Safety Security & Privacy

Concerns about the potential for a national security threat posed by the Chinese networking concern Huawei have been simmering at a low intensity for some time. They burst out into the full glare of publicity today with the release of a report by the House Intelligence Committee saying that Huawei and another Chinese telecom-equipment concern, Continue Reading →

Cybercriminals are once again targeting Skype users, although this time they are using ransomware and click fraud on their victims. For the uninitiated, ransomware is malware which restricts access to the computer it infects (either by encryption or locking the system and spamming with prompts), demanding a ransom paid for the restriction to be removed. Continue Reading →

A shadowy but well organized hacker group in the Middle East has disrupted the electronic banking operations of America’s largest financial institutions in recent days, underscoring U.S. vulnerability to online terrorism. A group identifying itself as Izz ad-Din al-Qassam Cyber Fighters attacked the websites of Wells Fargo, U.S. Bancorp and Bank of America. The strikes Continue Reading →

Seven rent-to-own companies and a software maker are settling charges with the Federal Trade Commission that rental computers illegally used spyware that took “pictures of children, individuals not fully clothed, and couples engaged in sexual activities.” As per the course, the FTC slapped the hand of DesignerWare of North East Pennsylvania and the rent-to-own companies. Continue Reading →

You’d think that the people who are technologically proficient would have learned by now, but that seems to not be the case. Romanian researcher Radu Dragusin reports that data from the Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers (IEEE) was kept on an unsecured FTP server for “at least one month” previous to his discovery. Though Continue Reading →

Samsung Galaxy S3 owners are subject to a vulnerability that can actually be fixed with an over-the-air update. Samsung today said that users can install a security update over the air that will safeguard them from a vulnerability that could allow someone to remotely delete all of their personal data from the handset. Security researcher Continue Reading →

Some users, mostly in France, reported that “private messages” sent between 2007-2009 were suddenly public. However, Facebook told the BBC: “[The] messages were older wall posts that had always been visible on the users’ profile pages. Separately, Facebook shares fell up to 11% after an influential journal said the stock is worth just $15. On Continue Reading →

For years, Microsoft engineers have quietly limited Hotmail passwords to 16 characters, a revelation that has surprised and concerned some users who have long entered passcodes twice that long to access accounts. One such user is Costin Raiu, the director of the global research and analysis team at antivirus provider Kaspersky Lab. On Friday he Continue Reading →

On Friday, Microsoft released an emergency patch for Internet Explorer (IE) to stymie active attacks that have been exploiting a bug in the browser, finishing a job it started only Monday. “Let’s call it five days from advisory to patch,” said Andrew Storms, director of security operations at nCircle Security. “I’d like to see anybody Continue Reading →

Apple’s “Find my iPhone” and “Find my iPad” features are extremely handy around the house—I’m not ashamed to say I use it regularly to help me figure out where I last set my phone down—but it’s got somewhat more of a mixed record in helping with the recovery of stolen iDevices. Police departments are sometimes Continue Reading →