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Symantec Admits Network Was Hacked
Symantec today reversed course away from earlier statements regarding the theft of source code of some of its flagship security products, now admitting that its own network was breached.
In a statement provided to the Reuters news service, the security software giant acknowledged that hackers had broken into its network when they stole source code of some of the company’s software.
Previously, Symantec had denied that its own network had been breached, and instead pointed fingers at an unnamed “third party entity” as the attack’s victim. Evidence posted by a hacker nicknamed “Yama Tough” — a self-proclaimed member of a gang calling itself “Lords of Dharmaraja” — indicated that the information was obtained from a server operated by the Indian government.
Two weeks ago, Symantec spokesman Cris Paden said that the hacker made off with source code of Symantec Endpoint Protection 11.0 and Symantec Antivirus 10.2, enterprise products between five and six years old.
India Wants To Monitor Twitter & Facebook
August 13, 2011 by admin
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India’s Communications Ministry has received a request from the Home Ministry to monitor social networking websites such as Twitter and Facebook amid fears that the services are being used by terrorists to organize attacks.
The request suggests that the Indian government is trying to expand the scope of its online surveillance for national security purposes.
Telecommunications service providers in India provide facilities for lawful interception and monitoring of communications on their network, including communications from social networking websites such as Facebook and Twitter, in accordance with their license agreements, Milind Deora, the minister of state for communications and IT, told Parliament, according to the country’s Press Information Bureau.
But there are certain communications which are encrypted, Deora said Friday.
The government did not provide details of what encrypted data they would like to have access to. A spokesman for the home ministry said on Monday that additional
information can only be provided in Parliament while it is in session.
Under new rules to the country’s IT Act that came into force earlier this year, websites and service providers are required to provide government security agencies with information on private accounts, including passwords, on request without a court order.
Most companies, however, are not willing to share information with law enforcement agencies unless they have a court order.
Twitter states in its guidelines for law enforcement that “non-public information about Twitter users is not released unless we have received a subpoena, court order, or other valid legal process document.”
EMC’s Data Breach Cost $66 Million
Between April and June 2011, EMC spent $66 million handling the fallout from a March cyber attack against its systems, which resulted in the compromise of information relating to the SecurID two-factor authentication sold by EMC’s security division, RSA.
That clean-up figure was disclosed last week during an EMC earnings call, by David Goulden, the company’s chief financial officer. It doesn’t include post-breach expenses from the first quarter, when EMC began investigating the attack, hardening its systems, and working with customers to prevent their being exploited as a result of the attacks.
In spite of the breach, EMC reported strong second-quarter financial results, earning consolidated revenue of $4.85 billion, which is an increase of 20% compared with the same period one year ago. Meanwhile, second-quarter GAAP net income increased by 28% from the same period last year, to reach $546 million. The company saw large growth in its information infrastructure and virtual infrastructure products and services, including quarterly revenue increases of 19% for its information storage group.
Those results led executives to increase their financial outlook for 2011 and predict consolidated revenue in excess of $19.8 billion, which would be a 16% increase from EMC’s 2010 revenues of $17 billion.
Google Rewrites Web Pages For Speed
August 2, 2011 by admin
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Google has created a hosted service that analyzes Web pages, rewrites their code to make them perform better and serves them up from Google servers.
To use the Page Speed Service, Web publishers must sign up and point their site’s DNS entry to Google. The service grabs the site’s content, optimizes it for speed and delivers the pages to end users.
Visitors will continue to access a site in the same way as before but could see speed enhancements of 25% to 60%, according to Google.
The service is currently being offered free to a limited number of hand-selected webmasters. Google will announce pricing and other details later. Webmasters can sign up to receive information.
More Citigroup Accounts Compromised Than Stated
June 21, 2011 by admin
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Citigroup was apparently hit harder by a cyber-attack in May than what was originally reported; which is now 360,000 of its customers. Unfortunately, this number is double the number that Citigroup initially stated.
Citigroup is one of the biggest banks in the US and ranks number 3 overall. The breach occurred on May 10th and was confirmed by Citigroup on June 8thth. That said, around 360,080 North American Citigroup credit card accounts were impacted by the breach, Citigroup stated; which is around 1 per cent of their North American card customer’s base.
FTC Singles Out Google’s Chrome
Federal Trade Commission Chairman Jon Liebowitz this week singled out Google for not adopting “Do Not Track,” the privacy feature that allows consumers the ability to opt out of online tracking by Web sites and marketing entities.
In an interview Monday with Politico, Liebowitz called out Google for not supporting Do Not Track in its Chrome browser.
Noting that Do Not Track had gathered momentum, Liebowitz said, “Apple just announced they’re going to put it in their Safari browser. So that gives you Apple, Microsoft and Mozilla. Really the only holdout — the only company that hasn’t evolved as much as we would like on this — is Google.”
Do Not Track has been promoted by the FTC and by privacy advocates including the Electronic Frontier Foundation (EFF), as the best way to help consumers protect their privacy.
The technology requires sites and advertisers to recognize incoming requests from browsers as an opt-out demand by the user. The information is transmitted as part of the HTTP header.
As Liebowitz said, Microsoft and Mozilla have added Do Not Track header support to their Internet Explorer 9 (IE9) and Firefox 4 browsers. While Apple hasn’t confirmed that the next version of Safari will include Do Not Track, developers have reported finding the feature in early editions bundled with Mac OS X 10.7, aka “Lion,” the upgrade slated to ship this summer.
Hackers Breach WordPress Servers
April 15, 2011 by admin
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Hackers have gained access to several servers that support WordPress and may have obtained source code, according to the founding developer of Automattic, the company behind the popular blogging platform.
Matt Mullenweg wrote on the WordPress blog that Automattic has been reviewing log records to determine how much information was breached and re-evaluating “avenues to gain access.”
“We presume our source code was exposed and copied,” Mullenweg wrote. “While much of our code is open source, there are sensitive bits of our and our partners’ code. Beyond that, however, it appears information disclosed was limited.”
Terror Alerts To Be Issued Via Facebook, Twitter
April 10, 2011 by admin
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The U.S. government may start issuing terror alerts via Facebook and Twitter, according to a news service report.
The Associated Press reported Thursday that the U.S. Department of Homeland Security is working to re-design the current color-coded terror alert system. The new system, according to the report, would have only two levels of alerts — elevated and imminent.
Those alerts would be conveyed out to the public in part via social networking sites Facebook and Twitter . The AP article is based on a 19-page draft of the plan that the news service obtained.
“The new terror alerts would also be published online using Facebook and Twitter ‘when appropriate,’” the news agency reported, “but only after federal, state and local government leaders have already been notified.”
The new system is expected to be in place by April 27.
Zeus Kerravala, an analyst at Yankee Group Research, said the fact that the U.S. government is entrusting something as critical as terrorist alerts to Facebook and Twitter shows how important social networking sites have become to people’s lives.
Google Launches Online Magazine
March 27, 2011 by admin
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Google has decided to launch its own quarterly online magazine, Think Quarterly, out of its centers in the U.K. and Ireland, saying that “in a world of accelerating change, we all need to take time to reflect.”
The first issue of Think Quarterly is already freely available online and is focuses on data, including data obesity, data impotence, data overload and open data.
“Think Quarterly is a unique communications tool that brings together some of the world’s leading minds to discuss the big issues facing businesses today,” the magazine says on its Twitter bio.
The magazine’s Twitter feed says it launched on March 21, though there is no mention of the magazine on Google’s blog, Twitter feed, Facebook page or newsroom.
In a note on the magazine’s website, the managing director of Google’s U.K. & Ireland Operations, Matt Brittin, said, “Think Quarterly is a breathing space in a busy world. It’s a place to take time out and consider what’s happening and why it matters.”
Tablets Likely to Transmit Sensitive Data
March 15, 2011 by admin
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Forty-eight percent of U.S. tablet device owners have used them to transmit all kinds of sensitive data, according to a survey released recently by Harris Interactive and FuzeBox.
Considering the explosive increase in tablet computer adoption, this is not entirely shocking news, but it should give pause to business owners and IT professionals. Sometimes without the explicit blessing of the company, employees are increasingly using tablets to answer work email and conduct day-to-day business. Read More…