dominate headlines and academic discussions.

But users, such as business leaders and operational teams who want to harness these tools practically and safely, have more practical worries. Less concerned about whether AI will end the world and more focused on whether it will expose customer data or make costly mistakes.

While builders are focused on the future, users want to know what AI can do today. And unfortunately, the gap between what they expect agentic AI to deliver and what it can is substantial.

Expectation vs reality

The narrative around agentic AI often paints a picture of fully autonomous digital workers able to alter a business overnight. While multi-agent LLMs are no longer theory, there’s more exploration that must be done before they can enable complete business transformation.

Current AI systems can deliver impressive agent-like behaviors including knowledge extraction from vast documents, accelerating the software delivery lifecycle, and empathetic customer interactions. But truly autonomous systems that work independently in complex novel environments remain out of reach.

While AI can complete structured tasks with human oversight, it struggles with open-ended problems, long-term planning and high-stakes decision making where failures have consequences.

For example, AI can identify potential vulnerabilities in code and propose wide ranging fixes, but developers must evaluate the solutions to implement and guide their application as AI can’t consistently decipher broader system context.

The danger of inflated expectations is that organizations are caught off guard by the real security risks. Lured into a false sense of readiness, they’re ill-prepared for the routine threats they’re far more likely to face.

The security challenge

As agentic AI systems become more autonomous, organizations face a critical challenge of ensuring systems act aligned with business goals. As agentic AI becomes more capable, it also becomes harder to control and therefore, easier to exploit. Unlike traditional software, which fails in predictable ways, AI systems can fail creatively, manipulated in ways their creators never anticipated.

So, what kinds of security risks should organizations actually be worried about?

While traditional IT challenges, such as data protection across systems, risk management, robust reporting and visibility remain critical, there are other novel challenges that require fresh approaches.

For example, adversarial prompt engineering, such as prompt injection where bad actors can embed malicious instructions in innocent requests, or context manipulation, where attackers provide false context, causing AI to make decisions based on incorrect assumptions.

Another significant issue is accumulation of errors: while experienced humans often spot their mistakes, AI errors can quickly snowball, especially in multi-agent systems, turning small problems into big ones; this can go unnoticed in the early stages as agentic reasoning is superficially similar to human reasoning, and then quickly spiral.

AI risks may seem daunting, but the solutions are often more familiar than organizations expect. It’s not a question of if a security problem will arise, but a matter of when, so it’s important to be prepared.

The solution

Many of the solutions for agentic AI’s specific security challenges exist in traditional cybersecurity and risk management frameworks. The approach requires companies to apply principles they’re already familiar with (or with which organizations they work with are familiar), including zero trust, human oversight, and controlled access.

Rather than assuming all AI inputs are safe, companies should treat them as potentially malicious and implement multiple validation layers. This approach works across all applications, whether customer service or financial operations.

While the principles are straightforward, successful implementation requires careful planning. To build effective agentic AI security, organizations should:

1. Start with a small blast radius: Begin with low-risk, high-value use cases where mistakes are recoverable. For example, deploy AI for document summarization before moving onto financial transactions. This builds organizational confidence and expertise.
2. Build governance: Don’t wait for problems to emerge. Establish clear approval processes and staff training programs so employees know what to do when things go wrong.
3. Automate the validation process: Build and continually grow comprehensive AI-based and traditional test suites that encapsulate the worst imagined case scenarios of adversarial attacks, edge cases, and so forth, so that we are not following a moving target but measuring our improvement carefully and preventing backslides.
4. Question everything: Train users and teams integrating AI tools to question AI outputs rather than inherently trusting them. Make verification part of company culture amongst both builders and consumers by setting up peer review processes, introducing spot-checking protocols and celebrating when someone catches a mistake.
5. Develop protection processes: Conduct regular risk assessments, audit existing implementations for vulnerabilities, implement monitoring systems, and create AI-specific incident response procedures. Set up security policies for success.
6. Stay ahead: Ensure employees are informed about emerging threats by providing relevant training, as well as encouraging them to participate in industry forums, discuss experiences with peers, and attend security conferences. Remember, knowledge is power.

The future

Agentic AI is a powerful tool that can transform how we work and solve problems. But like any powerful and emerging technology, it requires respect, understanding, and proper safety measures.

The key is approaching this technology with the same careful planning and risk management we should apply to any other tool. The gullible savant intern analogy reminds us that even the most capable systems need supervision, clear boundaries, and ongoing guidance.

We've featured the best AI website builder.

This article was produced as part of TechRadarPro's Expert Insights channel where we feature the best and brightest minds in the technology industry today. The views expressed here are those of the author and are not necessarily those of TechRadarPro or Future plc. If you are interested in contributing find out more here: https://www.techradar.com/news/submit-your-story-to-techradar-pro

• Microsoft saw a modified version of a GitHub project carrying malware
• The malware can serve as both a backdoor and an infostealer
• The group behind it was seen deploying encryptors, too

Microsoft has warned of a fake ChatGPT desktop application circulating online which actually carries a highly modular malware framework serving as an infostealer and a backdoor.

In an in-depth report, Microsoft said it observed the framework it dubbed PipeMagic, originating on GitHub.

“The first stage of the PipeMagic infection execution begins with a malicious in-memory dropper disguised as the open-source ChatGPT Desktop Application project,” the report reads. “The threat actor uses a modified version of the GitHub project that includes malicious code to decrypt and launch an embedded payload in memory.”

A handful of victims

The malware is the work of a threat actor known as Storm-2460, which Microsoft also flagged in early April 2025 abusing a zero-day vulnerability in the Common Log File System to deploy the RansomEXX encryptor.

In this case, while the group abused the same flaw - CVE-2025-29824, Microsoft did not state which encryptor was deployed. PipeMagic seems to have evolved, since in the earlier report, it was described as a simple backdoor trojan.

Now, it’s described as a highly modular malware framework which allows threat actors to execute payloads dynamically, maintain persistent control, and communicate stealthily with command-and-control servers. It can manage encrypted payload modules in memory, perform privilege escalation, collect extensive system information, and execute arbitrary code through its linked list architecture.

PipeMagic also supports encrypted inter-process communication via named pipes and can self-update by receiving new modules from its C2 infrastructure.

While Microsoft said the number of victims was “limited”, it did not discuss concrete numbers. The targets were observed in the United States, across Europe, South America, and the Middle East. Most targeted industries include IT, financial, and real estate.

To mitigate the threat, Microsoft recommended a layered defense strategy, which include enabling tamper protection and network protection in Microsoft Defender for Endpoint, and running endpoint detection and response in block mode, among other things.

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Looking for a different day?

A new NYT Strands puzzle appears at midnight each day for your time zone – which means that some people are always playing 'today's game' while others are playing 'yesterday's'. If you're looking for Tuesday's puzzle instead then click here: NYT Strands hints and answers for Tuesday, August 19 (game #534).

Strands is the NYT's latest word game after the likes of Wordle, Spelling Bee and Connections – and it's great fun. It can be difficult, though, so read on for my Strands hints.

Want more word-based fun? Then check out my NYT Connections today and Quordle today pages for hints and answers for those games, and Marc's Wordle today page for the original viral word game.

SPOILER WARNING: Information about NYT Strands today is below, so don't read on if you don't want to know the answers.

NYT Strands today (game #535) - hint #1 - today's themeWhat is the theme of today's NYT Strands?

• Today's NYT Strands theme is… Mint condition

NYT Strands today (game #535) - hint #2 - clue words

Play any of these words to unlock the in-game hints system.

• NOSEY
• LORD
• PURE 
• WALL
• GLOB
• DUNE

NYT Strands today (game #535) - hint #3 - spangram lettersHow many letters are in today's spangram?

• Spangram has 14 letters

NYT Strands today (game #535) - hint #4 - spangram positionWhat are two sides of the board that today's spangram touches?

First side: top, 4th column

Last side: bottom, 2nd column

Right, the answers are below, so DO NOT SCROLL ANY FURTHER IF YOU DON'T WANT TO SEE THEM.

NYT Strands today (game #535) - the answers

(Image credit: New York Times)

The answers to today's Strands, game #535, are…

• EURO
• PESO
• RAND
• POUND
• RUPEE
• DOLLAR
• SPANGRAM: GLOBAL CURRENCY

• My rating: Hard
• My score: 2 hints

I struggled today, but that could have more to do with me, rather than the difficulty of the search.

My first thought when I saw the theme was that we were looking for something to do with collecting. I thought of stamps, furniture and comics first – a world where mint-condition items are worth a tremendous amount more than comics you may have actually read.

I needed several hints to get me going and after being given EURO and PESO I made slow work of getting the rest of the board, including the spangram.

Like, I suspect the majority of players, KWANZA was my final GLOBAL CURRENCY. I've since discovered three facts about Angola's currency, in case it ever comes up in casual conversation: 1) it is named after a river 2) it replaced the escudo in 1977, and 3) all of the notes feature Agostinho Neto, the poet and leader who helped fight for Angola’s independence from Portugal. Every day’s a school day with Strands.

Yesterday's NYT Strands answers (Tuesday, August 19, game #534)

• HOITYTOITY
• PELLMELL
• HOCUSPOCUS
• WILLYNILLY
• SPANGRAM: HYPHENATED

What is NYT Strands?

Strands is the NYT's not-so-new-any-more word game, following Wordle and Connections. It's now a fully fledged member of the NYT's games stable that has been running for a year and which can be played on the NYT Games site on desktop or mobile.

I've got a full guide to how to play NYT Strands, complete with tips for solving it, so check that out if you're struggling to beat it each day.

Looking for a different day?

A new Quordle puzzle appears at midnight each day for your time zone – which means that some people are always playing 'today's game' while others are playing 'yesterday's'. If you're looking for Tuesday's puzzle instead then click here: Quordle hints and answers for Tuesday, August 19 (game #1303).

Quordle was one of the original Wordle alternatives and is still going strong now more than 1,100 games later. It offers a genuine challenge, though, so read on if you need some Quordle hints today – or scroll down further for the answers.

Enjoy playing word games? You can also check out my NYT Connections today and NYT Strands today pages for hints and answers for those puzzles, while Marc's Wordle today column covers the original viral word game.

SPOILER WARNING: Information about Quordle today is below, so don't read on if you don't want to know the answers.

Quordle today (game #1304) - hint #1 - VowelsHow many different vowels are in Quordle today?

• The number of different vowels in Quordle today is 3*.

* Note that by vowel we mean the five standard vowels (A, E, I, O, U), not Y (which is sometimes counted as a vowel too).

Quordle today (game #1304) - hint #2 - repeated lettersDo any of today's Quordle answers contain repeated letters?

• The number of Quordle answers containing a repeated letter today is 2.

Quordle today (game #1304) - hint #3 - uncommon lettersDo the letters Q, Z, X or J appear in Quordle today?

• No. None of Q, Z, X or J appear among today's Quordle answers.

Quordle today (game #1304) - hint #4 - starting letters (1)Do any of today's Quordle puzzles start with the same letter?

• The number of today's Quordle answers starting with the same letter is 0.

If you just want to know the answers at this stage, simply scroll down. If you're not ready yet then here's one more clue to make things a lot easier:

Quordle today (game #1304) - hint #5 - starting letters (2)What letters do today's Quordle answers start with?

• D

• M

• B

• W

Right, the answers are below, so DO NOT SCROLL ANY FURTHER IF YOU DON'T WANT TO SEE THEM.

Quordle today (game #1304) - the answers

(Image credit: Merriam-Webster)

The answers to today's Quordle, game #1304, are…

• DOLLY
• MERRY
• BUGLE
• WORST

This was one of those wonderful games of Quordle for me where every guess was correct and I zoomed through in under a minute – the puzzling equivalent of driving through a city and every light turning green.

Of course, there is also the fact that today’s round was quite easy with just three vowels, no rare words or odd words and two words ending in the same letter.

Daily Sequence today (game #1304) - the answers

(Image credit: Merriam-Webster)

The answers to today's Quordle Daily Sequence, game #1304, are…

• SHRUB
• LADEN
• TATTY
• ADORE

Quordle answers: The past 20

• Quordle #1303, Tuesday, 19 August: KNAVE, SMART, CARRY, MAMMA
• Quordle #1302, Monday, 18 August: FIBER, TRADE, RAYON, TEASE
• Quordle #1301, Sunday, 17 August: FUNGI, AMITY, DRIER, CHECK
• Quordle #1300, Saturday, 16 August: OWING, QUAKE, SLIDE, ELITE
• Quordle #1299, Friday, 15 August: WHALE, PRISM, DRAKE, TEPEE
• Quordle #1298, Thursday, 14 August: LAPEL, IDIOM, RENEW, LIVER
• Quordle #1297, Wednesday, 13 August: CACTI, HOMER, EMAIL, ALBUM
• Quordle #1296, Tuesday, 12 August: SPOOL, TITLE, JAUNT, OVINE
• Quordle #1295, Monday, 11 August: ADULT, BROOM, PURER, CRUEL
• Quordle #1294, Sunday, 10 August: SCRUM, PIPER, TROLL, SPORE
• Quordle #1293, Saturday, 9 August: NOOSE, INLET, ELEGY, VIRUS
• Quordle #1292, Friday, 8 August: KNEEL, KINKY, RALPH, BOOZY
• Quordle #1291, Thursday, 7 August: PLUNK, PROXY, CURVY, PEARL
• Quordle #1290, Wednesday, 6 August: RISKY, APART, FAUNA, HANDY
• Quordle #1289, Tuesday, 5 August: ROAST, SLICK, AUDIT, BILLY
• Quordle #1288, Monday, 4 August: MACAW, SINCE, COLON, CHIRP
• Quordle #1287, Sunday, 3 August: MOTIF, LEERY, LOFTY, BURST
• Quordle #1286, Saturday, 2 August: WARTY, PUPAL, CLEAR, SLICE
• Quordle #1285, Friday, 1 August: ACTOR, MEALY, WIDTH, ADOBE

Looking for a different day?

A new NYT Connections puzzle appears at midnight each day for your time zone – which means that some people are always playing 'today's game' while others are playing 'yesterday's'. If you're looking for Tuesday's puzzle instead then click here: NYT Connections hints and answers for Tuesday, August 19 (game #800).

Good morning! Let's play Connections, the NYT's clever word game that challenges you to group answers in various categories. It can be tough, so read on if you need Connections hints.

What should you do once you've finished? Why, play some more word games of course. I've also got daily Strands hints and answers and Quordle hints and answers articles if you need help for those too, while Marc's Wordle today page covers the original viral word game.

SPOILER WARNING: Information about NYT Connections today is below, so don't read on if you don't want to know the answers.

NYT Connections today (game #801) - today's words

(Image credit: New York Times)

Today's NYT Connections words are…

• CANDY CANE
• CAROUSEL
• CEILING FAN
• CROOK
• ZEBRA
• KNITTING NEEDLES
• CROCHET HOOK 
• BARBER POLE
• YIN-YANG SYMBOL
• CROWBAR
• PIANO KEYS
• CHOPSTICKS
• CLAVES
• DOMINO
• SKI POLES
• LAZY SUSAN

NYT Connections today (game #801) - hint #1 - group hints

What are some clues for today's NYT Connections groups?

• YELLOW: Monochrome items
• GREEN: Two of a kind
• BLUE: Staring at these will make you dizzy
• PURPLE: Bend at the end 

Need more clues?

We're firmly in spoiler territory now, but read on if you want to know what the four theme answers are for today's NYT Connections puzzles…

NYT Connections today (game #801) - hint #2 - group answers

What are the answers for today's NYT Connections groups?

• YELLOW: BLACK-AND-WHITE THINGS
• GREEN: PAIRS OF RODS
• BLUE: THINGS THAT ROTATE ABOUT A VERTICAL AXIS 
• PURPLE: RODS THAT CURVE AT ONE END

Right, the answers are below, so DO NOT SCROLL ANY FURTHER IF YOU DON'T WANT TO SEE THEM.

NYT Connections today (game #801) - the answers

(Image credit: New York Times)

The answers to today's Connections, game #801, are…

• YELLOW: BLACK-AND-WHITE THINGS DOMINO, PIANO KEYS, YIN-YANG SYMBOL, ZEBRA
• GREEN: PAIRS OF RODS CHOPSTICKS, CLAVES, KNITTING NEEDLES, SKI POLES
• BLUE: THINGS THAT ROTATE ABOUT A VERTICAL AXIS BARBER POLE, CAROUSEL, CEILING FAN, LAZY SUSAN
• PURPLE: RODS THAT CURVE AT ONE END CANDY CANE, CROCHET HOOK, CROOK, CROWBAR

• My rating: Hard
• My score: 1 mistake

Occasionally, Connections throw us a curveball – and today was one of those days, with 16 tiles of random items from a BARBER POLE to YIN-YANG SYMBOL.

As is often the case with these kinds of Connections I suffered temporary word blindness and failed to see a single link.

My mistake was putting together KNITTING NEEDLES and CROCHET HOOK with CHOPSTICKS and CANDY CANE, my thinking being they are all kinds of sticks.

Taking a deep breath I began to see some more promising patterns and got THINGS THAT ROTATE ABOUT A VERTICAL AXIS mainly because of LAZY SUSAN, an object I love as it sounds like such an insulting thing to call a revolving plate.

Magically, what was once confusing all made sense, a glorious feeling of enlightenment that is one of the biggest joys of Connections.

Yesterday's NYT Connections answers (Tuesday, August 19, game #800)

• YELLOW: QUITE THE TALKER BLABBERMOUTH, CHATTERBOX, PRATTLER, WINDBAG
• GREEN: FORTIFIED WINES MARSALA, PORT, SHERRY, VERMOUTH
• BLUE: ___ ROCK CLASSIC, LITTLE, PLYMOUTH, THE
• PURPLE: STARTING WITH WAYS TO MOVE QUICKLY DARTMOUTH, DASHBOARD, FLYWHEEL, RUSHMORE

What is NYT Connections?

NYT Connections is one of several increasingly popular word games made by the New York Times. It challenges you to find groups of four items that share something in common, and each group has a different difficulty level: green is easy, yellow a little harder, blue often quite tough and purple usually very difficult.

On the plus side, you don't technically need to solve the final one, as you'll be able to answer that one by a process of elimination. What's more, you can make up to four mistakes, which gives you a little bit of breathing room.

It's a little more involved than something like Wordle, however, and there are plenty of opportunities for the game to trip you up with tricks. For instance, watch out for homophones and other word games that could disguise the answers.

It's playable for free via the NYT Games site on desktop or mobile.

• The iPhone 17e will reportedly have a Dynamic Island rather than a notch
• It could also have a new chipset and a new design
• However, many of its other specs might remain unchanged

The iPhone 17e sounds like it might be quite a big step up from the iPhone 16e, with the key new addition possibly being the Dynamic Island.

This is according to reputable leaker Digital Chat Station (via GSMArena), and it would mean no more notch, bringing the front design in line with the latest iPhones.

The same source also claims the iPhone 17e will have an A19 chipset, which would likely mean the same chipset as the iPhone 17, but says it will once again have a 6.1-inch 60Hz screen, a single 48MP rear camera, and a 12MP front-facing camera with Face ID.

That’s unfortunate, given that plenty of mid-range Android phones – including key iPhone 'e' rivals like the Samsung Galaxy S24 FE and Google Pixel 9a – have multiple rear cameras and 120Hz screens. So this might still be a somewhat compromised handset and a tough sell, even at a price that’s likely to be a fair bit lower than other iPhone 17 models.

An intriguing new design

The iPhone 17e might look something like this iPhone 17 Air leak (Image credit: Majin Bu)

Intriguingly though, Digital Chat Station also appears to claim (going by a machine translation) that the iPhone 17e will get a third upgrade in the form of a new design. It’s not clear what they mean by that though – the move to a Dynamic Island would certainly be a change, but this seems to be a separate point they’re making, suggesting other changes.

We're expecting the rest of the iPhone 17 series to adopt a new Pixel-like camera design, so it's possible that this is what the source is referring to, in which case the iPhone 17e could look a lot like the iPhone 17 Air – which is also expected to have just one rear camera – from the back.

Alternatively, they could be referring to the addition of a Camera Control button, which is present on the main iPhone 16 line but absent from the iPhone 16e, but that’s just speculation.

We may not find out for sure which features the iPhone 17e gets or doesn't get for a while, with the only release date leak so far pointing to May of next year. But if you don’t overly care about having multiple rear cameras or a high screen refresh rate, then the iPhone 17e might be worth the wait.

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• Cisco Talos spotted a new threat actor, tracked as UAT-7237
• The group resembles the "typhoon" Chinese state-sponsored groups
• It targeted web hosting firms in Taiwan

Chinese hacking groups are now targeting web hosting companies in Taiwan, researchers are saying.

Security experts from Cisco Talos said they spotted a never-before-seen group that focuses on “establishing long-term persistence in web infrastructure entities in Taiwan.”

They are tracking the miscreants under the moniker UAT-7237, and believe it to be a subgroup of UAT-5918, meaning it is still a distinct entity, and most likely a state-sponsored one, at that. While Talos does not explicitly say it, it does say that the tools the threat actors are using are quite similar to different “typhoon” hackers which are known to be state-sponsored.

Living off the land

Most of the tools are open source and somewhat customized, with a custom Shellcode loader known as “SoundBill” particularly standing out.

The group uses Cobalt Strike beacons, is quite picky with its web shells, and relies on a combination of direct remote desktop protocol (RDP) access and SoftEther VPN clients.

Talos recently observed the group breaching a Taiwanese hosting provider, and being “particularly interested” in gaining access to the victim organization’s VPN and cloud infrastructure.

“UAT-7237 used open-source and customized tooling to perform several malicious operations in the enterprise, including reconnaissance, credential extraction, deploying bespoke malware, setting up backdoored access via VPN clients, network scanning and proliferation,” the researchers explained.

For initial access, UAT-7237 exploited known vulnerabilities on unpatched servers exposed to the internet. This technique is also common for other state-sponsored groups, such as Volt Typhoon and Flax Typhoon, who usually exploit unpatched VPN appliances, firewalls, and email servers. In some cases, they abuse valid credentials for VPN, RDP, and cloud accounts.

While they occasionally drop lightweight web shells or custom loaders, their preference is to blend into normal network activity and establish persistence through compromised infrastructure rather than phishing or malware.

Via Infosecurity Magazine

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