About
Dennis Fisher is a journalist with more than 13 years of experience covering information security.
Welcome to the age of targeted attacks, Mac users. Perhaps having grown tired of owning Windows machines around the world for the last few years, attackers in China now have taken up the challenge of going after Macs with the same kind of targeted attack tactics that have served them so well in the Windows world.
Dennis Fisher talks with Richard Boscovich of the Microsoft Digital Crimes Unit about the operation to take down the Zeus botnet, how the company works with partners and law enforcement on these operations and the importance of getting the word out to consumers about the danger of botnets.
The Federal Trade Commission has issued a new report on consumer privacy and online tracking and among the recommendations the commission makes is that data brokers make themselves known to consumers and be open and transparent about the data they collect on consumers. The FTC also says that companies should be building privacy protections into their products by design, including implementing the Do Not Track mechanism once it’s finalized.
Alternative mobile app markets have become a great place to find new games, utilities and other apps. But mostly they’re great if you’re looking for the latest stealthy Android malware. The newest example is a piece of malware called TGLoader that is showing up in repackaged legitimate apps and has the ability to get root privileges on victims’ phones and also cost them quite a bit of money by sending SMS messages to premium-rate numbers.
Microsoft has gone after another botnet, this time targeting some of the command-and-control infrastructure behind the Zeus network with a takedown effort that included seizing two IP addresses used for C&C servers and filing suit against 39 unnamed defendants. The action against Zeus is the latest in a string of such moves by Microsoft and some of its partners against the operators of botnets such as Kelihos and Waledac.
Apple’s iOS thus far has proven to be fairly resistant to malware and some other forms of attack, but that doesn’t mean that it is completely in the clear. A new vulnerability discovered by a researcher at a German security firm enables an attacker to take advantage of some odd JavaScript behavior and spoof a URL and present a user with an absolutely authentic-looking forged Web site.
Mozilla is considering a change to the way that it handles certificates issued by externally operated sub-CAs in an effort to gain more control of how these CAs issue certificates and what those certificates can do.
Google has fixed nine new vulnerabilities in its Chrome browser, including six high-risk flaws. The most serious of the bugs include three separate use-after-free vulnerabilities in various parts of the browser.
Mozilla has made a small but important change to the way that its Firefox browser handles search queries directed to Google, making the search provider’s encrypted search service the default option. The modification is in is not in the stable version of Firefox yet, but users who download the daily beta builds can access it now.
If there’s one thing attackers love, it’s readily accessible remote-connection services running on a target company’s network. Once an attacker knows that an organization is running a specific kind of VPN or has RDP enabled on a bunch of machines, he can then start looking for known vulnerabilities or target users’ credentials for those systems. The folks at Duo Security are releasing a new service today called VPN Hunter that will help companies identify which remote-access services on their networks are exposed to the Internet.
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