Security

In a recent piece on Microsoft's Windows Vista, our Bill Lindner warned users that "Big Brother" might just be watching you. If you're a resident of New York City, that threat just moved from your computer to the busy, dingy streets outside. What ... this essentially means is that the city itself will be installing both license plate readers and cameras across the crowded areas of Lower Manhattan. The project is called the "Lower Manhattan Security Initiative", a bit tamer than London, England's similar "ring of steel". London put such technology to use in order to curtail terrorist threats, ... (view more)

After spending months denying that there even was a Vista Service Pack 1 (SP1), Microsoft will be rushing out the first Vista SP1 beta around the middle of July. After agreeing to change the search feature in Vista due to complaints by Google and ... leading everyone to believe the first beta of SP1 for Vista wouldn't be released until near or after the first of the year, it now appears that Microsoft is attempting to get the final version of Vista SP1 out around November 2007. There is also a lot of widespread speculation that Vista SP1 is being rolled out in an effort to encourage Vista ... (view more)

Warning: If you're a REAL fan of RealPlayer, you could be in REAL trouble. That's the word coming from security experts iDefense Inc. Apparently, older versions of both RealPlayer and Helix Player are susceptible to a crucial security hole that ... could allow a hacker entry into a user's PC, whether it was running Windows, a Mac OS, or Linux. How is this possible? Evidently, it seems certain versions of the players can be subjected to buffer overflows, which by default could allow unauthorized code to be executed on a user's machine. That's enough to give an attacker control of the PC as a whole ... (view more)

Softpedia.com released a nice article regarding the plethora of Windows Vista "features and services" that collect, maintain and transmit your personal data to Microsoft and/or their "controlled subsidiaries and affiliates." If you're going to use ... Vista, you really don't have much say in the matter. Microsoft makes it crystal-clear that they're gathering information. The Vista Privacy Statement and the End User License Agreement (EULA) references most of these "features and services", but not all of them. "This disclosure focuses on features that communicate with the Internet and is not ... (view more)

Is Google Earth a threat to world security? According to the head of U.S. Air Force intelligence, surveillance, and reconnaissance, Lt. Gen. David Deptula, it is. How exactly does Google Earth jeopardize universal security? It gives Internet clients ... an astronaut's view of the earth. Users even have the ability to zoom down to street level and see very intricate details. Basically, anyone with a credit card is capable of getting a picture of absolutely any place on earth. (Source: zdnet.com ) Although this security threat is a large problem, it is only a recent issue. In fact, Deptula believes ... (view more)

The European Union's head justice official has applauded Google on its decision to reduce the amount of time it keeps the personal data of Internet users. "I think it is indeed a good step," said EU justice and home affairs commissioner Franco ... Frattini at a news conference in Luxembourg. His comment was in response to Google's decision to only keep the data for 18 months, a modest improvement from Google's original plan to keep the data for 18 to 24 months. (Source: mercurynews.com ) "I have appreciated the commitment of Google not only to meet our expectations in terms of protection of ... (view more)

Wondering why the majority of MySpace accounts were recently hijacked? The answer was revealed in an entry on Google's Online Security blog. "Starting in mid-March, the number of page views generated on phish sites increased five-fold, with almost ... all (95 per cent) targeting the popular social networking site." (Source: net-security.org ) The reason for the rapid increase: MySpace makes it easy for con-artists to identify and win the trust of individuals associated with specific companies. Since many people use the same login information for multiple web accounts, once a MySpace client's ... (view more)

A few days ago, I reported on McAfee's recent study of the web's riskiest websites. Although just 4% of the Internet is considered plagued by the "risky" site, the danger changes drastically depending on the search term. It seems it may also depend ... on the search engine, as McAfee has followed up its risky report with one accusing Yahoo of returning the highest percentage of threatening sites. Like the last survey, McAfee's SiteAdvisor division is behind the analysis. Once a search powerhouse during the web's early days, Yahoo has been more than eclipsed by Google. Aside from more reliable ... (view more)

Who is reading your instant messages? If you're using Yahoo Messenger, your privacy may be compromised. Yahoo Messenger vulnerabilities can allow remote hackers to access a user's system. The bugs were discovered by eEye Digital Security within the ... last few weeks; the security company gave these particular bugs its highest risk rating since the flaws enable remote code execution. However, the latest threats are not the only security issues connected to Yahoo Messenger. In fact, the researchers at eEye have located many other problems with this particular program. The eighth version of Yahoo's ... (view more)

Forcing someone into bed is a crime. So are inappropriate relations between a child and an adult. That's obvious, right? But, what happens when these actions take place online in the fantasy world of a massive multiplayer video game? That's the ... question authorities in Germany and Belgium are trying to answer right now. This virtual den of iniquity is known as "Second Life". But, to be fair, the game does not promote or encourage this kind of activity. Alas, freedom given inevitably becomes freedom abused. The problem: no physical crimes were actually committed and no children were really ... (view more)