Here is an excellent article on the response taken by a bank (whose identity is kept anonymous in the article) to a Phishing attack. (Link courtesy of beSpacific)
Category: Security
Microsoft: Damned if you do.
The patches that Microsoft released for a security flaw are partly to blame for the recent Zotob virus outbreak. As noted in many places, among them being This Week in Tech, hackers reverse engineered the patches to determine exactly where the security flaw was and released the Zotob virus within *THREE DAYS*. Microsoft is damned…
Spyware part of ID Theft Ring
This is very, very disturbing. An article over at Eweek claims that the spyware called CoolWebSearch is actually a keylogger. A test by a spyware removal company found that the program is sending passwords, user names and bank account information to a server in Texas. The FBI has been notified, but the article does not…
Must Read: Inside the Cisco/Lynn Controversy
For those of you who don’t know, Michael Lynn gave a speech at the Black Hat conference in Las Vegas on July 26th that has erupted into controversy. The topic? A revelation of the vulnerabilities in the Cisco routers that are the backbone of the Internet. He had to quit his job before doing it,…
Another reason to keep updating your security software
From CNet News: The attackers typically lure people to the malicious sites by sending enticing e-mails and instant messages. When a victim clicks on a link, the computer becomes infected. In one case, a greeting card was displayed and a tune played in the background while spyware was being installed on the compromised PC,Websense said….
FBI shuts down BitTorrent server today – the first criminal action against BitTorrent
The FBI earlier today raided the “Elite Torrents” BitTorrent network, shutting down its core server. Anyone accessing the site now receives the message “This Site Has Been Permanently Shut Down By The Federal Bureau of Investigation and U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement.” The site had been one that was sharing the new Star Wars release,…
FTC to urge ISP’s to take active role in policing the Net
An interesting article written by Declan McCullogh points out that the FTC plans to ask ISPs to take a more active role in policing the net. Basically, the plan is for the FTC to send a letter to ISPs pointing out steps these service providers can take to help reduce spam by finding and eliminating…
Spyware Survey Results
The Ponemen institute released the results of their 2005 National Spyware Survey today. Interestingly, 97% of the people who reported having found spyware on their machine did not remember seeing an end user license agreement (EULA) before the software was installed. Not surprising is the figure that 87% reported reduced productivity losses as a result…
Cybercrime in the spotlight: Extortion by means of DDos attacks
A cybercrime that has been around for a while, but companies are starting to admit to being victims of, is a distributed denial of service (DDos) attack done for the purpose of extorting money from the target company. A DDos attack is one in which a multitude of compromised systems attack a single target, thereby…
Virus sends Hate Spam
Now I know why I got a bunch of German spam yesterday – It turns out that a new version of the virus called Sober.q has been released. It sends spam to addresses found on infected PC’s, with neo-Nazi messages in German and English. So, somebody who knows me needs to update their anti-virus software….