Hasta La Gadget!

By now, you may have heard the story of the identity ‘hack’ perpetrated against Wired journalist Mat Honan. Using easily obtained data, an anonymous duo bluffed its way into changing his Amazon account, then his Apple iCloud account, then his Google account and ultimately the real target, Twitter. Both Amazon and Apple were docked for how easy it was to modify an account over the phone — and, in close succession, have both put at least a momentary lockdown on the changes that led to Honan losing much of his digital presence and some irreplaceable photos. His own publication has reportedly confirmed a policy change at Amazon that prevents over-the-phone account changes. Apple hasn’t been as direct about what’s going on, but Wired believes there’s been a 24-hour hold on phone-based Apple ID password resets while the company marshals its resources and decides how much extra strictness is required.

Neither company has said much about the issue. Amazon has been silent, while Apple claims that some of its existing procedures weren’t followed properly, regardless of any rules it might need to mend. However the companies address the problem, this is one of those moments where the lesson learned is more important than the outcome. Folks: if your accounts and your personal data matter to you, use truly secure passwords and back up your content. While Honan hints that he may have put at least some of the pieces back together, not everyone gets that second chance.

Filed under: Internet

Amazon, Apple stop taking key account changes over the phone after identity breach originally appeared on Engadget on Tue, 07 Aug 2012 23:40:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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Early last year, Twitter kicked off its Translation Center efforts in hopes of bringing support for more languages to the site with help of amicable volunteers from all over the globe. Naturally, this has helped the renowned Blue Bird network immensely during its global gibberish quest, having added compatibility with right-to-left idioms since the program started and, more recently, Ukranian and Catalan. To make things even better, today Twitter’s announced it’s now available in a few more, including Basque, Czech and Greek — which means that a simple trip to account settings can now translate your current 140-character experience into one of the aforementioned languages if you so choose. Twitter’s Translation Center is open to anyone willing to lend a hand, so those interested in helping the cause can pay the more coverage link a visit to learn how to get involved.

Filed under: Internet

Twitter announces it’s now available in three more languages: Greek, Czech and Basque originally appeared on Engadget on Tue, 07 Aug 2012 03:48:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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Ex-Gizmodo staff Mat Honan was not on the receiving end of any good news, especially after he found out that his iCloud account was hacked through the use of social engineering, where this particular “hacker” never had to rely on brute force password cracking or other nefarious tools to get the job done, as Apple Tech Support “released” the password (albeit unintentionally, of course) on his behalf. First, his iCloud account was entered, before the password was reset. A Gmail password recovery email was sent over to the .mac account, and just a couple of minutes after that, an email arrived to inform him that his Google Account password had already changed. At 5:00PM, the iPhone was wiped remotely, followed by his iPad and MacBook Air a minute and five minutes later, respectively.

Shortly after, the Twitter account was taken over because a long time ago, Mat linked his Twitter account to Gizmodo’s, where said “hacker” was also able to access Gizmodo’s Twitter account after that. I guess the saying holds true, a chain is only as strong as its weakest link, and Apple’s iCloud does seem to be the weak link here.

By Ubergizmo. Related articles: iCloud hacked?, iCloud-shaped house for the hardcore Apple fan,

Our Twitter account was hacked a few hours ago. We have the situation under control, don’t worry. But Gizmodo really hates to delete tweets. Really. It’s an actual policy: do not do it. Not for typos, not for nothin’. More »

The internet began as a pure place, free of malice and bad manners. Today, rudeness and horror abound. More »