The new school year brings with it new hopes, new subjects, new friends… and new (and not-so-new) video games. After the long summer break, it’s natural for kids to dive back into the cyberworld. When school’s in, there’s less time for hanging out with friends at the mall, so the digital space becomes the preferred meet-up place, including, of course, video games.

But the world of gaming isn’t quite as buddy-buddy as might seem at first glance, so here too cybersecurity is a must. Sure, the games themselves are (mostly) fine — the problem is the parasite scammers and cybercriminals they attract.

Kaspersky experts have dug deep to find out which games and players are most at risk, and what to do about it. See the full version of our report for answers to these, and other related questions.

Attackers love Minecraft

To fathom the threatscape facing young gamers, our experts analyzed statistics from the global Kaspersky Security Network (KSN). KSN collects huge amounts of anonymous cyberthreat intelligence data that we receive from users on a voluntary basis.

Selecting the most popular kids’ games for the study, we found the top four most-attacked titles from July 2023–July 2024 were Minecraft, Roblox, Among Us and Brawl Stars.

Game name
Number of attack attempts

Minecraft
3,094,057

Roblox
1,649,745

Among Us
945,571

Brawl Stars
309,554

Five Nights at Freddy’s
219,033

Fortnite
165,859

Angry Birds
66,754

The Legend of Zelda
33,774

Toca Life World
28,360

Valorant
28,119

Mario Kart
14,682

Subway Surfers
14,254

Overwatch 2
9,076

Animal Crossing
8,262

Apex Legend
8,133

That’s right, more than three million attack attempts on Minecraft alone! Almost twice more than on second-place Roblox. Why? Because so many players are looking to download mods and cheats for Minecraft, and these often turn out to be malicious apps.

As for the types of threats being spread, the most common are downloaders, adware, Trojans and backdoors. For several years now, malware downloaders have been the most live threat to the gaming industry — downloaders that tout themselves as the “best Minecraft modloader you can get” often turn out to download… backdoors, Trojans and other threats.

Popular phishing scams

While it’s easy to teach your kids to download apps only from trusted sources and use security solutions, keeping them safe from phishing is more of a challenge. Here, it pays to keep your ears and eyes sharp: the more you and your kids know and read about new scams, the better placed you are to spot them. What’s more, most gaming scams tend to follow a pattern.

Free skins

Pretty much every top kids’ game these days allows (or encourages) players to customize their character with skins that can cost serious money — millions of dollars in some cases! Most kids, of course, don’t have that kind of cash under the bed, so they’re always on the lookout for flashy item giveaways.

One such act of “generosity” was uncovered by our experts. The scammers craftily exploited two things close to young gamer hearts: Valorant and MrBeast. The first is a popular shooter game, while the other is one of the world’s most successful YouTubers, with a 300 million+ subscriber base – mostly kids.

The scammers invite gamers to log in to the phishing site using their game account credentials and then to open a treasure chest. Of course, there is no treasure — only a hijacked account.

Free in-game currency

Most in-game economies are built on two kinds of in-game currency: soft and hard. Soft currency is usually earned through playing the game; hard or premium currency is bought with real-world money. Naturally, it’s the latter that attracts cybercriminals.

For example, one scam asks Pokémon GO players to enter their game account username. That is followed by an “I’m not a bot” verification, after which the player lands on a site promising free in-game currency.

Such calls to action are a ruse to redirect users to a far more serious scam, where not only gaming accounts are at stake, but highly sensitive data like bank details.

Reward for in-game actions

“Do such_and_such and win a prize!” is a standard cybercriminal trick. We unearthed such a scam on a Roblox-related phishing site: victims were offered a US$100 Walmart gift card, the same amount for Taco Bell fast food outlets, and, for the especially greedy, US$25,000 in cash. But there’s a catch: first your payment details, please!

Since the youngest gamers don’t yet have payment details of their own, they’ll probably feed their parents’ bank card numbers to the hungry site. And you can only imagine mom and dad’s delight when the next billing statement arrives.

How young gamers can stay safe

Kids often lack basic cybersecurity skills, so can easily fall into cybercriminal traps for example, when trying to download a free game, a mod or a ‘must-have’ skin. That’s why teaching kids cyber hygiene is one of the most important missions of modern parenting.

Help your child think up a unique strong password, and get them used to using a password manager at an early age.
Tell your child about the risks they might face online.
Our Kaspersky Cybersecurity Alphabet is a fun and informative way to teach your kids about new technologies and basic cyber hygiene, and refresh your own knowledge at the same time.
Install reliable protection for gamers on all devices.
Be in the swim of the latest scams in the gaming world and warn your kids what to watch out for.
Use special apps to keep your kids safe — both online and offline.

For more great security tips for young gamers, check out the full version of our report.

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We regularly hear news about breakthroughs leading to the advent of working quantum computers. For now, such a computer doesn’t exist, so nobody can use one to crack encryption. But when it does arrive, it’ll already be too late to address the problem. That’s why new encryption algorithms that are resistant to both classical hacking methods and quantum-computer attacks are being standardized today. These algorithms are known as post-quantum or quantum-resistant. Support for these algorithms is gradually appearing in everyday devices and applications — they were recently integrated into Google Chrome. This, by the way, immediately exposed compatibility issues within standard organizational IT infrastructures. So, where have post-quantum algorithms already been implemented, and what should IT teams prepare for?

Which services already support post-quantum algorithms?

Amazon. The cloud giant introduced a “post-quantum” variant of TLS 1.3 for its AWS Key Management Service (KMS) back in 2020. Since then, the solution has been updated, adapting its configuration settings in line with NIST recommendations.

Apple iOS/iPadOS/macOS. In February 2024, Apple announced an update to the iMessage protocol, which will use the PQ3 quantum-resistant protocol for key exchange. It’s based on the NIST-recommended Kyber algorithm, but also utilizes classical elliptic-curve cryptography, providing dual-layer encryption.

Cloudflare. Since September 2023, Cloudflare has supported post-quantum key agreement algorithms for establishing connections to origin servers (client websites), and is gradually rolling out support for post-quantum cryptography for client connections. The technology is used when establishing a TLS connection with compatible servers/clients, applying a dual key agreement algorithm: classical X25519 for one part of the key, and post-quantum Kyber for the other. This popular combination is known as X25519Kyber768.

Google Chrome. Test support for post-quantum cryptography for establishing TLS connections appeared in August 2023, and as of version 124 in April 2024, it’s enabled by default. The algorithm used is X25519Kyber768.

Mozilla Firefox. Support for X25519Kyber768 for TLS and QUIC appeared at the beginning of 2024, but it’s still not enabled by default and must be activated manually.

Mullvad. This popular VPN service uses the following PQC method: first, a traditional encrypted connection is established, after which a new key agreement is conducted using the Classic McEliece and Kyber algorithms. The connection is then re-established with these keys.

Signal. The messenger implemented the PQDXH protocol in September 2023, using the same X25519Kyber768 mechanism.

Tuta(nota). The popular secure email service allows users to send post-quantum encrypted emails using the X25519Kyber768 algorithm. However, the obvious drawback is that this only works when communicating with other Tuta users.

Although not yet a commercial product, it’s also worth mentioning Google’s implementation of FIDO2 hardware security keys, which use a combination of classical ECDSA and post-quantum Dilithium.

In addition to these, PQC is supported by numerous libraries that serve as the foundation for other products, from email and web servers to operating systems. Notable libraries include OpenSSL and BoringSSL, as well as the experimental branch of Debian. Many of these implementations have been made possible thanks to the Open Quantum Safe initiative, which supports post-quantum forks of popular cryptographic utilities and libraries, available for a variety of popular programming languages.

The main drawbacks of quantum-resistant cryptography

The algorithms haven’t been sufficiently analyzed. Although the broader scientific community has been conducting cryptanalysis for several years, the mathematical principles behind post-quantum cryptography are more complex. Moreover, experience with classical cryptography shows that serious flaws or new attack methods can sometimes be discovered decades later. It’s almost certain that vulnerabilities will be found in modern PQC algorithms — not just implementation vulnerabilities, but fundamental algorithmic defects.
Key sizes are significantly larger than in RSA and ECC. For example, the Kyber768 post-quantum algorithm has a public key size of 2400 bytes. This leads to a significant increase in data transmission volumes if key renegotiation occurs frequently. In tightly designed or low-power systems, there might not be enough memory for such large keys.
The computational load of PQC is also higher than classical, which slows down operations and increases energy consumption by 2–3 times. However, this issue may be resolved in the future with optimized hardware.
Compatibility issues. All updates to encryption standards and protocols — even classical ones — create complications when some systems have been updated and other related ones haven’t.

Post-quantum compatibility problems

Practical issues will primarily affect services using the TLS protocol for connections. TLS is implemented in numerous ways across thousands of products — sometimes with errors. As soon as Google enabled Kyber support by default in Chromium 124, administrators started reporting that Chrome and Edge couldn’t establish connections with web servers, as they would immediately disconnect with an error after the ClientHello TLS handshake. This issue was caused by problem number two: the large key size. As a result, the ClientHello TLS message, which always fitted into a single TCP packet, expanded into multiple packets, and so servers, proxies, and firewalls not prepared for this larger ClientHello message would immediately terminate the connection. Appropriate behavior would involve reading the following packets and agreeing on an older, classical encryption algorithm with the client. A list of incompatible web servers and firewalls affected by this issue is being tracked on a dedicated site, with Cisco notably listed.

If an organization suddenly can’t open any websites, the problem is likely with the proxy or firewall, which needs an update. Until the developers of incompatible applications and devices release patches, a temporary solution is to disable PQC:

using MS Edge and Chrome group policies
in Chrome’s advanced settings: chrome://flags/#enable-tls13-kyber
in Firefox’s settings: about:config -> security.tls.enable_kyber

Administrators are advised to check their websites and web applications by enabling Kyber support in Firefox or Chrome and attempting to access the site. If an SSL/TLS error occurs, the web server needs to be updated.

Quantum-resistant cryptography standards

Standardization is key to preventing a “protocol mess” and compatibility issues. For PQC, this process is ongoing but far from complete.

NIST recently introduced the first full-fledged standards for post-quantum cryptography — FIPS 203, FIPS 204, and FIPS 205. Essentially, these are CRYSTALS-Kyber for key exchange, along with CRYSTALS-Dilithium and SPHINCS+ for various digital-signature scenarios.

European organizations  from — ENISA and ETSI to BSI and ANSSI — intend to adopt NIST’s standards but are open to considering additional algorithms if they prove to be better. They all emphasize the necessity of double encryption for critical data — using both post-quantum and classical algorithms simultaneously. Given the novelty of post-quantum algorithms, innovative methods of breaking them may emerge, which is why the second layer of encryption is recommended.

China plans to standardize post-quantum algorithms in 2025. The Chinese Association for Cryptologic Research (CACR) announced the finalists in 2020: Aigis-sig and Aigis-enc (modified relatives of CRYSTALS-Kyber and CRYSTALS-Dilithium) and LAC.PKE.

Meanwhile, the IETF working group responsible for internet protocols will likely endorse the use of cryptography standards proposed by NIST in these protocols.

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A corrupted hard drive no longer need lead to the loss of all your data. Today there are cloud services: mail is stored in Gmail, files in Dropbox, notes in Apple Notes, and so on. But even with cloud services there’s no doing without backup. Instead of corrupted drives, they present other surprises: for example, they might shutter, hike subscription prices, lose your data, or use it to train AI. And if your internet ever goes down, online-only data is useless.

So as not to be caught off guard by sudden unavailability or policy changes, always back up your data on your own computer and protect it against ransomware. And backups need to be both readable and usable without proprietary software. They should be able to either be exported to common standard formats (PDF, HTML), or migrated to a “backup” app that works offline and without a subscription.

There is no universal recipe here: each online service has its own procedure. Today we look at backing up data in Notion — a knowledge base and note-taking app.

Backup

Notion lets you export data in one of three formats: PDF, HTML or Markdown+CSV. You can export a single note, a group of notes, or even an entire database. But only business and enterprise subscribers can do a full export to PDF format.

For most apps, we recommend exporting to HTML format, as it’s free, saves all types of data, and can be viewed in any browser with no special software required.

You can do the exporting on a desktop computer or mobile device. For small amounts of data, a ZIP-archive download is immediate; for large amounts, you receive a download link by email — which arrives with some delay.

To export several notes or a subpage, press the advanced menu icon (•••), select Export, specify HTML as the export format, and include subpages and all types of content (Everything).

An entire workspace can be exported from the desktop app or web interface. Go to the settings, and under Workspace → Settings, click Export all workspace content. In addition to the above settings, be sure to enable Create folder for subpages.

Only workspace administrators have this export option. For teamspaces, the export won’t include other users’ personal (hidden) pages created within the teamspace.

Having unzipped the archive on your computer to a separate folder, you can open the index.html file in it with any browser and freely navigate through your notes.

Export to Obsidian or AFFiNE

To not only view saved notes but also be able to edit them without Notion, you have to migrate your data to another, similar app that works offline or on a server under your control. The list of possible alternatives to Notion warrants a long read all of its own, so here we’ll limit ourselves to just two apps that Notion users often recommend as a substitute.

Obsidian is an app for structured data storage that can work entirely offline, free of charge. There’s a paid service — Obsidian Sync — for synchronizing multiple devices, but users manage without it by placing the storage (vault) in an iCloud folder, or by using third-party plugins for synchronization with SFTP, Amazon S3, Dropbox or other services.

To migrate data from Notion to Obsidian:

Perform a full export of the Notion workspace as per the above instructions.
Install Obsidian and the official import plugin.
Create a vault in Obsidian for the migrated data.
Activate the installed plugin under Settings → Community plugins in Obsidian.
Start the import via the button on the vertical command bar on the left.
Select Notion (.zip) as the import file format, and in the dialog, specify the ZIP file downloaded during export.
Enable Save parent pages in subfolders.
Press Import.
Wait for the import to finish.

For very large databases, you may encounter problems with importing embedded ZIP files, in which case see the help page on the Obsidian website.

AFFiNE is an open-source app offering a workspace with fully merged docs, whiteboards and databases, replacing, the developers say, both Notion and Miro. The business model is based on paid plans and AI assistants, but the app can work offline and even function as a standalone server wholly on your own infrastructure.

Content export from Notion is built right into the AFFiNE desktop app, so the procedure is quite straightforward:

Perform a full export from Notion.
Unzip the file to a separate folder on your computer.
Install AFFiNE and create a workspace.
Run the import by going to All pages → New Page → More options → Import page.
Choose import from markdown files, and select the html file from the unpacked folder.

Visit the AFFiNE website for a video guide to importing from Notion.

And remember to protect local backups of your important data against stealers and ransomware with the help of Kaspersky Premium.

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After many years of research and testing, in mid-August 2023, the U.S. National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST) finally introduced fully-fledged post-quantum encryption standards — FIPS 203, FIPS 204, and FIPS 205. So let’s discuss them and see why they should be adopted as soon as possible.

Why do we need post-quantum cryptography?

First, let’s briefly outline the threat quantum computers pose to cryptography. The issue lies in the fact that quantum computing can be used to break asymmetric encryption. Why is this important? As a rule, today’s communication encryption typically uses a dual system:

All messages are encrypted using a symmetric algorithm (like AES), which involves a single key shared by all participants. Symmetric algorithms work well and fast, but there’s a problem: the key must be somehow securely transmitted between interlocutors without being intercepted.
That’s why asymmetric encryption is used to transmit this key (like RSA or ECDH). Here, each participant has a pair of keys — a private and a public one — which are mathematically related. Messages are encrypted with the public key, and decrypted only with the private one. Asymmetric encryption is slower, so it’s impractical to use it for all messages.

The privacy of correspondence is ensured by the fact that calculating a private key from the corresponding public key is an extremely resource-intensive task — potentially taking decades, centuries, or even millions of years to solve. That is — if we’re using traditional computers.

Quantum computers significantly speed up such calculations. Specifically, Shor’s quantum algorithm can crack private keys for asymmetrical encryption much faster than its creators expected — in minutes or hours rather than years and centuries.

Once the private key for asymmetric encryption has been calculated, the symmetric key used to encrypt the main correspondence can also be obtained. Thus, the entire conversation can be read.

In addition to communication protocols, this also puts digital signatures at risk. In the majority of cases, digital signatures rely on the same asymmetric encryption algorithms (RSA, ECDSA) that are vulnerable to attacks by quantum computers.

Today’s symmetric encryption algorithms, on the other hand, are much less at risk from quantum computers than asymmetric ones. For example, in the case of AES, finding a 256-bit key using Grover’s quantum algorithm is like finding a 128-bit key on a regular computer. The same applies to hashing algorithms.

The trio of post-quantum cryptography standards: FIPS 203, FIPS 204, and FIPS 205

The primary task for cryptographers has become the development of quantum-resistant asymmetric encryption algorithms, which could be used in key transfer and digital signature mechanisms. The result of this effort: the post-quantum encryption standards FIPS 203, FIPS 204, and FIPS 205, introduced by the U.S. National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST).

FIPS 203

FIPS 203 describes a key encapsulation mechanism based on lattice theory — ML-KEM (Module-Lattice-Based Key-Encapsulation Mechanism). This asymmetric cryptographic system — which is resistant to quantum algorithm attacks — is designed to transfer encryption keys between interlocutors.

ML-KEM was developed as part of CRYSTALS (Cryptographic Suite for Algebraic Lattices) and is also known as CRYSTALS-Kyber, or simply Kyber.

FIPS 203 features three parameter variants for ML-KEM:

ML-KEM-512: Security level 1 (equivalent to AES-128);
ML-KEM-768: Security level 3 (equivalent to AES-192);
ML-KEM-1024: Security level 5 (equivalent to AES-256).

FIPS 204

FIPS 204 defines a digital signature mechanism, also based on algebraic lattices, called ML-DSA (Module-Lattice-Based Digital Signature Algorithm). Previously known as CRYSTALS-Dilithium, this mechanism was developed within the same CRYSTALS project as Kyber.

FIPS 204 has three parameter variants for ML-DSA:

ML-DSA-44: Security level 2 (equivalent to SHA3-256);
ML-DSA-65: Security level 3;
ML-DSA-87: Security level 5.

FIPS 205

The third standard, FIPS 205, describes an alternative digital signature mechanism: SLH-DSA (Stateless Hash-Based Digital Signature Algorithm). Unlike the other two cryptosystems, which are based on algebraic lattices, SLH-DSA is based on hashing. This mechanism is also known as SPHINCS+.

This standard involves the use of both the SHA2 hash function with a fixed output length, as well as the SHAKE function with an arbitrary length. For each base cryptographic-strength level, SLH-DSA offers sets of parameters optimized for a higher speed (f — fast), or a smaller signature size (s — small). Thus, FIPS 205 has more variety — with as many as 12 parameter options:

SLH-DSA-SHA2-128s, SLH-DSA-SHAKE-128s, SLH-DSA-SHA2-128f, SLH-DSA-SHAKE-128f: Security level 1;
SLH-DSA-SHA2-192s, SLH-DSA-SHAKE-192s, SLH-DSA-SHA2-192f, SLH-DSA-SHAKE-192f: Security level 3;
SLH-DSA-SHA2-256s, SLH-DSA-SHAKE-256s, SLH-DSA-SHA2-256f, SLH-DSA-SHAKE-256f: Security level 5.

HNDL, and why it’s time to start using post-quantum encryption

For now, the threat of quantum algorithms breaking asymmetric encryption is mostly theoretical. Existing quantum computers lack the power to actually do it in practice.

Until last year, it was believed that sufficiently powerful quantum systems were still a decade away. However, a 2023 paper suggested ways to optimize hacking using a combination of classic and quantum computing. As a result, the timeline for achieving quantum supremacy seems to have shifted: RSA-2048 could very well be broken within a few years.

It’s also important to remember the concept of HNDL — “harvest now, decrypt later” (or SNDL — “store now, decrypt later”). Attackers with significant resources could already be collecting and storing data that can’t currently be decrypted. Once quantum computers with sufficient power become available, they’ll immediately begin retroactive decryption. Of course, when this fateful moment comes, it will already be too late, so quantum-resistant encryption standards should be implemented right now.

The ideal approach to deploying post-quantum cryptography based on established IT industry practices is hybrid encryption; that is, encrypting data in two layers: first with a classical algorithm, then with a post-quantum one. This forces attackers to contend with both cryptosystems — significantly lowering the chances of a successful breach. This approach is already being used by Signal, Apple, Google, and Zoom.

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