Storm Worm spews out 15 million pump-and-dump messages

The spam run began on 17 October and lasted about 36 hours, using infected computers in the Storm Worm network to send out the mails, MessageLabs said in a statement released on Tuesday. The spam sounded strange because the voice in the message was "synthesised using a very low compression rate of 16KHz to keep the overall file size small, at around 50KB, to avoid detection," the company said.

Storm is thought to have landed on as many as 15 million PCs over the past year, but recently its network of infected PCs has been shrinking. University of California, San Diego, researchers recently pegged it at about 160,000 computers, only 20,000 of which are accessible at any one time.

Storm Worm spews out 15 million pump-and-dump messages - Computerworld UK - The Voice of IT Management

Study Gives Insight Into Identity Theft

The Center for Identity Management and Information Protection (CIMIP) has released the first -ever study of closed United States Secret Service cases dealing with identity theft.

Organized group activity took place in 42 percent of the cases, involving 2-45 offenders. In about half of those cases the Internet was used to commit the crime. Just 20 percent of the cases involved non-technological methods for identity theft such as dumpster diving or change of address.

More than a third of the victims were financial institutions such as banks, credit unions and credit card companies. Individuals were victims 34 percent of the time and 59 percent of the victims did not know the offenders. Only 5 percent of the victims were related to the offender.

Study Gives Insight Into Identity Theft | WebProNews

Extra Security After New Raid at School

A DEFIANT head teacher has increased security measures and vowed not to be beaten by burglars after his school was raided for the second time in two weeks.

Thieves smashed their way into the learning support office at The Friary School, in Eastern Avenue, Lichfield, and stole more than pounds 1,500 worth of electrical equipment, including two computers, a video and overhead projector.

The incident happened between 10pm and 10.45pm on October 11, just two weeks after the first break-in when a computer was stolen.

Police believe an offender scaled the roof from the back of the school and climbed down into a quadrangle, before using a large concrete block to smash the window.

Bars have now been put up around the windows of the office in an attempt to stop further burglaries.

Extra Security After New Raid at School - Technology - RedOrbit

USB encryption security for Windows: IronKey review

The IronKey is a hardware-based, high-grade encrypted USB drive, produced by a company of the same name, IronKey Inc. It was made with the idea in mind that there's a growing tendency for people to carry their data, documents and their applications with them on a USB drive.

This product is also a sort of personal encryption hub that serves many functions. The single most eyebrow-raising aspect of the IronKey is that it self-destructs if an attempt is made to read the data on the device without following the proper decryption protocol. Not with a bang or a flash; the data encryption keys stored on the drive will be erased, making the data impossible (or at least unfeasibly difficult) to recover. Tampering physically with the device (i.e., trying to crack it open) causes it to self-destruct as well.

USB encryption security for Windows: IronKey review

Mother's ire puts Ballmer on defense over Vista

"I'm one of those early adopters of Vista," said Yvonne Genovese, an analyst who was interviewing Ballmer along with fellow analyst David Smith on stage at a conference forum. "My daughter comes in one day and says, 'Hey Mom, my friend has Vista, and it has these neat little things called gadgets -- I need those.'"

Said Ballmer: "I love your daughter."

"You're not going to like her mom in about two minutes," said Genovese, while the crowd laughed.

She went on to explain that she installed Vista for her daughter -- and two days later went right back to using the XP operating system. "It's safe, it works, all the hardware is fine, and everything is great," she said of XP.

Genovese also argued that her experience with Vista is broadly shared: "What we're seeing and what we're hearing from users is a very similar thing. It's difficult to implement. What should we be seeing that we're not seeing?"

"Let's start with the end user. Your daughter saw a lot of value," said Ballmer.

"She's 13," Genovese shot back.

Ballmer was good-natured about the critique as he defended the operating system. "Users appreciate the value that we put into Vista," he said. But, as with earlier operating system releases, "there is always a tension between the value that end users see -- and frankly, that software developers see -- and the value that we can deliver to IT."

Mother's ire puts Ballmer on defense over Vista

Hackers Could Shut Down Car Engines!

I had mentioned this a while ago in a conversation with a friend that these computerized cars would eventually be the subject of some potentially serious problems

Hackers Could Shut Down Car Engines!

Some people just have no idea what they are doing. Here we go again – this is another case of overzealous security that can seriously end up in hurting the ones who should be protected!
General Motors is going to come up with a system to make car thefts history…

http://itexperts.thetazzone.com/viewtopic.php?p=1045#1045
TAZForum 2 :: Security Zone :: View topic - Hackers Could Shut Down Car Engines!

Hacker broke into routers and stole VoIP services

In the US, a hacker has been jailed for two years after breaching security at 15 separate telcos with incredible ease.

At the trial, AT&T reported that Robert Moore ran six million scans on its network alone. Other companies that were successfully targeted used aliases in an attempt to build up confidence in their services.

The global hacking exercise conducted by Robert Moore was targeted at telcos and corporations, and the aim was to steal VoIP services and sell them through a third party.

For the UK Voice and Data commun

AT&T threatens to disconnect subscribers who criticize the company

AT&T has rolled out new Terms of Service for its DSL service that leave plenty of room for interpretation. From our reading of it, in concert with several others, what we see is a ToS that attempts to give AT&T the right to disconnect its own customers who criticize the company on blogs or in other online settings.

In section 5 of its legal ToS, AT&T stipulates the following:

AT&T may immediately terminate or suspend all or a portion of your Service, any Member ID, electronic mail address, IP address, Universal Resource Locator or domain name used by you, without notice, for conduct that AT&T believes (a) violates the Acceptable Use Policy; (b) constitutes a violation of any law, regulation or tariff (including, without limitation, copyright and intellectual property laws) or a violation of these TOS, or any applicable policies or guidelines, or (c) tends to damage the name or reputation of AT&T, or its parents, affiliates and subsidiaries.

AT&T threatens to disconnect subscribers who criticize the company