Security

If you missed out on the big deals offered this past Black Friday , then there's a good chance you're looking forward to doing some online shopping today, better known as Cyber Monday. Security experts, however, believe this year could offer an ... unprecedented amount of trouble for online consumers who don't take the proper precautions when shopping online for bargains. "Even more holiday shopping will happen online this year than last, and that means more scammers will be looking to do some shopping of their own -- possibly at your expense," said security expert, Stephen Cobb. (Source: ... (view more)

Web users have been warned to watch out for a bogus email claiming to offer vouchers for iTunes as a Black Friday bonus. It's actually malicious software that has been responsible for as much as 60 per cent of current online infections. The emails ... are reportedly coming from the address official@itunes.apple.com , though this is address is fake and may change. Emails have the headline "iTunes Gift Certificate" and contains a text only message claiming that users can get $50 if they use an attached code when making an iTunes purchase. Bogus File Attachment Virus-Laden Unlike many email scams, ... (view more)

An unconfirmed report claims foreign hackers were able to gain control of a US water company's pump and destroy it, remotely. If true, this appears to be the first such publicly acknowledged attack in the US. The report comes from Joe Weiss of ... Applied Control Solutions, an independent security firm for industrial control systems. Weiss says he received a government report about a water utility firm (which doesn't use ACS services), on the condition he withhold the water company's name and location. Separate reports have indicated the site was in Springfield, Illinois. (Source: theregister.co. ... (view more)

The creators of a recently-discovered form of malware (malicious software) have reportedly used stolen government ID to make the bogus software appear legitimate when presented on Windows PCs. Once the malware is installed, it can steal personal ... information, such as passwords or banking information, or download other malware programs to the PC. The malware is spread via infected PDF (portable document format) files that exploit a bug in the outdated Adobe Reader 8. (Source: computerworld.com ) The incident involves a code signing certificate, similar to the authentication systems for secure ... (view more)

Valve Corporation, which is behind the major online video game retailer and social networking platform Steam, has been hacked. According to reports, gamer credit cards have been compromised, as well. Steam is a major online gaming platform that ... provides nearly 2,000 games for play by some 35 million users based in 237 countries. Not only can visitors to the site download games, but they can also use the platform to easily organize multiplayer sessions, and can interact with one another through instant messaging. User Database Infiltrated by Hackers Given the massive size of Steam's user base ... (view more)

Seven people have been indicted by the U.S. Department of Justice for allegedly infiltrating millions of computers and using them to pocket some $14 million in fraudulent advertising revenue. Six of the defendants hail from Estonia and one from ... Russia. According to the U.S. Department of Justice, the seven were able to gain access to an estimated four million computers worldwide, and infect them with a form of malware that successfully diverted web traffic to sites that would pay the scheme's participants a percentage of advertising revenue. When users of these infected computers attempted to ... (view more)

Microsoft has published details of its next batch of security updates (known as Patch Tuesday), due to download to Windows machines automatically on Tuesday, November 8 via Windows Update. The only critical update in the batch affects newer rather ... than older editions of Windows. None of the security updates to be released next Tuesday are said to patch MS Word, which is currently being exploited by the Duqu virus (a major zero-day threat ). The entire update is a bit of a surprise, say critics, because it deals with just four groups of bugs -- a far cry from recent updates that have included ... (view more)

New reports are surfacing with details of the latest and what's considered to be one of the most dangerous Internet worms, dubbed "Duqu." It's said the worm can install and spread itself due to a security loophole in Microsoft Word. As reported last ... week, Duqu's programming code is very close to that of the Stuxnet worm that wreaked havoc back in 2010 . Stuxnet was a particularly sophisticated virus which infected Windows-based PCs, and in turn, attacked computers that controlled equipment in Iran's nuclear program to the point where it caused irreversible damage to equipment. So ... (view more)

Dozens of chemical companies have been hit with a wave of online attacks. At least 48 companies are confirmed to have been hit, of which 29 were in the chemical sector. The remaining 19 companies were involved in the chemical defense sector. ... According to security researchers at Symantec, the assault ran from July until the middle of September, though the effects are still being felt. The true scale may be larger: at least 101 different locations are known to be housing computers infected by the attack, covering 20 different countries. (Source: symantec.com ) Cyber Attacks Use Low-Tech ... (view more)

Officials are set to report that hackers briefly seized control of two NASA satellite and circumstantial evidence suggests that the Chinese military may have been involved. The breaches took place in 2007 and 2008 but have only just come to light. ... They are mentioned in a report to Congress that is due to be delivered next month, though a draft copy has been leaked to news agencies. The report comes from the US-China Economic and Security Review Commission and quotes information provided to the commission by the U.S. Air Force. (Source: google.com) The hacking took place four times in total: ... (view more)