Mindblown: a blog about philosophy.
-
New security software testing standards body formed
AMTSO to promote cross-industry debate and higher standards in testing. A collaborative group from across the security industry has officially been founded this week, aiming to provide a forum for discussion on matters related to testing security software. The Anti-Malware Testing Standards Organisation (AMTSO) will also create best-practices guidelines for testing, educate both testers and…
-
419 scammers plead guilty in US
African trio admit attempts to defraud via spam. Three men, two from Nigeria and a third from Senegal, entered guilty pleas in a Brooklyn, New York, courtroom last week after being deported from the Netherlands to face trial for running a series of ‘419’ spam scams. Operating in the usual manner for such scams, the…
-
Fake security blogs lead to malware
Blogger sites play on fears to draw victims to porn, trojans. According to a report from Aladdin , numerous fake security blogs have been set up on the Google -owned Blogger blogging system, some carrying security news items taken from other sites including Aladdin ‘s own website, and all redirecting to unrelated content, with porn…
-
February issue of VB published
The February issue of Virus Bulletin is now available for subscribers to download. The February 2008 issue of Virus Bulletin is now available for subscribers to browse online or download in PDF format. Some of the things this month’s issue has in store are: Malware vs. anti-malware: (how) can we still survive? : ‘Well executed…
-
First virus-writing arrests in Japan
Winny worm authors brought to book – for copyright violation. Japan has seen its first ever arrests of virus writers, with three men taken into custody in Kyoto last week and charged with creating worms targeting the Winny file-sharing platform. While no specific virus-writing offence exists under Japanese law, the men were charged with copyright…
-
Ledger poisons Google
Actor’s death exploited by malware writers to infect computers. The death of actor Heath Ledger on Tuesday had barely been confirmed a few hours when malicious websites started using his name to boost their rankings in Google searches. Web users who searched for ‘heath’ and ‘ledger’ in Google would have found these malicious sites high…
-
Polyglot worm spreads through MSN
Worm changes language to target wide audience. A new worm has been discovered that spreads through MSN Messenger . Once active, the worm opens random TCP ports to connect to an IRC server and then uses this connection to open a backdoor on the affected machine, allowing an attacker to issue commands locally. The worm,…
-
Symbian worm sighted in the wild
Malware pretends to be media or image file. A new worm has been sighted in the wild that operates on the Symbian operating system, which is used on many mobile phones. The worm, which researchers at F-Secure have called SymbOS/Beselo, shares many similarities with the SymbOS/Commwarrior worm that was first seen nearly three years ago…
Got any book recommendations?