Hack Targets NASA’s Earth Observation System
A hacker is claiming that a security hole in a server at NASA’s Goddard Space Flight Center has exposed data related to a satellite-based Earth observation system used to aid in disaster relief.
Paul Roberts
Barrett Brown, Public Face of Anonymous, Leaves Group
Barrett Brown, the reporter who became a media-friendly spokesperson for the shadowy hacking group Anonymous says that he is quitting the group in the wake of a public feud that has broken out between different hacker factions within the loosely organized collective.
Report: Google May Face $500m Fine Over Rogue Pharma Ads
The Wall Street Journal is reporting that search giant Google is close to reaching a settlement with the U.S. Justice Department over an investigation of the company’s policy of running ads from online pharmacies that operate outside U.S. borders and in violation of U.S. law.
Adobe released an update to its Flash Player that it says will make it easier for users to manage their online privacy.
The U.S.’s Computer Emergency Response Team (CERT) issued a warning to critical infrastructure firms on Wednesday about a serious security hole in products from Massachusetts firm Iconics that could leave critical systems vulnerable to remote attacks.
In the midst of an apparent civil war, the online hacking collective, Anonymous, has issued yet another public statement denying responsibility for a damaging hack of Sony’s PlayStation Network (PSN) and claiming that Sony is trying to shift blame for “internal problems” onto Anonymous.
Online scammers are recycling video and images released in the wake of the U.S. special forces raid on Osama bin Laden’s Pakistani compound to fuel Web based attacks that have been linked to rogue anti virus installations and botnets, according to Kaspersky Lab.
You’ve heard about the tidal wave of spam e-mail and scammy Web links that followed the killing of Osama bin Laden by U.S. Special Forces on Sunday. But what about the latest round of e-mails offering death photos of the slain terrorist leader? Well, turns out they’re fake, also.
ED: LastPass Asks Users To Change Password After Probable BreachDEK: The Web based password management firm says it detected what it thinks is a breach that could have exposed some customer passwords. LastPass, a Web based password management firm, advised its customers to change the password they use to access the service following what the company discovered signs that its network may have been compromised. In a blog post on May 4, LastPass said it noticed a “network traffic anomaly” lasting a few minutes on Tuesday morning and that a subsequent investigation could not rule out a data breach and, in fact, found evidence that data may have been siphoned off from one of the firm’s databases. An analysis of the outbound data transfer from the server is large enough to have included “people’s email addresses, the server salt and their salted password hashes from the database.” LastPass said it was “assuming the worst:” that “the data we stored in the database was somehow accessed.” However, its unlikely – given the amount of data believed to have been transferred – that much user encrypted data was transferred, the company said. The data stolen could potentially allow attackers to launch brute force attacks on user accounts – using e-mail addresses associated with accounts and dictionary-style attacks to break LastPass Master Passwords, which would give attackers access to any online accounts and passwords managed in a given account. As a result, the company is forcing all its customers to change the master password used to access their account. LastPass is also accelerating the roll out of a new encryption scheme that will use a SHA-256 bit algorithm on the server and a 256-bit salt using 100,000 rounds, the company said. If a breach did occur, its not clear what the origin of the attack was. LastPass admitted that a network VoIP phone server was “more open to UDP than it needed to be,” but said that server didn’t show any signs of tampering, nor did its databases. In February, an indepndent security researcher did reveal a cross site scripting hole on the LastPass Web site (http://threatpost.com/en_us/blogs/password-management-site-lastpass-sports-security-hole-022811) that he said could have been used to expose user e-mails and a list of sites beloning to a particular LastPass accounts. No login data was exposed, but the researcher, Mike Cardwell, said that such data could potentially be vulnerable, also. LastPass, a Web based password management firm, advised its customers to change the password they use to access the service following what the company discovered signs that its network may have been compromised.
The Wall Street Journal is reporting that Navy Seals hauled off a treasure trove of data, including computers, hard drives and portable storage devices, following their successful raid on the compound of Osama bin Laden – a raid that culminated with the death of the terrorist leader.
