What A Teenage Facebook Update Can Teach Your Business
A US teenager has cost her father $80,000 with one Facebook update. Patrick Snay had previously sued Gulliver Preparatory School in Florida for wrongful dismissal, winning a settlement of $80,000 plus a further $10,000 in back pay. As part of the settlement Snay agreed to a confidentiality clause. Unfortunately, he did not do so. Feeling […]
CryptoLocker Now Comes In The Mail
Earlier this month Brian and I both wrote about ransomware and the threat it poses to both business and individual computer users. Now, if further evidence is needed of how the problem continues to grow, it appears that there is a large run of CryptoLockered-emails appearing, purporting to have come from Royal Mail. The email […]
Could Google's New Project Tango Be An Intelligence Agency's Wet Dream?
I doubt I am alone in having a craving for new technology, hankering after the latest gadgets long before I have even considered how I will use them. Thats why I have a few non-security feeds deposited into my email inbox every day; to feed my thirst for just about anything electronic. Sometimes, though, the […]
Businesses And The Planned Attack
Most people outside of the security industry still have a very stereotypical view of hacker culture. Just this week I had a discussion at work (retail industry) and was surprised that just about everyone on my team still thought hackers were spotty no-friend kids who messed things up to get their kicks. That simply isn’t […]
Majority Of Organisations Unable To Respond Effectively To A Cyber Attack
A new report from AccessData and the Ponemon institute paints a pretty poor picture of how organisations struggle to cope in the aftermath of a cyber attack. The report, Threat Intelligence & Incident Response: A Study of U.S. & EMEA Organizations polled 1,083 Chief Information Security Officers and security personnel across a range of businesses in […]
(ISC)2 Launches Safe And Secure Online Programme In Ireland
The (ISC)2 Foundation has launched its Safe and Secure Online programme in Ireland to coincide with Safer Internet Day 2014. The new programme, which is free, is designed to help students, teachers, parents and governors to use the internet in a more secure manner. Volunteers, who are all (ISC)2-certified information security experts, will make themselves […]
Quis custodiet ipsos custodes? – Security Breach at Garda Ombudman Commission Offices
The Latin phrase “Quis custodiet ipsos custodes?” is often translated to “Who watches the watchmen?” and is used to challenge calls for blanket surveillance by governments. The idea behind it is that we need some level of accountability to those that we give the powers of arrest and surveillance to. This morning the Sunday Times […]
Stand and Deliver, Your Money or Your Bytes
Europol’s Cyber Crime Centre (EC3) released a report on the rising threat of Ransomware to individual computer users and to businesses. This report follows on from a number of media stories on how this scourge is spreading. The EC3 report, which was developed jointly with the Dutch National High Tech Crime Unit (NHTCU), aims to raise […]
Stand And Deliver, Your Bandwidth And Our Bitcoins
Ransomware is a fairly new phenomenon but one that is becoming increasingly prevalent. Just this morning Brian wrote about how some companies are being held to ransom, leading to loss of business data or payment of monies for the return of their lost bytes. But the criminals who write this particular type of malware use […]
Vince Cable: Britain's Essential Services Vulnerable To Cyber Attack
The UK’s business secretary, Vince Cable, has warned a summit of intelligence chiefs and regulators that the country’s essential services are vulnerable to a cyber attack. He told summit participants that more needs to be done to protect critical infrastructure from the new breed of threat posed by terrorists and criminals alike, saying that gas […]