Security

Facebook has elaborated on the changes it wants to make to its Data Use Policy and Statement of Rights and Responsibilities. This new explanation is in response to the user feedback it has received thus far on a proposal it made late last month. The crux of its proposed change is to scrap its user ...

American and British intelligence agencies on Tuesday were warned by the NDB, Switzerland's federal intelligence service, that some shared information related to counterterrorism had been stolen. Last summer, an NDB IT technician reportedly downloaded terabytes of data that had been shared between t...

The Tumblr microblogging, social networking and online sharing site was hit on Monday by a group that harasses blogs and practices Internet trolling -- the posting of provocative or off-topic messages online. The hackers created an offensive posting that propagated itself relentlessly on Tumblr's ne...

SPOTLIGHT ON SECURITY

Bill Closing Email Privacy Loophole Clears Committee

A bill to protect email privacy cleared a key U.S. Senate committee last week, buoying the spirits of privacy advocates. The proposed law would close a loophole in the 1986 Electronic Communications Privacy Act, which allows the government to peep on email more than 180 days old without a warrant. "...

Those who want to post reviews on Google Play will be required to use a Google+ account, the parent company of both announced on Tuesday. The new rules will be implemented with the latest version of Google Play, which the company is now introducing for Android devices. They have already been impleme...

Mozilla has made its Web browser more social -- and more secure -- with the release of Firefox 17. The latest version of the foundation's popular browser includes a plug-in that displays notifications and instant messages from Facebook in a sidebar. The plug-in is the first implementation of the Soc...

TECH TREK

Israel Bombarded by Millions of Hack Attempts

More than 44 million hacking attempts have been made on Israel's government websites since last week, when it unleashed 20 air strikes and killed Hamas' top military commander, the Israeli government announced Sunday. Israel's finance minister, Yuval Steinitz, said only one hack was successful, alth...

SPOTLIGHT ON SECURITY

Skype Takes Heat for Security - Both Too Little and Too Much

Microsoft had to temporarily disable Skype's password reset feature last week after a Russian hacker revealed a simple way to lock users out of their accounts. All an attacker needed to know was an email address associated with an account in order to hijack it. That address could be used to create a...

Well, that was fast. About 24 hours after Sen. Harry Reid, D-Nev., said he would move to bring the once-failed Cybersecurity Act of 2012 to the Senate floor for a vote, its opponents shot it down again. Reid's procedural motion to move the bill forward was rejected 51-47 on Wednesday. The bill, intr...

Skype on Wednesday fixed a vulnerability that allowed users' accounts to be hijacked using the password reset process. The vulnerability was published two months ago on the Russian site Xeksec. Skype has fixed the problem by updating the password reset process. To exploit the vulnerability, all a ha...

Surveillance of Internet users by governments around the world is on the rise, Google concludes in its latest Transparency Report, which details government requests it receives for information about its users. The United States tops the list of countries making requests for user data. "This is the s...

eBay is taking another stab at the Chinese market. The retailer's new Chinese site, which is a joint venture with luxury retailed xiu.com, is described as low-key but stylish, and focuses on mid-range to high-end products such as clothing, handbags and accessories. Banana Republic, Clinique and Gues...

John McAfee, founder of the eponymous antivirus software company, is wanted in Belize in connection with the murder of American Gregory Faull. The San Pedro police department is said to be actively searching for McAfee, who has gone missing. This episode is focusing a very public spotlight on the do...

EXPERT ADVICE

Disaster Planning on an SMB Shoestring

For folks on the East Coast of the United States, the past few weeks have been pretty intense. Between hurricane Sandy and the associated fallout -- flooding, lack of public transportation, power outages, dark cell towers -- many firms in impacted areas have experienced firsthand the value of their ...

SPOTLIGHT ON SECURITY

Stuxnet Spotted Stateside in Chevron Computers

Chevron was infected with the Stuxnet malware in 2010, the company revealed last week, raising concerns about the effectiveness of cyberweapons as a policy tool. Because of Stuxnet's design, it didn't do any damage to Chevron's computers, but the fact that a cyberweapon created to attack Iran's nucl...

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