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Another audacious trojan
They get bolder and bolder don't they? The audacity of this trojan is such that it actually holds your machine to ransom and threatens to delete files every 30 mins until you send cash to a Western Union account.
April 29, 2006 | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBack
Beware the VoIP phish
Looks like phishers are starting to make use of the flexibility of VoIP in the latest stings. Emails claiming to be from banks have a 'call center' number included. The number goes through to a VoIP service complete with fake operator on the end, who then squeezes you for personal details. Cheeky.
Let's be careful out there...
April 29, 2006 | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBack
McKinnon's last stand
Alleged hacker Gary McKinnon has hit out at the US' extradition procedure ahead of his hearing next month. At InfoSec this week, McKinnon, who is understood to have broken into military systems in search of proof about little green men, accused the US of misusing the law.
He believes his case, and others like his, are being blown way out of proportion.
I don't know about aliens, but if it goes badly for him, he might be spending time with a lot of orange men.
April 29, 2006 | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBack
Ni hao Mr Zombie
Hackers are looking to the Far East, especially China, to source zombie PCs for botnet attacks.
Apparently western nations are becoming too security conscious. I think this pretty much identifies the threat coming from developing markets.
April 27, 2006 | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBack
They're coming!
"An effective mobile virus is coming; maybe not tomorrow or this year or even next, but it's coming," so says Greg Day, security consultant at McAfee.
Batten down those hatches people.
April 27, 2006 | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBack
Oh dear...
Some red faces here no doubt. Apparently scans by security firm McAfee at InfoSec this week have turned up a whole bunch of unsecured wireless networks. Even worse, some stands are actually pumping out viruses.
Interesting comment from Bruce Schneier though, he reckons this just goes to show how hard it is to secure networks.
April 27, 2006 | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBack
Spyware: Darwinism in action
Scary stuff happening at InfoSec. The evolution of spyware is apparently outpacing that of viruses, with some software resetting itself hourly to evade detection.
Also, 'build your own spyware' kits are already commonplace on the internet in publicly available forums, leading to fears that script kiddies could develop and distribute their own malware.
April 26, 2006 | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBack
Infosec Introduction
Below is a video of Alun Michael (Minister for Industry and the Regions) from this years event, presenting the findings of the 2006 DTI Information Security Breaches Survey are unveiled.
Click the image to play the movie
April 26, 2006 in Infosec 2006 | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBack
pAssw0rD please
Perhaps no surprises here, but poor password policy management is leaving firms wide open.
"It is madness to use the same password for your banking site as for your football supporters' page," said Graham Cluley, senior technology correspondent at Sophos, which carried out the survey released at InfoSec.
Guess us Grimsby Town supporters are pretty safe though.
April 26, 2006 | Permalink | Comments (0 ) | TrackBack
From the floor at InfoSec
Following up from the previous post, some of the companies looking to tackle internal threats are Marshal, which announced WebMarshal 2006, a gateway-based spyware-prevention tool, which combines URL filtering, content inspection, anti-spyware and antivirus capabilities.
And Websense, which launched version 6.0 of its Web Security Suite to help firms stop employees inadvertently exposing them to risks.
Back to the fray.
April 26, 2006 | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBack
The enemy within
Well, InfoSec is well and truly underway here in London. One of the big bits of news flying around is that internal threats are still the biggest security risk for firms, according to a recent survey of law enforcers, government officials and industry experts.
And with the introduction of new legislation like Sarbanes-Oxley and Basel II, responsibility is going all the way to the top.
In the survey, three-quarters of respondents said that the board should be held responsible for any security breaches, although 90 percent said the IT department was the biggest factor in ensuring security is not compromised.
April 26, 2006 | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBack
InfoSec kicks off
Over 10,000 attendees are expected to turn out at the InfoSec security conference which starts in Olympia, London today. The highlight of the show is expected to be Gary McKinnon, the man accused of hacking into the US Navy's computers in search of evidence for UFOs.
McKinnon will be part of the hackers' panel on Thursday. It could actually be his last chance to attend InfoSec for some time if found guilty.
April 25, 2006 | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBack
Seven black Xs for OS X
"There seem to be some problems with the claimed 'solid as a rock' Unix operating system," says security researcher Tom Ferris. Ferris claims to have found seven zero day vulnerabilities in OS X, which he has reported to Apple.
The vulnerabilities, ranging from 'medium' to 'critical' in nature, are expected to be fixed in the next security update.
April 25, 2006 | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBack
European phishing trip
In a follow up to the previous post - ...but nearly half of all phishing attacks are being directed at banks outside of the US. Mainly Europe and Asia. Even 10 per cent of phishing sites are hosted in the UK.
April 24, 2006 | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBack
Spam, spam, spam...
This may come as no surprise, but the US is the single biggest spam culprit in the world. According to Sophos, almost a quarter of all canned meat product comes from the States, and most of that is sent by malware infected machines.
Watch out for those zombies.
April 24, 2006 | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBack
Finjan finds critical XP bug
Finjan has gone and found an exploitable in the Remote Data Services object in fully patched versions of Windows XP SP2, as well as IE 7.0b1.
This particular nasty allows read and write privileges and comes with the "full control of the target machine" warning. Finjan have pointed out the bug to Microsoft and the fix was made available in the security bulletin released yesterday.
April 12, 2006 | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBack
Virus coder throws down gauntlet
Somebody's done it. Created a proof of concept virus that infects both Windows and Linux. Trend Micro reckons the threat isn't up to much yet as it needs to be manually executed, only infects the current directory and doesn't cause any actual harm. But it does throw down the gauntlet for cross platform viruses.
April 11, 2006 | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBack
Phishers get whimsical
Interesting. Those pesky phishers have baited their lines with something new. In what appears to be an evolution of this fraudulent activity, a new fake email targeting Chase Bank customers only has a telephone number as a contact.
Naturally, the number is toll free - just like the real Chase uses - and registered with fake details. I guess it works to reassure the victim in the dangerous days. Anway, a recorded message asks for your credit card and personal details.
Keep sharp.
April 7, 2006 | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBack
Rootkits at dawn
Those cheeky Finnish chappies at F-Secure have been shooting their mouths off about who's the fastest draw in the antivirus world. Apparently the F-Secure boys have stolen a lead on the likes of McAfee and Symantec. Although the McAfee gang did poke some pretty big holes in F-Secure's methodology. Sheesh guys, aren't we all on the same side? Apparently not.
Twenty paces on my mark...
April 4, 2006 | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBack
Bad numbers
Aha! Proof at last that crazy numbers game Sudoku is bad for you. Well, this version is anyway. Apparently this downloadable Sudoku game, YazzleSudoku, is actually spyware. If you install and run it, you will be bombarded with ads. Thing is, even Panda admits that it tells you it's installing ad programs, and won't let you play it unless you do. Kinda obvious for spyware isn't it? Beware the bad numbers.
April 4, 2006 | Permalink | Comments (1) | TrackBack
Enigma machine heads for Eur40k
Wow. What claims to be an authentic WWII German Enigma machine is just about to top Eur40,000 as of Sunday night. The eBay auction is set to end Monday. The portable encryption machine, made in 1941, is similar to the ones cracked by British code breakers at Bletchley Park. The machine is claimed to be the genuine article, but serial numbers which could prove its provenance have been removed. Some reports suggest the price, for a three rotor Enigma at least, is a little high.
April 2, 2006 | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBack
