Back in 1998, Tim May warned us of the “Four Horsemen of the Infocalypse”: “terrorists, pedophiles, drug dealers, and money launderers.” I tended to cast it slightly differently. This is me from 2005: Beware the Four Horsemen of the Information Apocalypse: terrorists, drug dealers, kidnappers, and child pornographers. Seems like you can scare any public … Read More “Scaring People into Supporting Backdoors” »
Category: crime
Auto Added by WPeMatico
This is interesting research: In a BGP hijack, a malicious actor convinces nearby networks that the best path to reach a specific IP address is through their network. That’s unfortunately not very hard to do, since BGP itself doesn’t have any security procedures for validating that a message is actually coming from the place it … Read More “Using Machine Learning to Detect IP Hijacking” »
In 2017, some Android phones came with a backdoor pre-installed: Criminals in 2017 managed to get an advanced backdoor preinstalled on Android devices before they left the factories of manufacturers, Google researchers confirmed on Thursday. Triada first came to light in 2016 in articles published by Kaspersky here and here, the first of which said … Read More “Backdoor Built into Android Firmware” »
The so-called Crypto Wars have been going on for 25 years now. Basically, the FBI — and some of their peer agencies in the UK, Australia, and elsewhere — argue that the pervasive use of civilian encryption is hampering their ability to solve crimes and that they need the tech companies to make their systems … Read More “Evaluating the GCHQ Exceptional Access Proposal” »
Modern cars have alarm systems that automatically connect to a remote call center. This makes cars harder to steal, since tripping the alarm causes a quick response. This article describes a theft attempt that tried to neutralize that security system. In the first attack, the thieves just disabled the alarm system and then left. If … Read More ““Two Stage” BMW Theft Attempt” »
Evidence that stolen credit cards are being used to purchase items in games like Clash of Clans, which are then resold for cash. Powered by WPeMatico
There are some good lessons in this article on financial fraud: That’s how we got it so wrong. We were looking for incidental breaches of technical regulations, not systematic crime. And the thing is, that’s normal. The nature of fraud is that it works outside your field of vision, subverting the normal checks and balances … Read More “On Financial Fraud” »
If you’re going to commit an illegal act, it’s best not to discuss it in e-mail. It’s also best to Google tech instructions rather than asking someone else to do it: One new detail from the indictment, however, points to just how unsophisticated Manafort seems to have been. Here’s the relevant passage from the indictment. … Read More “E-Mail Leaves an Evidence Trail” »
Brian Krebs has a long article on the Mirai botnet authors, who pled guilty. Powered by WPeMatico
Daphne Caruana Galizia was a Maltese journalist whose anti-corruption investigations exposed powerful people. She was murdered in October by a car bomb. Galizia used WhatsApp to communicate securely with her sources. Now that she is dead, the Maltese police want to break into her phone or the app, and find out who those sources were. … Read More “Daphne Caruana Galizia’s Murder and the Security of WhatsApp” »