NewsBits for March 1, 2005 ************************************************************ Man in Piracy Case Found Dead Russell Sprague was in jail awaiting sentencing for copying movies. An autopsy is set for today. A man awaiting sentencing in Los Angeles in the biggest federal Internet movie piracy case to date was found dead in his jail cell Monday morning, the U. S. Marshals Service said. Russell William Sprague, 52, may have died of a heart attack, authorities said. An autopsy was scheduled for today. (LA Times article, free registration required) http://www.latimes.com/technology/la-fi-sprague1mar01,1,1187795.story - - - - - - - - - - Man charged with passing on chip details A Taiwanese citizen living in California took chip design information from his company and e-mailed it to a potential rival in Taiwan, U.S. authorities charged Monday. The U.S. Attorney for Northern California alleged that Shin-Guo Tsai, 35, took data sheets from Volterra Semiconductor and sent them over the Internet to a potential competitor on Dec. 25, 2004. http://news.zdnet.com/2100-9584_22-5594098.html http://www.mercurynews.com/mld/mercurynews/news/local/11020083.htm - - - - - - - - - - Piracy Suits Target College Network Users The recording industry has filed lawsuits against 753 more people as part of its ongoing legal fight against individuals who swap music over the Internet. The suits include complaints against people at USC and 10 other universities suspected of using the colleges' computer networks to send music over the Internet. (LA Times article, free registration required) http://www.latimes.com/technology/la-fi-rup1.5mar01,1,395436.story - - - - - - - - - - New Bagle damages security software A new variant of the Bagle worm is circulating, antivirus companies say. The variant, BagleDl-L, is a Trojan horse that damages security applications and attempts to connect with a number of Web sites. According to antivirus companies F-Secure and Sophos, these Web sites currently contain no malicious code, but both companies believe this could soon change. http://news.zdnet.com/2100-1009_22-5594201.html Latest Bagle causes concern http://news.zdnet.co.uk/internet/security/0,39020375,39189583,00.htm Fourth Bagle variant spotted today http://www.vnunet.com/news/1161598 Three more Bagle variants on the loose http://www.vnunet.com/news/1161586 Bagle variants served up with spam http://www.theregister.co.uk/2005/03/01/bagle_trojan/ - - - - - - - - - - Zafi-D and Netsky top virus charts But Bagle and Sober will be the ones to watch The Zafi-D and Netsky viruses continue to top the latest malware charts compiled by security researchers. Antivirus software company Sophos said that Zafi-D, which first appeared at the end of 2004, has been the most regularly spotted malware, followed by Netsky P. http://www.vnunet.com/news/1161599 - - - - - - - - - - 'Perfect storm' for new privacy laws? A series of security break-ins is kick-starting a political drive to reshape federal laws that dictate how companies protect personal information --and what they have to do if that data leaks out. What began with the leak of tens of thousands of records from data broker ChoicePoint earlier this month was quickly compounded by a series of rapid- fire incidents involving Bank of America, Science Applications International Corp., an online payroll services company and the T-Mobile Sidekick of hotel heiress Paris Hilton. http://news.zdnet.com/2100-1009_22-5593225.html Paris Hilton hack highlights security failure http://www.vnunet.com/news/1161595 - - - - - - - - - - Costa Rica May Criminalize VoIP The growing surge in international VoIP calls has caused the state-owned telecommunications monopoly in Costa Rica to propose legislation that could criminalize the use of Internet telephone calls. The Instituto Costarricense de Electricidad (ICE) said that it views VoIP as a value-added telecom service and, as such, it should be regulated. At its most Draconian, the proposal would make Internet telephoning a crime. http://www.techweb.com/wire/networking/60403862 - - - - - - - - - - Online click fraud a growing problem Like thousands of other merchants, Tammy Harrison thought she had struck gold when hordes visited her website by clicking on the small Internet ads she purchased from the world's most popular online search engines. It cost Harrison as much as $20 for each click, but the potential business seemed to justify the expense. http://www.miami.com/mld/miamiherald/business/11017080.htm - - - - - - - - - - Send-Safe spam tool gang evicted by MCI US telco MCI Worldcom has caved in to mounting pressure and booted a site that sells spamming software off its network. Send-safe.com, which sells a package that uses broadband-connected PCs infected by viruses such as SoBig to distribute junk mail, has been left searching for a permanent home after 18 months with MCI. http://www.theregister.co.uk/2005/03/01/send-safe_evicted/ - - - - - - - - - - Fighting child porn online In time of intensive global computerization humanity faced plenty of challenges, which have quickly turned into real threats to economic and social well-being. Cybercrime and cyberterrorism can be included in list of threats. A phenomenon of cybercrime is so young as it is not well studied. Being a crime which has transnational nature, cybercrime requires special approaches. http://www.crime-research.org/articles/Saytarly01/ - - - - - - - - - - Porn plummets as spammers clean up Pornographic spam email dropped by a huge 92.5 per cent during February, while unsolicited emails offering dating services surged by 171 per cent, newly published research has claimed. Email management firm Email Systems said that the surge in dating spam last month was accompanied by a steep increase in unsolicited email offering financial services, which jumped by 107 per cent. http://www.vnunet.com/news/1161583 - - - - - - - - - - Insecure indexing risk dissected It's embarrassing when future PR items, upcoming security advisories or boilerplates for obituaries that are not meant to be visible to external users drift into the public domain. These documents might get accidentally uploaded to the wrong part of a website but mischievous attacks can also play a role. http://www.theregister.co.uk/2005/03/01/insecure_indexing/ - - - - - - - - - - Volcanic island wants to host your data SecurStore is trying to tempt companies to store their data in Reykjavik. But won't Iceland's volcanoes be a problem? An offshore data backup company is urging UK and US companies to store their data in Iceland -- a country renowned for its volcanoes. SecurStore, which hosts the Icelandic arm of Vodafone (Og Vodafone), is attempting to attract customers to what it calls a storage "safe-haven" for firms. http://news.zdnet.co.uk/internet/security/0,39020375,39189589,00.htm - - - - - - - - - - DHS, Justice work on XML Homeland Security and Justice department officials have a new partnership to enhance development of an Extensible Markup Language model that could save federal, state, local and tribal agencies billions of dollars as they improve their computer systems to share information with one another. http://www.fcw.com/fcw/articles/2005/0228/web-dhsdoj-03-01-05.asp http://www.gcn.com/vol1_no1/daily-updates/35176-1.html - - - - - - - - - - Internet sites caught up in gangs' wars of words Sal Rojas was working on his computer science degree when he created BrownPride.com to celebrate Latino culture. His site quickly evolved into a popular forum for urban expression, showcasing mural art, music and fashion. But it has also become the target of ``high-tech taggers'' and ``cyberbangers.'' http://www.mercurynews.com/mld/mercurynews/news/local/states/california/the_valley/11020008.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 2000-2005, NewsBits.net, Campbell, CA.