NewsBits for February 20, 2003 sponsored by,
Southeast Cybercrime Institute - www.cybercrime.kennesaw.edu
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Nigerian diplomat killed over e-mail scam
A Czech pensioner who had been defrauded by a criminal
gang operating the notorious Nigerian e-mail scam has
been arrested on suspicion of shooting dead a Nigerian
diplomat, according to reports. Michael Lekara Wayid,
Nigeria's consol in the Czech Republic, was shot and
killed at the Nigerian embassy in Prague on Wednesday,
and an embassy clerk was also injured. A 72 year-old
man was arrested at the scene and taken into custody.
http://zdnet.com.com/2110-1105-984938.html
http://news.zdnet.co.uk/story/0,,t269-s2130821,00.html
http://www.theregister.co.uk/content/6/29410.html
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FBI probing credit card theft
The FBI is investigating a recent computer hacking
incident in which as many as eight million credit
card numbers may have been stolen from a company
that processes transactions, investigators said
on Wednesday. Omaha, Neb.-based Data Processors
International , which processes transactions
involving Visa, MasterCard, American Express
and Discover Financial Services for merchants,
said in a statement that it had "recently
experienced a system intrusion by an unauthorized
outside party." FBI spokesman Paul Bresson said,
"We are aware of the matter and looking into it.
http://zdnet.com.com/2110-1105-985210.html
http://news.zdnet.co.uk/story/0,,t269-s2130765,00.html
Firm's System Hacked to Tap Credit Data
http://www.latimes.com/technology/la-fi-rup20.11feb20,1,6568363.story
http://www.cnn.com/2003/TECH/internet/02/20/credit.hack.ap/index.html
http://www.securityfocus.com/news/2552
http://www.securityfocus.com/news/2537
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Airman guilty of possessing child porn
A staff sergeant caught in an Air Force Internet sting
pleaded guilty Feb. 10 to attempting to take indecent
liberties with a minor and possessing child pornography,
the Air Force announced Tuesday. Staff Sgt. Gery B. Cook
was sentenced to 18 months' confinement, reduction in
rank to E-1, forfeiture of all pay and allowances and
a bad conduct discharge, the service said. According
to an Air Force statement, information from local
authorities in North Carolina led the Air Force Office
of Special Investigations to investigate whether Cook
was communicating sexually explicit language and
photographs via e-mail with someone he believed
to be younger than 16. In fact, the Air Force said,
Cook was communicating with an undercover AFOSI
agent posing, via e-mail, as a 14-year-old girl.
http://www.estripes.com/article.asp?section=104&article=13177
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Long Island man faces child porn charges
A Long Island man was ordered held in the Ontario
County Jail after local State Police investigators
arrested him on child pornography charges. Steven
Munar, 31, of Centereach, Suffolk County, has been
charged with promoting an obscene sexual performance
of a child, a felony. His arrest followed an
investigation by the State Police in Lyons, Wayne
County, and a member of the departments local Cyber
Terrorism Unit.
http://www.democratandchronicle.com/news/0219story12_news.shtml
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Teens parents sue official in Greene over nude photos
The parents of a 17-year-old girl who received e-mailed
nude photos of a Greene County sheriffs deputy sued the
former deputy and Greene County Sheriff Jerry Erwin. The
lawsuit charges the deputy sent images of his deputys
badge and also induced the girl to engage in phone sex.
Erwin said in September that Sgt. Peter Tobias was fired
for using his home computer to communicate with a 15
year-old girl in an Internet chat room meant for people
older than 18. Erwin said in September that his office
learned of Tobias February 2001 acts in July, when
contacted by the FBI.
http://www.activedayton.com/ddn/local/daily/0219tobias.html
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Pennsylvania forces ISPs to block access to porn Web sites
Pennsylvania is forcing Internet providers to block
Web sites that include child pornography, a new legal
strategy that technology and civil liberties experts
worry will unintentionally interfere with legitimate
surfing. In a precursor to a possible courtroom
challenge, lawyers from the Center for Democracy
and Technology will try to compel Pennsylvania's
attorney general to disclose new details about the
state's tactics. They are worried other states may
follow Pennsylvania's practice.
http://www.salon.com/tech/wire/2003/02/19/internet_filters/
http://www.siliconvalley.com/mld/siliconvalley/news/editorial/5222575.htm
http://www.usatoday.com/tech/news/2003-02-20-net-porn_x.htm
http://www.theregister.co.uk/content/6/29418.html
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UK crack down on prescription drug ads on the Web
The Government is set to target the UK Internet
industry in a bid to crack-down on sites illegally
advertising and selling prescription medicines
such as the male anti-impotence drug Viagra.
In effect, the whole of the UK Internet industry
is being warned to comply with the existing law
concerning the advertising and sale of prescription
only medicine or face legal action.
http://www.theregister.co.uk/content/6/29407.html
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Nintendo seeks US trade sanctions to fight piracy
Following the seizure of over a quarter of a million
pirated Game Boy Advance software units in China
last month, Nintendo of America is lobbying for
trade sanctions to help it bring organised large-
scale piracy under control.
http://www.theregister.co.uk/content/54/29417.html
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Piracy Battle Shifts to Bertelsmann
Two world-renowned songwriters and two
independent music publishers sued Bertelsmann for
$17 billion Wednesday, accusing the German media
conglomerate of deliberately helping users of the
wildly popular Napster song-swapping service violate
millions of copyrights. Opening a new front in the
war on Internet file-sharing, the suit in New York
federal court seeks class-action status for about
160,000 songwriters and their publishers and is
based largely on evidence that emerged in Napster's
bankruptcy proceedings last year, including memos
from Bertelsmann executives who concluded Napster
was breaking the law.
(LA Times article, free registration required)
http://www.latimes.com/technology/la-fi-napster20feb20001447,1,3736642.story
http://news.com.com/2100-1023-985285.html
Fighting piracy with P2P blocking
http://zdnet.com.com/2100-1105-985027.html
Fingerprinting P2P pirates
http://news.com.com/2100-1023-985027.html
http://www.msnbc.com/news/875205.asp
Silicon Valley spars with Hollywood
http://www.nandotimes.com/technology/story/772843p-5556518c.html
Compromise copyright bill in works
http://news.zdnet.co.uk/story/0,,t269-s2130774,00.html
http://www.wired.com/news/business/0,1367,57746,00.html
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THE QUESTIONS THAT CAUGHT A HACKER
It Was the most innocent of ploys to entrap the
most cunning of deceivers. And it was, perhaps,
an ironic end for a teenage hacker who had stolen
hundreds of pounds by breaking into computers
using what is known as a Trojan horse virus.
Police had been trying for months to identify
the internet fraudster known to them as Gafferboy
- but without success. Yet Andrew Edgar fell for
the most naive of traps set by Danielle Athi,
then aged just 12.
http://www.thisisnottingham.co.uk/displayNode.jsp?nodeId=66056&command=displayContent&sourceNode=65583&contentPK=4226039
http://www.theregister.co.uk/content/55/29403.html
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New blocker lets you bill the spammer
An Australian entrepreneur has created what may be
the first antispam service that lets its users charge
for the privilege of sending them e-mail. The concept
has been discussed in technology circles for the
better part of a decade, but Sydney resident Bernard
Palmer, 59, has decided to try to turn the concept
into a business. "Spammers aren't going to be sending
many spams to you if you charge them 50 cents,"
Palmer said. "A spam would cost them $2 million."
http://zdnet.com.com/2100-1105-985175.html
Spam emailers face legal battle
http://news.zdnet.co.uk/story/0,,t269-s2130767,00.html
Some Call It Trash
http://www.fortune.com/fortune/smallbusiness/skeptic/0,15704,419106,00.html
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Symantec explains its 'we spotted Slammer' claim
Symantec finally stepped in last night to clarify
its handling of the discovery of the prolific SQL
Slammer worm. Last week Symantec raised hackles
in the security community by claiming that it
discovered the prolific worm "hours before it
began rapidly propagating".
http://www.theregister.co.uk/content/56/29406.html
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XP Hole Plagues All Similar Apps
A significant security flaw was discovered
in Microsoft software this week, but this time
Microsoft isn't to blame. Well, not completely.
The most recent security problem uncovered in
a Microsoft product is a genuine threat, security
experts say, but it isn't a problem particular
to the Windows XP operating system.
http://www.wired.com/news/infostructure/0,1377,57739,00.html
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Open Source security manual and training for ethical hacking
The Open Source Security Testing Methodology
Manual (OSSTMM) has become an international
open standard, according to its creator, Pete
Herzog. It is used by large organizations like
the U.S. Treasury Department, Home Depot, Verisign,
and IBM, although Herzog says that he has a hard
time getting entities that use the manual to talk
much about it.
http://www.theregister.co.uk/content/53/29416.html
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DOD prepares for biometric-embedded smart card pilot
The Defense Departments Biometrics Management Office
plans to complete its last proof of concept for
a biometric-enabled Common Access Card by the end
of April and start a pilot as early as this summer.
http://www.gcn.com/vol1_no1/daily-updates/21180-1.html
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Cyberwarfare presents dangers of its own
Recent news reports state that the National
Infrastructure Protection Center of the FBI has
warned that escalating friction between the United
States and Iraq could lead to cyberattacks between
both countries. This follows closely on the heels
of reports that President Bush has executed a secret
order permitting the U.S. government to promulgate
guidelines pursuant to which the Defense Department
could launch cyberattacks against computer systems
in other countries.
http://www.usatoday.com/tech/columnist/ericjsinrod/2003-02-20-cyberwarfare_x.htm
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Confidence in IT Security Growing
JUDGING FROM THE RESULTS of a survey CSO conducted
late last fall, a high percentage of respondents
(from among nearly 800 CSOs and other top security
executives) may feel more of an allegiance to their
former colleagues in law enforcement than they do
to their enterprise's customers. In answer to our
questions about their willingness to rat out various
stakeholders and under what conditions, 24 percent
of respondents said they would give up information
about customers to government or law enforcement
agencies without a court order. When it came to
their trading partners and employees, the
percentages were 23 and 37, respectively
http://www.csoonline.com/csoresearch/report49.html
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A CIO's Guide to New Antivirus Tech
From blended threats to backdoor trojans,
the latest antivirus technologies help companies
wrangle the evolving threat of malicious code.
It sounds like a chat-room joke: How many script
kiddies does it take to crank trojans out of
a malware kit? But this is no joke. The current
plague of viruses, worms and trojans can be
described as an expanding social, rather than
technical, phenomenon.
http://www.newsfactor.com/perl/story/20799.html
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Going Wireless Without Broadcasting Your Secrets
Unsecured wireless networks expose an organisation's
internal networks and data to anyone from bandwidth
freeloaders looking for free, high-speed internet
access, to potentially malicious hackers. Each
week vnunet.com asks a different expert from
the antivirus world to give their views on
recent virus and security issues, with advice,
warnings and information on the latest threats.
http://www.newsfactor.com/perl/story/20811.html
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Flying to the US? Give US.gov all your personal data
The European Commission has tamely agreed to airlines
handing over personal details of all passengers flying
to the US, in the name of 'homeland security.' These
details could include all sorts of stuff the airline
happens to have on record for you, including credit
card numbers, phone numbers, special dietary
requirements, and any other comments it has
entered on the Passenger Name Record (PNR).
http://www.theregister.co.uk/content/6/29408.html
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Mobile phones to join war on crime
Mobile phones could soon become important tools
in disaster prevention and the fight against crime,
industry experts are predicting. Applications such
as terrorist alert services, burglary prevention
tools and surveillance technology could become
commonplace mobile technology within the next
few years.
http://www.cnn.com/2003/TECH/02/20/3gsm.cannes4/index.html
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New weapons in wartime
U.S. forces are expected to unsheathe several
new weapons and tactics in Iraq, including devices
still under development. Military officials and
analysts say the new weapons would target Iraqi
armored vehicles, communications networks and
the chemical and biological weapons the Bush
administration believes Iraq still cradles.
http://washingtontimes.com/business/20030220-9797648.htm
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