The Department of Energy's Pacific Northwest National Laboratory (PNNL) is working on restoring Internet connectivity and email services after being hit by a "sophisticated cyberattack" five days ago.
Jaikumar Vijayan | 07 Jul | Read more
Mobile payments technology is a loud sonic boom thundering through the payments industry. But are all -- or any -- of these payment schemes compliant with the <a href="http://www.csoonline.com/article/519563/the-great-pci-security-debate-of-2010-transcribed">Payment Card Industry Data Security Standard (PCI DSS?)</a>
George V. Hulme | 05 Jul | Read more
How can you be sure your organization doesn't have insidious viruses or other <a href="http://www.infoworld.com/t/malware">malware</a> lurking within systems and applications, waiting to inflict damage? You can't.
Bob Violino | 05 Jul | Read more
Arizona State Police recently fell victim to a <a href="http://www.pcworld.com/businesscenter/article/231067/lulzsec_said_it_leaked_arizona_police_documents.html">second embarrassing data dump</a> that included information stolen from the personal e-mail accounts of 12 Arizona police officers. The stolen data, according to the hackers, includes names, addresses, phone numbers, passwords, Social Security numbers, online dating account info, voicemails, chat logs, internal police reports, and racist chain e-mails. Hackers also say they nabbed the personal data of Stephen Harrison, a spokesman for the Arizona Department of Public Safety.
Since 1997 identity theft and fraud has affected more than 5.4 million people in the United States. And that number is on the rise with, more than 1.3 million complaints to the <a href="http://www.ftc.gov/sentinel/">Consumer Sentinel Network</a> (CSN) between January and December of 2009 alone. <a href="http://www.ftc.gov/sentinel/reports/sentinel-annual-reports/sentinel-cy2009.pdf">According to the Federal Trade Commission</a> (PDF), of the 721,418 fraud-related complaints to the CSN in 2009, this has cost customers [of various products and services] more than 1.7 billion dollars at a median payout of $399. But what can companies do to prevent fraud and identity theft?
James Mulroy | 30 Jun | Read more
<a href="http://www.pcworld.com/article/231213/anonymous_picks_up_slack_as_lulzsec_calls_it_quits.html">Lulz Security</a> may be officially disbanded after 50 days of online hijinks including raids against the servers of <a href="http://www.pcworld.com/article/231201/lulzsec_says_goodbye_with_new_data_dump.html">NATO</a>, the <a href="http://www.pcworld.com/businesscenter/article/230235/lulzsec_sets_sights_on_us_senate_and_gamemaker_bethesda.html">U.S. Senate</a>, <a href="http://www.pcworld.com/article/228983/hackers_deface_pbs_site_promise_more_lulz.html">PBS</a> and <a href="http://www.pcworld.com/article/231215/lulzsec_a_short_history_of_hacking.html">many others</a>. But law enforcement officials are still actively searching for the rogue hackers. So far, however, it appears the law is coming up empty. FBI agents recently descended on the home of Iowa resident Laurelai Bailey hoping to find out more information about the February hack into security firm <a href="http://www.pcworld.com/businesscenter/article/220209/lessons_learned_thanks_to_hbgary_and_anonymous.html">HBGary Federal</a>, according to <a href="http://gawker.com/5816291">Gawker</a>.
Access to the Internet is vital for doing business, but without safeguards in place, malware and data leaks can be a mouse click away from disaster. Network firewalls and <a href="http://www.pcworld.com/reviews/collection/6706/top_paid_antivirus_for_2011.html">antivirus software</a> are common in workplaces, but more small companies are increasingly turning to Web filtering tools for additional protection.
Elsa Wenzel | 29 Jun | Read more
The federal agency that regulates banks today issued new rules for online <a href="http://www.networkworld.com/topics/security.html">security</a> for financial institutions, instructing them to use minimal types of "layered security" and fraud monitoring to better protect against <a href="http://www.networkworld.com/columnists/2011/062311-andreas.html">cybercrime</a>.
Ellen Messmer | 29 Jun | Read more
Sony hacker George Hotz a.k.a Geohot is reportedly <a href="http://www.pcworld.com/article/231202/sony_hacker_said_to_land_facebook_job.html">working at Facebook</a> after spending several years agitating technology giants. The news follows Hotz's antics this year when Sony sued him for distributing digital keys and a set of tools that would let you run <a href="http://www.pcworld.com/businesscenter/article/216541/sony_asks_for_restraining_order_over_ps3_hack.html">illegally copied games</a> on the PlayStation 3. Before his Sony showdown, Hotz was also one of the first people to jailbreak Apple's iPhone with a hardware unlock, although software tools that could do the same job soon replaced this method.
With the surge in <a href="http://blogs.csoonline.com/hacktivism">hacktivism</a> and nation-state espionage in recent years, not to mention the continuing high levels of cybercrime, companies need better tools to evaluate the quality of any developer's code.
Robert Lemos | 29 Jun | Read more
The <a href="http://www.pcworld.com/article/231215/lulzsec_a_short_history_of_hacking.html">hacker group LulzSec</a> made headlines recently with its smash and grab data breaches against Sony, the U.S. Senate, Arizona's Department of Public Security and PBS. But it turns out that attacks like these are often avoidable, according to a new report sponsored by the Department of Homeland Security.
Lulz Security's hacking continues to get political: on Friday the group attacked the Arizona Department of Public Safety in retaliation for immigration laws.
Jared Newman | 25 Jun | Read more
Massive website compromises using a technique known as <a href="http://www.csoonline.com/article/499964/sql-injection-attacks-led-to-heartland-hannaford-breaches-">SQL injection</a> has long been a top security concern for Web developers and site owners. Now, the attacks may become harder to detect and prevent, according to one security firm's analysis.
Robert Lemos | 20 Jun | Read more
Our critical infrastructure is an attractive target for enemy nations, terrorist groups, or even run-of-the-mill cyber criminals, and many security experts believe that it is not remotely protected against cyber attacks. The SCADA systems that manage and control much of the critical infrastructure for the United States were not designed with security in mind, and are not engineered for an Internet-connected world.
Tony Bradley | 20 Jun | Read more
Orlando, Florida's city Website could be the latest target of hackers at noon EST Thursday if Web chatter between hackers online turns out to be true. Plans of the alleged attack are being circulated on Anonymous-related IRC channels. Anonymous is a group of loosely affiliated hackers that work together to coordinate hack attacks.