NewsBits for July 7, 2004
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Hooked on Phonics fined by FTC
The makers of the popular reading education program
Hooked on Phonics were fined Wednesday by the Federal
Trade Commission for sharing private consumer information
-- including information about children -- with outside
marketing firms, despite promises made in its privacy
policy.
http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/5386195
http://computerworld.com/securitytopics/security/privacy/story/0,10801,94369,00.html
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Scotland Yard and the case of the rent-a-zombies
Vast networks of home computers are being rented
out without their owners' knowledge to spammers,
fraudsters and digital saboteurs, security experts
said on Wednesday. The terminals have been infected
by a computer virus, turning them into "zombies"--
slaves to the commands of a malicious and unseen
controller. Connect them all up, and the result
is a powerful network of zombie PCs that security
experts call a "botnet."
http://zdnet.com.com/2100-1105_2-5260154.html
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Dutch slap cuffs on race-hate rappers
The Centre of Information and Documentation on
Israel (CIDI) yesterday lodged a police complaint
against the makers of a song that uses racist
language against Jews, homosexuals and Amsterdam
soccer team Ajax. The song, recorded by supporters
of the Rotterdam football team Feyenoord under
the name of Sluipschutters (Snipers), was released
through the peer-to-peer file sharing service Kazaa.
http://www.theregister.co.uk/2004/07/07/race_hate_rappers/
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You've Got Mail (and Court Says Others Can Read It)
When everything is working right, an e-mail message
appears to zip instantaneously from the sender to
the recipient's inbox. But in reality, most messages
make several momentary stops as they are processed
by various computers en route to their destination.
Those short stops may make no difference to the
users, but they make an enormous difference to the
privacy that e-mail is accorded under federal law.
http://www.nytimes.com/2004/07/06/technology/06net.html
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Congress mulls new Net phone rules
Two key members of Congress announced legislation
Tuesday that could create a sweeping federal
regulatory framework for Internet phone calls.
Reps. Rick Boucher, D-Va., and Cliff Stearns, R-Fla.,
assert that the Federal Communications Commission--
not state governments or regulators--should oversee
rules regarding phone calls made over the Internet.
Their bill would beat back attempts by regulators
in states such as New York, California and Minnesota
to extend their jurisdiction to the fledgling
technology known as voice over Internet Protocol,
or VoIP.
http://news.com.com/2100-7352-5258191.html
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Court refuses to lift California e-voting restrictions
The California Secretary of State and proponents
of paper audit trails for voting machines garnered
a judicial win Tuesday when a U.S. District Court
judge refused to strike down the state's
decertification of e-voting systems in 14 counties.
The ruling freezes a bid by four California counties
and the American Association of People with
Disabilities to avoid having to find alternatives
to their electronic voting systems come the November
presidential elections.
http://news.com.com/Court+refuses+to+lift+California+e-voting+restrictions/2100-1028_3-5260214.html
http://computerworld.com/governmenttopics/government/legalissues/story/0,10801,94372,00.html
Lots of questions, few clear answers on e-voting
http://www.gcn.com/vol1_no1/daily-updates/26515-1.html
E-voting security: looking good on paper?
http://www.theregister.co.uk/2004/07/07/e_voting_security/
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Great Britain: A new law on cybercrime is being elaborated
The threats facing Britain's Internet-enabled
companies and consumers are so great that new
laws are needed to fight the problem, and fix
the mistakes made by the government in its
previous attempts to combat spam. That was
the message from the Communications Management
Association (CMA) on Monday, as it kicked off
a debate into Broadband Britain at the
Enterprise Networks show.
http://www.crime-research.org/news/07.07.2004/474/
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Old-school worm loves Windows applications
The latest Lovgate worm variant can destroy access
to hundreds of Windows applications as it spreads.
The latest variant of the Lovgate worm scans PCs
for executable files and then renames them,
a tactic used by viruses from a much older
generation, according to antivirus companies.
http://news.zdnet.co.uk/internet/security/0,39020375,39159870,00.htm
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Password-stealing Trojan cut off at source
A malicious program that tried to steal banking
passwords has been stopped, says Symantec.
An attempt to pinch user information from banking
sites using a malicious pop-up program has been
nipped in the bud, says Symantec. Last week,
security experts uncovered a Trojan horse --
dubbed PWSteal.Refest by the security software
maker -- which installs itself through a pop-up
advertisement when users logged onto the Web
sites of any one of nearly 50 targeted banks.
http://news.zdnet.co.uk/internet/security/0,39020375,39159780,00.htm
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Lax data security seen at many Japanese companies
A Japanese government report published yesterday
says at least 40% of companies surveyed are taking
no special measures to ensure the privacy and
security of personal data stored on computers.
Results of the survey were included in the
government's annual White Paper on Information
and Communications in Japan, which was published
by the Ministry of Public Management, Home Affairs,
Posts and Telecommunications (MPHPT). It comes
after several incidents in the last year in which
personal information on customers, sometimes
numbering into the millions of people, has
beenleaked or stolen from Japanese companies.
http://computerworld.com/securitytopics/security/story/0,10801,94368,00.html
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36 percent of software worldwide pirated, trade group says
O&O Software, with only 28 employees, has built
a $3 million-a-year business developing award-
winning utilities for personal computers. How
much bigger it might be without the plague of
software piracy is impossible to say, but it's
clear sales are being lost.
http://www.siliconvalley.com/mld/siliconvalley/news/editorial/9097724.htm
Software piracy losses double
http://zdnet.com.com/2100-1104_2-5259395.html
http://www.cnn.com/2004/TECH/biztech/07/07/software.piracy.reut/index.html
http://www.newsfactor.com/story.xhtml?story_title=Software-Piracy-Soars&story_id=25750
UK firms 'forget' to pay PS1bn for software
http://news.zdnet.co.uk/business/legal/0,39020651,39159797,00.htm
http://www.vnunet.com/news/1156500
Software pirates cost $9.7bn in Europe - BSA
http://www.theregister.co.uk/2004/07/07/bsa_software_piracy_study/
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VoIP hacks gut Caller I.D.
Implementation quirks in Voice over IP are making
it easy for hackers to spoof Caller I.D., and to
unmask blocked numbers. Caller I.D. isn't what it
used to be. Hackers have discovered that the handy
feature that tells you who's calling before you
answer the phone is easily manipulated through
weaknesses in Voice over IP (VoIP) programs and
networks. They can make their phone calls appear
to be from any number they want, and even pierce
the veil of Caller I.D. blocking to unmask an
anonymous phoner's unlisted number.
http://www.securityfocus.com/news/9061
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Two more from NIST
Two new publications from the National Institute
of Standards and Technology provide technical help
for government agencies and businesses that are
required to protect information systems. One
publication offers a starting point for organizations
to understand basic information security principles.
The other gives technical tips for setting up
electronic authentication using guidelines issued
by Office of Management and Budget officials.
http://www.fcw.com/fcw/articles/2004/0705/web-nist-07-07-04.asp
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PC: Hey, your mobile's being stolen!
Researchers at Leeds University are developing
technology that will allow Bluetooth devices to
keep tabs on - and potentially protect - each other.
Bluetooth, the short-range personal area networking
technology, may have found a new application as
a guard dog for notebooks and smartphones.
http://news.zdnet.co.uk/hardware/emergingtech/0,39020357,39159785,00.htm
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Another day, another IE flaw...
Yet another vulnerability has been unearthed
in Microsoft's Internet Explorer - the company
is working on a 'series of updates', it says.
A computer science researcher has highlighted
the shortcomings of Microsoft's latest patch
for its Internet Explorer browser by identifying
another way that online vandals could run
malicious programs on a Web surfer's computer.
http://news.zdnet.co.uk/0,39020330,39159868,00.htm
Microsoft, biometrics firm to tackle homeland security
http://zdnet.com.com/2100-1105_2-5259889.html
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Multi-Layer Intrusion Detection Systems
A business critical system has been breached
by attackers. Responding to the event, you grab
your gear and head down to where the system is.
En route a red faced executive seemingly about
to explode brushes past you in a hurry, suddenly
turning around upon realization that you are the
specialist responding to the very incident which
has him on the brink. Already knowing the words
about to come out of his mouth, the man begins
to spout, "We need this system back up immediately!!
http://www.securityfocus.com/infocus/1788
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Attention, Shoppers:
You Can Now Speed Straight Through Checkout Lines!
Radio-frequency chips are retail nirvana. They're
the end of privacy. They're the mark of the beast.
Inside the tag-and-track supermarket of the future.
I'm in a supermarket called the Extra Future Store
in Rheinberg, Germany, 40 kilometers north of
Dusseldorf, jonesing for a bit of Philadelphia
cream cheese. I feed my request into the touchscreen
console on my shopping cart, and up pops a map
showing the optimal path to the dairy section.
I steer over and grab a box - regular in name
but far smarter than the average cream cheese.
The package carries a computer chip that talks
to a 2-millimeter-thin pad lining the shelf
under the box. When I pick up the cheese,
sensors in the pad notify the store's
database that the box has been removed.
http://www.wired.com/wired/archive/12.07/shoppers.html
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