“The United States could be creating a smart grid power distribution system with a false sense of the threats it will face and of its ability to secure it, a panel of security professionals said Tuesday. The nation’s critical infrastructure has been identified as a high-value target, and the Homeland Security Department has been given [...]
“The U.S. government’s main code-making and code-cracking agency now works on the assumption that foes may have pierced even the most sensitive national security computer networks under its guard. ‘There’s no such thing as ‘secure’ any more,’ Debora Plunkett of the National Security Agency said on Thursday amid U.S. anger and embarrassment over disclosure of [...]
“Homeland Security Secretary Janet Napolitano today stressed the need for shared responsibility and strategic partnerships to secure cyberspace. ‘This has got to be a team effort,’ Napolitano said at a cyberspace symposium held in Washington. ‘No one agency can do it alone. Cybersecurity is about effective partnerships and shared security.’ She said a layered approach [...]
“The state’s computer systems are at ‘high risk’ of online attack, and a firm hired to secretly hack into agencies’ systems easily gained access to thousands of documents containing Coloradans’ sensitive personal information, an audit released Monday revealed. The audit, conducted from February through November, found that 12 of 20 agencies had failed to submit [...]
“When a corporation screws up and your account information is compromised by ‘unauthorized access’ (code for ‘someone broke into our database and stole your data’), current law seems to side with the corporate behemoths. They send you an ‘oops, we’re sorry’ email and you have to suck it up. Liability? Seems AWOL. This weekend, Gawker [...]
“If you think there’s a group of nerdish hackers somewhere hunched over their computers launching cyberattacks 24-7 on companies that have refused service to WikiLeaks, you’re wrong. Helping the hacking forum known as ‘Anonymous’ and ‘Operation Payback’ can be as simple as sending an e-mail to one of the many websites it uses — and [...]
“The official site, regeringen.se, was offline for several hours overnight and only a message saying the site could not be reached was visible. Commercial websites including Visa, MasterCard and PayPal have already been targeted by co-ordinated action on one of the busiest shopping days of the year after the firms said that they would no [...]
“The number of cyber attacks aimed at taking over systems that control utilities and other critical industries is on the rise, according to a senior Department of Homeland Security official. ‘It’s certainly a trend,’ said Greg Schaefer, assistant secretary for DHS’ Office of Cybersecurity and Communications on Tuesday at an event hosted by the Defense [...]
“Credit card company Mastercard’s website is currently unavailable due to an apparent hacking campaign organised in response to the company’s refusal to handle donations to the WikiLeaks website. The attack, called ‘operation: payback’ has apparently been organised by internet freedom of speech activists, calling themselves ‘Anonymous’. Mastercard announced on Monday it would no longer handle [...]
“One of the latest batch of leaked US embassy cables suggest that China is abusing its access to Microsoft source code by using the information to carry out cyber warfare. The latest cable released by Wikileaks, and uncovered by The Guardian, suggests that the Chinese government is using licensed access to Microsoft source code in [...]
