Security Breaking News

Black box for the enterprise protects data from terrorists, hurricanes
A new disaster-recovery vendor is taking the concept of an airplane black box and adapting it to the enterprise to create a new way of protecting crucial data from natural disasters and terrorist attacks. More..

World Bank denies report of massive data breaches
Count the World Bank Group among the high profile organizations suffering major data breaches - maybe. More..

Exploit code loose for six-month-old Windows bug
Microsoft Thursday acknowledged that exploit code is circulating for a vulnerability it acknowledged six months ago, but has yet to patch. More..

U.S. gov't proposes digital signing of DNS root zone file
The U.S. government is soliciting input on a way to make the Internet's addressing system less susceptible to tampering by hackers. More..

Antivirus superhero comes to the rescue
Japan's cheap and pervasive high-speed Internet connections are finally catching up with the country. More..

U.K. companies offered 'password amnesty'
Authentication specialist Cryptocard is offering U.K. businesses the chance to test the company's remote access login service free-of-charge until year-end. More..

Romanian pleads guilty to phishing-related charges
A Romanian man pleaded guilty earlier this week to charges related to possession of stolen credit card information obtained from fraudulent Web sites. More..

PCI app security: Who's guarding the data bank?
While Willy Sutton never really said it, the truth is that people rob banks because that is where the money is. Today's criminals don't walk into banks with loaded guns and get-away drivers. Rather they connect from a remote location using a browser and are armed with hacking tools and spyware. More..

Researchers reveal 'clickjacking' attack info
The security researchers who two weeks ago warned of new "clickjacking" vulnerabilities in browsers, Web sites and popular plug-ins, revealed a dozen variants of the bug Tuesday. More..

11 Microsoft security updates due next week
Next week will be a busy one for system administrators as Microsoft is planning to ship 11 security updates -- four of them rated critical -- for its products. More..

Microsoft to improve Vista's problematic UAC in Windows 7
Microsoft plans to improve the much-maligned user account control (UAC) feature in the next version of its Windows client OS, acknowledging that the new security feature it built into Windows Vista has caused unnecessary problems for users. More..

Centralizing enterprise security ops and management
Fulfilling the risk management and regulatory compliance obligations with consistency in today's vastly disparate and complex IT enterprise environments has challenged CIOs to rethink the approach to operating their security posture. More..

Apple posts Security Update 2008-007
Apple on Thursday posted Security Update 2008-007, a new security patch for client and server versions of Mac OS X 10.5 "Leopard" and Mac OS X 10.4.11. The update is available for download from the Software Update system preference or from Apple's Web site. More..

You need to encrypt your e-mail
On Oct. 1, a new Nevada law went into effect that requires organizations operating in the state to encrypt personal information sent outside of the organization. A similar, but more restrictive, law will go into effect on Jan. 1, 2009 in Massachusetts. What this means is that if you operate a business in either state, you will have to encrypt certain types of sensitive information if you send it past your corporate firewall or else face legal consequences. More..

How to react to a fire alarm
We've been conditioned by years of fire drills to assume that alarms are either tests or false alarms, and just mean a 20-minute work break. But if a fire alarm is to serve its function, we need to assume - or at least pretend - that it's the real thing. Most important, we need to assume that we will not be returning to work. More..

The difficulties VoIP presents to NAC
VoIP presents its own set of NAC problems that can be overcome, but need to be up front in the minds of people making NAC decisions. More..

Clickjackers could hijack Webcams, microphones, Adobe warns
Adobe Systems warned users Tuesday that hackers could use recently-reported "clickjacking" attack tactics to secretly turn on a computer's microphone and Web camera. More..

Firefox extension blocks dangerous Web attack
A popular free security tool for the Firefox browser has been upgraded to block one of the most dangerous and troubling security problems facing the Web today. More..

Symantec to buy e-mail security vendor MessageLabs
Symantec will pay $695 million for MessageLabs, a security vendor that offers a hosted spam and Web traffic filtering service. More..

U.S. man indicted for hacking Palin's e-mail account
A 20-year-old Tennessee man has been indicted for hacking into an e-mail account of U.S. vice presidential candidate Sarah Palin, according to court records. More..

Cambridge lab sets quantum key world record
The hugely promising security technology of Quantum Key Distribution (QKD) has moved an important step closer to commercialization with the announcement by U.K.-based researchers that they can now shift encryption keys around at speeds of 1Mbps. More..

Mac security focus: Privacy
At the very least, losing your wallet to a thief is a major pain in the neck: you lose your cash and (possibly) some precious mementos, and you have to cancel your credit cards and replace your driver's license. More seriously, the thief could steal your identity, using your personal information to make purchases, get loans, or cause you all kinds of grief by pretending to be you. More..

IBM, Secret Service among elite group to study identity/cyber crime issues
IBM, LexisNexis and the Secret Service are among a group of corporations, government agencies and academic institutions that has formed to study and help solve identity management challenges around cybercrime, terrorism and narcotics trafficking.  More..

Remote workers to IT: We do care about security
Fear not IT and infosecurity personnel: Most of your remote workers, mobile users and road warriors toting around laptops and BlackBerrys have the business's best interests in mind when it comes to network security. More..

Why security pros hate SharePoint, and what to do about it
Microsoft SharePoint has many fans these days, but Andre Koot isn't among them. More..