The big picture: The US government has had a bad run of cybersecurity-related incidents over the last couple of weeks. In the span of 12 days, officials from the FBI, DoD, and USMS have confirmed one data leak caused by human error and two separate attacks against government systems. So far, investigators have either not found any suspects or are keeping the lid on what they have discovered.
What just happened? In what could be described as beautifully ironic, a notorious ransomware-as-a-service (RaaS) gang has been brought down after the FBI infiltrated its systems, disrupted operations, and seized its sites. Or, as the Deputy US Attorney General put it, they "hacked the hackers."
PSA: Ad blocking is perhaps one of the most controversial aspects of browsing the web today. Users agree that it declutters web pages, but they also deny ad revenue to many sites that need it (like TechSpot). However, law enforcement agencies admit that ad blocking also mitigates some security risks that online advertising introduces.