Security

Hackers have reportedly infiltrated restricted computer databases at the University of California Berkeley, putting the private data of 160,000 students, alumni, and others at risk. According to UC Berkeley, computer administrators determined that ... electronic databases in University Health Services had been breached by overseas criminals on April 21, 2009. UHS electronic medical records, including details of patients' diagnoses, treatments and therapies were not affected in this breach because they're stored on a separate system. (Source: http://datatheft.berkeley.edu ) Social Security Numbers ... (view more)

Over 8 million medical patients' drug prescription records from the Virginia Prescription Monitoring Program (PMP) have been stolen by hackers, who are demanding $10 million to return them. The PMP medical records being held for ransom include drug ... prescription information, social security numbers, and driver's license details for over 8 million Virginia patients. (Source: com.au ) Secure Site Replaced with Ransom Demand On April 30, 2009, the secure site for the Virginia PMP was replaced with this ransom demand: "I have your s**t! In *my* possession, right now, are 8,257,378 patient records ... (view more)

Radio frequency identification (RFID) is behind new-age systems the Highway E-Z Pass and the MasterCard PayPass bank card. Unfortunately, it now seems hackers are trying to take advantage of this convenient technology, and security experts are ... facing a serious challenge in keeping people safe. To participate in the Highway E-Z Pass, a person must first install a RFID tag in their windshield prior to traveling on a toll highway. When the driver approaches the stretch of the road that requires payment, their account is electronically debited. MasterCard PayPass bank cards work in a similar ... (view more)

Hackers have taken notice of the worldwide H1N1 hysteria and, in an effort to catch people reading up on the virus, have begun flooding email inboxes with messages promising "swine flu" news. These messages instead deliver malware and dubious ... advertisements promoting anything from herbal medications to male enhancement pills. The "hot topic" of the past few weeks has been the worldwide spread of the H1N1 virus, more commonly referred to as "swine flu". All across the globe, analysts and experts have urged people to help stop the global outbreak by reading up on the virus, and if any symptoms ... (view more)

McAfee has launched a new website designed to help the victims of various cybercrimes fight back against Internet deviants. Dubbed the " Cybercrime Response Unit," it acts a lot like an "Online 911". A victim of an online hacking is left with very ... little options following an attack. On one hand, the thought of calling the police to report a random computer virus is comical, but if the virus is comprehensive enough that it affects a great number of people, the party responsible for its creation should be held accountable. In the U.S., online crimes can be prosecuted by ... (view more)

Recently, the Conficker/Downadup worm infected several hundred machines and critical medical equipment in an undisclosed number of U.S. hospitals. The attacks were not widespread; however, Marcus Sachs, director of the SANS Internet Storm Center, ... told CNET News that it raises the awareness of what we would do if there were millions of computers infected in hospitals or in critical infrastructure locations. It's not clear how the devices (including heart monitors, MRI machines and PCs) got infected. Infected computers were running Windows NT and Windows 2000 in a local area network (LAN) that ... (view more)

Security specialists who monitor the behavior of cybercriminals are now reporting a disturbing trend among online scammers: paying "captcha-breakers" to solve random blocks of text, to supersede anti-fraud and anti-spam measures. Humans Versus ... Computer Programs Catpcha stands for Completely Automated Public Turing test to tell Computers and Humans Apart. Captchas are most prevalent online blogs that require a user to enter a series of numbers or letters in order to post a comment online. While sometimes an inconvenience, websites and online forms that require captchas are critical ... (view more)

Security researchers believe they have found a problem with Windows 7 that cannot be fixed. Thankfully, it can only be exploited by people with physical access to a computer. Vipin Kumar and Nitin Kumar demonstrated how to attack a machine using the ... security gap at a conference in Dubai known as Hack In The Box. They've created an application named VBootKit 2.0 which takes up just 3KB of space. Once installed on a machine, the application can temporarily remove the user's password, then give anyone connected to the machine (through a local area network or the Internet) the ability to remotely ... (view more)

If you're a computer hacker, the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) wants to hire you to help secure the nation's networks. Millions of digital attacks occur each day -- one of the most recent of which involves a breached fighter-jet project -- ... and has caused the DHS to put out ads looking for those who understand hackers. Ethical Hacking The DHS wants to hire so-called 'ethical hackers' to analyze threats and keep constant watch over government networks such as the Einstein program (PDF) and to develop ways to reduce vulnerabilities. In addition to hiring ethical hackers requested by the ... (view more)

According to a recent study, there were more electronic records being exposed in 2008 than in the previous four years combined. The study suggests that most breaches could have been avoided had the proper precautions been put in place. An astounding ... 99% of breaches were done through servers and applications, rather than desktop computers, notebooks, mobile phones or portable media combined. Verizon Business Data Breach Investigations A 2009 Verizon Business Data Breach Investigations Report (PDF) analyzed 90 confirmed breaches from 2008 that affected 285 million records. A previous report ... (view more)