'Flame' Virus Impersonates Microsoft Update

It’s a scenario security researchers have long worried about, a man-in-the-middle attack that allows someone to impersonate Microsoft Update to deliver malware -- disguised as legitimate Microsoft code -- to unsuspecting users. And that’s exactly what turns out to have occurred with the recent Flame cyberespionage tool that has been infecting machines primarily in the Middle East and is believed to have been crafted by a nation-state.

  • Read the article: Wired

Facebook Creating Technology to Allow Children's Accounts

Facebook Inc. is developing technology that would allow children younger than 13 years old to use the social-networking site under parental supervision, a step that could help the company tap a new pool of users for revenue but also inflame privacy concerns. Mechanisms being tested include connecting children's accounts to their parents' and controls that would allow parents to decide whom their kids can "friend" and what applications they can use, people who have spoken with Facebook executives about the technology said.

Antivirus Leader Calls Cyberweapons 'Dangerous Innovation'

When Eugene Kaspersky, the founder of Europe’s largest antivirus company, discovered the Flame virus that is afflicting computers in Iran and the Middle East, he recognized it as a technologically sophisticated virus that only a government could create. He also recognized that the virus, which he compares to the Stuxnet virus built by programmers employed by the United States and Israel, adds weight to his warnings of the grave dangers posed by governments that manufacture and release viruses on the Internet.

Google to Alert Chinese Users About Censorship

Google has quietly upped the ante in a long-running dispute with the Chinese authorities over censorship, adding a software twist to its search page that warns users when they type a search term whose results are likely to be blocked in China. The change, announced without publicity on one of Google’s corporate blogs, is described as an improvement in the search experience for users in mainland China, who can be disconnected from Google without explanation when they try to open a Web page that was found using a censored search term.

Canadian Court Rules for RIM in BBM Trademark Case

Research In Motion Ltd. won a federal court ruling in Canada allowing it to keep the BBM trademark for its popular messenger service, the company said, a rare bit of good news for the BlackBerry maker. Canadian television and radio research firm BBM Canada had filed a trademark infringement suit against RIM, arguing that it had been using the BBM name for 60 years and RIM's use of the acronym confused the public.

Obama Expands Use of Cyberweapons Against Iran

From his first months in office, President Obama secretly ordered increasingly sophisticated attacks on the computer systems that run Iran’s main nuclear enrichment facilities, significantly expanding America’s first sustained use of cyberweapons, according to participants in the program. Mr. Obama decided to accelerate the attacks — begun in the Bush administration and code-named Olympic Games — even after an element of the program accidentally became public in the summer of 2010 because of a programming error that allowed it to escape Iran’s Natanz plant and sent it around the world on the Internet.

Google Targets Microsoft, Nokia in EU Patent Complaint

Google Inc. accused Microsoft Corp. and Nokia of conspiring to use their patents against smartphone industry rivals, and said it has filed a formal complaint with the European Commission. In its complaint, Google claimed Microsoft and Nokia, which cooperate on smartphone technology and production, transferred 1,200 patents for assertion to a group called MOSAID, which the company called a "patent troll" -- a term referring to a holder of patents that litigates them aggressively.

U.S. Lawmakers Oppose Effort for UN Internet Control

Lawmakers said they are united when it comes to keeping the Internet free from centralized control and preventing the United Nations from gaining power over Web content and infrastructure. The U.S. government wants to bring as much ammunition as possible to a December meeting in Dubai where delegations from 193 countries will discuss whether to hand governance of the Internet over to the United Nations.

FTC Chairman Urges Simpler Privacy Policies

Federal Trade Commission Chairman Jon Leibowitz, speaking at the D10 conference, called on technology companies to implement three things to protect consumer privacy. Acknowledging that tech vendors are doing better today at building privacy into apps, what he called, "privacy by design," he said that most companies actually want to design with consumer protection in mind.

Publishers File Response E-Book Price-Fixing Suit

The government’s complaint “piles innuendo on top of innuendo.” It is based “entirely on the little circumstantial evidence it was able to locate.” And it “sides with a monopolist.” These arguments were part of a response by two publishers, Penguin Group USA and Macmillan, to a Justice Department lawsuit filed in April that accused five major publishing houses of conspiring with Apple to fix the price of e-books.

Researchers Looking Into Source of 'Flame' Virus

Security experts have only begun examining the thousands of lines of code that make up Flame, an extensive, data-mining computer virus that has been designed to steal information from computers across the Middle East, but already digital clues point to its creators and capabilities. Researchers at Kaspersky Lab, which first reported the virus, believe Flame was written by a different group of programmers from those who had created other malware directed at computers in the Middle East, particularly those in Iran.

Korea Fair Trade Commission Raids Google's Offices

The Korea Fair Trade Commission raided Google’s offices in Seoul, people familiar with the matter say. This is the second time the agency has busted in on Google’s South Korean headquarters, and appears to be a response to the search behemoth’s resistance to the KFTC’s Android-related antitrust investigation. Sources say the agency believes Google impeded its probe by deleting documents and asking employees to telecommute while it was occurring.