Security
Port
A Security Port Blog
Increase In Chinese Internet
Users |
04/29/2008 | |
By some measures, China has tied the
United States as the online population leader with its
government reporting that the number of Internet users
there has soared to 221 million.
|
Raytheon Buys Security Company |
04/29/2008 | |
U.S. company Raytheon announced last week
that it bought the software security company SI
Government Solutions.
SI Government Solutions has
been a major supplier software security expertise to
U.S. intelligence agencies. The amount Raytheon paid for
the company was not
revealed.
|
China Seizes Pirates |
04/28/2008 | |
Chinese police have seized $750 million
worth of pirated computer software and broken up a
piracy ring in southern China, state media said as
Beijing vows to crack down on a problem which has soured
trade ties. |
Google Tackles Child Porn |
04/25/2008 | |
Google engineers have adapted a software
program to help track child sex predators and search for
patterns in images of abuse on the web.
Google
has created the technology for the National Centre for
Missing and Exploited Children (NCMEC).
It was
originally developed to block copyrighted videos on the
company's YouTube division.
The program uses
pattern recognition to enable analysts to sort and
identify files containing child sex abuse.
Google says its aim in teaming up with the
centres Technology Coalition Against Child Pornography
is to develop solutions that would make it harder for
people to use the web to exploit children or traffic in
child pornography.
complete article
|
Paypal to Block Unsafe
Browsers |
04/24/2008 | |
Web payment firm Paypal has said it will
block unsafe browsers from using its service as
part of wider anti-phishing efforts. Customers will
first be warned that a browser is unsafe but could then
be blocked if they continue using it.
Paypal
said it was an alarming fact that there is a
significant set of users who use very old and vulnerable
browsers such as Internet Explorer 4.
|
Hackers Using Poor Code to Access
Websites |
04/23/2008 | |
Web designers making very old mistakes are
letting malicious hackers hijack visitors to their
sites, say experts. Many of the loopholes left in
the code created for websites have been known about for
almost a decade say the security researchers.
The poor practices are proving very attractive
to hi-tech criminals looking for a ready source of
victims.
According to Symantec the number of
sites vulnerable in this way almost doubled during the
last half of 2007.
complete article
|
Cybercrooks Winning Web |
04/22/2008 | |
Despite all the antivirus software, all
the extra security features in your computers operating
system and all the government regulations intended to
make the Internet a safer place, your personal computer
and your personal data are as threatened as ever.
Cybercrooks Winning Web
|
Performing Better Searches |
04/21/2008 | |
Performing and perfecting search engine
results can save web surfers lots of time and energy.
Understanding the nuances of searching allows
researchers to immediately drill down and locate the
information they are seeking, without having to wade
through a myriad of irrelevant search results in the
process. The increasing complexity of search engines has
made understanding search engines a necessity for those
who spend any amount of time online. The following
search tips are standards that will work in most of the
major search engines.
Performing Better Searches
|
Avoid Duplicate Content Penalties and
Black Hat SEO |
04/19/2008 | |
While it may still be debatable whether
all the major search engines currently employ a
duplicate content penalty, all have made it abundantly
clear that they do not have any desire to provide search
results that rehash the same content over and over.
Actively avoid any potential penalties by taking a
proactive approach to building unique content.
Avoid Duplicate Content Penalties
|
Hosted Software Issues Raised |
04/18/2008 | |
Shifting to a hosted software model can
cut IT costs and ease administration and upgrades, but
managers must prepare users for its significant effect
on work processes and job roles, said CIOs sitting on a
panel at Computerworld USs recent SaaSCon
conference.
Lane said IT managers should hammer
prospective hosted software providers with questions
about their security tools, datacentre location, backup
and recovery capabilities, and how the hosting facility
is set up to deal with unexpected outages. He also
suggested that the audience look closely at the vendor's
service level guarantees.
|
Stolen Hospital Records Sold |
04/17/2008 | |
The former Manhattan hospital employee
accused of stealing the records of nearly 50,000
patients sold the information, prosecutors said
Saturday. Dwight McPherson, 38, used his position in
the admissions department at New York-Presbyterian
Hospital Weill Cornell to obtain lists of patient names,
phone numbers and Social Security numbers over a
two-year period, according to a complaint filed
yesterday.
He confessed to his role in the
identity theft scheme when he was arrested Friday night,
the complaint says. |
High
Security for Pope |
04/16/2008 | |
The last time a pope visited the United
States in 1999, an audiotape of an Islamic extremist
that accused the pontiff of leading a crusade against
Muslims would not likely have created a huge
stir.
But that was before the terrorist attacks
of Sept. 11, 2001, after which people worldwide became
aware of the murderous threat of Osama bin
Laden.
So the release last month of bin Laden's
comments about Pope Benedict XVI probably heightened
further the awareness of those assigned to protect the
pope during his six-day visit to Washington and New York
that begins Tuesday, a former Secret Service agent said.
|
Thugs are Guardians of the
Flame |
04/15/2008 | |
They wear bright blue tracksuits, and
Beijing Olympic organizers call them flame
attendants. But a military bearing hints at their
true pedigree: paramilitary police sent by Beijing to
guard the Olympic flame during its journey around the
world.
Torchbearers have criticized the security
detail for aggressive behavior, and a top London
Olympics official simply called them
thugs.
They were barking orders
at me, like Run! Stop! This! That! and I was like,
Oh my gosh, who are these people? former
television host Konnie Huq told British Broadcasting
Corp. radio about her encounter with the men in blue
during Londons leg of the relay last week.
|
More
Security Than Athletes |
04/14/2008 | |
Beijing will have at least 94,000 security
staff – but only 10,500 athletes. After the protests
that greeted the torch relay, China is getting ready to
put on the greatest show of security the world has ever
seen. What used to be called the Olympics are likely
this summer to become the Paramilitary Games. China is
planning to deploy more than 94,000 security personnel
at the Beijing celebration in August, which means that
uniformed and plain-clothes operatives will outnumber
the 10,500 athletes by nearly nine to one.
|
$240
Million in Internet Fraud |
04/13/2008 | |
Nearly $250 million worth of individual
losses from Internet fraud was reported by Americans to
the FBI last year, the bureau said.
The figures
were released by the Internet Crime Complaint Center, a
partnership between the FBI and the non-profit National
White Collar Crime Center, in its seventh annual report
on Internet crime this week.
The $239 million
loss represents a 20 percent growth from fraud losses
reported to the center in 2006, and officials say it
represents just a fraction of the total costs of
cybercrime to the U.S.
economy.
|
Middle School Security
Increased |
04/12/2008 | |
Security has been increased at a
Simpsonville middle school after a student was arrested
and suspended for wearing a T-shirt with a noose and a
reference to the Ku Klux Klan.
Greenville
television station WYFF says some students at Bryson
Middle School stayed home yesterday. The students say
they feared violence after the T-shirt worn by an
eighth-grader angered both black and white students the
day before.
The student lifted another shirt
revealing the racist T-shirt in the
lunchroom.
The student has been charged with
disturbing school and recommended for
expulsion.
|
Security is Not Immune to Budget
Cuts |
04/11/2008 | |
Conventional wisdom is that security
spending will be sheltered from economic volatility. But
not according to a Goldman Sachs survey of 50 chief
security officers. |
McCain May Get Secret Service
Protection |
04/10/2008 | |
Republican presidential candidate John
McCain says he plans to meet with the U.S. Secret
Service soon about getting body guards.
The
Arizona senator, who has won enough delegates to win the
partys nomination, has gone without Secret Service
protection. However, agency Director Mark Sullivan
testified publicly before Congress this week that McCain
had no security detail, prompting the candidate to say
perhaps the time has come, the New York Daily News
reported Saturday.
|
Untrained Users are Security
Risks |
04/09/2008 | |
Businesses are giving users greater
freedom with corporate IT systems, according to a recent
report, but many of those users lack the necessary
security training. The study, conducted by a
consortium, led by PricewaterhouseCoopers, on behalf of
the Department for Business, Enterprise & Regulatory
Reform (BERR), found that firms are placing greater
trust in their staff.
Seven out of eight firms
now have information security policies in place
according to newly released findings from the annual
Information Security Breaches Survey (ISBS). Those
policies are loosening controls over users.
complete article
|
Flash Security Concerns |
04/08/2008 | |
Warnings have been issued by a great many
online security authorities that Flash has security
flaws, yet the warnings have fallen upon deaf
ears.
The problems are not with the new versions
of Flash files, but with the slightly older ones, made
with older authoring programs that were, are full of
vulnerabilities. These files are vulnerable to XSS
(Cross-site Scripting)
attacks.
|
Google Using YOUR Data |
04/07/2008 | |
Shareware Promotions has posted a very
important and revealing post about Google and how they
want to use Google Analytics data and
Adwords! Anyone with half a brain should have
seen this coming.
In fact I wrote a piece about
this awhile back, here is an excerpt:
Google
Analytics is free, no one can beat the price, but what
is the real cost? The cost is your data. While not
terribly important when analyzed alone, when aggregated
with other information Google has access to, it could be
damaging. Data mining has made the collection of data
meaningful. It has become easier to find patterns and
trends in large volumes of data.
While any of that information
independent of other data, might be non-threatening or
irrelevant to someone doing analysis, when combined with
other data Google has access to, it can paint a very
clear picture of how, not only individual companies are
performing, but the aggregate data could possibly paint
a picture of how entire business sectors or industries
are performing.
If you are using
Analytics consider yourself warned yet again!
Full Shareware Promotions Blog Post
Full Article Google As Big Brother
|
GSM
Security Concerns |
04/06/2008 | |
The security of the most widely used
standard in the world for transmitting mobile phone
calls is dangerously flawed, putting privacy and data at
risk, two researchers warned at the Black Hat conference
in Europe on Friday. |
IRS
Warns of Scammers |
04/05/2008 | |
This year, identity thieves are not just
trying to gain access to your bank account or to open
lines of credit in your name. Scammers are on the prowl
for ordinary citizens' identities that they can they can
use in filing phony tax returns, and fraudulently
claiming refunds, as well as swipe rebates, associated
with the 2008 federal economic stimulus package.
|
JuicyCampus Crack Down |
04/04/2008 | |
The college gossip Web site
JuicyCampus.com has criticized a consumer fraud
investigation launched by the New Jersey attorney
general.
JuicyCampus publishes anonymous, often
malicious gossip about college students, with language
ranging from catty to hateful and potentially
offensive.
Last week the New Jersey Attorney
General Anne Milgram subpoenaed the company as part of a
fraud investigation. |
TorrentSpy Shutdown |
04/04/2008 | |
Expensive legal battles have caused
TorrentSpy, the search engine for the BitTorrent
file-sharing service, to shut down.
TorrentSpy
was a search engine that helped visitors find torrent
files on the Web. Torrent files are often music or movie
files stored in an easily shared file format. The search
engine came under legal fire from the entertainment
industry, which in general does not want licensed
content to be distributed royalty-free.
|
Internet Ticket Scalping |
04/03/2008 | |
People who use software to breach security
measures on the Internet and purchase tickets for profit
would be fined as much as $5,000 under a proposal
advancing in the Legislature. |
Facebook Security Lapse |
04/02/2008 | |
A security lapse made it possible for
unwelcome strangers to peruse personal photos posted on
Facebooks popular online hangout, circumventing a recent
upgrade to the websites privacy controls.
The
Associated Press verified the loophole Monday after
receiving a tip from a Byron Ng, a Vancouver, Canada
computer technician. Ng began looking for security
weaknesses last week after Facebook unveiled more ways
for 67 million members to restrict access to their
personal profiles. |
Mozilla Battles Apple |
04/01/2008 | |
Steve Jobs is using Apple Software Update
to slip his Safari browser onto Windows machines. And
Mozilla CEO John Lilly is peeved. Presumably, Lilly
is peeved because Safari browsers on Windows machines
would eat into the market share of Mozilla' very own
Firefox browser. But Lilly says he is peeved for
different reasons. He says he's peeved because Steve
Jobs little Software Update trick undermines the
security of the entire internet.
|
SuperMarket Security Breach |
03/31/2008 | |
Unauthorized software that was secretly
installed on servers in Hannafords supermarkets across
the Northeast and in Florida enabled the massive data
breach that compromised up to 4.2 million credit and
debit cards, the company
said.
|
Current Blog
2008 Security Blog Archive
April Archive
March Archive
February Archive
January Archive
2007 Security Blog Archive December
Archive November
Archive October
Archive September
Archive August
Archive July
Archive June
Archive May
Archive April
Archive March
Archive February
Archive January
Archive
2006 Security Blog Archive December
Archive November
Archive October
Archive September
Archive August
Archive July Archive
June
Archive May Archive
April
Archive March
Archive February
Archive January
Archive
| |
 |

Security Alerts
Locate security alerts, and security feeds via a security rss feed
directory.
|