NewsBits for September 15, 2003 sponsored by,
Southeast Cybercrime Institute - www.cybercrime.kennesaw.edu
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Restrictions lifted on NY Times hacker
Adrian Lamo, accused of attacking the networks of The New
York Times, Yahoo and other companies, will have to live
with his parents but can use a PC for some purposes. A
federal judge on Friday said Adrian Lamo, the so-called
homeless hacker, could go free on bail with only limited
restrictions on his computer use until his next court
date in October.
http://news.zdnet.co.uk/0,39020330,39116344,00.htm
http://www.cnn.com/2003/TECH/internet/09/15/hacker.arrest.ap/index.html
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MSN email spoofer pleads guilty to wire fraud
An email spoofer who set up a simple scam to defraud
MSN customers pleaded guilty last week to wire fraud.
Matthew Thomas Guevara, 21, of Chicago, Illinois faces
a jail sentence of up to 5 years and a fine of $250,000
for conning MSN customers into revealing their credit
card details.
http://www.theregister.co.uk/content/6/32820.html
http://computerworld.com/securitytopics/security/story/0,10801,84964,00.html
Microsoft thanks FBI for nabbing scammer
Microsoft has thanked the FBI and the US Attorney's
Office following the successful prosecution of an
email scammer who passed himself off as its online
service, MSN. The company stressed that it had
cooperated with the investigation that resulted
in Matthew Thomas Guevara pleading guilty last
week to wire fraud.
http://www.vnunet.com/News/1143613
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Neighbors hail child porn addict's lengthy sentence
Neighbors, counselors and prosecutors believe it was
only a matter of time before James Charles Klueber
would act on his sexual attraction to adolescent boys.
Northampton County Judge Stephen G. Baratta agreed
and handed down Friday what is essentially a life
sentence to prevent the 43-year-old Palmer Township
man from preying on children. Klueber, of the 2700
block of Crestmont Avenue, was sentenced to 33 to
67 years in state prison for sending more than 100
images of child pornography over the Internet to
an undercover police officer on Dec. 21, 2001.
Klueber pleaded guilty to 134 counts of sexual
abuse of children -- one for each image -- after
prosecutors dropped more than 400 counts, according
to defense attorney Robert Patterson.
http://pennlive.com/news/expresstimes/pa/index.ssf?/base/news-7/1063443846319660.xml
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Man who maintained child porn chatroom convicted
A Joplin man will turn himself over to federal authorities
for trading child pornography over the internet. 32 year
old John Farlow will serve a 10 year prision term for the
crime. He was charged last year when police in Germany
informed U.S. Customs Services about a child porn chat
room farlow was maintaining. A search warrent was issued
for his house at 2529 South Minnesota and for his computer.
Once Farlow is done with his 10 year term, he has to install
hardware and software to moniter his computer use and also
register on the sex offenders list.
http://216.87.159.45/news/default.asp?mode=shownews&id=1849
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Man accused in child porn case accepts plea agreement
A Connecticut man arrested in Mexico after being indicted
on child pornography charges in West Virginia has accepted
a plea agreement. Paul David Rene, 38, was initially
arrested in January 2002 after workers at a Martinsburg
computer repair shop discovered child pornography files
on his computer while repairing it in July 2001.
http://www.stamfordadvocate.com/news/local/state/hc-13135808.apds.m0691.bc-ct-childsep13,0,6628291.story
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Internet sting case stands test of law in Montco court
Prosecutors won a guilty verdict last week in the first
trial in Montgomery County involving Internet sting
investigations, in which police pose online as juveniles.
Jimmy Jacob of Philadelphia was found guilty in a one-day
trial heard by Judge Paul Tressler. Assistant District
Attorney Todd Stephens said the guilty verdict was
important because it demonstrated that online undercover
investigations can pass legal scrutiny. "I think it's
important to get the conviction as we did so that we
can establish [that] what we are doing is within the
parameters of the law and that the perpetrators should
be prosecuted," Stephens said. He said it was the first
trial in the county involving an online sting case.
http://www.philly.com/mld/inquirer/news/local/6773314.htm
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Internet child sex sting nets 19 more
The man from the computer chat room arrived for the
rendezvous, as he had promised, with perfume and
a brassiere. But the 13-year-old girl with whom
authorities say he had arranged to have oral sex
was a no-show. Over two weeks last summer, the gift
bearer, Anil Kumar, 34, from Creve Coeur, chatted
on the Internet with someone who presented herself
as a bored teenage girl, police say. She was, in
fact, as fictional as Nabokov's "Lolita." She was
St. Louis County police vice detective Adam Kavanaugh,
37, pretending to be a prepubescent girl. Police
arrested Kumar in a parking lot on Aug. 14 last year.
They said it was the spot where he had arranged to
meet the girl, and said the bra and perfume were
evidence he'd come for a sexual encounter. Kumar
later admitted as much, according to the complaint
against him. He is one of six area men who have been
charged in a long-running county sting. Prosecutors
plan to roll out charges against 19 others in the
weeks to come.
http://www.stltoday.com/stltoday/news/stories.nsf/News/F05F3E114C0BAA2F86256DA20016FC4B?OpenDocument&Headline=Internet+child+sex+sting+nets+19+more+
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2 Arrests in Porn Cases
A career counselor at Stony Brook University and
a retired elementary school teacher from Holbrook
were arrested Thursday in separate investigations
after sexually explicit images of children were
discovered on their computers, Suffolk and Stony
Brook University police said. In each case,
computer technicians found the photographs -
some depicting pre-pubescent children having
sex with adults - and notified authorities.
http://www.newsday.com/news/local/longisland/crime/ny-lisex133452975sep13,0,2165079.story
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Garda charged with child pornography
A member of the Gardai charged with possession of
child pornography has been sent forward for trial
to the Dublin Circuit Criminal Court. Thirty-eight-
year-old Darrach Kennedy from Knocklyon in Dublin
was stationed at Garda Headquarters in the Phoenix
Park. He is facing two charges under the 1998 Child
Trafficking and Pornography Act. The Dublin District
Court heard today that the Book of Evidence had been
served and the DPP had consented to the case being
sent forward for trial. Judge Clare Leonard then
sent the case forward to the next sitting of the
Circuit Criminal Court.
http://u.tv/newsroom/indepth.asp?pt=n&id=37097
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FBI arrests area man in GA - travels to have sex with 3-year-old
A Parkersburg man who allegedly traveled to Georgia
to have sex with a 3-year-old girl was arrested by
the FBI. Gary W. Powers, 52, of Core Road, Parkersburg,
was arrested last Saturday at a restaurant in northeast
Atlanta during an FBI sting operation. He was charged
with traveling in interstate commerce to engage in
sexual activity with a minor, the FBI said. "He had
been corresponding online with a third party and had
expressed his desire to travel to Atlanta to have sex
with a 3-year-old girl," said Special Agent Joe Parris,
media coordinator for the Atlanta Field Office of the FBI.
http://www.newsandsentinel.com/news/story/0913202003_new02_Sex.asp
Van Buren Man Arrested for Trying to Have Sex With 15-year-old
http://www.katv.com/news/stories/0903/102683.html
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Teacher charged in child porn case
Kansas City, Kan., police arrested an elementary school
computer science teacher Friday for allegedly having
child pornography on his school computer. Joseph T.
Martin Jr., 46, of Olathe was charged in connection
with pornography found at Whittier Elementary, 2600
S. 10th St., said police spokesman Capt. Michael Kobe.
Wyandotte County Jail officials said Martin remained
jailed on Saturday afternoon. School officials discovered
"inappropriate materials" in Martin's classroom after
school Wednesday, said Linda Murray, an assistant
superintendent for the Kansas City, Kan., School
District.
http://www.kansascity.com/mld/kansascitystar/6764659.htm
Teacher Convicted Of Having Child Pornography On Classroom Computer
http://www.nbc4.tv/news/2485431/detail.html
Former karate instructor admits owning child porn
http://www.pottstownmercury.com/site/news.cfm?newsid=10159425&BRD=1674&PAG=461&dept_id=18041&rfi=6
Man indicted on federal child porn counts
http://www.redding.com/news/stories/20030913lo021.shtml
UC Davis Employee Busted For Child Porn
http://fox40.trb.com/news/ktxl-091203pornarrest,0,1896925.story
Chat Room Conversations End in Local Man's Arrest
http://kdka.com/local/local_story_258183810.html
Child porn case sparks shock waves
http://www.daily-journal.com/content/?id=33862
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Ten on internet child porn charges
A FATHER and his son were among ten men who appeared
before Ipswich magistrates today charged with child
porn offences. Computer consultant Michael Richards,
51, formerly of Hollesley, but now of Salehouse,
Rackheath, Norfolk, is charged with 16 allegations
of making indecent photographs of children under
the age of 16. The offences were said to have
taken place between 1999 and 2003.
http://www.eveningstar.co.uk/Content/news/story.asp?datetime=15+Sep+2003+19%3A04&tbrand=ESTOnline&tCategory=News&category=News&brand=ESTOnline&itemid=IPED15+Sep+2003+16%3A09%3A47%3A577
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Barclays customers conned by email
The bank has warned users of its Internet bank not
to disclose personal information, after a handful
fell for a scam. UK bank Barclays warned on Saturday
of an email scam that tricks its online customers
into revealing their confidential details. The bank
said fraudsters had sent an email message falsely
purporting to be from Barclays, which included a
link to what appeared to be the bank's Web site.
http://news.zdnet.co.uk/internet/security/0,39020375,39116345,00.htm
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FCC, music biz face showdowns this week
The media and entertainment industries face a pair
of big policy hurdles this week as the Senate takes
up an effort to roll back media rules put in place
by the Federal Communications Commission in the
spring, and the appeals court hears arguments over
the music industry's attempts to name Internet
copyright pirates.
http://www.cnn.com/2003/SHOWBIZ/09/15/media.capitol.reut/index.html
Recording industry in a bind
http://www.siliconvalley.com/mld/siliconvalley/news/local/6776689.htm
Insiders blamed for most online movie piracy
http://www.newscientist.com/news/news.jsp?id=ns99994166
Record companies have reason to worry
http://www.pittsburghlive.com/x/tribune-review/columnists/copeland/s_155108.html
Record companies are right to sue over greedy music downloading
http://www.siliconvalley.com/mld/siliconvalley/6775670.htm
SBC Won't Name Names in File-Sharing Cases
http://www.nytimes.com/2003/09/16/business/media/16SWAP.html
Crackdown May Send Music Traders Into Software Underground
http://www.nytimes.com/2003/09/15/technology/15DARK.html
Hollywood Faces Online Piracy, but It Looks Like an Inside Job
http://www.nytimes.com/2003/09/15/technology/15MOVI.html
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White House picks Symantec exec as cybersecurity chief
The Bush administration on Monday selected Amit
Yoran, a respected software executive from Symantec
Corp., as the nation's new cybersecurity chief
inside the Department of Homeland Security. Yoran,
who is hardly a household name but well known
within the cybersecurity community, will be the
government's evangelist for convincing Americans
to improve their computer defenses against hackers,
disgruntled employees, commercial rivals and foreign
governments.
http://www.siliconvalley.com/mld/siliconvalley/news/editorial/6778104.htm
http://www.securityfocus.com/news/6961
http://news.com.com/2100-7348_3-5076914.html
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A14151-2003Sep15.html
http://www.msnbc.com/news/966902.asp
http://www.cnn.com/2003/TECH/ptech/09/15/cybersecurity.chief.ap/index.html
http://computerworld.com/securitytopics/security/story/0,10801,84988,00.html
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It took him around 20 minutes to perform the "test"
The french website zataz.com was hacked yesterday.
ZataZ is famous for publishing news about technology
and the underground. The french Whitehat Alex-Ploit
simply broke into the computer of the journalist's
colleague using an old well known windows vulnerability.
Then he stole the configuration file of the colleague's
ftp client, decrypted the login and password and
proceeded to connect to zataz.com and could have
changed the index page.
http://www.crime-research.org/eng/news/2003/09/Mess1401.html
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Government laptops 'not secure'
One in 17 key public sector workers, like government
or defence officials, say they have either lost theirs
or had them stolen, said security firm Thales. Those
who do hold on to them admit they do not use any kind
of encryption to protect sensitive information. Most
rely on passwords to prevent access to files and
a surprising number write their passwords down.
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/technology/3109602.stm
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HPD combats Web predators
The Internet has become a virtual playground for
child predators. A predator can anonymously slip into
a childrens chat room, extract personal information
from the children in the room and potentially use
the information for a meeting or abduction that
could lead to sexual abuse. While Internet usage
has steadily grown over the past 10 years, many
local law enforcement agencies are ill-prepared
to deal with cases that have high-tech implications.
The Huntington Police Department, while struggling
to adequately staff its personnel-strapped
department, is taking steps to be ready to
work cyber-stalker cases in the future.
http://www.herald-dispatch.com/2003/September/15/LNtop1.htm
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CERT to partner with Homeland Security Department
The federally funded Computer Emergency Response
Team at Carnegie Mellon University will partner
with the Department of Homeland Security and receive
additional funds and staff, federal and university
officials said Monday. The partnership between the
National Cyber Security Division of the federal
agency and CERT will be known as US-CERT, and
is intended to prevent, protect and respond to
viruses and other cyber attacks on the Internet.
http://www.siliconvalley.com/mld/siliconvalley/news/editorial/6779687.htm
http://www.gcn.com/vol1_no1/daily-updates/23534-1.html
http://www.fcw.com/fcw/articles/2003/0915/web-cyber-09-15-03.asp
http://www.govexec.com/dailyfed/0903/091503tdpm1.htm
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A15829-2003Sep15.html
http://computerworld.com/securitytopics/security/story/0,10801,84985,00.html
DHS creates emergency response team
http://www.fcw.com/fcw/articles/2003/0915/web-dhs-09-15-03.asp
Feds set up cyberfighting group
http://zdnet.com.com/2100-1105_2-5076745.html
'NET Guard:' An idea still waiting for its time to come
http://www.govexec.com/dailyfed/0903/091503cdam1.htm
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Companies Scramble to Patch Software Holes
A series of major software security alerts issued by
Microsoft Corp. over the past two months is causing
headaches for corporate system administrators worldwide.
Testing new Microsoft patches and rolling them out
to affected systems is taking weeks or months at many
companies, stretching overworked IT departments and
delaying other technology projects. The patching task
has been made more burdensome by the fact that at least
one software fix recently released by Microsoft failed
provide complete protection.
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A12004-2003Sep15.html
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Cybercrime insurance growing
Almost every week brings a new revelation of a
computer breach somewhere in the business world.
Companies spend billions of dollars erecting firewalls,
buying anti-virus software and taking other defensive
measures, but sometimes those safeguards aren't enough.
For firms that still feel vulnerable, cyberinsurance
provides another layer of protection. Cyberinsurance
or e-commerce insurance covers a laundry list of high-
tech dangers, from lost income if a hacker interrupts
your business to the costs of recovering data destroyed
by a virus or malicious code.
http://www.azcentral.com/arizonarepublic/business/articles/0915insure15.html
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Paying Spammers Not to Spam
Founders of a new antispam service say they have
developed a system to convince spammers to remove
specific e-mail addresses from their mailing lists,
but two major spam-fighting groups are warning
potential subscribers to stay away. The service,
offered by San Antonio, Texas-based Global Removal,
charges subscribers a $5 lifetime fee to have their
e-mail addresses put on a permanent do-not-spam list.
Addresses on the list are then compared with, and
removed from, mailing lists maintained by Global
Removal's partnering businesses -- more than 50
known spammers and an equal number of legitimate
e-mail marketers.
http://www.wired.com/news/business/0,1367,60431,00.html
Spam falls after South Korea strengthens e-mail law
http://computerworld.com/securitytopics/security/story/0,10801,84963,00.html
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PGP makes email encryption easier
PGP Corporation today introduced simpler email
encryption in which the burden of securing email
messages is shifted from the client to the network.
PGP Universal software suite, launched today,
represents a new architecture for the company.
The complexity of email encryption systems has
long been a factor holding back deployment. Some
vendors have responded to by repackaging encrypted
email as a Web-based service.
http://www.theregister.co.uk/content/55/32828.html
http://news.zdnet.co.uk/internet/security/0,39020375,39116351,00.htm
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Offshore security: Considering the risks
The economics driving the globalization of IT
infrastructure is putting the spotlight on the
security of offshore IT operations, primarily in
India. Huge investments are being made that assume
that the risk of offshore security can be managed,
as long as the necessary homework is done.
http://computerworld.com/managementtopics/outsourcing/story/0,10801,84671,00.html
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Immunity from the Pop-Up Plague
A judge has ruled that it's up to Web surfers to
keep adware and spyware out of their hard drives.
Here's what you can do. One lesson from the Internet
bust: If something seems too good to be true, it
probably is. Take those thousands of pieces of
"free" software available on the Net for everything
from file sharing and instant messaging to e-mail
and calendar applications.
http://www.businessweek.com/technology/content/sep2003/tc20030912_0013_tc073.htm
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Ballmer: Stop viruses before they start
Microsoft Chief Executive Steve Ballmer warned Monday
that recent security vulnerabilities represent a "new
and growing challenge to innovation" and conceded that
his company is under attack from "thieves, con artists,
terrorists and hackers." In response, the Redmond, Wash.,
software giant plans to develop new means for thwarting
such attackers and aims to shut down the invasions before
they wreak the havoc seen with recent viruses such as
MSBlast.
http://news.com.com/2100-1002_3-5076903.html
http://www.securityfocus.com/news/6965
Microsoft's New Security Road Map
http://www.newsfactor.com/perl/story/22289.html
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These tips could help keep your PC virus-free
Normally, the aisles are fully stocked at one of the
large computer stores where I shop. But a recent trip
to buy anti-virus software found me looking at picked-
over shelves, with little left. Perhaps the Blaster
worm and SoBig.F virus provided the wake-up call many
of us needed regarding anti-virus software. The two
malware programs certainly caught my attention. I had
anti-virus software on my computer, but my subscription
for software updates had lapsed.
http://www.signonsandiego.com/news/computing/choney/20030915-9999_mz1b15choney.html
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Dynamic Honeypots
For the past eight months we have been discussing what
honeypots are, their value, their different types,
and how they can be used and deployed. Today we will
do something a little different. Instead of discussing
what honeypots can do and how they work, we will take
a look into the crystal ball and see what honeypots
should do, how they could work. If I had a dream
honeypot, this is what I would like to see in the
future: the dynamic honeypot.
http://www.securityfocus.com/infocus/1731
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IBM tags new RFID services
IBM expanded its presence in the market for radio
frequency identification on Monday with the
introduction of services to help companies adopt
the supply-chain management tool. Radio frequency
identification (RFID) has generated interest among
retailers and consumer-goods companies as a method
to more effectively track inventory. The technology
allows companies to closely follow movement
of products via computer networks linked with
microchips that are attached to specific items.
http://zdnet.com.com/2100-1103_2-5076368.html
http://www.wired.com/news/privacy/0,1848,60408,00.html
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Kansas police to use wireless remote cameras
Police officers in this south-central Kansas town
plan use a wireless remote camera system to monitor
potential trouble spots from headquarters and patrol
cars. The miniature portable cameras, linked to
a wireless broadband system, will be placed in
multiple locations, ranging from banks to parks
and alleys, said Pratt police chief Lonnie McCollum.
http://www.usatoday.com/tech/news/internetprivacy/2003-09-15-kansas-cameras_x.htm
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