As an analyst, and now as a consultant, I raise issues of digital
and physical security: let’s talk about them, in plain terms, and
collectively move to do something. As a member of the security
digerati, I think we should be helping people, and we have to either
step up with a better way forward, or get the hell out of the way.
Computer systems with proper security and network controls should be able to withstand about 80 percent of known cyberattacks, according to a senior National Security Agency official. Richard Schaeffer Jr., the NSA’s information assurance director, told the Senate Judiciary Committee’s Terrorism and Homeland Security Subcommittee that three measures in particular are especially effective: “Best practices, proper configurations [and] good network monitoring.” Read the full article. [Government Computer News]
Technologists already are worried about the security implications of linking nearly all elements of the U.S. power grid to the public Internet. Now, privacy experts are warning that the so-called “smart grid” efforts could usher in a new class of concerns, as utilities begin collecting more granular data about consumers’ daily power consumption. Read the full article. [Washington Post]
Connecticut Attorney General Richard
Blumenthal is investigating Blue Cross Blue Shield’s loss of
confidential information, including tax identification and Social
Security numbers, for 800,000 healthcare providers nationwide. The attorney general is also seeking additional identity theft
protection for affected doctors, therapists, and other professionals,
according to a statement from the attorney general issued. The companies lost the information when a laptop was stolen Aug. 25. Read the full article. [Dark Reading]
The Serious Organised Crime Agency (Soca) says websites are currently being used to recruit “money mules”. The “mules” are ordinary people who send and receive payments through their bank accounts to facilitate business. But in reality, the cash has been laundered from crime, leaving unwitting mules open to prosecution. Fraudsters are using a variety of bogus and legitimate recruitment channels to con job-hunters into thinking they have found genuine employment. Read the full article. [BBC]
They’re the Internet equivalent of storm chasers, spending endless hours scanning and sleuthing, looking for the telltale signs of botnets. Here’s an inside look at the battle against cybercrime’s weapons of mass infection. Read the full article. [CSOonline.com]
Hackers are increasingly targeting law firms and public relations
companies with a sophisticated e-mail scheme that breaks into their
computer networks to steal sensitive data, often linked to large
corporate clients doing business overseas. Read the full article. [NYTimes.com/AP]
A hacker has broken into the Nebraska Worker’s Compensation database,
prompting an FBI investigation and an effort to contact those who may
be affected. Several thousand people could be affected by the
breach, which was discovered last week when the state’s chief
information officer noticed an unusual amount of Internet traffic
traversing the Worker’s Compensation courts server. Read the full article. [KETV.com]
In May 2007, President Bush authorized the National Security Agency,
based at Fort Meade, Md., to launch a sophisticated attack on an enemy
thousands of miles away without firing a bullet or dropping a bomb. At the request of his national intelligence director, Bush ordered
an NSA cyberattack on the cellular phones and computers that insurgents
in Iraq were using to plan roadside bombings. The devices allowed the
fighters to coordinate their strikes and, later, post videos of the
attacks on the Internet to recruit followers. Read the full story [National Journal].
Researchers at the University of Pennsylvania say they’ve discovered a
way to circumvent the networking technology used by law enforcement to
tap phone lines in the U.S.The flaws they’ve found “represent a serious threat to the accuracy and completeness of wiretap records used for both criminal investigation and as evidence in trial,” the researchers say in their paper, set to be presented today at a computer security conference in Chicago. Read the full article. [PC World]
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