As August 2025 comes to a close, ESET Chief Security Evangelist Tony Anscombe reviews a selection of the top cybersecurity stories that moved the needle, raised the alarms or offered vital lessons over the past 30 or so days, as well as offers insights they hold for your own cyber-defenses:
- WhatsApp took down 6.8 million user accounts in the first half of 2025 that were linked to scammers targeting people around the world,
- the UK government agreed to abandon its demand for Apple to provide a "backdoor" to people's encrypted user data in the cloud,
- attacks by Russia-aligned threat actors on water facilities in Norway and Poland,
- Nigeria deporting more than 100 foreign nationals, including 50 from China, in a crackdown on one of the "largest foreign-led cybercrime syndicates",
- cybercriminals auctioning off active police and government email credentials on underground forums.
Don't forget to check out the July 2025 edition of Tony's monthly security news roundup for more insights.
