Monday 08/10/09

Code Library Bug Is Likely Patch Tuesday Target This month's Patch Tuesday release will include nine security updates, five of them "critical" and all but one affecting Windows. Read more...

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Hathaway Resigns From Cybersecurity Czar Post
A former Bush administration aide, she was working as cybercoordination executive for the Office of the Director of National Intelligence when she was appointed to her new role by President Obama in February. At the time, she was directed to conduct a 60-day review of cybersecurity preparedness across the federal government.

Hathaway's highly anticipated review was finished in May and called on government officials to take several steps to bolster cybersecurity. One of the main recommendations was to establish a cybersecurity office within the executive offices of the president to oversee and enforce the development and implementation of a national

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Security experts scramble to decipher Twitter attack
Security analysts Thursday scrambled to find a motive behind the distributed denial-of-service attacks that brought down Twitter for several hours, and also hit Facebook, Google and LiveJournal.

With little information to go on, researchers ended up speculating on who launched the attacks and why, although several agreed that Twitter's infrastructure needed immediate strengthening.

"If you monitor the hacking forums, it's clear they're pissed at Twitter," said Richard Stiennon, founder of IT-Harvest, a security research firm. "Twitter came out of nowhere. Hackers hated that. They'd been using forums and IRC to communicate, and all of a sudden, the rest of the world has their own thing in Twitter."

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Adobe Reader's security woes a boon for up-and-coming rival Foxit
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Facing criticism, Adobe is aiming to release security patches more quickly.

But it's not fast enough for many companies, says one anonymous security researcher at the Black Hat conference, who told CNET this week: "As a result of the number of zero-day attacks on PDFs this year, large banks hate Adobe."

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Pro-Georgian blogger target of Internet attacks AFP – Fri Aug 7, 9:59 pm ET
AFP/File
SAN FRANCISCO (AFP) - Cyber assaults that temporarily derailed the websites Twitter, Facebook and LiveJournal were aimed at a pro-Georgian blogger, according to Internet security company F-Secure.

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Cyber Attackers Empty Business Accounts in Minutes PC World – Thu Aug 6, 3:10 pm ET
The criminals knew what they were doing when they hit the Western Beaver County School District.

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The Case of the Impossible Address
An IP address of 0.0.0.0 just doesn't make sense. So how did traffic for that destination get delivered to the network?

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Kepler telescope makes quick discovery
cnn.com — NASA scientists who put the telescope through a 10-day test after its March 6 launch said this week that Kepler is working well. Its ability to detect minute changes in light has enabled scientists to determine that a planet orbiting a distant star has an atmosphere, shows only one side to its sun and is so hot it glows. More…

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$60, at-home night vision gets cheaper, better
August 10, 2:56 p.m. UTC - by Ben Kuchera Posted in: Gear & Gadgets
Ars Technica takes a look at the next-generation of night-vision, in a toy. JAKKS Pacific has taken a second pass at its night vision design, making it easier to use and adding a larger screen that now takes advantage of both eyes. It's time to go ninja hunting.
Read more

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Facing Five Years In Prison For Posting A Photo On MySpace Wearing Gang Colors

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Washington Post Says Economy Is Bad... No, Good... No, Bad For Nigerian 419 Scammers

There's a fascinating article in the Washington Post about the impact of the worldwide financial crisis on Nigerian 419 scammers.

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Malaysia Wants To Filter The Internet, But Swears It Won't Be Used To Stop Political Dissent

Malaysia's government has had something of a love-hate affair with citizens and opposing politicians using blogs and other social media to protest the government -- and has even sent opposition bloggers they don't like to jail. So, you can imagine the concern when the government announced plans to install widespread internet filters modeled on China's fault "Green Dam" software. Not surprisingly, the government officials back the plan insist it won't be used against political targets, but just obscene material. Opponents find that hard to believe. Even if (and it's a big "if") that's the intent of the government, having it be so easy to "accidentally" start blocking opposition sites is probably too tempting for many.

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Group of ISPs issue tips for dealing with bots
Angela Moscaritolo August 07, 2009
One industry group is trying to help network operators help respond to bot infections.

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Who Needs Spy Satellites? Google Earth Pinpoints Where Missile Targeted Taliban
by Erick Schonfeld on August 10, 2009

The leader of Pakistan’s Taliban, Baitullah Mehsud, may or may not be dead after a CIA missile hits his father-in-law’s home in the remote “Zangarha area” of the country. But now we can see exactly where that missile hit, and we don’t even need access to a spy satellite. Thanks to Google Earth, we get the image above.

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