Cybercrime

Coordinating Attack Response at Internet Scale

How do we help coordinate responses to attacks against Internet infrastructure and users? Internet technology has to scale or it won't survive for long as the network of networks grows ever larger. But it's not just the technology, it's also the people, processes and organisations involved in developing, operating and evolving the Internet that need ways to scale up to the challenges that a growing global network can create. more

Mega Hacks and the Employees That Lost

When a business gets hacked and its corporate information is dumped on the Internet for all and sundry to see (albeit illegally), the effects of that breach are obviously devastating for all concerned. In many ways it's like the day after a fierce storm has driven a super-cargo container ship aground and beachcombers from far and wide have descended upon the ruptured carcass of metal to cart away anything they think has value or can be sold by the side of road. more

If It Doesn’t Exist, It Can’t Be Abused

A number of outlets have reported that the U.S. Post Service was hacked, apparently by the Chinese government. The big question, of course, is why. It probably isn't for ordinary criminal reasons: The intrusion was carried out by "a sophisticated actor that appears not to be interested in identity theft or credit card fraud," USPS spokesman David Partenheimer said. ... But no customer credit card information from post offices or online purchases at usps.com was breached, they said. more

European Data Breaches Have Resulted in Loss of 645 Million Records Since 2004

A first-time study of publically-reported data breaches in the 28 European Union member countries, plus Norway and Switzerland, conducted by the Central European University's Center for Media, Data and Society (CMDS) has found that between 2004 and 2014 the continent's organizations suffered 229 incidents covering 227 million personal records.  more

.trust Technical Policy Launch

Whenever I examine the technical elements of the various Internet security certifications and standards that organisations are clamouring to achieve compliance against, I can't help but feel that in too many cases those businesses are prioritising the wrong things and wasting valuable resources. They may as well be following a WWI field guide on how to keep cavalry horses nourished and bayonets polished in a world of stealth aircraft and dirty bombs. more

Cigarette Smuggling and Cyber Security: Low-Tech Crimes Fund High-Tech Threats

You may not connect the cheap cigarettes sold under the counter (or out of a trunk, bodega or by a street vendor) with the mysterious charges on your credit card that you don't remember making or the cash that has, somehow, just disappeared from your bank account. You also may not connect that website selling cheap cigarettes made in second and third world countries with Shellshock or whatever the fashionably scary cyber-threat of the day is when you're reading this. more

Call for Nominations: M3AAWG J. D. Falk Award Seeks Stewards of a Better Online World

Anyone seeking to honor a groundbreaking contribution toward a better online world should submit a nomination for the 2014 M3AAWG J. D. Falk Award. Presented to people whose work on specific projects made the Internet a safer, more collaborative, more inclusive place, the J. D. Falk Award has recognized leaders and pioneers who saw elements of the online experience that needed improvement and took action to fix them.  more

The Importance of IP Resource Planning in Government ICT Strategic Plans

It seems everywhere I turn, there's someone throwing around statistics for how the Internet and broadband will drive economic growth, create jobs, end world hunger and bring world peace (ok, maybe not the later). Sure enough, government officials are buying into that rhetoric and extending it in initiatives like national broadband strategies, cybercrime and cybersecurity plans as well as e-governance strategies. more

A Bad Year for Phishing

Here at the Anti-Phishing Working Group meeting in Hong Kong, we've just released the latest APWG Global Phishing Survey. Produced by myself and my research partner Rod Rasmussen of Internet Identity, it's an in-depth look at the global phishing problem in the second half of 2013. Overall, the picture isn't pretty. There were at least 115,565 unique phishing attacks worldwide during the period. This is one of the highest semi-annual totals we've observed since we began our studies in 2007. more

Secure Domain Foundation Launched to Help Internet Infrastructure Operators Fight Cybercrime

Experts and companies in the information security industry today announced the formation of the Secure Domain Foundation (SDF), a new, non-profit, community-driven organization devoted to the identification and prevention of Internet cyber crime utilizing the domain name system (DNS). more

Dynamic DNS Customers, Check Your Router Settings!

There have been quite a few news stories released over the last 24 hours regarding a wide-scale compromise of 300,00 Internet gateway devices. Here's the executive summary of what happened, how to check if you are vulnerable, and what you can do to fix it... If you use any of these devices, you should check it to ensure your device has not been compromised. more

Mind the Step(-function): Are We Really Less Secure Than We Were a Year Ago?

In January 1995, the RFC Editor published RFC 1752: "The Recommendation for the IP Next Generation Protocol"... The Internet is a security officer's nightmare -- so much openness, so easy to capture packet traffic (and/or spoof it!) and send all manner of unwanted traffic. It was built as a research network, hosted by institutes that were 1/ professionally responsible and 2/ interested in working together collegially. So, in the 19 years since the publication of that statement, have we really failed to address the stated goal? more

April 8 2014: A World Less Secure

Not long after the message that Microsoft will stop updating Windows XP from 8 April onwards, after extending it beyond the regular life cycle for over a year already, came the soothing message that malware will be monitored for another year. That may be good news to some, but the fact remains that this is not the same as patching. Remaining on XP leads to a vulnerable state of the desktop, lap top and any other machine running on XP; vulnerable to potential hacks, cyber crimes, becoming part of a botnet, etc. more

CircleID’s Top 10 Posts of 2013

Here we are with CircleID's annual roundup of top ten most popular posts featured during 2013 (based on overall readership). Congratulations to all the participants whose posts reached top readership and best wishes to the entire community for 2014. more

Canada’s Anti-Spam Law Coming Into Force July 01, 2014

Canada's Anti-Spam Law, CASL, is now a done deal. Last Thursday, Treasury Board of Canada President (and champion of CASL) Tony Clement approved Industry Canada regulations in their final form. Today, Minister of Industry the Honourable James Moore announced CASL will come into force in July 1, 2014. more