Hasta La Gadget!

Earlier this morning, we reported that the AntiSec hacker group claimed to have stolen personal information of Apple device owners from an FBI agent’s notebook – amounting to 12 million or so Device IDs, while allegedly leaking out a million of those as proof. It is now the FBI’s turn to refute such allegations, where FBI officials claim that the bureau never requested for and has never been in possession of the database that was hacked. I guess it is a matter of words now, and an issue of public perception. Who do you think is the better poker player here, and whose bluff do you call?

FBI officials did, however, say that they are unable to verify the validity of the data which AntiSec released, and instead issued a warning to computer users to be more vigilant and careful whenever clicking on links as they might end up clicking on malicious links that lead to malware being installed on your machine.

By Ubergizmo. Related articles: Apple UDID Leak: Why Does It Matter?, 1 million Apple Device IDs leaked, claim hackers,

The FBI agent whose hacked laptop gave up a 12m-strong database of Apple device user details was the star of a promo encouraging hackers to get involved with the agency, it’s been revealed in an ironic twist to the tale. Special Agent Christopher K. Stangl was featured in a 2009 recruitment video titled “Wanted by the FBI: Cyber Security Experts,” in which he called on those “with computer science backgrounds” to get involved with the federal agency.

“Hello. My name is special agent Chris Stangl of the New York city field office of the FBI. Today more than ever we need individuals with computer science backgrounds to join the FBI. From a special agent that investigates cyber crime or the computer scientist that is embedded in the cyber squad that analyzes malware” Chris Stangl, FBI

Unsurprisingly, Stangl’s video on Facebook has seen renewed interest since AntiSec claimed it was the agent’s Dell Vostro laptop from which it extracted the database. “No way this guy should be entrusted with the personal info of 12 million people” one comment on the social site reads.

According to AntiSec, a remote exploit performed on the agent’s notebook granted access to select files saved to the desktop. Among those files was a database containing more than 12m records from iOS devices, including UDID identifiers, full names, phone numbers, postal addresses, and more.

Not all of the records had all of the data attached, and it’s unclear where exactly the database was sourced. Some suggestions have included previously-seized developer servers snatched as part of FBI raids, though the filename used implied that the National Cyber-Forensics & Training Alliance was involved somehow.

The FBI – and Stangl himself – have declined to comment on the security breach.

[via Forbes]

Now there’s irony: Hacked FBI agent the posterboy for hacker collaboration is written by Chris Davies & originally posted on SlashGear.
© 2005 – 2012, SlashGear. All right reserved.

Hack collective AntiSec claims to have broken into an FBI agent’s laptop and extracted what turned out to be a 12m long list of personal details from Apple devices, alleging that the federal agency had been tracking users. The document supposedly contains Unique Device Identifiers (UDID), usernames, name and type of device, Apple Push Notification Service tokens, zipcodes, cellphone numbers, addresses, and other content; AntiSec has released 1,000,001 UDIDs (along with the device name/type) as a proof of hack.

According to the group, a remote exploit on the Dell laptop used by one FBI supervisor managed to pull out several files saved to the desktop. One of those files was a .CSV database containing a huge number of Apple device details, though no other mention of the purpose of that file was discovered on the machine.

“During the second week of March 2012, a Dell Vostro notebook, used by Supervisor Special Agent Christopher K. Stangl from FBI Regional Cyber Action Team and New York FBI Office Evidence Response Team was breached using the AtomicReferenceArray vulnerability on Java, during the shell session some files were downloaded from his Desktop folder one of them with the name of “NCFTA_iOS_devices_intel.csv” turned to be a list of 12,367,232 Apple iOS devices including Unique Device Identifiers (UDID), user names, name of device, type of device, Apple Push Notification Service tokens, zipcodes, cellphone numbers, addresses, etc. the personal details fields referring to people appears many times empty leaving the whole list incompleted [sic] on many parts. no other file on the same folder makes mention about this list or its purpose” AntiSec

However, that hasn’t stopped speculation as to the FBI’s intentions with the data. AntiSec suggests that it could be the basis of a tracking project, using Apple UDID codes to monitor individual users; it also claims that “it’s the right moment to release this knowing that Apple is looking for alternatives [to UDID].”

Not all of the records have all of the database fields filled in – some are limited to ZIP code – and it’s unclear where the FBI sourced the data from initially. The filename includes “NCFTA”, which is potentially the National Cyber-Forensics & Training Alliance, an organization which “functions as a conduit between private industry and law enforcement with a core mission to identify, mitigate and neutralize cyber crime” and which “manages the collection and sharing of intelligence” between those groups.

Although app developers have access to some of the data included, it’s apparently rare that they would have full postal address details for individual users.

[via TNW; via Hacker News]

12m iPhone and iPad ID database hacked from FBI claims AntiSec is written by Chris Davies & originally posted on SlashGear.
© 2005 – 2012, SlashGear. All right reserved.

NCsoft has issued advice to players of Guild Wars 2 to be “vigilant on receiving emails related to game accounts,” this coming after ArenaNet confirmed that there has been a bunch of hacked Guild Wars 2 accounts. This bit of news is rather surprising considering how Guild Wars 2 was up and running just a day ago, although there were those who pre-booked the game and had a 3-day headstart over the rest of the crowd. Over the weekend, a group of players resorted to airing their grievances on different online forums that their Guild Wars 2 account appeared to have been compromised.

There were some who experienced missing items, while others had it worse – being locked out of the game completely, and this is not even due to you being Iranian with a World of Warcraft account. So far, ArenaNEt’s support team have responded to some individual emails, one of them stating, “You are correct, your account was hacked. Thank you for submitting a ticket — that will expedite the process! (And I’m sorry that happened to you.)”

It seemed that there is a possibility of these hacked accounts being accessed by gold sellers, according to ArenaNet, with no firm confirmation on how widespread the hacking problem had become.

By Ubergizmo. Related articles: USB Video Out via Windows Phone 7, Guild Wars 2 live and running,

While holding your iPad in your hands in typically the way you use a tablet, sometimes it’s nice to set it in a stand so you can watch movies, read recipes, or use it as a photo frame. This simple hack allows you to easily prop up your iPad on a flat surface. It’s pretty smart, and won’t cost you much.

You wouldn’t think that a curtain rod and a kitchen handle could be matched together to make an iPad stand, but Theo Gough made it work. Hot glue was used to mate them, and the stand works in landscape and portrait mode. The items used for this hack are no longer stocked at IKEA, but other similar pieces could probably be used.

This stand doesn’t just work for iPads. Most tablets will be able to fit in this minimal stand.

[via IKEA Hackers]