For technologists
Spanair crash shows deadly result of using tainted USB stick
August 22, 2010
A virus-carrying USB thumb drive has been implicated in the 2008 crash of a Spanish jetliner, the deadliest air disaster in Spanish history.
Packed with vacationers, Spanair Flight JK5022 smashed into the ground shortly after takeoff from Madrid’s Barajas international airport, bound for the Canary Islands. The Aug. 20, 2008 tragedy killed 154 of 172 souls on board the Boeing MD-80 jetliner.
El Pais cites a 12,000-page …More
Shifting dynamics trigger Intel’s McAfee acquistion; is Symantec next?
August 20, 2010
The 60% share-price premium McAfee CEO Dave DeWalt got Intel to pay to acquire McAfee doubled the share-price premium DeWalt garnered the last time he flipped a mid-sized tech company to a giant corporation.
In 2003, DeWalt, then CEO of Documentum, sold the content management firm to EMC, for $1.9 billion, at a share price that translated into a 29% premium, says Daniel Ives, tech industry analyst at …More
How DNS, the backbone of the Internet, is being shored up
August 13, 2010
Two recent developments having to do with Domain Name System, or DNS, should help substantively shore up cybersecurity over the long haul.
VeriSign this week launched a new managed DNS service aimed at helping companies and organizations — especially small- and medium-sized firms — run more smoothly and better defend against denial of service attacks.
That follows the big announcement late last month at the Black Hat cybersecurity …More
Google-Verizon call for Congressional ban on Net Neutrality for mobile devices
August 10, 2010
CEO Eric Schmidt
Google on Monday reversed its long-held support of Net Neutrality — the notion that all Web sites should be equally available to all persons — and joined forces with Verizon calling for new federal laws that would reshape the Internet. Howls of protest instantly erupted from consumer advocacy groups.
MoveOn.Org Civic Action, Credo Action, the Progressive Change Campaign Committee, ColorofChange.org and Free Press …More
Will Apple’s patch be in time to stem iPhone, iPad malicious attacks?
August 7, 2010
LastWatchdog has confirmed that Apple has now completed a patch for a milestone security flaw that makes it possible to remotely hack —or jailbreak — iOS, the operating system for iPhones, iPads and iPod Touch.
But company spokeswoman Natalie Kerris told LW late Friday that she could give no hints about when the patch would go into wide public release.
“With regard to what you’re asking about, we’re aware …More
Microsoft issues emergency patch for “million dollar” Windows LNK flaw
August 2, 2010
Microsoft today rushed out an emergency patch for Windows Vista and Windows 7 PCs just eight days before its next Patch Tuesday.
The software giant issues security patches on the second Tuesday of each month, and only rarely issues so-called out-of-band patches. The company has never issued an emergency patch this close to Patch Tuesday, says Jason Miller, data and security team leader at patch management firm, Shavlik …More
Poisoned search results, spreading scareware, heat up for 4th of July
July 2, 2010
Scareware purveyors are ramping up for a big weekend poisoning search results.
Achal Khetarpal, research director at antivirus firm CyberDefender, just typed “4th July dessert recipes” as a Bing query and got this innocuous-looking, but highly invasive, link as the 10th ranked result:
This is step one of a ruse spread by one of the most active scareware gangs out there selling worthless software …More