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Submission + - Police Reveal Botnet Herders' Disaster Recovery Secrets (databreachtoday.com)

Submitted by kierny
kierny writes: Cybercrime gangs and fraudsters have been adapting to botnet disruptions and takedowns. "What we're seeing is the bad guys are starting to learn from this," said Steven Wilson, head of the European Cybercrime Center at Europol — the EU's law enforcement agency — at a recent cybersecurity conference. "They now have their disaster recovery plans. They're the ones who can be back up and running within a day to two days." Security researchers say these backup botnets are tough to detect, until gangs have already spooled them up and put them to use in major campaigns.

Submission + - 'Endrun' Networks: Help in Danger Zones (healthcareinfosecurity.com)

Submitted by kierny
kierny writes: Drawing on networking protocols designed to support NASA's interplanetary missions, two information security researchers have created a networking system that's designed to transmit information securely and reliably in even the worst conditions. Dubbed Endrun, and debuted at Black Hat Europe, its creators hope the delay-tolerant and disruption-tolerant system — which runs on Raspberry Pi — could be deployed everywhere from Ebola hot zones in Liberia, to war zones in Syria, to demonstrators Ferguson.

Submission + - NASA Eyes Crew Deep Sleep Option for Mars Mission (discovery.com)

Submitted by astroengine
astroengine writes: A NASA-backed study explores an innovative way to dramatically cut the cost of a human expedition to Mars — put the crew in stasis. The deep sleep, called torpor, would reduce astronauts’ metabolic functions with existing medical procedures. Torpor also can occur naturally in cases of hypothermia. “Therapeutic torpor has been around in theory since the 1980s and really since 2003 has been a staple for critical care trauma patients in hospitals," aerospace engineer Mark Schaffer, with SpaceWorks Enterprises in Atlanta, said at the International Astronomical Congress in Toronto this week. "Protocols exist in most major medical centers for inducing therapeutic hypothermia on patients to essentially keep them alive until they can get the kind of treatment that they need.” Coupled with intravenous feeding, a crew could be put in hibernation for the transit time to Mars, which under the best-case scenario would take 180 days one-way.

Submission + - 5 Million Google Passwords Leaked (inforisktoday.co.uk)

Submitted by kierny
kierny writes: After first appearing on multiple Russian cybercrime boards, a list of 5 million Google account usernames — which of course double as email usernames — are circulating via file-sharing sites. Experts say the information most likely didn't result from a hack of any given site, including Google, but was rather amassed over time, likely via a number of hacks of smaller sites, as well as via malware infections.

Numerous commenters who have found their email addresses included in the list of exposed credentials say the included password appears to date from at least three years ago, if not longer. That means anyone who's changed their Google/Gmail password in the last three years is likely safe from account takeover. But how many people haven't changed their password in that timeframe?

Submission + - Bitcoin, Meet Darwin: Crypto Currency's Future (informationweek.com)

Submitted by kierny
kierny writes: Today, Bitcoin, tomorrow, the dollar? Former Central Intelligence Agency CTO Gus Hunt says governments will learn from today's crypto currencies and use them to fashion future government-protected monetary systems. But along the way, expect first-movers such as Bitcoin to fall, in a repeat of the fate of AltaVista, Napster, and other early innovators. But the prospect of fashioning a better, more stable crypto currency system — and the likelihood that Bitcoin may one day burn — is good news for anyone who cares about crypto currencies, as well as the future and reliability of our monetary systems.

Submission + - Why Laws Won't Save Banks From DDoS Attacks (informationweek.co.uk)

Submitted by kierny
kierny writes: Rep. Mike Rogers (R-Mich.) should know better. The chairman of the House Intelligence Committee claimed to told NBC News that the Operation Ababil U.S. bank disruption DDoS campaign could be stopped, if only private businesses had unfettered access to top-flight U.S. government threat intelligence.

Not coincidentally, Rogers is the author of CISPA (now v2.0), a bill that would provide legal immunity for businesses that share threat data with the government, while allowing intelligence agencies to use it for "national security" purposes, thus raising the ire of privacy rights groups.

Just one problem: Numerous security experts have rubbished Rogers' assertion that threat intelligence would have any effect on banks' ability to defend themselves. The bank disruptions aren't cutting-edge or stealthy. They're just about packets overwhelming targeted sites, despite what Congressionally delivered intelligence might suggest.
Security

Submission + - Modest Proposal For Stopping Hackers: Get Them Girlfriends (informationweek.com) 1

Submitted by kierny
kierny writes: Hackers/crackers who get arrested are typically male and young adults--if not minors. Why is that? According to research by online psychology expert Grainne Kirwan, it's because the typical hacker "ages out" once they get a girlfriend, job, kids, and other responsibilities that make it difficult to maintain their hacking/cracking/hacktivist lifecycle. Could that finding offer a way to help keep more young hacking enthusiasts out of jail?
Security

Submission + - Internet Crime Focus Of Black Hat Europe (informationweek.com)

Submitted by
kierny
kierny writes: ""The Internet needs crime," said reknowned cryptographer Whitfield Diffie, kicking off the Black Hat Europe conference in Amsterdam. His analysis--that there can't be good guys, without bad guys--helps explain not just the rise of black hat hackers and more recently, hacktivism, but signals that the information security profession will continue to not just be relevant, but demanded, especially as the number of data-spewing devices increases exponentially."
Privacy

Submission + - W3C Proposes Do Not Track Privacy Standard (informationweek.com)

Submitted by
kierny
kierny writes: "A W3C working group is crafting two standards, due out by summer 2012, to enable consumers to opt out of online tracking. Numerous big players are involved, including Google, Facebook, IBM, Mozilla, Microsoft, plus the Center for Democracy and Technology, Electronic Frontier Foundation, and Federal Trade Commission.

The first standard is Tracking Preference Expression, “to define a standard for a how a browser can tell a website that a user wants more privacy,” says W3C working group co-chairman Dr. Matthias Schunter of IBM Research. “So you send a signal, and you get a response from the website which tells you that the request has been honored.” The second standard, meanwhile, is the Tracking Compliance and Scope Specification, which details how websites should comply with Do Not Track preferences. But, don't expect Do Not Track to be active by default."

Comment Re:Spending more money (Score 1) 333

by kierny (#8267713) Attached to: PalmSource Drops Mac Synchronization in Cobalt
Palm already dropped support for OS X before this announcement. I "switched" from XP to an OS X Powerbook and was surprised (d'oh) to discover the OS X Palm Desktop would't recognize the USB-to-Serial converter Palm makes.

"A fix is expected by the end of 2003," said Palm. (This was December 2003.) Then last week they said "early 2004." Now I think they mean never.

Perhaps Palm is a victim of its own success. I'm still using a Palm IIIxe -- a great device, ten times better constructed than my wife's newer b/w Palm 125. For keeping addresses/phone #'s/memos/password vault on hand, it's well worth the money I spent -- 3 years ago. I was always amazed Palm kept upgrading/releasing its software for free. No one else does that these days. (Apple charges for iLife 2004, etc.) Still, it's a pain in the butt to have a perfectly good PDA not be useful because of some stupid conduit software. Of course I could spend money on a Keyspan adapter or new software, but why not just buy a new Palm ...

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