Showing posts with label cybersecurity. Show all posts
Showing posts with label cybersecurity. Show all posts

Saturday, December 24, 2016

This low-cost device may be the world’s best hope against account takeovers


The past five years have witnessed a seemingly unending series of high-profile account take-overs. A growing consensus has emerged among security practitioners: even long, randomly generated passwords aren't sufficient for locking down e-mail and other types of online assets. According to the consensus, these assets need to be augmented with a second factor of authentication.-arstechnica


Article recommending security key technology for second factor authentification.   Multifactor Authentication needs be enabled on important accounts to make it harder for hackers to gain access to an account. 

That said I believe means to link accounts, with encrypted long term backups, directly to one's person should be created, such that if one provides, say dna or several biometrics and multiple identifying documents one recovers the account no matter how it was compromised.

Thursday, December 15, 2016

Yahoo was hacked again news | cybersecurity | tech news

Yahoo admits it’s been hacked again, and 1 billion accounts were exposed

That's a billion with a b—and is separate from the breach "cleared" in September.-source link


Monday, October 24, 2016

new hacking attack for android phones 2016 october

Using Rowhammer bitflips to root Android phones is now a thing

Permission-less apps take only seconds to root phones from LG, Samsung and Motorola.-source arstechnica

"The breakthrough has the potential to make millions of Android phones vulnerable, at least until a security fix is available, to a new form of attack that seizes control of core parts of the operating system and neuters key security defenses...

 An app containing the researchers' rooting exploit requires no user permissions and doesn't rely on any vulnerability in Android to work. Instead, their attack exploits a hardware vulnerability, using a Rowhammer exploit that alters crucial bits of data in a way that completely roots name brand Android devices from LG, Motorola, Samsung, OnePlus, and possibly other manufacturers."-source arstechnica
 
New hacking technique makes many major brand android phones vulnerable for now.   Very dangerous stuff, and this is still human hacking.   If a collective of artificial general intelligence systems of similar to human level can be accelerated significantly, run faster than real time, it stands to reason that all digital systems will be compromised in short order.   Human developers won't be able to keep up with a machine that can thoroughly analyze code and generate exploits perhaps within minutes of any software release or update.   Virtual Full Access to all digital systems will allow for unprecedented superiority in cyberspace.
 
But of course that is but one of the applications of mastery of true intelligence, the power of the science of mind design, it can also accelerate all forms of progress.   Mathematical progress specially, as that does not tend to require complex physical simulations that may slow things a bit, though through mathematical and computer science progress simulation rate may be accelerated substantially through the discovery of theoretically optimal exact algorithms and theoretically optimal heuristic algorithms.




Sunday, October 2, 2016

Cybersecurity | Many apps compromised

More than 400 malicious apps infiltrate Google Play

“DressCode” apps turned phones into listening posts that could bypass firewalls.-source link

Thursday, September 29, 2016

Record-breaking DDoS reportedly delivered by >145k hacked cameras

Record-breaking DDoS reportedly delivered by >145k hacked cameras

Once unthinkable, 1 terabit attacks may soon be the new normal.-news source link

Thursday, September 8, 2016

Worrisome cyberscecurity article on compromising pc and mac logins


Stealing login credentials from a locked PC or Mac just got easier
20 seconds of physical access with a $50 device is all it takes.
 Snatching the login credentials of a locked computer just got easier and faster, thanks to a technique that requires only $50 worth of hardware and takes less than 30 seconds to carry out.
-source arstechnica

Worrisome article on the easy compromising of login credentials on mac and pc with relatively cheap device.

Thursday, September 1, 2016

Future of tor and Anonymity




Since Edward Snowden stepped into the limelight from a hotel room in Hong Kong three years ago, use of the Tor anonymity network has grown massively. Journalists and activists have embraced the anonymity the network provides as a way to evade the mass surveillance under which we all now live, while citizens in countries with restrictive Internet censorship, like Turkey or Saudi Arabia, have turned to Tor in order to circumvent national firewalls. Law enforcement has been less enthusiastic, worrying that online anonymity also enables criminal activity...
 For a dissident or journalist worried about a visit from the secret police, de-anonymisation could mean arrest, torture, or death.
 Without anonymity, democracy crumbles-source arstechnica
 
Anonymity is the basis of true freedom of speech, if technologies to facilitate it improve freedom can be protected from those who would seek to curtail it.  That is, freedom of expression can be guaranteed without the possibility of hostile reprisal.  And it is this the free exchange of ideas that guides the evolution of human culture towards a higher state of being.   The few corrupt and unfit leaders attempting to derail the process of man's ascent into a more perfect society, they are like malignant cancer cells, they're a threat towards human society and human well-being.


Monday, August 22, 2016

Face biometric securing with most sensors not safe, cybersecurity news

"Hackers Trick Facial-Recognition Logins With Photos From Facebook (What Else?)...
 Their attack, which successfully spoofed four of the five systems they tried, is a reminder of the downside to authenticating your identity with biometrics. By and large your bodily features remain constant, so if your biometric data is compromised or publicly available, it’s at risk of being recorded and exploited. Faces plastered across the web on social media are especially vulnerable—look no further than the wealth of facial biometric data literally called Facebook."-source wired

It seems simple single factor biometrics could be tricked in the case of faces, and as seen previously probably fingerprints too.  Multifactor authentication is a must.

Tuesday, July 26, 2016

Bad cybersecurity news

New attack that cripples HTTPS crypto works on Macs, Windows, and Linux

Hack can be carried out by operators of Wi-Fi hotspots, where HTTPs is needed most.-source arstechnica