Vulnerabilities


Researchers Find Hole in Quantum Cryptography

The Norwegian University of Science and Technology (NTNU) and the
University of Erlangen-Nürnberg together with the Max Planck Institute
for the Science of Light in Erlangen have recently developed and tested a
technique exploiting imperfections in quantum cryptography systems to
implement an attack. Read the full article. [Science Daily]

TweetDeck Scam Uses Fake Update As Lure

Compromised Twitter accounts have been used to post links to an exploit
portal that poses as a download site for an update to TweetDeck, the
popular micro-blogging client software package. Read the full article. [The Register]

Hacking by Numbers

In this video from the OWASP AppSec Research conference, Tom Brennan of WhiteHat Security discusses the current trends in vulnerabilities in Web applications and what’s driving them.


By Alex RothackerIn our last column, we focused on privilege escalation attacks, and the impact that this category of  SQL injection attacks can have on the database – particularly where specific database vulnerabilities exist, and can be exploited through the manipulation of privileges. Let’s look more deeply at how organizations struggle with the issue of extensive privileges assigned directly to users – or indirectly through user groups. We’ll address what can happen when database users are over-credentialed, and what should be done to ensure you are aware of all activity that is occurring in your environment.

The buzz this morning isn’t Google’s Buzz, but its new Priority Inbox feature for the company’s Web based Gmail messaging service. The new feature allows heavy e-mail users to filter out and prioritize important messages. But the search giant has already hit a snag in releasing it to the public.

Organized cyber thieves stole more than $600,000 from the Catholic Diocese of Des Moines, Iowa
earlier this month with the help of
dozens of unwitting co-conspirators hired through work-at-home job
scams, at least one of whom was told the money was being distributed to
victims of the Catholic Church sex abuse scandals. Read the full article. [KrebsonSecurity]

A Spanish security researcher has discovered a new vulnerability in Apple’s QuickTime software that can be used to bypass both ASLR and DEP on current versions of Windows and give an attacker control of a remote PC. The flaw apparently results from a parameter from an older version of QuickTime that was left in the code by mistake.

In an effort to help mitigate man-in-the-middle attacks that make normal HTTP connections look like secured HTTPS sessions, Mozilla is adding support in Firefox 4 for a new technology called HTTP Strict Transport Security that enables site operators to tell browsers to always request an HTTPS session on future visits.