The annual hackers’ conference, DEF CON, wrapped up yesterday, but one of the weekend’s many great mysteries still persists. The images above are an encryption puzzle ("Encryption is Key") that was printed on the Electronic Frontier Foundation’s fundraising t-shirts from the event. As of Sunday morning, no one had solved it, so here’s a hint, straight from our friends at the EFF.
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Be honest, how often do you use unsecured Wi-Fi for something you shouldn’t? You know, just a quick Facebook login at Starbucks. If you’ve done it even once, that’s too much, because making a secret spy computer that can steal all that data is dumb easy. And cheap to boot.
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Chinese hackers have been harassing the US in a series
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The Chinese hacking collective known as APT1 has long been suspected of working with China’s army, and as such has garnered its fair share of attention from the powers-that-be. Back in February, the hackers inadvertently revealed the extent of their intentions, doing so by falling for a “honeypot” – one of several decoy water plants. […]
Like a lot of organizations, NASA’s doing its best to keep up with the times and move its computer systems onto the cloud. Like only a government agency can do, it’s failing fantastically at doing so securely.
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We haven’t even known about Google Chromecast for a week, and already, hackers have found a way to gain root access to the hardware. Now, it’s time to poke around and see what’s inside.
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Big security breach definitely happening on Instagram. This is the third hacked account I’ve seen including mine. pic.twitter.com/sWvoZBeVIo
— Graham Hancock (@grahamhancock) July 27, 2013
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Barnaby Jack, a prolific hacker hailing from New Zealand, has unfortunately passed away in an apartment in San Francisco at the age of 35. The cause of death has not been revealed, but a spokesperson for the local police did say that foul play was not a factor. Jack was scheduled to attend the Black Hat conference next week, an hour of which will now be dedicated to his memory instead.
During the event next week, Jack was supposed to demonstrate how one can hack into implanted defibrillators and pacemakers, exposing vulnerabilities in the technology. According to Reuters, which interviewed the hacker earlier this month, he’d stated his method could “kill a man” with the implanted technology up to 30 feet away.
Although he had dabbled in many categories, Jack is perhaps best known for a hack called Jackpotting, which involves a demonstration of the hacker causing ATMs to dispense bills. He had also worked at identifying vulnerabilities in medical devices that could prove dangerous, and has received praise from individuals, companies, and even government agencies for his efforts.
Jack worked at McAfee and other places, with the last being IOActive Inc., a consulting firm that focused on cyber security. The cause of death will be reported in one month, according to the police spokesperson, following an autopsy. According to Reuters, his sister confirmed his passing, but did not provide details.
Stuart McClure, a security industry executive and colleague of Jack, said to Reuters in a statement: “He was passionate about finding security bugs before the bad guys. He was one of those people who was put on this earth to find vulnerabilities that can be exploited in a malicious way to hurt people.”
SOURCE: Reuters
Barnaby Jack, renown hacker, dies at 35 is written by Brittany Hillen & originally posted on SlashGear.
© 2005 – 2013, SlashGear. All right reserved.
There are your everyday run-of-the-mill hackers, and then there are the hackers who set the bar for everyone else. Though we’d hardly call them exemplary individuals, the five culprits recently indicted for the largest known financial hack in US history would certainly belong in the latter category. Comprised of four Russians and a Ukrainian, the quintet’s unsavory accomplishments include breaking into networks belonging to major corporations like Nasdaq, Dow Jones, 7-Eleven and JCPenney — siphoning more than 160 million credit card numbers and bringing about millions of dollars in losses. They did so with SQL injection attacks to install malware that let them crack passwords and snag other sensitive data. Two of them — Vladimir Drinkman and Dmitriy Smilianets — have been arrested, while the rest — Alexandr Kalinin, Roman Kotov and Mikhail Rytikov — remain at large. All five could be behind bars for decades if found guilty. For the nitty gritty as to just how and which companies were affected, hit up the source link below. It’s enough to make you want to change your password several times over.
Filed under: Internet
Via: Ars Technica
Source: US Department of Justice
The Syrian Electronic Army has claimed ownership of a hack against Tango, saying they swiped 1.5 terabytes worth of user data. Tango has since confirmed that a breach of its system did take place, saying that the hackers accessed “some data.” They did not, however, confirm whether it was the SEA, nor did they provide details on the extent of the security breach.
TangoMe Inc., the company behind Tango, confirmed the breach on its Twitter account, saying that it “experienced a cyber intrusion that resulted in unauthorized access to some data.” The company went on to state that it is in the process of improving its security system. This came after the Syrian Electronic Army posted screenshots as proof of their hacking endeavors.
According to the hacker collective, the information they stole amounted to 1.5 terabytes, and included things like the phone numbers of users, contact information, and emails. It then went on to say that the information it gathered will be given to the Syrian government – “much of ” it, anyway. According to the BBC, some experts have stated that outdated software on Tango’s part may have been the reason it was targeted.
Following the Tango breach, the Syrian Electronic Army then turned its attention to The Daily Dot, which hosted a story on the hack alongside a cartoon of the Syrian president. The hacking group fired off a tweet, demanding the image be removed. When The Daily Dot failed to do this, the SEA then breached its admin panel and deleted the article from its system.
The is the latest of a long list of breaches the SEA has pulled off, many of which involves low-level hacking to gain access to Twitter accounts, where mostly nonsense tweets are posted. The Guardian, The Onion, Financial Times, E! Online, CBS, and more have all been targeted by the group, which you can find out more about in our timeline below.
SOURCE: BBC News
Syrian Electronic Army hacked Tango, swiped user data is written by Brittany Hillen & originally posted on SlashGear.
© 2005 – 2013, SlashGear. All right reserved.
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