NewsBits for September 8, 2005 ************************************************************ Court Overturns Child Porn Conviction The increasingly common law enforcement tactic of having adult officers pose as children in Internet chat rooms to arrest potential sex offenders came under legal attack yesterday when Maryland's highest court ruled that the law does not allow the prosecution of people who merely believed they were dealing with children. http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2005/09/07/AR2005090702067.html - - - - - - - - - - Suspected child abuser nabbed in London cybercafe Police arrested a suspected child abuser in a central London cyber cafe on Wednesday. The unnamed 54 year-old man is suspected of inciting the rape of a youngster, inciting the distribution of child abuse images and of facilitating a child for the purpose of sex. The operation at an online cybercafe on the Strand was led by officers from Scotland Yard's paedophile unit. Police said the arrest showed that even those who avoided using their own computers to orchestrate child abuse can still be detected and arrested. http://www.theregister.co.uk/2005/09/08/child_abuse_cybercafe_arrest/ - - - - - - - - - - Hackers Admit to Wave of Attacks An Ohio computer hacker who served as a digital button man for a shady internet hosting company faces prison time after admitting he carried out one of a series of crippling denial-of-service attacks ordered by a wealthy businessman against his competitors. In a deal with prosecutors, Richard "Krashed" Roby, 20, pleaded guilty in federal court in Toledo last month to intentionally damaging a protected computer, after launching a 2003 attack on an online satellite TV retailer that caused at least $120,000 in losses. http://www.wired.com/news/privacy/0,1848,68800,00.html http://www.it-observer.com/news.php?id=5465 - - - - - - - - - - Ex-Student Sentenced in UT Computer Hacking Case A former University of Texas at Austin student has been sentenced to five years of probation and ordered to pay more than $170,000 in restitution for hacking into the school's computer system and taking Social Security numbers and other personal information from tens of thousands of people. http://www.woai.com/news/cyberstuff/story.aspx?content_id=E6CD0693-ED79-418F-B90D-0A8B149B5B35 - - - - - - - - - - Ireland celebrates first anti-spam conviction Ireland's Data Protection Commissioner, Billy Hawkes, has secured his first conviction for a breach of the country's anti-spam law. A similar law exists in the UK but the UK Commissioner, Richard Thomas, has taken no such action to date. Ireland is also considering stiffer penalties for spammers. http://www.channelregister.co.uk/2005/09/07/irish_spam_conviction/ - - - - - - - - - - Former state trooper jailed for child porn The Benton County law enforcement community was "shocked" and "devastated" by Wednesdays arrest of one of its own, according to Sheriff Keith Ferguson. Joseph T. Hutchens, a retired state trooper and current bailiff for Circuit Judge David Clinger, was arrested for possessing child pornography on his county-owned computer. "He was a close friend of mine," Ferguson said about Hutchens arrest. "Its one of the hardest things Ive done since becoming sheriff. I have no mercy for anyone who has anything to do with the molestation of children." http://nwanews.com/story.php?paper=bcdrSSion;=News&storyid=24983 - - - - - - - - - - Dutch ISPs sue government for wiretapping costs A large group of ISPs and telecom operators in the Netherlands is to sue the Dutch Government for the cost of installing wiretaps. Wiretapping is required by the Dutch Telecommunication Act of 1998. The Dutch Government insists that it is normal for ISPs and telecom operators to pay the costs for general law enforcement. http://www.theregister.co.uk/2005/09/06/dutch_wiretapping/ - - - - - - - - - - EU backs plans for .kid TLD The European Parliament is backing proposals to introduce a new .kid top level domain (TLD) just for children to "protect them from inappropriate content on the internet". The new TLD - similar to .com or .org - would be restricted to sites especially tailored for youngsters with content regularly vetted and approved by an independent body. http://www.theregister.co.uk/2005/09/08/eu_kids/ - - - - - - - - - - Parental software to detect Dutch illegal file sharing Dutch anti piracy organisation BREIN is to release free parental software on 22 September, that will detect file sharing programs such as Kazaa or illegal media files on PCs. The software will not be able to remove those files - parents have to do this manually if they wish. http://www.theregister.co.uk/2005/09/08/parental_software_file_sharing/ - - - - - - - - - - Mother's Web warning after suicide The mother of a teenage girl who hanged herself after looking at suicide Web sites has warned of the dangers they pose. Carina Stephenson, 17, was found hanged in woods near her home in the village of Branton, near Doncaster in northern England, on May 21 this year. Before her death she spent four months filming a reality TV show in the Australian outback with her family. The program, called "The Colony," is scheduled to be shown on The History Channel from Sunday. http://www.cnn.com/2005/WORLD/europe/09/08/britain.suicide/index.html - - - - - - - - - - Yahoo Accused of Aiding China in Arrest Reporters Without Borders says the Internet portal firm handed over data to authorities that led them to a cyber dissident. A media watchdog group has accused American Internet giant Yahoo of helping the Chinese government track down a journalist, who later was sentenced to 10 years in prison on charges of e-mailing state secrets. Reporters Without Borders said Internet portal Yahoo provided information that enabled the Chinese government to link sensitive materials found on the Internet to he personal computer of reporter Shi Tao. (LA Times article, free registration required) http://www.latimes.com/technology/la-fg-chiyahoo8sep08,1,6877981.story - - - - - - - - - - E-banking security provokes fear or indifference A recent study by analyst Forrester Research has unearthed conflicting views about the safety or otherwise of online banking. The survey of 11,300 UK net users found that while many online banking consumers are complacent about security, a large minority have given up online banking as a direct result of security fears. http://www.channelregister.co.uk/2005/09/07/forrester_ebanking_survey/ - - - - - - - - - - Cisco Gear Hackable, Vendor Admits Cisco on Wednesday confirmed that routers and other devices running the newest versions of its IOS (Internetwork Operating System) are vulnerable to serious attack. The San Jose, Calif.-based network hardware maker published a security advisory and recommended that users either upgrade to alternate editions or install fixed versions of IOS. http://informationweek.com/story/showArticle.jhtml?articleID=170701271 http://www.vnunet.com/vnunet/news/2142042/unpatched-bugs-ms-outlook http://www.theregister.co.uk/2005/09/08/cisco_authentication_bug/ http://www.techworld.com/security/news/index.cfm?RSS&NewsID=4360 http://software.silicon.com/security/0,39024655,39152044,00.htm - - - - - - - - - - Symantec Plugs DoS Flaws in Brightmail Internet security software vendor Symantec Corp. has shipped a patch for a pair of security flaws affecting users of its enterprise-facing Brightmail AntiSpam product. According to a security advisory from Symantec, the vulnerabilities can be exploited by malicious hackers to launch denial-of-service attacks. http://www.eweek.com/article2/0,1759,1856717,00.asp - - - - - - - - - - PayPal Freezes Out Katrina Aid On the morning of Sept. 3, Rich Kyanka set up a PayPal account to raise money for Hurricane Katrina victims, with the intention of donating the money to the American Red Cross. Kyanka runs the popular Something Awful web community, which is hosted in New Orleans, and donations came in quickly. Within nine hours, Something Awful readers had donated $27,695.41. Kyanka donated an additional $3,000 from his own pocket. http://www.wired.com/news/hurricane/0,2904,68788,00.html After the Storm, the Swindlers http://www.nytimes.com/2005/09/08/technology/08fraud.ready.html - - - - - - - - - - Continuous Data Protection a Better Backup Option Blogs and discussion forums have been abuzz about continuous data protection solutions designed to meet the needs of SMBs. They have continuous protection of data. They can restore not only the current version of a file, but also the version captured in its latest snapshot, whenever they want. Management is simpler. http://www.it-observer.com/news.php?id=5466 Pushing out security settings configured in the Registry http://www.computerworld.com/securitytopics/security/story/0,10801,104458,00.html - - - - - - - - - - Online Scams Hold Back Personalized Search Personalized search is considered the next frontier for search technologies. By collecting data about the user, including most visited Web sites and past queries, an online service could deliver better results. http://www.newsfactor.com/story.xhtml?story_id=02000000GCE8 - - - - - - - - - - Clarke: Europe must trade civil liberties for security British Home Secretary Charles Clarke has warned that European citizens will have to accept that civil liberties may have to be bartered away in exchange for protection from terrorists and organised criminals. http://www.theregister.co.uk/2005/09/07/lib_security_trade/ - - - - - - - - - - Task force: IT systems' design should incorporate privacy safeguards New IT tools such as data mining ought to be used for homeland security only if their intrusiveness on privacy and infringement of due process rights can be adequately addressed in advance, according to a new report from a task force sponsored by the New America Foundation, a Washington-based think tank. http://www.gcn.com/vol1_no1/daily-updates/36896-1.html - - - - - - - - - - Smut-free GTA: San Andreas coming next week Games publisher Take-Two Interactive will next week re-release Grand Theft Auto: San Andreas having culled the controversial game of its naughty bits. GTA:SA hit the headlines in July after it emerged that the game contains x-rated content, although it takes a special 'Hot Coffee' modification code to open the software's virtual kimono. In normal circumstances, the nudie shower scenes and digital rumpy-pumpy are never shown, merely hinted at with some suggestive sound effects. http://www.theregister.co.uk/2005/09/08/return_of_gta-san_andreas/ - - - - - - - - - - Playing the phishing blame game Comment In 2004, I came across an empirical study published by the CERT/CC that indicated a diminishing correlation between the number of vendor-issued vulnerabilities and the number of reported security incidents. In the years prior to 2002, the number of reported security breaches had always been proportional to the number of vendor-published vulnerabilities. http://www.theregister.co.uk/2005/09/08/phishing_blame_game/ - - - - - - - - - - Tesco packs teen's mobile with porn UK supermarket chain Tesco has apologised to a 14-year-old boy after returning his repaired mobile phone packed with hard-core porn, UK tabloid the Sun reports. Callum George's new Sagem clapped out after just two weeks, prompting the lad to return it for repair. It duly found its way back to him in the post, complete with letter "explaining a faulty circuit had been replaced", as Callum's mum Cathy put it to the paper. A shocked Cathy continues: "But there were voicemail messages and numbers that Callum did not recognise. Then he found the pictures and video clips." http://www.theregister.co.uk/2005/09/08/tesco_mobile_phone/ - - - - - - - - - - Police use software to predict recidivism Handwriting analysis picks up likely reoffenders The National Offender Management Service, part of the Probation Service, is to use new technology that analyses writing styles to predict whether someone is likely to reoffend. http://www.vnunet.com/vnunet/news/2142051/probation-service-writing - - - - - - - - - - Colorado law enforcement agencies sharing data Seven law enforcement agencies in the northwest Denver metropolitan area will exchange data through the new Jefferson County Law Enforcement Sharing System, which uses a commercial analysis tool that is popular among other jurisdictions. In the projects first phase, the Jefferson County Sheriffs Office and the cities of Arvada, Lakewood' and Westminster will integrate data from their records management systems. Developers will expand that capability to the cities of Broomfield, Golden and Wheat Ridge during the second phase. http://www.fcw.com/article90690-09-08-05-Web *********************************************************** 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.