October 28, 2002 Dawn raids target software pirates Police and Trading Standards officers launched a series of dawn raids this morning in an orchestrated crackdown on software pirates. More than 20 people have been arrested after officers raided addresses up and down the country. Codenamed "Operation Andrew", officials seized more than 8,500 pirate master CDs and copying equipment worth PS500,000. http://www.theregister.co.uk/content/4/27815.html - - - - - - - - Reuters hacks accused of hacking Reuters, arguably the world's best known news agency, stands accused of hacking today amid accusations that it broke into the computer systems of Swedish IT group Intentia to publish its results ahead of their official release. Intentia said it would file criminal charges today after its internal investigation of how its disappointing third quarter figures came to be obtained before their scheduled release pointed the finger of blame at Reuters. http://www.theregister.co.uk/content/6/27816.html http://www.nandotimes.com/technology/story/595343p-4624080c.html - - - - - - - - Australian court fines "mastermind" counterfeiter The Federal Court has ordered the "mastermind" of an operation to import and sell counterfeit PlayStation games to pay more than AU$220,000 in damages to Sony Computer Entertainment (SCE) Ltd. SCE, which released a statement heralding the decision as "a significant victory against gaming software piracy," said the award was the highest the company had received during a three-and-a-half year anti-piracy campaign. http://zdnet.com.com/2110-1105-963514.html - - - - - - - - PayPal Users Targeted by E-Mail Scam--Again For the second time in two months, scam artists have tricked users into sharing passwords and credit card info. Users of online payment service PayPal have again been targeted by scam artists trying to steal their personal data, including name,address, home and work telephone numbers, and credit card information. http://www.pcworld.com/news/article/0,aid,106412,00.asp http://www.idg.net/ic_959527_5055_1-2793.html - - - - - - - - Youth workers suspended over web porn Wirral Council finds offensive material in routine network sweep. Five youth workers have been suspended after Wirral Metropolitan Borough Council found pornographic material on its network. The employees are all members of the council's youth offending team. http://www.vnunet.com/News/1136325 - - - - - - - - Pentagon computers tougher for hackers The Department of Defense's computer networks were probed by hackers 14,500 times last year, with just 70 getting in. Of those, only three caused any damage -- and they were the same viruses that hobbled the private computer networks, according to the Army's chief of intelligence. The problem is not that hackers and virus-makers are getting better, but that relatively low-level systems administrators are failing to stop known gaps in their systems, said Lt. Gen. Robert Noonan, deputy chief of staff for intelligence, at a conference of electronic warfare professionals held here. http://www.upi.com/view.cfm?StoryID=20021028-091658-8410r - - - - - - - - Mexico summit: Sink the pirates The United States, China, Japan and other Pacific Rim nations have agreed to take more steps to curb Internet piracy and cooperate more closely on punishing cybercrime. At the Asia Pacific Economic Cooperation summit, which ended Sunday in Los Cabos, Mexico, President Bush and other politicians agreed on a set of anti-terrorism and trade-related measures that included "curtailing copyright infringement over the Internet" and enforcing intellectual property treaties. http://zdnet.com.com/2100-1106-963538.html http://news.com.com/2100-1023-963538.html - - - - - - - - EU to unveil media piracy crackdown New laws will create tougher standards against pirates, seeking to stem the media industry's estimated PS2.8bn annual losses. The European Commission will propose new legislation next month aimed at strengthening the fight against music and film piracy, a shady business worth PS2.8bn a year globally for pirate discs alone, EU sources said. The new rules will create tougher minimum standards for each of the 15 EU member states, filling existing gaps and loopholes allowed by the current legal fragmentation. But it will not go as far as imposing mandatory criminal sanctions for pirates. http://news.zdnet.co.uk/story/0,,t269-s2124543,00.html - - - - - - - - Government, industry debate international IT security center U.S. and European officials and businesses on Monday debated the merits of a proposal to establish a global center for information technology security based on the center that united them in their fight against the much- anticipated Y2K computer bug. Harris Miller, president of the Information Technology Association of America, raised the issue here at the U.S.-EU IT Security Forum. http://207.27.3.29/dailyfed/1002/102802tdpm2.htm - - - - - - - - Is a larger Net attack on the way? Recent attack may have been just a prank or a test shot. The Internet was never really in danger being knocked offline during last weeks coordinated attack on its infrastructure, most computer experts now agree. But the day is coming, some believe, when the Net will go dark for a day or so, shut down by an attacker. U.S. government officials are taking last weeks incident very seriously, partly because it might have been a test shot fired over the Internets bow by a group with larger plans, and partly because the incident has sparked a fresh round of speculation about attack strategies that could in fact cripple the Net. http://www.msnbc.com/news/827209.asp What If A Hacker Attacked And No One Noticed? The Internet sufferred what's being called the largest attack ever against its infrastructure --and very few people even noticed. On Oct. 21, a distributed denial-of-service attack, designed to flood the Internet's 13 root servers with too much traffic, lasted one to four hours but failed to cripple the Net. According to Matrix NetSystems Inc., which tracks Internet performance, several of the root servers kept working throughout the attack. Says Gartner security analyst John Pescatore, "The failure of this attack shows the Internet is a lot more resilient than many people give credit. Hackers aren't going to crash the Internet in 15 minutes." http://www.informationweek.com/story/IWK20021025S0025 Of mad snipers and cyber- terrorists Last Monday the Internet was attacked in what one Washington official described as "the most sophisticated and largest assault" in its history. Eight of thirteen root DNS servers got whacked simultaneously with a distributed denial of service attack. Had the assault not been shut down in an hour, the constant interchange of e-mail spam and viruses might have been slowed; the ability of millions to BS idly with strangers in IRC might have been impeded; e-commerce orders of bulk dog food might have gone unfulfilled; and millions of teenagers might have been denied their daily downloads of porn and warez and MP3s. http://www.theregister.co.uk/content/6/27819.html - - - - - - - - More people using - and losing - PDAs A chain is only as strong as its weakest link, and one of the weakest links in the sprawling field of information technology these days can be found piling up in the back seats of taxis, airport lost-and-found departments, and hotel rooms. Laptops, cell phones and the burgeoning number of personal desk assistants - also known as PDAs - might make life easier for employees in the field, but short of chaining them to their owners' bodies, these labor-saving devices are being lost and stolen at an alarming rate. And there are growing amounts of sensitive information stored inside. http://www.nandotimes.com/technology/story/595644p-4624460c.html - - - - - - - - The battle to control viruses Inside Sophos' headquarter 75,000 viruses lurk Anti-virus firm Sophos gets more calls about hoaxes than it does about any individual virus. So much so that it now compiles a list of topten hoaxes to sit alongside the top ten most virulent viruses explained Graham Cluley, Chief Technology Consultant at Sophos. While hoaxes cannot actually do any damage to computers, they do use up valuable bandwidth, waste a good deal of resources and are therefore a nuisance. http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/technology/2358075.stm - - - - - - - - 'We are the worst security risk' - sys admins confess More than half of all senior IT managers (58 per cent) think that their own IT departments offer the largest threat to IT security. IT security holes in corporate systems often open up during systems upgrades or when integrating new applications into core infrastructure, senior managers reported during a recent (and not particularly comprehensive) survey by security consultants Defcom. http://online.securityfocus.com/news/1499 - - - - - - - - Privacy loses an ally in Armey I'm going to miss Dick Armey, the crusty Texas Republican and House majority leader who is retiring after 17 years in Congress. No, I won't miss his repeated attempts to outlaw electronic vice. An unapologetic social conservative, Armey voted to restrict online sales of alcohol, prohibit Internet gambling and restrict the sale of violent videogames to minors. Still, Armey emerged as one of the finest champions of privacy in Washington, and his departure means that the House leadership will no longer include anyone attuned to the perils of electronic snooping. http://zdnet.com.com/2100-1107-963557.html http://news.com.com/2010-1069-963537.htm - - - - - - - - FoTW: "I will attack you in cyberspace!" Incoming! Andrew, you have exaggerated by making "fun" of Beth Goza's weblog! if you will not apologize her publicly (in the www.theregister.co.uk ) and admit publicly that you was wrong, then I will publish negative information about you at http://WirelessSoftware.info and I will ensure that it will be apppearing at FIRST PLACE in Google.com after typing "Andrew Orlowski" and clicking search! http://www.theregister.co.uk/content/35/27799.html - - - - - - - - Sniper leaves a mark Two electronic fingerprint databases turned out to be keys to cracking the Washington, D.C., sniper case. One, operated by the FBI, gave authorities the identity of a 17-year- old suspect in the three-week killing spree. The other, operated by the Immigration and Naturalization Service, led police to the 41-year-old suspected gunman, John Allen Muhammad. Initially, the databases were tapped by Montgomery, Ala., police who were investigating a murder that appeared to be unrelated to the sniping spree. http://www.fcw.com/fcw/articles/2002/1028/web-fprint-10-28-02.asp *********************************************************** Search the NewsBits.net Archive at: http://www.newsbits.net/search.html *********************************************************** The source material may be copyrighted and all rights are retained by the original author/publisher. The information is provided to you for non-profit research and educational purposes. Reproduction of this text is encouraged; however copies may not be sold, and NewsBits (www.newsbits.net) should be cited as the source of the information. 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