Security
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Storm-3168: Agentic-driven cloud attacks using compromised service principals
Microsoft details an Azure attack where two compromised service principals mapped a tenant, then fired off 100+ storage account deletions in about seven minutes, deleted a Key Vault and Function App, and pulled storage account keys. One possible entry point was a client secret pasted into a public GitHub issue and later “removed”, except it lived on in the edit history. Good reminder to audit app registrations for stale secrets and excessive Contributor rights, and to put resource locks and deletion protection on anything you need to recover, because those locks are what saved some of the storage accounts here.
https://www.microsoft.com/en-us/security/blog/2026/09/25/storm-3168-agentic-driven-cloud-attacks-using-compromised-service-principals/ -
Beyond the ransomware: Tracking Storm-2570’s consistent tradecraft across deployments
Storm-2570 is a ransomware affiliate that hops between Qilin, DragonForce, Anubis and BERT, but its playbook barely changes: RMM tools like Atera, MeshAgent, ScreenConnect and NinjaRMM, PsExec for lateral movement, Defender tampering, then s5cmd or Rclone for exfiltration. The lesson for MSPs is to detect the behaviour rather than the payload, and to accept that attackers abusing the same RMM tools we use isn’t going away. Worth a look at the mitigations: tenant-wide tamper protection, ASR rules (including blocking PsExec and WMI process creation), and alerting on any RMM agent you didn’t deploy.
https://www.microsoft.com/en-us/security/blog/2026/09/24/beyond-ransomware-tracking-storm-2570-consistent-tradecraft-across-deployments/ -
Disrupting EvilTokens: The AI Chatbot Built for Cybercrime
Microsoft’s Digital Crimes Unit has taken down EvilTokens, a subscription service that hijacked mailboxes via device-code sign-ins, then ran an AI chatbot over the inbox to find the “money movers”, vendor invoices and the best people to impersonate. It was linked to more than 12,000 compromised inboxes across over 10,000 organisations, with Australia among the most affected countries. Practical takeaways: block device code flow with Conditional Access where it isn’t needed, revoke sessions and tokens (not just passwords) after a compromise, and make out-of-band verification of payment changes non-negotiable for clients.
https://blogs.microsoft.com/on-the-issues/2026/09/22/disrupting-eviltokens-the-ai-chatbot-built-for-cybercrime/ -
Reimagining the SOC for the agentic era in Microsoft Defender
Microsoft has announced the integrated security operations center (ISOC) in Microsoft Defender, now in preview, bringing SIEM and threat protection together as one foundation that both analysts and AI agents work from. It’s light on specifics and heavy on vision, but the direction is clear: Sentinel and Defender are converging into one platform, with agents taking on more of the investigation work. Still early, but if you run a Microsoft-based SOC or MDR offering, expect your tooling and workflows to shift around this.
https://www.microsoft.com/en-us/security/blog/2026/09/23/reimagining-the-soc-for-the-agentic-era-in-microsoft-defender/ -
Risks of AI misalignment to Australian organisations
ASD’s ACSC has issued an alert after AI agents, blocked by security controls on public-facing sites, independently found vulnerabilities and pushed on without human authorisation to finish the task they’d been given. There’s no sign of malicious targeting, but it means your web-facing systems now need to hold up against persistent automated agents, not just people and scanners. Nothing groundbreaking in the advice (strong authentication, prompt patching, log monitoring, segmentation, testing incident response against AI scenarios), but it’s a handy official reference when clients ask whether this is a real risk.
https://www.cyber.gov.au/about-us/view-all-content/alerts-and-advisories/risks-of-ai-misalignment-to-australian-organisations -
OpenAI ‘climbed the fence’: Taskforce scrambles after long delays flagging Medicare hack
The Prime Minister has revealed that an OpenAI agent running an internal evaluation in June got around controls on the legacy Medicare Statistics Reporting Service and pulled data; no personal information was accessed and the portal has since been shut down. OpenAI only flagged it in September via a generic government inbox, and the government has now set up a taskforce and is eyeing AI transparency laws. The MSP lesson is about forgotten legacy sites: if a bot on a research errand can walk into a government portal, check what old client portals and web apps are still sitting exposed.
https://www.smh.com.au/politics/federal/openai-breaches-medicare-albanese-reveals-20260924-p6100u.html
Microsoft 365 & Windows
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Put multiple values in one cell with lists and arrays in Excel
Excel can now hold multiple values in a single cell via lists (Insert > List or Ctrl+J), arrays in cells and nested arrays, along with new FLATTEN, HAS, HASANY and HASALL functions. It’s Beta Channel only for now, needs workbook Compatibility Version 3, and has real gaps: PivotTables, charts, Power Query and data validation don’t handle arrays yet. Worth a look for the power users you support, but keep it out of important workbooks until it’s generally available, which is Microsoft’s own advice.
https://techcommunity.microsoft.com/blog/Microsoft365InsiderBlog/put-multiple-values-in-one-cell-with-lists-and-arrays-in-excel/4559395 -
Link to a location in Word for Windows and Mac
Word for Windows and Mac now lets you select content, right-click and choose Copy Link to Location, producing a cloud link that opens the document at exactly that spot in web or desktop Word. Nothing groundbreaking, but it’s a genuine time saver when reviewing long policies, contracts and proposals with clients. It needs Windows Version 2605 or Mac 16.109 and later, so check update channels if users can’t see it.
https://techcommunity.microsoft.com/blog/microsoft365insiderblog/link-to-a-location-in-word-for-windows-and-mac/4541663
Cloud & AI
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Introducing the new Copilot with Home, Code and Autopilot
Microsoft has rebuilt the Copilot app around Home (Chat and Cowork together, with Word, Excel and PowerPoint built in), Code (natural-language building of apps and automations that run sandboxed inside your tenant) and Autopilot (formerly Scout), a persistent agent with its own identity that works in Teams and Outlook. The bit MSPs need to get across is the billing split: everyday Copilot stays on the per-user licence, while Cowork, Code, Autopilot and frontier models like Astra and Fable run on usage-based billing, with new FinOps controls in Agent 365. Home and Code roll out to the Frontier program in the coming weeks and Autopilot heads to private preview, so plan governance for user-built apps and agent identities now, before clients start asking.
https://blogs.microsoft.com/blog/2026/09/25/introducing-the-new-copilot-with-home-code-and-autopilot/ -
The new Copilot is here: The opportunity for Microsoft partners
This is the partner-facing companion to the new Copilot launch. The detail that matters for CSP partners: from 2 November 2026, usage-based billing will be enabled by default for new Microsoft 365 Copilot Business licences bought through CSP, making it easier to switch on experiences like Copilot Cowork. Good reminder to review your CSP billing and client spending controls before then, so nobody gets a surprise bill for agent usage they never approved.
https://partner.microsoft.com/en-us/blog/article/ai-at-work-marketing-moment -
Introducing Claude Opus 5.5
Anthropic says Opus 5.5 matches Claude Fable 5.1 on most work while costing around 40% less to run than Opus 5, with token pricing cut to US$4 input and US$20 output per million. It also claims the model is much less likely to take hard-to-reverse actions or step outside its boundaries, and is more resistant to prompt injection, which matters more than benchmarks if you’re letting agents loose on client systems. It’s available now on Azure, AWS and Google Cloud, though its safeguards reroute most cybersecurity tasks to an older model, so don’t expect it to power security tooling out of the box.
https://www.anthropic.com/claude-opus-5-5
After hours
Hacking this BYD was too easy; it didn’t even have a password | Four Corners Documentary – https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_TZFcyzGEiY
Editorial
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