7 posts and columns on attacks

News Byte

McAfee Releases Annual "Top Scary Reasons to Buy Our Software" List

in News on December 28, 2010 at 11:33 am PT

Security outfit McAfee today unveiled its 2011 Threat Predictions report, and sure enough, the biggest threats are aimed at “2010′s most buzzed about platforms and services, including Google’s Android, Apple’s iPhone, foursquare, Google TV and the Mac OS X platform, which are all expected to become major targets for cybercriminals.” Another in a long list of non-shocking (but still sobering) predictions: “Politically motivated attacks will be on the rise, as more groups are expected to repeat the WikiLeaks paradigm.” The report’s bottom line: Anything you do online carries risks. Which is undeniably true.

PayPal Releases Funds to WikiLeaks as Supporters Strike Back

in Commerce on December 8, 2010 at 3:29 pm PT

PayPal has just released the remaining funds in the account associated with WikiLeaks today, after restricting access to the account last week, according to a PayPal blog post. However, it did not not reinstate the ability for it to receive donations.

News Byte

WikiLeaks Leaves Amazon, Returns to Sweden

in News on December 1, 2010 at 1:12 pm PT

WikiLeaks has left its U.S. host, Amazon Web Services, and moved its operations back to Sweden. The whistleblowing site had left Bahnhof, its Swedish host, and sought refuge with Amazon after Sunday’s leak of U.S. State Department documents left it besieged by almost constant DDOS attacks. The site reported another DDOS attack early yesterday, and was down earlier today. Neither WikiLeaks nor Amazon has officially commented on their relationship or why it ended.

Chinese Scientists Recalibrate Google’s Evil Scale

in News on February 26, 2010 at 3:01 am PT

Evidently, Baidu isn’t nearly as effective an academic research tool as Google, because the latter’s threatened withdrawal from China has got the country’s scientists pretty worried. A survey of 784 Chinese scientists by science journal Nature found that many feel the search engine is indispensable to their work, particularly if it requires English-language searches for material outside China.

And Now a Few Words of Happy Reassurance from National Intelligence Director Dennis Blair

in News on February 4, 2010 at 12:01 pm PT

Coming as it does after Google’s revelation that its network was compromised by malicious hackers, Director of National Intelligence Dennis Blair’s warning that the United States is not yet able to guard its national networks against cyber attacks seems to be, well, stating the obvious. That said, it’s well worth noting, because the sophistication of the attacks against Google obviously does not bode well for national security.

Web Attack Targeted Critic of Russia

in News on August 7, 2009 at 5:05 pm PT

As Facebook, Twitter and other popular Internet services investigated the cause of this week’s massive computer attacks, attention turned to a blogger whose writings blasting Russian officials may have been the target.

Chinese Hackers Target NYPD Too, Says Police Commissioner

in News on April 23, 2009 at 10:16 am PT

New York City’s police department joins the Dalai Lama, the Joint Strike Fighter and the U.S. electrical grid as the latest alleged target of Chinese hackers. New York Police Commissioner Raymond Kelly said Wednesday that hackers make at least 70,000 attempts every day to access computer systems of the New York Police Department, the largest police force in the U.S.