Latest news with #LinkedIn-style
Economic Times
25-05-2025
- Entertainment
- Economic Times
Kesha seeks seed funding for her 'LinkedIn-like' startup
Kesha has branched out from being a chart-topping pop star into a businesswoman. The singer behind the 2010 hit Tik Tok is looking to raise seed funding for her social media startup, Smash. In an Instagram post earlier this week, Kesha unveiled Smash as a "new community-based platform to connect and protect music creators." The motto aligns with her eponymous music label, Kesha Records, which she launched in September last year. Kesha's Smash app and her record label find their origins in a darker past involving a bitter legal battle with her producer, Lukasz "Dr Luke" Gottwald, over a predatory record deal she signed as a teenager. The LinkedIn-style app is meant to help creators connect, with the option to offer their services, similar to freelancing platform Fiverr, Kesha said in an interview with Wired. The app will prioritise artists' right where they are not forced to part with rights to their creations. "I want a place where artists and music makers of any kind can have community, they can collaborate, they can hire each other and retain all the rights to everything they create," Kesha said. "There's no gatekeeping of contacts." Kesha has onboarded Alan Cannistraro as the chief technical officer (CTO) for Smash. He was behind some of the first iOS apps during his 12 years at Apple, before leaving to work at Facebook, where he built the Year-In-Review feature. He then went on to start a social video platform called Rheo.
Yahoo
25-04-2025
- Business
- Yahoo
North Korean Hackers Targeting Crypto Developers With U.S. Shell Firms
North Korean hackers posing as American tech entrepreneurs quietly registered companies in New York and New Mexico as part of a campaign to compromise developers in the crypto industry, security firm Silent Push said Thursday. Two businesses, Blocknovas and Softglide, were created using fictitious identities and addresses. The operation is tied to a subgroup within the Lazarus Group. The North Korean-backed hacking unit has stolen billions worth of crypto in the past years using sophisticated techniques and strategies that target unsuspecting individuals or companies. 'This is a rare example of North Korean hackers actually managing to set up legal corporate entities in the US in order to create corporate fronts used to attack unsuspecting job applicants,' said Kasey Best, director of threat intelligence at Silent Push. The hackers' playbook is as manipulative as it is effective: use fake LinkedIn-style profiles and job postings to lure crypto developers into interviews. Then, during the recruitment process, they are tricked into downloading malware disguised as job application tools. Silent Push identified multiple victims of the operation, especially those contacted through Blocknovas, which researchers say was the most active of the three front companies. The firm's listed address in South Carolina appears to be an empty lot, while Softglide was registered through a tax office in Buffalo, New York. The firm added that the malware used in the campaign includes at least three virus strains previously tied to North Korean cyber units. These programs can steal data, provide remote access to infected systems, and serve as entry points for additional spyware or ransomware. The FBI has seized the Blocknovas domain, per Reuters. A notice posted to the site states it was taken down 'as part of a law enforcement action against North Korean cyber actors who utilised this domain to deceive individuals with fake job postings and distribute malware.'
