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Malicious Spam Spikes To 'Epic' Level
Posted: August 17th, 2011, 7:52pm CEST by samzenpus
Tags: spam
Trailrunner7 writes "There has been a huge spike in spam volume in the last few days, including a massive amount of malicious spam with infected attachments, and researchers say that levels of junk mail are now far higher than they were before the takedown of the notorious Spamit affiliate program last fall. The huge spike comes at a time when spam should, in fact, be dropping because of the takedown of the Rustock botnet, the Spamit network and other botnets. 'From the beginning of August, we have observed a huge surge of malicious spam which far exceeds anything we have seen over the past two years, including prior to the SpamIt takedown last October. The majority of the malicious spam comes from the Cutwail botnet, although Festi and Asprox are among the other contributors,' M86 researcher Rodel Mendrez said." -
Hackers Get Their Own Scoreboard and Rankings
Posted: August 17th, 2011, 5:51pm CEST by samzenpus
Tags: security
wiredmikey writes "Sometimes hacking is about money; other times, it's about competition, and when that happens, it is also about getting a little credit. Enter RankMyHack.com. The site is described as the world's 'first elite hacker ranking system,' and invites people to submit proof of their Website hacks in exchange for points — the higher the points, the higher the place on the leader board. In order to get ranked, hackers need to prove they have indeed hacked a site – by inserting a predetermined text into the hacked site page. Rankmyhack then scans for the text in the page and gives score based on how popular the website is, with lower points awarded for XSS attacks. Assuming the site is real – and early reports indicate that it is – hackers can now see where their hacks stack up against those of their peers. Will this morph into a playground for hacktivists to hone their skills?"Read more of this story at Slashdot.
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How To Steal ATM PINs With a Thermal Camera
Posted: August 17th, 2011, 5:24pm CEST by CmdrTaco
Tags: security
An anonymous reader writes "Researchers from UCSD have demonstrated how thermal imagery cameras can be used to steal customers' PINs (PDF) when you withdraw cash from ATMs. Their paper, entitled 'Heat of the Moment: Characterizing the Efficacy of Thermal Camera-Based Attacks', (PDF) discovered that plastic PIN pads were the best for retaining heat signatures showing which numbers (and in which order) were used by bank customers. Fortunately the methodology does not appear to have been used by criminals yet, but a third of people surveyed admit that they do not check ATMs for tampering before withdrawing cash."Read more of this story at Slashdot.
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GPGPU Bitcoin Mining Trojan
Posted: August 17th, 2011, 3:00pm CEST by CmdrTaco
Tags: bitcoin
An anonymous reader writes "Security researchers have unearthed a piece of malware that mints a digital currency known as Bitcoins by harnessing the immense power of an infected machine's graphical processing units. According to new research from antivirus provider Symantec, Trojan.Badminer uses GPUs to generate virtual coins through a practice known as minting. That's the term for solving difficult cryptographic proof-of-work problems and being rewarded with 50 Bitcoins for each per correct block."Read more of this story at Slashdot.
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Collar-Bomber Tracked By Gmail Accesses
Posted: August 17th, 2011, 2:15pm CEST by Soulskill
Tags: crime
RockDoctor writes "Reports indicate that a suspect has been arrested in the Australian 'collar bomb' hostage/extortion case. The allegation is that the suspect had set up a Gmail account, through which he (allegedly) planned to communicate with the extortion victims and arrange delivery of the payment. Unfortunately for him, records were kept showing the location and time the account was set up, and also for a number of accesses. This information, combined with 'CCTV footage and motor vehicle records,' allowed the police to put an identity to the suspect, and arrange for his arrest. So, if you're planning an extortion scheme, don't drive your car to the internet cafe, don't set up the account from an airport, wear anonymous clothes (like Jason Bourne does?) and do all your accesses through hacked shell accounts somewhere in Outer Mongolia. But, this being Slashdot, everyone knew that already."Read more of this story at Slashdot.
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Fired Techie Created Virtual Chaos At Pharma Co.
Posted: August 17th, 2011, 11:19am CEST by Soulskill
Tags: security
itwbennett writes "Using a secret vSphere console, Jason Cornish, formerly an IT staffer at the U.S. subsidiary of drug-maker Shionogi, wiped out most of the company's computer infrastructure earlier this year. Cornish, 37, pleaded guilty Tuesday to computer intrusion charges in connection with the attack."Read more of this story at Slashdot.
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Amazon Launches 'AWS GovCloud'
Posted: August 17th, 2011, 3:06am CEST by Soulskill
Tags: cloud
wiredmikey writes "Amazon Web Services today announced 'AWS GovCloud,' a new AWS Region designed to allow U.S. government agencies and contractors to move IT applications and systems into the cloud by addressing their specific regulatory and compliance requirements. Previously, government agencies with data subject to Compliance regulations such as the International Trade and Arms Regulation (ITAR), which governs how organizations manage and store defense-related data, were unable to process and store data in the cloud that the federal government mandated be accessible only by U.S. persons. AWS said that it will screen customers prior to providing access to the AWS GovCloud, helping to ensure customers are 'U.S. Persons,' not subject to export restrictions."Read more of this story at Slashdot.