NewsBits for December 3, 2004 ************************************************************ Lycos Europe halts anti-spam counterattacks The Web portal Lycos Europe on Friday terminated a spam-fighting campaign that had been criticized as a breach of Internet civility. The decision follows complaints from security experts that Lycos was acting as a vigilante and could potentially harm legitimate Web sites by distributing a screensaver program that aims to overwhelm what Lycos defines as spam servers. http://www.siliconvalley.com/mld/siliconvalley/news/editorial/10333807.htm http://www.theregister.co.uk/2004/12/03/lycos_antispam_site_offline/ http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/6647377/ http://www.cnn.com/2004/TECH/internet/12/02/anti.spamvigi.ap/index.html - - - - - - - - - - Microsoft Sues over 'Brown Wrapper' Spam Breaches Microsoft Corp. has filed class action lawsuits against vendors of sexually explicit commercial e-mail, the Seattle Post-Intelligence said Friday. In seven suits filed Thursday in Washington state, the software company alleged the purveyors violated federal restrictions on pornographic spam, or unsolicited e-mail messages. http://www.newsfactor.com/story.xhtml?story_title=Microsoft-Sues-over--Brown-Wrapper--Spam-Breaches&story_id=28850 http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/6643500/ - - - - - - - - - - Berkeley Hack Sparks Legislative Backlash The research community would lose its access to sensitive information from California's state- run programs under proposed legislation announced this week, a reaction to the penetration earlier this year of a university system housing personal data on over one million participants in a state program. http://www.securityfocus.com/news/10053 - - - - - - - - - - Indian Trust injunction removed Appeals court judges declared today that U.S. District Judge Royce Lamberth has the authority to order the Interior Department to go off-line, but they also said that he erred in doing so earlier this year. http://www.fcw.com/fcw/articles/2004/1129/web-interior-12-03-04.asp - - - - - - - - - - Former cybersecurity czar: Code-checking tools needed Software vendors need automated tools that look for bugs in their code, but it may be a decade before many of those tools are mature and widely used, said the former director of cybersecurity for the U.S. Department of Homeland Security. http://computerworld.com/securitytopics/security/story/0,10801,98041,00.html - - - - - - - - - - Phishing losses overestimated - survey Fraud losses from email phishing attacks will hit $137m globally in 2004, according to a study from research and consulting firm TowerGroup. The figure is much lower than previous estimates. For example, a September survey commissioned by TRUSTean, an online privacy non-profit organization and NACHA, an electronic payments association, put US phishing losses to date at $500m. http://www.vnunet.com/news/1159854 - - - - - - - - - - Anti-Spyware Market Set To Boom The market for anti-spyware software will boom in the next few years, from $12 million in 2003 to $305 million in 2008, according to estimates from IDC. The research firm says some 67 percent of PCs are infected with spyware, which can steal personal information and facilitate identity theft. http://www.newsfactor.com/story.xhtml?story_title=Anti-Spyware-Market-Set-To-Boom&story_id=28834 - - - - - - - - - - Wozniak's Wheels of Zeus Tackles Enterprise Data Encryption Wozniak offered a peek into his vision for the company on Ziff Davis Media's Security Virtual Tradeshow, where he introduced "wOz Location- Based Encryption," an application that uses GPS tracking within a wireless hub to encrypt and decrypt sensitive data for large businesses. http://www.eweek.com/article2/0,1759,1734857,00.asp - - - - - - - - - - Insecure credentials worry states, feds Fake IDs are becoming as prevalent as fake currency was back in 1865, when the Secret Service was established to fight counterfeiting, said Richard L. Outland, the agencys assistant chief of forensic services. Speaking today at the American Legislative Exchange Councils policy summit in Washington, Outland said about one-third of all currencies were counterfeit in the 19th century. http://www.gcn.com/vol1_no1/daily-updates/28029-1.html - - - - - - - - - - Need a job? Get a card - arresting ID pitch to business Analysis It might not be your Big Brother's Database, but the UK ID scheme has certainly mastered doublespeak. Take, for example, the way it will force businesses to joyfully embrace ID card checks - or else. http://www.theregister.co.uk/2004/12/03/business_immigrant_checks/ ID cards will hit business, watchdog warns http://www.theregister.co.uk/2004/12/03/idcards_bad_for_business/ Biometrics must balance privacy and security http://www.cnn.com/2004/TECH/science/12/02/biometrics.story/index.html - - - - - - - - - - Q&A: ISS exec on security threat prevention Security architectures that are designed solely to react to threats instead of preventing them in the first place are doomed to fail in a world of fast-evolving and self-propagating threats, says Tom Noonan, CEO of Atlanta-based Internet Security Systems Inc. http://computerworld.com/securitytopics/security/story/0,10801,98047,00.html Q&A: IBM security chief puts focus on compliance, cyberattacks http://computerworld.com/securitytopics/security/story/0,10801,98037,00.html - - - - - - - - - - Microsoft blog service sparks censorship dodging You can't register a blog with MSN Spaces if it contains rude words. Or can you? MSN Spaces, Microsoft's new blogging service, has sparked a new game -- trying to circumvent its censorship controls. Boing Boing, a popular blog, reported on Friday morning that MSN Spaces is rejecting certain blog titles or URLs because they contain words that Microsoft has deemed inappropriate. http://news.zdnet.co.uk/internet/0,39020369,39175985,00.htm *********************************************************** 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.