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  • Diginotar declared bankrupt

    Browsers and operating systems had already revoked trust in Dutch CA. Dutch certificate authority Diginotar was declared bankrupt by a Dutch court this morning. Diginotar made the news earlier this month when a large number of rogue certificates signed by the CA were discovered . The certificates were generated by a hacker, possibly acting on…

  • Bank’s Twitter account hacked to send phishing messages

    Important lessons for companies engaging in social media. Last week, the Twitter account of the Bank of Melbourne was hacked and used to send direct messages containing phishing links to its followers. A recently relaunched subsidiary of Westpac , the Australian bank engages heavily with its customers through its @BankofMelb Twitter account. However, the security…

  • Confirmed newsletter subscriptions half as likely to be blocked

    Good practice means good performance. Newsletters that do not confirm their subscriptions are twice as likely to be blocked by spam filters as those that do, Virus Bulletin has found. The research, in which over 500 newsletters were sent to 21 anti-spam solutions, was part of the most recent VBSpam comparative test . Unbeknownst to…

  • Windows Help Files used in targeted attacks

    Files with code-executing properties attached to emails. Researchers at Symantec have discovered Windows Help Files being used in targeted attacks. Such help files, which use the .hlp extension, are used by Windows Help , a program that allows users to find help for programs running on the popular operating system. Because the files can call…

  • Iranians spied on using rogue DigiNotar certificates

    Fake certificates signed for CIA, Mossad, Google, Facebook. It is likely that Iranian Internet users have been spied on following a hack discovered at Dutch certificate authority (CA) DigiNotar last week, according to Trend Micro . In July, a hack at DigiNotar resulted in a large number of fake SSL certificates being issued for popular…

  • Researchers find email used in RSA hack

    Email with malicious attachment uploaded to online scanning service Researchers at F-Secure have managed to obtain the file used in the targeted attack against security vendor RSA back in March. At the time, RSA was admirably open about the attack and explained that one of its employees had received a targeted email containing a malicious…

  • Explosive growth of malicious spam

    Spam filters less likely to block current malware campaigns. While several reports show that the global levels of spam have seen a steady decline over the past year, this month has seen a spike in the number of spam messages with malicious attachments, security firm M86 reports. Using well-known tricks to deceive users, including subject…

  • Spam sent via fake out-of-office messages

    ‘Sick leave’ message followed by weight loss spam. In an apparently new way of spreading their messages, spammers are advertising their products via fake out-of-office replies. The example VB has seen involved a legitimate email which was sent with an (unintentional) typo in the domain name of the intended recipient. What came back was an…

  • Fake codec trojan disables anti-virus software

    Victim tricked into believing security software still active. A new trojan, discovered by researchers at ESET , spreads itself via fake codecs, then disables running anti-virus solutions and makes the user believe that the anti-virus is still running. The trojan spreads via Facebook chat and engages in a short, probably automated, conversation with the victim…

  • Banking malware tells user to ‘refund’ money

    Web injection used to suggest accidental transfer. In a new twist to banking trojans, a piece of malware found on German computers tricks victims into believing a large amount has accidentally been transferred to their account and asks them to refund the money. Banking malware has become very sophisticated in recent years and several instances…

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