Category Archives: Internet Security
Internet Storm Center – SANS Internet Storm Center
I recently had a client get an interesting phishing message. They had received a fake message from their CEO to their Controller - a "start the conversation" email to end up with a wire transfer. This sort of email is not common, but is frequent enough in Sr Management circles, especially if you are in the middle of merger or acquisition discussions with another company.
Some technical warning signs in that note were:
So the discussion quickly moved from "I'm glad our execs came to us, we really dodged a bullet there" to "just how did this get in the door past our spam filter anyway?"
This is where things got interesting. Their SPAM filter does use the SPF (Sender Policy Framework) DNS TXT record, and a quick check on the SPF indicated that things looked in order there. However, after a second look, the problem jumped right out. A properly formed SPF will end with a "-", which essentially means "mail senders in this SPF record are valid for this domain, and no others". However, their SPF had a typo - their record ended in a "~" instead. What the tilde character means to this spam filter is "the mail senders in this SPF record are valid for this domain, but YOLO, so is any other mail sender".
From the RFC (RFC7208), the ~ means "softfail", "A "softfail" result is a weak statement by the publishing ADMD that the host is probably not authorized". More detail appears later in the RFC: "A "softfail" result ought to be treated as somewhere between "fail" and "neutral"/"none". The ADMD believes the host is not authorized but is not willing to make a strong policy statement. Receiving software SHOULD NOT reject the message based solely on this result, but MAY subject the message to closer scrutiny than normal." This same reasoning applies to the ~all and -all directives in the SPF (which I see more often).
You'd think that a lot has changed since 2006 (the date of the original SPF spec, RFC4408), that in 2017 a spam filter should fail on that result, but apparently not (sad panda). Kinda makes you wonder what the actual use case is for that tilde character in the definition - I can't think of a good reason to list permitted mail senders, then allow any and every other server too.
That being said, their filter *should* still have caught the mismatch between the "from" and "reply-to" fields, especially since it involved an external source and internal domains. Or at least paired that up with the domain mismatch to weight this email towards a SPAM decision. But that's another rant altogether.
Long story short - this type of attack was pretty popular (and widely reported) about a year ago, but successful methods never (never ever) go away. A little bit of research can make for a really well-formed phish, right down to using the right people in the conversation, good grammar, and phrasing appropriate to the people involved. So a bit of homework can get an attacker a really nice payday, especially if their campaign targets a few hundred companies at a time (and they put more work into their email than the example above)
So in this case, a typo in a DNS record could have cost millions of dollars. Good security training for the end users and vigilant people made all the difference - a phone call to confirm is a "must-do" step before doing something irrevocable like a wire transfer.
=============== Rob VandenBrink Compugen
Xavier pointed me towards a new issue posted on Palo Alto's Unit 42 blog - the folks at PA found apps in the Google Play store infected with hidden-iframe type malware. 132 apps (so far) are affected, with the most popular one seeing roughly 10,000 downloads. But we're not at the end of the trail of breadcrumbs yet .. these apps were traced back to just 7 developers, who aren't in the same company, but all have a connection to Indonesia (the smoking gun here was the code signing certificate). But wait, we're *still* not at the punchline.
Two more facts to throw into the pot - the malware that the app downloads is a windows executable, so this is unintentional - the developers in question would know that a windows PE won't run on their android platform. The malicious apps also point to sinkholed domains, so they are doubley ineffective. The theory so far is that these 7 developers have all downloaded an infected IDE (Integrated Development Environment) or APK packager, which then infects all of their subsequent android apps.
If this sounds like last year's XCodeGhost issue to you (where Apple devs pulled unsanctioned, infected code libraries), you are not alone. Because of their position in the food chain, developers especially need to be careful about what they download, and what ingredients go into making their apps. This means libraries, compilers, IDEs - everything that goes into the pot to make the soup that becomes their app. One infected tool or library can easily affect thousands or millions of end users. Luckily today's issue ends up being a bit of a non-issue - - the malware simply is not effective on the platform it's being delivered to. However, if it had been written a bit more cleverly, or been more targetted, it could have become a decent android worm, or the android app could have become a "carrier" for a plague on windows or OSX hosts. Hopefully it's a wake-up call for folks to build their apps using libraries and code directly from the source - a free download generally means that you've just become the product (or the vector to get to the end product).
Kudos to Xiao Zhang, Wenjun Hu and Shawn Jin from Palo Alto Networks for their excellent sleuthing and write-up. They in turn acknowledge Zhi Xu and Claud Xiao from Palo Alto Networks as well as the Google Security team for their help in piecing this together. Full details here: http://researchcenter.paloaltonetworks.com/2017/03/unit42-google-play-apps-infected-malicious-iframes/
=============== Rob VandenBrink Compugen
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BullGuard | Internet Security and Antivirus protection …
About BullGuard
Consumers deserve more when it comes to security. At BullGuard, we make it simple to protect everything in your digital lifefrom your data, to your identity, to your Smart Home. As the only security company whose sole focus is on the consumer, BullGuard combines technical expertise with a genuine understanding of your needs to deliver complete protection across all your connected devices. Consumers deserve more when it comes to security. At BullGuard, we make it simple to protect everything in your digital lifefrom your data, to your identity, to your Smart Home. As the only security company whose sole focus is on the consumer, BullGuard combines technical expertise with a genuine understanding of your needs to deliver complete protection across all your connected devices. Were your own private bodyguardtracking and tackling security threats so you can connect confidently, control easily, and travel freely throughout your digital world.
As part of our ongoing promise to be champion of todays digital consumer, weve added Dojo by BullGuard to our multi-award winning product portfolio. Its the best custom-built solution to protect Wi-Fi enabled devices in the home. Dojo gives customers the freedom to add as many Smart Home devices as they want without compromising privacy or security. Dojo by BullGuard is the cornerstone of a Smart Home, ensuring a connected world where every consumer, in every home, is smart, safe and protected.
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Google cracks longtime pillar of internet security – MarketWatch
A cryptographic technology long central to internet security has been dealt a knockout blow by researchers at Google and a Dutch research institute.
In a paper to be published Thursday, the researchers demonstrate an attack on an algorithm called SHA-1, which has been widely used over the past 20 years to verify the authenticity of digital documents.
SHA-1 has worked behind the scenes to guarantee that the websites people visit are, in fact, are what they claim to be. It is what is known as a hash function--a technique for turning any digital document into a unique 40-digit sequence of letters and numbers. That digital fingerprint serves as a quick way of authenticating digital certificates, passwords, even office documents.
Called a collision attack, the researchers technique is something cryptographers have contemplated since 2005, when researchers in China reported the first significant flaws in SHA-1. Until now, it was only a theoretical attack, said Marc Stevens, a researcher with the Centrum Wiskunde & Informatica in Amsterdam, which collaborated with Alphabet Inc.s Google unit GOOGL, -0.56% on the effort. We actually did it.
An expanded version of this report appears at WSJ.com.
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Google cracks longtime pillar of internet security - MarketWatch
What you need to know about ‘Cloudbleed,’ the latest internet security bug – Globalnews.ca
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It's time to change your passwords one again, thanks to a potentially massive data leak.
Its once again time to change your passwords. A bug found in internet infrastructure company Cloudflares software has been leaking personal data including private chat logs and passwords from hundreds of thousands of websites for months.
Cloudflare, which offers hosting and security services to websites, hosts six million sites, including services like Uber, FitBit, OKCupid and password management program 1Password.
READ MORE: Average cost of data breach in Canada is $6.03M, study finds
According to Google researchers who discovered the bug, now known as Cloudbleed, the vulnerability had been sending chunks of data to users browsers when they visited a webpage hosted by the company. The bug may have been active since September 2016, but researchers say it was definitelyfrom February 13 until it was discovered on February 18.
Of the leaked data, researchers said they found private messages from dating sites, full messages from chat services, online password data, frames from adult video sites and hotel booking details.
READ MORE: Canadian Tire admits 5 days after breach customer info may have been accessed
WATCH ABOVE: One of Canadas largest in-store and online retailers has acknowledged it suffered a security breach forcing it to prevent customers from checking their points and credit card accounts. Sean OShea reports.
While the leak has the potential to be very dangerous for web users, the company said there is no evidence the data was accessed by hackers.
Weve seen absolutely no evidence that this has been exploited, Cloudflare Chief Technology Officer John Graham-Cumming told Reuters. Its very unlikely that someone has got this information.
Researchers said about 120,000 webpages were leaking information every day.Graham-Cumming noted the company has been working with Google to remove any sensitive data that may have been indexed by search engines.
The website doesitusecloudflare.com has already been set up, allowing users to search through services they have signed up for to see if they might be affected.
Unfortunately, its unclear just how many web users may have been affected by the Cloudflare bug. While the company has downplayed the severity of the leaked data and fixed the vulnerability itself, security experts warn there could still be fallout for those who use websites run by Cloudflare.
READ MORE: Ransomware on the rise in Canada How to protect your data
While Cloudflares service was rapidly patched to eliminate this bug, data was leaking constantly before this point for months. Some of this data was cached publicly in search engines such as Google, and is being removed, wrote security expert Ryan Lackey in a blog post.
Other data might exist in other caches and services throughout the Internet, and obviously it is impossible to coordinate deletion across all of these locations. There is always the potential someone malicious discovered this vulnerability independently.
Dating site OKCupid said its initial investigation revealed minimal, if any exposure from the bug. 1Password also said none of its data was found to be at risk.
Lackey and others recommend users change their passwords right away, just in case any leaked data fell into the wrong hands.
Cloudflare is behind many of the largest consumer web services (Uber, Fitbit, OKCupid, ), so rather than trying to identify which services are on Cloudflare, the most cautious is use this as an opportunity to rotate ALL passwords on all of your sites, he said.
Security breaches like this one are a good opportunity to be more proactive about the type of passwords you use. For example, stay away from easy-to-guess passwords like 123456 or password as well as easy to guess identifiers, like your dogs name.
Experts say passwords that include a mix of letters, numbers and symbols are more secure but numbers included in a password should never be something easy to guess based on the user. That means your age, the current year, or your address are not good choices. Similarly, the longer the password the better.
Passwords that use up to 10 uppercase and lowercase letters mixed with numbers are proven to be more secure despite being hard to remember.
READ MORE: How to protect yourself from security breaches on social media sites
One tip is to construct a password from a sentence, mix in a few uppercase letters and a number for example, There is no place like home, would become tiNOplh62.
And remember, try not to use the same password for any two accounts.
If the website or service you are using offers two-stepauthentication, experts agree its in your best interest to turn it on.
Two-factor or two-step authentication requires the user to set up their account so that a text message containing a secondary login code is sent to their phone every time they log in to their account. That means a hacker would have to have both your password and your cellphone in order to get access to your accounts.
With files fromReuters
2017Global News, a division of Corus Entertainment Inc.
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What you need to know about 'Cloudbleed,' the latest internet security bug - Globalnews.ca
Data from internet-connected teddy bears held ransom, security expert says – Fox News
Data from internet-connected smart teddy bears has been leaked and ransomed, exposing childrens voice messages and more than half a million customer accounts, according a security expert.
In a blog post, cybersecurity expert Troy Hunt says that an unnamed source contacted him about a data breach affecting the CloudPets range of stuffed animals. The Bluetooth-connected toys let parents upload and download messages to and from their children via an app.
The CloudPets database had allegedly been left exposed online.
MY FRIEND CAYLA: DOLL BANNED IN GERMANY NOT 'ESPIONAGE DEVICE,' COMPANY SAYS
Someone sent me data from the table holding the user accounts, about 583k records in total, wrote Hunt, in his blog post. There are references to almost 2.2 million voice recordings of parents and their children.
Hunt added that the information was sent to him by someone who travels in data breach trading circles, and said that others had also accessed the information. The CloudPets data was accessed many times by unauthorised parties before being deleted and then on multiple occasions, held for ransom, he wrote.
According to data received by Hunt, the 583,000 records were part of the larger database, which contained more than 820,000 users.
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Technology news website Motherboard also reports that it was contacted about the breach independently by two security researchers in the last few weeks. With the help of the researchers, Motherboard was able to verify the legitimacy of the breach, it said.
Spiral Toys, the company behind CloudPets, has denied that customers were hacked. In a statement emailed to Fox News.com the Los Angeles-based firm said that it was notified of a potential breach on Feb. 22. "When we were informed of the potential security breach we carried out an internal investigation and immediately invalidated allcurrent customer passwords to ensure that no information could be accessed," it said. "Toour best knowledge, we cannot detect any breach on our message and image data,as all data leaked was password encrypted."
Spiral Toys is also requiring users to choose new increased security passwords. "An email will be sent outinforming customers of the potential compromised login data and will give thema link to create a new password," it said.
BEWARE GOOGLE CHROME SCAM THAT COULD INJECT MALWARE INTO YOUR COMPUTER
The company added that its CloudPet services havebeen running safely since March 2015. "We are taking all steps necessary tocontinue to run safely on our production servers," it said. "We are committed toprotecting our customer information and their privacy in order to ensureagainst any such incidents in the future."
Spiral Toys said that once customers' needs have been addressed and it has documented the incident, itwill file the cyber-crimereport with the State Attorney General in California.
Other internet-connected toys have also been grabbing headlines. The My Friend Cayla doll, for example, was recently banned by The Federal Network Agency in Germany amid hacking fears, although the dolls German distributor insists it is safe to use. Hello Barbie has also been in the security spotlight in recent years, while electronic toy maker Vtech has been targeted by hackers.
HOW AI AND TECH COULD STRENGTHEN AMERICA'S BORDER WALL
Steven Malone, director of security productmanagement at security companyMimecast told Fox News that users need to think carefully about the security implications of the Internet of Things, where a wide range of devices are connected to the web. "Just because you can connect a device to the Internet, it doesnt mean you should!" he wrote.
Follow James Rogers on Twitter @jamesjrogers
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Data from internet-connected teddy bears held ransom, security expert says - Fox News
Emsisoft Internet Security 2017.2.0.7219 – TechCentral.ie
If youre going to pay for security, its a good idea to pay for a complete package. Previously Emsisoft offered a bundle of its Anti-Malware and Online Armor packages, but has ditched that in favour of this: one integrated suite containing the functionality and protection of both.
It shares the Emsisoft Anti-Malware user interface, and then adds in the core firewall protection from Online Armor. Your money buys you the protection of not just one, but two anti-malware engines (BitDefender alongside Emsisofts own) and offers three layers of protection in the form of a real-time file scanner, zero-day blocker based on suspicious behaviour and a web blocker that prevents you from visiting known unsafe websites.
Emsisoft also comes with an optional PUP module that will alert you whenever potentially unwanted programs like browser toolbars and bundleware try to get on your system.
When it comes to the firewall, while Emsisoft Internet Security includes the same robust engine that powers Online Armor, it utilises a simpler, friendlier UI thats intelligent enough to keep the number of alerts it throws at you to a minimum while keeping you informed as programs attempt to access the internet for the first time after installation.
All of this is wrapped up in a slimline, Windows 10-inspired user interface thats as slick and lightweight as the program itself. Installation is straightforward: enter your license or activate the trial, download the latest updates, choose whether or not to enable PUP protection and then choose your initial scan.
Once set up, click the programs Notification area icon to access the configuration screen. This is split into six sections Overview is self-explanatory, as is Scan, Quarantine (go here to view what files have been blocked and unblock them), Logs and Settings. The Protection tab is the most useful this is where you fine-tune your various protection settings, but for most people these can be left alone.
Delving deep into the program is definitely something for more advanced users, but the fact is that Emsisoft Internet Security will provide protection for any user, whatever their level of technical know-how.
For v2017.2release info (see the changelogfor more):
New: Scanner settings screen which acts as a template for on demand and (new) scheduled scans. Improved: PUP detection in installers. Improved: Program start-up performance. Improved: Integration with Windows Security Center. Improved: Minor improvements related to permissions. Improved: Faster loading of the Behavior Blocker screen. Improved: Minor GUI improvements. Fixed: Issue where missed scheduled scans were not executed.
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Everything You Need to Know About Cloudbleed, the Latest Internet Security Disaster – Gizmodo
Image: Cloudflare / Gizmodo
Have you heard? A tiny bug in Cloudflares code has led an unknown quantity of dataincluding passwords, personal information, messages, cookies, and moreto leak all over the internet. If you havent heard of the so-called Cloudbleed vulnerability, keep reading. This is a scary big deal.
Lets start with the good news. Cloudflare, one of the worlds largest internet security companies, acted fast when security researcher Tavis Ormandy of Googles Project Zero identified the vulnerability.
The bad news is that the Cloudflare-backed websites had been leaking data for months before Ormandy noticed the bug. Cloudflare says the earliest data leak dates back to September 2016. Its so far unclear if blackhat hackers had already found the vulnerability and exploited it secretly before Cloudflare fixed its code. Cloudflares clients include huge companies like Uber, OKCupid, 1Password (Update: 1Password claims its user data is safe), and FitBit. That means a holy fuck ton of sensitive data has potentially been compromised.
As with any major security vulnerability, it will take some time before we can fully comprehend the level of destruction caused by Cloudbleed. For now, you should change your passwordsall of themand implement two-factor authentication everywhere you can. Youll figure out why this is a good idea when you read about how this nasty little security disaster unfolded.
You might not be familiar with Cloudflare itself, but the companys technology is running on a lot of your favorite websites. Cloudflare describes itself as a web performance and security company. Originally an app for tracking down the source of spam, the company now offers a whole menu of products to websites, including performance-based services like content delivery services; reliability-focused offerings like domain name server (DNS) services; and security services like protection against direct denial of service (DDoS) attacks.
The fact that Cloudflare is a security company makes the dustup around this new vulnerability supremely ironic. After all, countless companies pay Cloudflare to help keep their user data safe. The Cloudbleed blunder did the opposite of that.
Ive informed Cloudflare what Im working on. Im finding private messages from major dating sites, full messages from a well-known chat service, online password manager data, frames from adult video sites, hotel bookings, Tavis Ormandy wrote in an advisory. Were talking full https requests, client IP addresses, full responses, cookies, passwords, keys, data, everything. Ormandy also said that the Cloudbleed vulnerability leaked data across 3,438 unique domains during a five-day period in February.
For you geeks out there, Cloudbleed is especially interesting because a single character in Cloudflares code lead to the vulnerability. It appears to be a simple coding error, though weve reached out to Cloudflare for information on what exactly happened. (Update: Cloudflare called us back and explained some things.) Based on whats been reported, it appears that Cloudbleed works a bit like Heartbleed in how it leaks information during certain processes. The scale of Cloudbleed also looks like it could impacts as many users as Heartbleed, as it affects a common security service used by many websites.
According to a Cloudflare blog post, the issue stems from the companys decision to use a new HTML parser called cf-html. An HTML parser is an application that scans code to pull out relevant information like start tags and end tags. This makes it easier to modify that code.
Cloudflare ran into trouble when formatting the source code of cf-html and its old parser Ragel to work with its own software. An error in the code created something called a buffer overrun vulnerability. (The error involved a == in the code where there should have been a >=.) This means that when the software was writing data to a buffer, a limited amount of space for temporary data, it would fill up the buffer and then keep writing code somewhere else. (If youre dying for a more technical explanation, Cloudflare laid it all out in a blog post.)
In plain English, Cloudflares software tried to save user data in the right place. That place got full. So Cloudflares software ended up storing that data elsewhere, like on a completely different website. Again, the data included everything from API keys to private messages. The data was also cached by Google and other sites, which means that Cloudflare now has to hunt it all down before hackers find it.
Its unclear who exactly has been pwned. Cloudlfare claims that only a very small number of requests led to leaked data, but since the vulnerability has been almost six months, who knows how much information is out in the wild. Furthermore, the fact that so much of that data was cached across different sites means that, while Cloudflares initial patch stopped the leaking, the company needs to do lots of hunting around the web to ensure that all of the leaked data gets scrubbed. And even worse, even sites that dont use Cloudflares servicebut have a lot of Cloudflare usersmight have compromised data on their servers.
Entrepreneur and security expert Ryan Lackey offered some good advice in a blog post. And Lackey knows what hes talking about, since his company CryptoSeal was acquired by Cloudflare in 2014.
Cloudflare is behind many of the largest consumer web services (Uber, Fitbit, OKCupid, ), so rather than trying to identify which services are on Cloudflare, its probably most prudent to use this as an opportunity to rotate ALL passwords on all of your sites, Lackey wrote. Users should also log out and log in to their mobile applications after this update. While youre at it, if its possible to use 2FA or 2SV with sites you consider important.
Changing your passwords sucks, but you should be doing it on a semi-regular basis anyways. As weve argued in the past, you might as well enable two-factor authentication on everything, too, since its your best first defense against hackers. That said, nothing is ever truly secure on the internet, and Cloudbleed might compromise some accounts using. two-factor authentication.
This is all to say: you cant control what happens under the hood of websites and companies like Cloudflare that power them. But you can watch your own assand pray to the hacker gods to keep you safe. Whatever works.
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Everything You Need to Know About Cloudbleed, the Latest Internet Security Disaster - Gizmodo
New internet security device launched to safeguard schools against child abuse – Phys.Org
February 20, 2017 by Andrew Merrington Credit: University of Plymouth
Computer experts at the University of Plymouth have created a new device that provides round-the-clock monitoring against online child abuse and radicalisation for primary and secondary schools.
ICAlert plugs straight into a school's network, checks all web traffic, and immediately generates an alert if there is any attempted access of illegal material, such as child abuse images, terrorist material or extremism websites.
The University is now working with South West Grid for Learning (SWGfL) and the Internet Watch Foundation (IWF) to offer the safeguarding service for schools across the region, and SWGfL has seconded specialist police officers with extensive experience at handling child pornography offences to be the points-of-contact.
The technology has been developed by academics within the School of Computing, Electronics and Mathematics. Bogdan Ghita, Associate Professor of Computer Networks, co-led the project with Paul Dowland, until recently Associate Professor of Information Systems Security, now of Edith Cowan University, Perth, Australia.
Bogdan said:
"The challenge was to encapsulate the service offered by SWGfL in a self-contained, reliable and affordable box that required minimal set up and no input thereafter. The resulting solution brings together hardware that connects seamlessly into a school's network infrastructure, with efficient software that delivers the required analysis. ICAlert offers long-term, effective monitoring of a school's network and is flexible enough to deal with increasing internet traffic or number of users."
The low-cost devices are supported by the Counter Terrorism Internet Referral Unit (CTIRU) and manufactured by Cornwall firm Selectronics Limited. Once plugged into a school's network, the device is ready to use and requires no additional management by the school. The tool receives periodic updates that include the latest list of banned web content links, as published by the Internet Watch Foundation, in an encrypted format. It is against this list that ICAlert compares internet traffic at the school.
The team say it provides an alternative solution to 'filtering', where access to banned sites is simply denied and the attempt to perpetrate an offence goes unnoticed.
South West Grid for Learning (SWGfL), and the Internet Watch Foundation (IWF) under a Home Office regulated project, have been piloting this alerting capability (for illegal content) with its connected schools since 2006.
David Wright, Chief Executive at SWGFL, said:
"Over this period there have been a number of alerts that have led to successful prosecutions and the removal of potential threats to children and wider school communities. This is something that SWGfL is particularly proud of, and ICAlert now extends this alerting capability to any school firstly in the region and potentially nationally thereafter."
Explore further: New research lifts the lid on 'sexting' attitudes and practices amongst teenagers
A new study conducted by Plymouth University and UK Safer Internet Centre supported by the NSPCC, reveals new concerns and trends in 'sexting' amongst teenagers.
Major US Internet firms have joined an effort to curb the spread of images of sex abuse of children, organizers said Monday.
Billions of fitness trackers, medical implants, surveillance cameras, home appliances, thermostats, baby monitors and computers in automobiles now are connected as part of a rapidly expanding "internet of things."
As an increasing number of devicesfrom cars to light bulbs to kitchen appliancesconnect with computer networks, experts are raising concerns about privacy and security. Just this fall, attackers used compromised home ...
Oracle on Monday announced it is buying Dyn, a Web traffic management firm recently hit with a cyber attack that closed off the internet to millions of users.
The increasing availability of mobile phones and tablets to school children is forcing schools to reconsider their approach to web filtering as students abandon controlled campus networks for public wireless.
Chinese telecoms giant ZTE unveiled Sunday what it said is the world's first smartphone compatible with the lightening-fast 5G mobile internet service that networks expect to have up and running by 2020.
Jeff Regan was born with underdeveloped optic nerves and had spent most of his life in a blur. Then four years ago, he donned an unwieldy headset made by a Toronto company called eSight.
The race to develop self-driving vehicles took a new turn on Thursday when Google's parent company Alphabet filed a lawsuit against Uber, accusing it of stealing technology.
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Car shopping isn't just about kicking the tires anymore. It's also about testing the technology.
Today, researchers at the Dutch research institute CWI and Google jointly announce that they have broken the SHA-1 internet security standard in practice. This industry standard is used for digital signatures and file integrity ...
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New internet security device launched to safeguard schools against child abuse - Phys.Org
Letter: Internet security is in jeopardy – INFORUM
Our government's contract with ICANN expired, and on Oct. 1, ICANN assumed direct control over critical internet infrastructure. Typical of GOP liberal leadership, congressional leaders Sen. Mitch McConnell, R-Ky., and Rep. Paul Ryan, R-Wis., adjourned Congress without challenging Obama's plan to surrender control.
With confidence in the establishment media at an all-time low, alternative media's use of the internet is America's new popular channel of communication. Moreover, because many government services, telecommunications, emergency services (and military concerns) are critically tied to the internet, the passing of control to an international consortium raises concerns about national security, privacy, stability, and censorship. ICANN's Board of Directors includes members from 111 countries, many of which, aside from not being America's friends, are notorious for policing and censoring their citizens for expressing politically incorrect and religious ideas.
A number of Congressmen have expressed concern about an internet run as in China and Russia, and Attorneys General of four states unsuccessfully filed a lawsuit to block the turnover.
In September, 77 national security, cybersecurity, and industry leaders wrote to Obama's Defense Secretary and the Joint Chiefs Chairman calling on top military officials to oppose relinquishing American Internet guardianship to foreign corporations and countries.
Do we want this "Government Advisory Committee," including members from Bulgaria, Venezuela, Cuba, China and Russia, to oversee and control our internet?
This transfer is unconstitutional and unacceptable. Congress is responsible for the problem and must take action to correct it.
Call Sens. John Hoeven and Heidi Heitkamp and Rep. Kevin Cramer to oppose this move.
Stahl lives in Valley City, N.D.
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Google researchers have cracked a key internet security tool – Recode
Google researchers have cracked a key internet security tool, and hope their finding will spur an end to widespread use of the encryption method.
The team announced Thursday that they had succeeded in breaking SHA-1, or Secure Hash Algorithm 1, encryption in a use case involving a pair of PDF documents.
What this means is that a method of internet security that has for years been known to be theoretically vulnerable has now been proven vulnerable. And what that means is theres now a fire under the butts of entities still using the algorithm to finally update their systems to use something else.
Per its vulnerability disclosure policy, Google plans to release the code they used to break the SHA-1 encryption 90 days from now, at which point attackers will basically have an instruction manual for breaking the algorithm. Anyone still using it will be significantly more vulnerable.
Moving forward, its more urgent than ever for security practitioners to migrate to safer cryptographic hashes, reads a company blog post about the finding.
SHA-1 may be used to encrypt things like electronic documents (including legal documents), payment transactions, emails and email attachments.
The algorithm is extremely widely used. We cant quantify it, but SHA-1 is extremely widely used, said Google researcher Elie Bursztein, based in Mountain View, explaining that SHA-1 has been used for many years so a lot of people have legacy systems that incorporate it.
The research was spearheaded by Marc Stevens, on staff at Netherlands computer science research institute Centrum Wiskunde & Informatica. Stevens said his SHA-1 research, funded by the Dutch government, began in 2009.
Google started working with Stevens in 2015, according to Bursztein. He said the company contributed resources pro bono, including infrastructure for computing, engineering time and expertise.
SHA-1s usage stems back to as early as 1995, when the internet was just becoming mainstream with consumers, according to Stevens. But the cyber security community didnt know it was weak, really weak, until 2005, so there was no clear incentive to use something even stronger.
Ars Technica, which reported on the finding earlier today, cited popular software development management system Git as a major entity that uses the algorithm.
Any software company that has been around long enough, including Google, will have used SHA-1, according to Bursztein. He said Googles system for critical security does not rely on the vulnerable algorithm.
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Google researchers have cracked a key internet security tool - Recode