Trend Micro is warning about a phishing attempt that targets users of Microsoft Outlook, prompting recipients to reconfigure their Outlook by clicking on a link that leads to a Web site that asks for an account name and password, as well as mail server information.
Scammers Luring Victims Through Twitter, Google Searches
Online scammers are targeting people looking for popular topics on Twitter and Google to lure them to Web sites that display fake security warnings and try to sell them antivirus products, PandaLabs said. This technique isn't new, but seems to be widening on Google and is particularly successful on Twitter where links are spread fast and furiously and people often don't think before they click.
China Blocks Twitter Before Tiananmen Anniversary
Access to the popular social networking service Twitter and e-mail service Hotmail was blocked across mainland China, two days before the 20th anniversary of the bloody Tiananmen Square crackdown. While anniversary commemorations are illegal in China, crowds gather every year for a vigil in Hong Kong, a former British colony that enjoys greater freedom.
Privacy Expectations, Reality Differ Online, Study Says
When asked about online privacy, most people say they want more information about how they are being tracked and more control over how their personal information is used. Those consumer expectations are rarely in line with the data collection practices of Internet companies, which often collect information about their users not only on their own sites, but also when those users visit other sites across the Web, according to a new privacy study conducted by a group of graduate students at the University of California, Berkeley.
Hackers Increasingly See Facebook as Easy Target
Facebook is the new playground for phishers. Why? The social networking site has made things relatively easy for computer criminals.
Psion Drops "Netbook" Tradedmarks to Settle Dispute
Psion and Intel have settled their legal battle over the use of the word "Netbook." Since early 2008, chipmaker Intel has been using the term to refer to small, cheap, low-powered sub-notebooks, and its Atom chipset has become by far the most popular engine for such machines.
Obama Administration Struggling with Internet, Paper Says
In a paper on the early use of Web 2.0 techniques by the Obama administration, a lawyer for the new media team of the Obama transition leading up to Inauguration Day says using social networking sites and other tools technology to bring citizens into government is more difficult that it sounded on the campaign trail.
Wikipedia Bans Scientology Users from Contributing
Wikipedia has banned contributions from the Church of Scientology to end a long-running dispute over the editing of Scientology-related articles on the site. The online encyclopedia, which is edited by users, has ruled that all IP addresses owned and operated by the Church of Scientology and its associates are to be blocked as if they were open proxies.
Cybersecurity a Serious Challenge, Obama Says
Calling protection of government and private computer and communications networks "one of the most serious... security challenges we face," President Obama said he would appoint a White House advisor to oversee a national effort to improve cyber-security throughout the U.S. The president noted that millions of Americans already had been victimized by computer tampering and that his own campaign computers had been breached by hackers between August and October.
Military Contractors Seek Cyberwarfare Work
The government’s urgent push into cyberwarfare has set off a rush among the biggest military companies for billions of dollars in new defense contracts. The exotic nature of the work, coupled with the deep recession, is enabling the companies to attract top young talent that once would have gone to Silicon Valley.
Hacking Group Breaks Into Two U.S. Army Servers
A known computer hacking clan with anti-American leanings has successfully broken into at least two sensitive Web servers maintained by the U.S. Army, InformationWeek has learned exclusively. Department of Defense and other investigators are currently probing the breaches, which have not been publicly disclosed.
EU Pursuing New Sanctions Against Microsoft
Frustrated with past efforts to change Microsoft Corp.'s behavior, European Union regulators are pursuing a new round of sanctions against the software giant that go well beyond fines. The regulatory push is focused on a longstanding complaint against Microsoft: that it improperly bundles its Web browser with its Windows software.
U.K. Puts Price Tag on Illegal File-Sharing
Around seven million people in the UK are involved in illegal downloads, costing the economy tens of billions of pounds, government advisers say. Researchers found 1.3m people using one file-sharing network on one weekday and estimated that over a year they had free access to material worth £12bn.
Pentagon Set to Create New Internet Military Command
The Pentagon plans to create a new military command for cyberspace, administration officials said, stepping up preparations by the armed forces to conduct both offensive and defensive computer warfare. The military command would complement a civilian effort to be announced by President Obama that would overhaul the way the United States safeguards its computer networks.
Gumblar Attack Spreading Malware, Security Firm Says
The Web site compromise attack known as Gumblar has added new domain names that are downloading malware onto unsuspecting computers, stealing FTP credentials to compromise more sites, and tampering with Web traffic, a security firm said.
European Union to Examine Google's Book Settlement
The European Union's executive body will study plans by Google to make millions of books available online after Germany said the Internet company's project flouts EU copyright law. The bloc's industry ministers agreed to ask the European Commission to look at how Google's settlement with authors in the United States affect writers' rights in the EU.
Man Gets 8 1/2 Years for Running Phishing Scam
A Romanian immigrant has been sentenced to 8 1/2 years in prison for running a lucrative computerized "phishing" scheme that collected financial records and personal identification from thousands of individuals, including nearly 100 from Minnesota. Sergiu D. Popa, 23, of Shelby Township, Mich., was sentenced in federal court in Minneapolis for a plot that cost his 7,000 or so victims about $700,000, by his own admission.
Bank Robber Confesses on MySpace, Pleads Guilty
A man who confessed to robbing a South Carolina bank in a message posted on MySpace has pleaded guilty. Federal prosecutors said that 27-year-old Joseph Northington of Roanoke, Va., will be sentenced later for using a firearm during a crime of violence.
FCC Chairman Releases Report on Rural Broadband Strategy
Acting FCC Chairman Michael Copps released a report on broadband strategy for rural America as part of the 2008 Farm Bill. In that bill Congress asked the Federal Communications Commission to work with the U.S. Department of Agriculture to submit "a report describing a comprehensive rural broadband strategy."
EU Pushing Music Industry to Change Online Licenses
EU antitrust regulators told the music industry to move quickly and change licenses that currently restrict online music stores such as iTunes from offering the same songs for sale across Europe. Internet music downloads in Europe lag behind those in the United States, pulling in just a fraction of revenues the record industry is losing from falling CD sales.
