NewsBits for August 12, 2005 ************************************************************ Man faces additional charges in ChoicePoint fraud scheme A Nigerian man who pleaded no contest earlier this year for his role in a fraud ring that stole data from ChoicePoint Inc. has pleaded not guilty to six new charges, authorities said. Olatunji Oluwatosin, 42, was charged last week in Superior Court and has pleaded not guilty to additional counts of identity theft, conspiracy and grand theft. If convicted of all the charges, he could face up to 18 years in prison. http://www.signonsandiego.com/news/state/20050812-0441-ca-choicepoint-identitytheft.html - - - - - - - - - - WebTV hacker sentenced to six months in jail The sentence that was given on Monday by the U.S. District Judge Ronald Whyte, includes also a $27,100 fine to be paid to Microsoft and six month home detention. http://www.gameshout.com/news/032005/article610.htm - - - - - - - - - - PS200,000 card fraud gang jailed for four years Four men have been convicted in Cardiff crown court of running an ATM fraud gang thought to have stolen up to PS200,000 earlier this year. The four men from eastern Europe were sentenced to four years jail time after being found in possession of a variety of equipment, including cameras and computers, which was used to steal bank card account and PIN numbers. http://software.silicon.com/security/0,39024655,39151323,00.htm - - - - - - - - - - B.Y.U. hacking charge filed A federal prosecutor has charged a Brigham Young University student with fraud for tampering with four campus computers to secretly log the private keystrokes of 600 students who used the machines. Esteban N. Rodriguez, 25, "intentionally accessed a computer without authorization and exceeded authorized access, and thereby obtained information from a protected computer," according to documents filed Tuesday in U.S. District Court. http://deseretnews.com/dn/view/0,1249,600154978,00.html - - - - - - - - - - Warrant issued for martial arts instructor on child porn charges A martial arts school instructor in Springdale is accused of taking photos of a 13-year-old girl and storing them in his computer, as well as trying to sexually assault an 11-year-old girl at the martial arts school, according to an arrest affidavit on a warrant filed Thursday by the Washington County Prosecutors Office. http://nwanews.com/story.php?paper=nwatSSion;=News&storyid=31085 - - - - - - - - - - Glitch on Verizon Wireless Web Site Left Data at Risk Verizon Wireless said yesterday that computer programming flaws in its online billing system could have allowed customers to view account information belonging to other customers, possibly exposing limited personal information about millions of people. http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2005/08/11/AR2005081102122.html - - - - - - - - - - Cabir mobile worm gives track fans the run around Phone-mad Finns are coping with a minor outbreak of the Cabir mobile virus at the Athletic's World Championship in Helsinki this week. Cabir, which infects smartphones running Symbian Series 60 using Bluetooth short-range radio communication technology to spread, is flourishing in the packed stadium area. The version of Cabir spreading drains the power of the infected phones as it tries to propagate but is otherwise relatively harmless. http://www.securityfocus.com/news/11279 http://www.vnunet.com/vnunet/news/2141087/finns-face-cabir-mobile-virus - - - - - - - - - - Exploits Circulate for Windows 2000 Worm Hole That's the blunt warning from Microsoft Corp.'s security response center after "detailed exploit code" for a wormable flaw started circulating on underground security Web sites. http://www.eweek.com/article2/0,1759,1847756,00.asp Microsoft exploit code hits the web http://www.vnunet.com/vnunet/news/2141090/microsoft-exploit-code-hits-web - - - - - - - - - - Intercepted E-Mail Indictment Revived A federal appeals court Thursday revived the government's online eavesdropping prosecution against an executive of a company that offered e-mail service and surreptitiously tracked its subscribers' messages. The case, closely watched by Internet privacy groups, had been dismissed in 2003 by a judge who found it was acceptable for the company _ an online literary clearinghouse _ to make copies of the e-mails so it could peruse messages sent to its subscribers by rival Amazon.com Inc. http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2005/08/11/AR2005081101334.html - - - - - - - - - - Md. Court: Downloading Child Porn Does Not Violate Law A court ruling in Maryland is helping define a state law that deals with computers and child pornography. The law makes it a crime to "use a computer to depict or describe a minor engaging in an obscene act." The court of appeals ruled this week that merely downloading child pornography from the Internet does not violate that law. http://www.clickondetroit.com/technology/4839832/detail.html - - - - - - - - - - NY enacts security breaches disclosure law New York has enacted an information security breaches law which will oblige firms and local government agencies to notify customers in the state if their personal information is taken or its systems are hacked into. http://www.securityfocus.com/news/11280 - - - - - - - - - - E-mail exposure: Is your company liable? Watch out! You may be responsible for gremlins in your corporate e-mail. Brace yourself: You could be legally responsible for worldwide network security. OK, that may be an overstatement, but it does capture the essence of what's ahead. Companies that pass viruses, worms or any type of malware to other companies via electronic transmissions such as e-mail could find themselves in court, say legal and security experts. And they could be held liable for damage done, even if they unintentionally spread such cyberpests. http://computerworld.com/governmenttopics/government/legalissues/story/0,10801,103696,00.html - - - - - - - - - - Traffic Hackers Hit Red Light If you've ever been stuck in traffic longing for a magic box that could turn all your red lights to green, beware: Acting on that fantasy became a federal crime this week. The Safe Intersections Act, part of the transit bill signed Wednesday by President Bush, makes it a misdemeanor for unauthorized users to wield a "traffic signal pre-emption transmitter," a special remote control used by police, firefighters and ambulance drivers to change traffic lights to green as they approach an intersection. http://www.wired.com/news/technology/0,1282,68507,00.html - - - - - - - - - - Harmless hackers or teen criminals? 'Arrest me, I know the password!' They're being called the Kutztown 13 -- a group of high schoolers charged with felonies for bypassing security with school-issued laptops, downloading forbidden Internet goodies and using monitoring software to spy on district administrators. http://www.cnn.com/2005/TECH/internet/08/09/kutztown.hackers.ap/index.html - - - - - - - - - - Computer Theft Case Shows Database Perils On the hunt for a hacker two years ago, security officials at data management company Acxiom Corp. discovered that an Internet address at one of its clients' contractors was taking far more data than it should have. The e-mail marketing contractor, Florida-based Snipermail.com, gathered contact information and sent bulk-email advertisements and sweepstakes offers on behalf of advertisers. But downloading 1.6 billion customer records _ the equivalent of 550 telephone books filled with names, e-mail and postal addresses _ wasn't part of the job. http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2005/08/12/AR2005081200051.html - - - - - - - - - - NIST, DHS add national vulnerability database to mix The National Institute of Standards and Technology and the Department of Homeland Security took the wraps off the National Vulnerability Database this week, but questions still remain whether the federal initiative improves upon existing databases or just adds another choice to the current collections of flaws. http://www.securityfocus.com/news/11278 - - - - - - - - - - Home PC face security onslaught If your house was burgled only 12 minutes after you moved in, you would probably think about selling up and moving on pretty quickly. While this may not happen to your home, it will happen to the PC you use to browse the web if you do not have anti-virus software or a firewall installed. http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/technology/4745053.stm - - - - - - - - - - Lessons to Learn from Cisco vs. Lynn Opinion: By suing the ISS researcher who disclosed their flaw, Cisco looks like a bully and draws extra attention to its vulnerability. Cisco, those folks that make professional-style routers so beloved by Internet types, beat up a fellow trying to share some research (done while he was employed by Internet Security Systems) at the recent Black Hat security conference in Las Vegas. http://www.eweek.com/article2/0,1759,1847745,00.asp - - - - - - - - - - TPMs Make E-Commerce Safer Opinion: Trusted Platform Modules will put e-commerce transactions on the user's side of the network. I got interesting responses to my recent column on Trusted Platform Modules, which I see as having a great future in resolving some of our security problems. TPMs, if you've never heard of them, are chips that store cryptographic information needed to unlock hard drives, authenticate network log-ons and perform similar tasks. http://www.eweek.com/article2/0,1759,1847769,00.asp Chip-Based Security Finds New IT Niches http://www.eweek.com/article2/0,1759,1847397,00.asp - - - - - - - - - - Police blotter: 'Special skills' hurt credit card thief "Police blotter" is a weekly report on the intersection of technology and the law. This episode: An Internet credit card thief is nabbed. What: Appeal by a Massachusetts man who had pleaded guilty to illegally possessing credit card numbers obtained from e-commerce sites. When: Decided July 22 by the First Circuit Court of Appeals. http://news.com.com/Police+blotter+Special+skills+hurt+credit+card+thief/2100-1030_3-5830060.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 2000-2005, NewsBits.net, Campbell, CA.