NewsBits for July 27, 2004 ************************************************************ MyDoom's day passes quickly The latest variant of the MyDoom worm, which was discovered Monday, peaked after around 12 hours and has already started dying out, according to antivirus companies. The new generation, known as both MyDoom.M and MyDoom.O, slammed four popular search engines Monday and clogged e-mail accounts around the world. Google, Yahoo, AltaVista and Lycos all slowed to a crawl, because once the worm infects a PC, it automatically performs Web searches on those search engines. http://zdnet.com.com/2100-1105_2-5285046.html http://news.zdnet.co.uk/0,39020330,39161718,00.htm http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/technology/3930017.stm MyDoom opens door for attack on Microsoft While the spread of the latest version of the MyDoom worm appeared to be quickly halted, the pest lived on Tuesday with a growing host of ancillary infections, including one programmed to launch a denial-of-service attack on Microsoft. MyDoom.M, a new variant of the prolific worm, came to life Monday and quickly wreaked havoc on Google and other search sites, thanks to a novel method the worm's creator devised to propagate the pest. http://zdnet.com.com/2100-1105-5285821.html http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/5529616/ Virus Overwhelms Google, 3 Other Search Engines Many computer users were unable to reach the Google, Yahoo, Lycos and AltaVista search engines yesterday after a new computer virus surfaced that apparently overwhelmed the Internet services with automated queries. Access to Google was blocked for as long as five hours, some users reported. Visitors attempting to reach the Web site instead received an error message: "The service you requested is not available at this time." http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A16473-2004Jul26.html?referrer%3Demail http://www.vnunet.com/news/1156907 http://www.theregister.co.uk/2004/07/27/google_bashing_virus/ http://computerworld.com/securitytopics/security/story/0,10801,94801,00.html?SKC=security-94801 MyDoom virus 'hit 1m emails since yesterday' http://www.netimperative.com/cmn/viewdoc.jsp?cat=all&ct=news&docid=BEP1_News_0000067541 - - - - - - - - - - Internet Attack Targets DoubleClick DoubleClick Inc., the company that provides online advertising services for some of the nation's most popular Web sites, was the target of a sophisticated attack today, the third time in two months that hackers have targeted a major player in the commercial Internet. Beginning at roughly 10:30 a.m. ET, unknown attackers overwhelmed DoubleClick's Internet servers with a flood of bogus Web page requests, blocking many major sites from loading ad images on their sites. http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A18735-2004Jul27.html http://www.siliconvalley.com/mld/siliconvalley/news/editorial/9251997.htm http://computerworld.com/securitytopics/security/story/0,10801,94837,00.html - - - - - - - - - - Hackarmy hides behind governor Arnie Arnold Schwarzenegger is the latest big name to be used in an attempt to lure unsuspecting internet users into downloading software which could open their PCs to hackers. Security company Sophos is warning that thousands of messages posted to internet newsgroups are urging computer users to download a file claiming to contain a suicide note from Schwarzenegger. http://www.vnunet.com/news/1156918 Hacker's Osama bin Laden Hoax Terrorizes Computers http://www.crime-research.org/news/27.07.2004/522/ A Russian response to Osama Bin Laden virus http://www.crime-research.org/news/27.07.2004/523/ - - - - - - - - - - eBay denies South Africa 419 hacking report Auction site eBay has denied South African reports that a database of customer credit card numbers it maintains has been compromised by a Nigerian 419 syndicate. According to News24, advanced free fraudsters "gained access to the credit card numbers... addresses and identity numbers of thousands of eBay clients and have started to distribute this to other syndicate members". http://www.theregister.co.uk/2004/07/27/ebay_denies_419_hack/ - - - - - - - - - - Barrister Bailed on Child Porn Charges A barrister appeared in court today charged with downloading almost 3,800 child porn images. John Temple, 45, of Durham, appeared at Liverpool Magistrates' Court accused of 17 counts of possession of indecent images of children. He was arrested following a police raid of his north west Durham home on May 26 this year when officers allegedly discovered 3,766 child porn pictures stored on his personal computer and on disks. http://news.scotsman.com/latest.cfm?id=3244518 - - - - - - - - - - Seminary student charged in child porn case A 27-year-old Polish seminary student has been charged with possession and distribution of child pornography, a prosecutor said Monday as an investigation widened into Austria's worst church sex scandal in nearly a decade. State prosecutor Walter Nemec said in a statement that the student, whose name was not released, downloaded "numerous" lurid photos from a Web site based in his native Poland. Authorities say up to 40,000 photos and numerous videos, including child pornography and pictures of candidates for the priesthood kissing and fondling each other and their older instructors, were found at the Roman Catholic seminary in St. Poelten, 50 miles west of Vienna. http://www.signonsandiego.com/news/world/20040719-0316-austria-seminaryporn.html - - - - - - - - - - China shuts down 700 porn sites Chinese authorities have shut down 700 pornographic Web sites in less than two weeks as part of a massive campaign to clean up the Internet, the official Xinhua News Agency said Tuesday. Citing figures from the Ministry of Public Security, Xinhua said 224 suspects have been detained since July 16, when the crackdown began. No details were given on those cases. http://www.usatoday.com/tech/news/techpolicy/2004-07-27-china-cans-porn_x.htm - - - - - - - - - - Judge: RIAA can unmask file swappers A federal judge has handed a preliminary victory to the recording industry by granting its request to unmask anonymous file swappers accused of copyright infringement. U.S. District Judge Denny Chin ruled Monday that Cablevision, which provides broadband Internet access in Connecticut, New Jersey and New York, can be required to divulge the identities of its subscribers sued over copyright violations. http://zdnet.com.com/2100-1104_2-5285605.html - - - - - - - - - - Homeland Security rapped over data-sharing The U.S. Department of Homeland Security is woefully behind in the vital task of sharing computer security information with private companies, government auditors said Tuesday. The report from the General Accounting Office said the DHS has "not yet developed a plan that describes how it will carry out its information- sharing responsibilities." http://zdnet.com.com/2110-1105_2-5285599.html http://www.govexec.com/dailyfed/0704/072704tdpm1.htm - - - - - - - - - - Government tries to secure UK from electronic attack The government hopes to increase the security of essential services by issuing early warnings of upcoming vulnerabilities - before patches are available. The Home Office has said it will start giving advance warning about upcoming security patches and software vulnerabilities to essential public services, such as transportation, health and telecommunications. http://news.zdnet.co.uk/internet/security/0,39020375,39161878,00.htm - - - - - - - - - - Call to block child gambling online Internet gambling websites should introduce age-verification checks to prevent children from betting online, a children's charity urged today. The call by the charity NCH comes after it found that a 16-year-old girl was able to register with 30 gambling websites after lying about her age. Only seven sites requested verification of her age when she claimed to be 21. http://www.guardian.co.uk/online/story/0,3605,1269499,00.html http://www.theregister.co.uk/2004/07/27/kids_gamble_nch/ - - - - - - - - - - Consumers still falling for phish Confused by what's arriving in your inbox? You're not alone. Nearly one out of three Internet users were unable to tell the difference between fraudulent e-mails designed to steal their identities and legitimate corporate e-mail, a new study finds. Anti-spam firm MailFrontier Inc. showed 1,000 consumers examples of so-called "phishing" e-mail as well as legitimate e-mail from companies such as eBay and PayPal. About 28 percent of the time, the consumers incorrectly identified the phishing messages as legitimate. http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/5519990/ - - - - - - - - - - Hacking soars in South Korea Computer hacking in South Korea -- where attacks on government agencies have raised national security concerns -- has increased dramatically in recent years, government statistics show. Reports of hacking from South Korea into computers in other countries increased from 6,531 in 2002 to 14,063 in 2003, and then to 10,634 in the first half of 2004, the Korea Information Security Agency said in a report. Those statistics were mainly based on reports from other countries. http://www.siliconvalley.com/mld/siliconvalley/news/editorial/9251997.htm - - - - - - - - - - Al Qaeda in cyber space: threats of cyberterrorism Terrorism, as a display of utmost extremism, is based on various disagreements (national, transnational) in politics, economy, religious or criminal grounds and has been widely discussed for a long time. Modern level of high technologies development extends capabilities of their use to commit actions of terrorism. http://www.crime-research.org/news/27.07.2004/515/ - - - - - - - - - - Are P2P networks leaking military secrets? A new Web log is posting what it purports are pictures, documents and letters from U.S. soldiers and military bases in Iraq and elsewhere--all of which the site's operator claims to have downloaded from peer-to-peer networks such as Gnutella. The "See What You Share" site has been online for a week and has published photos ranging from a crashed military jet to a screenshot of a spreadsheet file that appears to include names, addresses and telephone numbers of marines. http://news.com.com/Are+P2P+networks+leaking+military+secrets%3F/2100-1038_3-5285918.html - - - - - - - - - - Government takes new tack to secure online transactions Establishing proof of identity to conduct business online today is a much different security challenge than it was in the mid-1990s. Back then, for example, the only way Treasury Department officials could entice financial institutions to place their orders for government securities online was to use digital certificates and an elaborate public-key infrastructure for securing the transactions. http://www.usatoday.com/tech/news/computersecurity/2004-07-27-password-jungle_x.htm - - - - - - - - - - America - a nation of corporate email snoops Forget Big Brother, US conglomerates are paying low-tech snoopers to read workers' emails. According to research from Forrester Consulting, 44 per cent of large US companies (20,000 workers and above) pay someone to monitor the firm's outgoing mail, with 38 per cent regularly auditing email content. According to the study - reported without question in the mainstream press - companies' motivation was mostly due to fears that employees were leaking confidential memos. http://www.theregister.co.uk/2004/07/27/corporate_snooping_survey/ - - - - - - - - - - Spamming for Dummies Let's call him Stan. Our entirely fictitious character begins his work day, as many of us do, by opening his email client and checking for new messages. As usual, a few legitimate emails are hidden amongst a deluge of spam, one of which catches his eye. Already a keen businessman, Stan doesn't take long to realise that the designer jewellery he's selling from his website could move off the shelves a lot faster if he could reach two million people with each advertisement. http://www.theregister.co.uk/2004/07/27/spamming_for_dummies/ - - - - - - - - - - Under-the-skin ID chips move toward U.S. hospitals VeriChip, the company that makes radio frequency identification--RFID--tags for humans, has moved one step closer to getting its technology into hospitals. The Federal Drug Administration issued a ruling Tuesday that essentially begins a final review process that will determine whether hospitals can use RFID systems from the Palm Beach, Fla.-based company to identify patients and/or permit relevant hospital staff to access medical records, said Angela Fulcher, vice president of marketing and sales at VeriChip. http://zdnet.com.com/2100-1103_2-5285815.html *********************************************************** Search the NewsBits.net Archive at: http://www.newsbits.net/search.html *********************************************************** The source material may be copyrighted and all rights are retained by the original author/publisher. The information is provided to you for non-profit research and educational purposes. Reproduction of this text is encouraged; however copies may not be sold, and NewsBits (www.newsbits.net) should be cited as the source of the information. Copyright 2000-2004, NewsBits.net, Campbell, CA.