NewsBits for July 15 2004 ************************************************************ Police arrest 45 over child porn Police in Greater Manchester yesterday arrested 45 people suspected of downloading pornographic images of children from the internet. The arrests followed raids at 50 homes from Rochdale to Wigan. More than 500 officers took part in Operation Baglan, and seized a number of computers. http://www.theregister.co.uk/2004/07/14/operation_baglan/ - - - - - - - - - - Priest Sentenced to Prison after Downloading Porn A pedophile priest was convicted Tuesday of violating his probation, and he was sentenced to 20 years in prison. Father Carlos Lozano was convicted ten years ago of molesting four boys. In March, probation officers found Lozano had downloaded porn onto his computer. Lozano told officers he was just exploring his sexuality. The porn was a violation of Lozano's probation, officers said. http://www.woai.com/news/local/story.aspx?content_id=3476CA45-BDEC-4128-866B-9F8BDC3C216B - - - - - - - - - - Pedophile jailed for 18 months A PEDOPHILE who had images on his computer of three and four-year-old girls being sexually abused has been jailed in Brisbane for 18 months. Ian Mitchell Johnston, 45, had more than 11,000 child sex images on his computer hard drive and compact discs when he was raided by Queensland police in November last year after an overseas tip-off. http://www.heraldsun.news.com.au/common/story_page/0,5478,10134485%255E1702,00.html - - - - - - - - - - Child porn teacher spared prison McAuslan's images were spotted by staff at the Eton IT department. A former teacher at Eton College who admitted downloading child porn has been spared a jail sentence. Ian McAuslan, 58, had admitted two counts of possessing indecent images of children, and 14 of making them, at Bracknell Magistrates' Court in April. McAuslan, from Lingwood Close in Southampton, was arrested after the images were found when his school computer was handed in for an upgrade. He was given nine months' imprisonment, suspended for two years, on Wednesday. http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/uk_news/england/berkshire/3893257.stm - - - - - - - - - - Child porn case: city manager charged Alison Pasch is sickened by allegations that Belding City Manager Mike Wood was looking at child pornography while he was supposed to be running the city. "It's disgusting," Pasch, a Belding resident, said as she finished her grocery shopping Tuesday. "We don't pay taxes to pay his wages to have him get his jollies off looking at little ids. As far as I'm concerned, throw the book at him, fire him, do whatever they can for him using and abusing his job. "I have no sympathy for him." http://www.mlive.com/news/grpress/index.ssf?/base/news-1/1089816601303390.xml - - - - - - - - - - Web site calls local man a pedophile A local man has hired an attorney and plans to sue a watchdog Internet organization after the group accused him of soliciting sex with an underage girl over the Web, and sent flyers to his neighborhood claiming he was a pedophile. Perverted-Justice.com, a volunteer organization that surfs the Web attempting to expose possible pedophiles, posted a conversation from a Yahoo chat room of a person they believe to be a Hollister resident communicating sexually explicit comments and sending lewd photos of himself to a volunteer posing as a 13-year-old girl, according to the site. http://www.freelancenews.com/news/newsview.asp?c=113678 - - - - - - - - - - Bootleg-DVD Operation Raided L.A. police arrest 5 and close a factory that allegedly could make 1million copies a year. In a major bootleg- movie sweep, Los Angeles police shut down a counterfeiting operation Wednesday that film industry officials said could make more than 1 million DVDs a year. Police from a new anti-piracy unit raided an apartment on Burlington Avenue in the Pico-Union area, where officials confiscated 5,680 DVDs that included camcorder copies of such recently released movies as "Anchorman." Police also seized 40 DVD burners, 6,000 blank discs and $2,000 in cash. (LA Times article, free registration required) http://www.latimes.com/technology/la-fi-bust15jul15,1,6607626.story Can Odd Alliance Beat Pirates? http://www.wired.com/news/digiwood/0,1412,64212,00.html - - - - - - - - - - Credit risk for customers after firm's PCs stolen A US financial services company is warning 47,000 customers that thieves who took computers from one of its offices may have their credit-card details Intuit, a provider of financial software and services, is warning 47,000 customers that their credit-card data may be at risk after computers were stolen from a company office. http://news.zdnet.co.uk/internet/security/0,39020375,39160542,00.htm - - - - - - - - - - Online Hacker Shop Shuts Down An online shop that was selling the source code for two computer programs has abruptly suspended its operations, citing a "redesign" of its "business model." The Source Code Club opened its doors on Monday, using an e-mail posting to an online discussion group to advertise the availability of source code and design documents for two products: the Dragon intrusion detection system (IDS) software from Enterasys Networks and peer-to-peer server and client software from Napster, now owned by Roxio. http://story.news.yahoo.com/news?tmpl=story&ncid=1212&e=4&u=/pcworld/20040715/tc_pcworld/116912&sid=95612658 - - - - - - - - - - Bush Signs Identity Theft Bill President Bush signed a tough new identity theft bill into law today, legislation passed by Congress in response to evidence that the problem is growing rapidly as more Americans use the Internet to shop and manage their personal finances. The Identity Theft Penalty Enhancement Act adds two years to prison sentences for criminals convicted of using stolen credit card numbers and other personal data to commit crimes. Violators who use that data to commit "terrorist offenses" would get five extra years. http://www.securityfocus.com/news/9120 http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/5437439/ http://www.theregister.co.uk/2004/07/15/anti_phishing_bill/ About face on ID theft, phishing (series of stories) http://zdnet.com.com/2251-1110-5271073.html Gov.uk launches anti-fraud website http://www.theregister.co.uk/2004/07/15/ant_fraud_website/ - - - - - - - - - - South Korea enlists Beijing to halt Chinese hackers South Korea said on Thursday it had sought China's help in stopping a wave of Chinese hackers who had used viruses to attack government computers in Seoul. Earlier this week, the National Intelligence Agency (NIS), South Korea's spy agency, said hackers based in China had stolen passports and launched two kinds of viruses in attacks on 10 government institutes related to national security. http://www.reuters.com/locales/c_newsArticle.jsp?type=technologyNews&localeKey=en_IN&storyID=5678605 - - - - - - - - - - UK companies in 'blissful ignorance' over spyware threat Survey: Fewer than one in seven UK companies recognise that malicious emails could expose their networks to a corporate spy, say MessageLabs UK companies are finally wising up to the importance of deploying software patches and keeping their antivirus signatures up to date, but the increasing threats from Trojans and spyware have still not sunk in, according to a survey conducted by email security services firm MessageLabs. http://news.zdnet.co.uk/0,39020330,39160552,00.htm - - - - - - - - - - Forensic computing uncloaks industrial espionage Forensic computing techniques proved decisive in winning a recent High Court action involving underhand dealings and industrial espionage in Britain's automotive tools industry. Computer forensics firm Vogon International was called in to help investigate the alleged theft of electronic copies of vital engineering drawings by a former director and members of staff who had left British Midland Tools, in Tamworth near Birmingham, to join Midland International Tooling Ltd (MIT). http://www.theregister.co.uk/2004/07/15/autocad_cads_foiled/ - - - - - - - - - - Searching for Ways to Fight Junk E-Mail Internet service providers are working on systems that would verify senders' identities. Be liberal in what you accept and conservative in what you send. That was the philosophy when computer scientists sent the first electronic-mail messages over the Internet more than 30 years go. At the time, the Net was in its infancy, used by a few hundred researchers at universities, government labs and high-tech companies. (LA Times article, free registration required) http://www.latimes.com/technology/la-fi-email15jul15,1,5687839.story - - - - - - - - - - Security tops network wish list Nearly eight out of 10 companies rate security as the single most important attribute of corporate networks, according to new research. A poll of 254 senior executives by the Economist Intelligence Unit found that security has replaced network reliability and availability as the most critical network attribute. http://www.vnunet.com/news/1156671 Measuring security http://computerworld.com/securitytopics/security/story/0,10801,94524,00.html - - - - - - - - - - Season over for 'phishing'? The latest innovation in identity fraud typically begins with an unexpected e-mail message from a financial institution proclaiming something like: "Your account information needs to be updated due to inactive members, frauds and spoof reports." Anyone who clicks on the included hyperlink and types in their personal details is unwittingly connecting not to their own bank, but to a scam artist engaged in the sport of "phishing" for illegally obtained credit card numbers, bank account information, and Social Security numbers. http://zdnet.com.com/2100-1105_2-5270077.html - - - - - - - - - - Service Pack 2: Patching the unpatchable Two and a half years after promising a secure Windows, Microsoft is within a month--maybe-- of releasing Windows XP Service Pack 2. It will do a lot to fix viruses and Trojans, but like a tired old general always fighting the last war it won't do much for the current and most lethal security threats we face. http://zdnet.com.com/2100-1107-5270521.html? - - - - - - - - - - Where to keep your data truly safe... Ever since the first time I lost a significant amount of data due to an application crash, system and hard drive failure, which is many years ago now, I have been almost paranoid about saving, duplicating and backing up all my data. Everything I do and communicate via my computers is regularly backed up in at least three different geographical locations including my home, office and the homes of my PA and my children. http://zdnet.com.com/2100-1107_2-5270733.html - - - - - - - - - - Bugwatch: Mobiles catch the security bug The mobile industry must acknowledge the threat from a new generation of viruses. Each week vnunet.com asks a different expert to give their views on recent virus and security issues, with advice, warnings and information on the latest threats. This week Sal Viveros, wireless security evangelist at McAfee, argues the case for antivirus protection for mobile devices in the wake of the first wireless worm. http://www.vnunet.com/news/1156659 - - - - - - - - - - Homeland Security Department plans new passenger screening system The Homeland Security Department is scrapping a controversial airline passenger screening system, but still plans to implement a program that checks passenger information against terrorist watch lists, officials said Thursday. http://www.govexec.com/dailyfed/0704/071504c1.htm http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/5440542/ http://www.wired.com/news/privacy/0,1848,64227,00.html - - - - - - - - - - Webcam Helps Nab Home Invasion Suspects Law enforcement officials in Volusia County said two teenage burglars were caught red-handed by a computer. Deltona resident Leonard Meeks had left his computer's webcam on Tuesday night, and it caught two teenagers breaking into his home, WESH NewsChannel 2 reported. http://www.wesh.com/news/3528024/detail.html http://www.courier-journal.com/localnews/2004/07/15ky/B3-webcam0715-3957.html *********************************************************** 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. Copyright 2000-2004, NewsBits.net, Campbell, CA.