Latest IT Security News, Alerts Updates for the Week

Facebook users beware! You may have a phishing and malware combo attack coming your way!
There’s a new threat doing the rounds on the Internet. And this time, it is a combo of phishing and malware attack. You might receive a message from a Facebook friend informing that his or one of his friends’ car has been stolen. The message might contain a hyperlinked phrase – “Do you know / recognize the thieves? Here are the pics.” Do not click this link. Clicking it will take you to a spoofed Facebook which will ask you to login in, and for your secret code. Thereafter, you will take you to a fake YouTube page and you will be asked to download a YouTube Player. Odds are, this download will be a Trojan horse. More news here.

Google brings in Incremental Authentication to ease logging in for users
How many times have you been put off by an Android app asking you a bunch load of permissions at one go? Google has introduced a new feature called incremental authentication [also called Incremental Auth]. It comes as an update of Google’s social network authentication service called Google+ Sign-In. With incremental auth, apps can ask users for permissions only when they are required. For instance, there’s an app that lets users to save their playlist to Google Drive. Now, when the user first logs into this app, they will be asked for basic permissions, say profile information. And when the user is ready to save their playlist to the Google Drive, the required permissions will be asked by the app. This feature is especially helpful to reach to users who are new to an app and may hesitate to grant multiple permissions at the same time. With Incremental Auth, users can be in control on how and when their data is being used by an app. Read the entire story here.

And we thought 00000000 is a stupid password!
Here’s a news that may tickle your funny bone – The launch code for all US nuclear missiles for a whopping 20 years was… Wait for it… 00000000. Yes, a deadly, jaw dropping combination of eight zeros! This outrageous fact was discovered by Steven M. Bellovin, a computer science professor at Columbia. The fact that no one cracked the launch code and we did not read about giant nuclear bombarding by US, only strengthens our belief on the word called ‘luck’ and earns a resounding ‘Phew!’ But luck does not stay forever. So, choose strong passwords which are made up of uppercase and lowercase letters, special characters, numbers, non-dictionary words. Believe that, we can do better than 123456, 654321 or 00000000! More news here.

The FBI can spy on you using your computer’s webcam and you won’t even know it!
News are up that the FBI can activate your computer’s webcam and spy on you. You might be thinking, if that’s the case, then you would have known about it because every time the webcam is ON, it triggers the recording light. But guess what, the FBI can do the spying without deactivating the light. And this is nothing new. The FBI has been using this technology for several years. In their defense, this technology has been used to investigate terrorism or serious criminal cases. Now, that’s the good part of it. What happens when such spyware technology falls into the wrong hands; who are to be blamed then, the FBI, the victim for not securing their computer or the hacker who is just doing what they do best? Read more about this story here.

Explicit Images of Carla Bruni were used to launch a cyberattack during the G20 Summit in Paris
The cyberattack that occurred in the G20 Summit in Paris back in 2011, was executed using explicit images of former French Lady, Carla Bruni. The diplomats who attended the summit received messages with link offering to show these images. According to an official in Paris, nearly every recipient of the message, clicked the link and downloaded a Trojan horse on their systems. The cyberattack is said to have originated in China, and it may still be lurking on the Internet. More about this news here.

Rajiv Singha