Cyber Security

If you have any e-mails that are older than 180 days (and we all do), they’re considered “legally abandoned.” Any governmental agency can look at these e-mails simply by providing a statement saying that they are relevant to an investigation. The scariest part? There’s no judicial review or oversight required… none at all. You might Continue Reading →

Just more than a week after Twitter introduced two-step verification, LinkedIn has followed suit. LinkedIn announced in a blog post Friday that users on the social network for professionals now have the option to enable two-step verification via SMS text message to protect their accounts. “All LinkedIn accounts are already protected by a series of Continue Reading →

Digital note-taking service Evernote was forced to reset its 50 million-plus users’ passwords after suffering an unauthorized breach on March 2. Thursday, less than three months on from that incident, it is beefing up account security measures with three new measures, including two-factor authentication, which will initially go live to its premium users. In the Continue Reading →

A 17-year-old German student contends PayPal has denied him a reward for finding a vulnerability in its website. Robert Kugler said he notified PayPal of the vulnerability on May 19. He said he was informed by email that because he is under 18 years old, he did not qualify for its Bug Bounty Program. He Continue Reading →

Designs for many of the nation’s most sensitive advanced weapons systems have been compromised by Chinese hackers, according to a report prepared for the Pentagon and to officials from government and the defense industry. Among more than two dozen major weapons systems whose designs were breached were programs critical to U.S. missile defenses and combat Continue Reading →

Snapchat has taken the mobile world by storm. The application allows users to send pictures and videos to friends that will self-destruct after a maximum of 10 seconds. Even better, if someone tries to take a screenshot of the image, the sender is automatically notified. Although its founders may not be proud of it, the Continue Reading →

Hours after Twitter rolled out support for two-step verification, Kim Dotcom has claimed credit for inventing the security feature. In a series of tweets, the embattled Megaupload founder points to a patent dating back to 1997 as proof for his claim, and accuses companies including Google, Facebook, and Twitter of infringing his intellectual property rights. Continue Reading →

A Google security engineer accused Microsoft of treating outside researchers with “great hostility” just days before posting details of an unpatched vulnerability in Windows that could be used to crash PCs or gain additional access rights. Microsoft acknowledged the vulnerability late Wednesday. “We are aware of claims regarding a potential issue affecting Microsoft Windows and Continue Reading →

After months of people yelling at them to increase security, Twitter finally began to roll out two-step verification for its accounts on Wednesday. To ensure that your account is protected, you should enable two-step verification immediately. It only takes about two minutes, and all you need is a cell phone. What is Two-Step Verification? Two-step Continue Reading →

A Congressional survey of utility companies has revealed that the country’s electric grid faces constant assault from hackers, with one power company reporting a whopping 10,000 attempted cyberattacks per month. US Reps. Edward Markey (D-MA) and Henry Waxman (D-CA) sent 15 questions to more than 150 utilities and received replies from 112 of them. Only Continue Reading →