Friday, August 1, 2008

Friday News Feed 8/1/08

DHS stays mum on new 'Cyber Security' center
http://news.cnet.com/8301-13578_3-10004266-38.html?tag=nl.e703
The Bush administration's newly created National Cyber Security Center remains shrouded in secrecy, with officials refusing to release information about its budget, what contractors will run it, and how its mission relates to Internet surveillance.

In correspondence with the U.S. Senate posted on Thursday, the Bush administration said it would not provide that information publicly. An 18-page, partially redacted letter from DHS said that disclosure could affect "the conduct of federal programs, or other programs or operations essential to the interests of our nation."





This IT shop isn't worried about bandwidth demands from the Olympics
The 2008 Olympic Games in Beijing are just a week away. Is your IT department ready to handle the impact on your business from employees downloading online video of the opening ceremonies or the latest gymnastic feat?





IOC admits it accepted China Internet censorship






Hackers start DNS attacks, researcher says






FBI warns of new Storm worm attacks






Study: Companies need to address telework security





Some Web sites blocked at China Olympic press center






The Real Dirt on Whitelisting - 7/30/2008 5:50:00 PM The choice for blacklisting versus whitelisting isn’t really black and white






Hacking Without Exploits - 7/29/2008 4:30:00 PM Black Hat researchers will demonstrate how the bad guys are quietly raking in big bucks without ninja hacking skills, tools, or exploit code






New Video Surveillance Technology 'Recognizes' Abnormal Activity - 7/28/2008 10:05:00 AM BRS software can establish 'normal' on-camera activity – and alert security staff when something unusual occurs






Anthrax Scientist Kills Himself
washingtonpost.com — A top U.S. biodefense researcher apparently committed suicide just as the Justice Department was about to file criminal charges against him in the anthrax mailings that traumatized the nation in the weeks following the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks, according to a published report. More… (World News)







Identity Theft Monitoring Services Called 'Waste' The Privacy Rights Clearinghouse reports that many services are available for free, and that paying for extras doesn't buy much.





Extradition Appeal for British Hacker Dismissed UPDATE: A British hacker who broke into U.S. military computers looks set to be extradited to the U.S. after a British court ruling.





DNS Attack Writer a Victim of His Own Creation One week after releasing attack code, HD Moore has fallen victim to a cache poisoning attack.





Check Your Personal Data Before Your Employer Does Conducting your own preemptive background check can stave off nasty surprises.





AOL Sued for the Names of Bloggers Critical of Memphis Police Leadership
The city of Memphis, Tennessee sued AOL for the names of people contributing to the web blog MPD Enforcer 2.0. The blog is critical of law enforcement leadership and is very popular with Memphis police. The blog is credited with raising public discussion about the use of law enforcement resources.
Police director sues to find identity of blogger critical of MPD






Terrorists Using Open Wireless Networks
Remember when I said that I keep my home wireless network open? Here's a reason not to listen to me:

When Indian police investigating bomb blasts which killed 42 people traced an email claiming responsibility to a Mumbai apartment, they ordered an immediate raid.
But at the address, rather than seizing militants from the Islamist group which said it carried out the attack, they found a group of puzzled American expats.

In a cautionary tale for those still lax with their wireless internet security, police believe the email about the explosions on Saturday in the west Indian city of Ahmedabad was sent after someone hijacked the network belonging to one of the Americans, 48-year-old Kenneth Haywood.

Of course, the terrorists could have sent the e-mail from anywhere. But life is easier if the police don't raid your apartment.

EDITED TO ADD (8/1): My wireless network is still open. But, honestly, the terrorists are more likely to use the open network at the coffee shop up the street and around the corner.






Why You Should Never Talk to the Police
This is an engaging and fascinating video presentation by Professor James Duane of the Regent University School of Law, explaining why -- in a criminal matter -- you should never, ever, ever talk to the police or any other government agent. It doesn't matter if you're guilty or innocent, if you have an alibi or not -- it isn't possible for anything you say to help you, and it's very possible that innocuous things you say will hurt you.

Definitely worth half an hour of your time.

And this is a video of Virginia Beach Police Department Officer George Bruch, who basically says that Duane is right.
Posted on July 31, 2008 at 12:52 PM






3,000 Blank British Passports Stolen
Looks like an inside job.
Posted on July 31, 2008 at 6:08 AM






World War II Deception Story
Great security story from an obituary of former OSS agent Roger Hall:
One of his favorite OSS stories involved a colleague sent to occupied France to destroy a seemingly impenetrable German tank at a key crossroads. The French resistance found that grenades were no use.

The OSS man, fluent in German and dressed like a French peasant, walked up to the tank and yelled, "Mail!"

The lid opened, and in went two grenades.

Hall's book about his OSS days, You're Stepping on My Cloak and Dagger, is a must read.
Posted on July 29, 2008 at 1:50 PM





Poisoned DNS servers pop up as ISPs patch Robert Lemos, 2008-07-30 An online attacker poisons at least one domain-name server at a major Internet service provider to send Google lookups to a pay-per-click ad network.





Federal agencies slow to deploy cryptoNews Brief, 2008-07-29Despite high-profile data breaches, less than a third of U.S. government systems have encrypted sensitive data, states a report to Congress.





Yahoo relents, gives coupons, refunds to music DRM captives
Yahoo announced last week that it would be shutting down its DRM authentication servers in September, leaving Yahoo Music customers out in the cold. Now, the company says it will offer coupons to customers who want to repurchase their music from Rhapsody's DRM-free store, or refunds to those who just want their darn money back.
July 31, 2008 - 09:55AM CT - by Jacqui Cheng







Top Botnets Pushing Rogue 'Antivirus' ProgramJuly 30, 2008
Four of the top spamming botnets are sending malicious spam in order to install a rogue anti-virus program on victims' machines.






UPS, E-Tickets and MoreJuly 28, 2008
The Pushdo botnet has added three more spam themes to distribute malware along with its UPS theme.





The peaceful worm…. not :(







Backdoor scams emerge on phishing kits
Sue Marquette Poremba July 31, 2008
Nearly half of the live phishing kits identified online have backdoors designed to steal from the information thieves using them.






Senate OKs revamped identity theft legislation
Dan Kaplan July 31, 2008
The U.S. Senate on Wednesday passed the latest version of the Identity Theft Enforcement and Restitution Act.






Expert urges China visitors to encrypt dataReuters - Thu Jul 31, 11:30 PM ET
WASHINGTON (Reuters) - China's blocking of Web sites has embarrassed the International Olympic Committee, but a computer security expert said on Thursday that visitors to Beijing also needed to protect their data from prying eyes.






McAfee Expands Into Data Loss Prevention
McAfee agreed to spend $46 million in cash to acquire privately owned Reconnex, maker of data loss prevention solutions.

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