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Verizon just raised a big warning flag for Yahoo

washingtonpost.com

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Re: Verizon just raised a big warning flag for Yahoo

#2

Post by justinlardinois »

From a thread about the data breach:

> Investors are conflicted: on the one hand, Yahoo had a data breach that will cost them trust, but on the other hand, investors are surprised to hear there are still 500 million Yahoo users.

https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=12559594

Re: Verizon just raised a big warning flag for Yahoo

#4

Post by jessaustin »

But Silliman made clear on Thursday that the “state-sponsored” nature of the breach would have no bearing on the analysis of materiality.

“From a legal perspective,” he said, “the question . . . ‘is it a state-sponsored attack?’ isn't really relevant in terms of what we're looking at. The question is whether this [had] a material or an adverse effect on the asset we are buying.”

One can see why he didn't want to call "bullshit" publicly, and the news media is required to be dumb, but does anyone with a clue really believe these oh-so-convenient "state actor" attributions? We're supposed to imagine that Russia: 1) wanted what Yahoo had, and 2) wanted to get caught at it. What's the motivation? Did Marissa cut in front of some favored oligarch at the ski lift in Davos or something?

Re: Verizon just raised a big warning flag for Yahoo

#5

Post by heroprotagonist »

While I suspect some of this is posturing for a better price, I'm certain from some past experience that Verizon is very serious about security.

A lot of large enterprise take an approach my colleagues have referred to as 'rubber stamp security', that checks boxes in a compliance report while still remaining largely ineffective. For example, these companies buy tools and install them, but then never configure them properly.

From what I've seen of Verizon, they are more serious about security and beyond requiring an effective toolset, they take the approach of hiring new people who already know the tools well or give effective training to their existing and competent people as part of the onboarding process. This sounds like a no-brainer, but a lot of companies either don't do this or do it very poorly.

Beyond any kind of material impact of the breach on Yahoo's business, it would require a _lot_ of work from their security teams to absorb Yahoo in a way that raises them to Verizon's standards. An acquisition of this size is rarely very easy, but having to completely overhaul the acquired company's entire security posture just adds to this effort. Verizon's security team has to consider Yahoo's infrastructure with very little trust at this point. I wouldn't much care for the prospect of having a flaming bag of poo deposited on my porch, either.

Re: Verizon just raised a big warning flag for Yahoo

#7

Post by oneloop »

Lawsuit: Yahoo CEO Illegally Purged Male Workers to Replace with Women

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XnrkkMtHBL0

EDIT: Haha why is this being downvoted so heavily? Is it because it's off-topic, or you don't like the suggestion that someone could be discriminatory against men, or what?

Re: Verizon just raised a big warning flag for Yahoo

#8

Post by oneloop »

jessaustin wrote: post #4

But Silliman made clear on Thursday that the “state-sponsored” nature of the breach would have no bearing on the analysis of materiality. “From a legal perspective,” he said, “the question . . . ‘is it a state-sponsored attack?’ isn't really relevant in terms of what we're looking at. The question is whether this [had] a material or an adverse effect on the asset we are buying.” One can see why he didn't want to call…

Come on...

WikiLeaks drops shit on Clinton, blame Russia.

Mayer does a terrible job, blame Russia.

Who wants to bet that next we'll hear Elizabeth Holmes blaming Russia for her silly Edison machines not working properly.

Re: Verizon just raised a big warning flag for Yahoo

#9

Post by oneloop »

justinlardinois wrote: post #2

From a thread about the data breach: > Investors are conflicted: on the one hand, Yahoo had a data breach that will cost them trust, but on the other hand, investors are surprised to hear there are still 500 million Yahoo users. https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=12559594

> but on the other hand, investors are surprised to hear there are still 500 million Yahoo users.

Not the onion.

Re: Verizon just raised a big warning flag for Yahoo

#10

Post by fowl2 »

heroprotagonist wrote: post #5

While I suspect some of this is posturing for a better price, I'm certain from some past experience that Verizon is very serious about security. A lot of large enterprise take an approach my colleagues have referred to as 'rubber stamp security', that checks boxes in a compliance report while still remaining largely ineffective. For example, these companies buy tools and install them, but then never configure them pr…

this... is certainly not my experience. However, they're a large organisation so they're most likely schizophrenic.
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