Mindblown: a blog about philosophy.
-
Another security hole found in GMail
Vulnerability latest in a growing list of holes in Google’s web applications. A significant security hole has been found in Google ‘s web mail application GMail . Security researcher Petko Petrov announced the discovery of the flaw in GMail (in some countries known as Google Mail ) on his website , where he demonstrates a…
-
Fujacks/Panda virus authors sentenced, offered job
Fujacks author put away for four years. Four men who were charged last month with writing, selling and spreading the W32/Fujacks virus and worm (a.k.a. the ‘Panda burning joss-sticks’ virus) have been sentenced in a Chinese court, with the self-confessed author of the virus being sent to prison for four years. But 25-year-old lead programmer…
-
Vulnerabilities closed in OpenOffice, StarOffice
Flaws patched in TIFF parsing code. Security researchers at iDefense revealed last week that OpenOffice version 2.0.4 and earlier versions are vulnerable to maliciously crafted TIFF files, which can be delivered in email attachments, published on websites or shared using peer-to-peer software. According to iDefense , ‘When parsing the TIFF directory entries for certain tags,…
-
Boot virus shipped on German laptops
Aged malware installed on batch of Vista systems. A consignment of laptops from German manufacturer Medion , sold through German and Danish branches of giant retail chain Aldi , have been found to be infected with the boot sector virus ‘Stoned.Angelina’, first seen as long ago as 1994 and last included on the official WildList…
-
Microsoft files further adware patent
User behaviour monitors could be used to target ads. Following a patent application disclosed some months ago , details have been released of another adware scheme patented by Microsoft . This time, the idea is to monitor the behaviour of users to deduce the kinds of advertising that would be most effective at any given…
-
St. Petersburg US Consulate website hacked
Malware served by official government site. Web-watchers at Sophos have reported spotting malware hosted on the website of the US Consulate in St. Petersburg, using obfuscated JavaScript and hidden iframes to silently download trojans to vulnerable systems. The hack was part of a sizeable attack targeting vulnerable web servers worldwide last week, with over 400…
-
VB2007 last-minute hot-topic papers revealed
Schedule for up-to-the-minute tech talks announced. VB has unveiled the schedule for a series of up-to-the-minute technical presentations at the VB2007 conference next week (19-21 Sept) in Vienna. The eight ‘last-minute’ presentations include material on today’s hottest topics, with the papers being selected just days prior to the start of the conference, to avoid the…
-
Quiet Patch Tuesday
Four flaws fixed in minimal security update. Microsoft ‘s monthly ‘Patch Tuesday’ release of security updates for Windows and other software has been fairly quiet this month – with four patches released, only one of which is labelled ‘Critical’. The most serious issue is a vulnerability in the Microsoft Agent usability tool, which could be…
-
New worm spreading via Skype
Multilingual malware posing as porn in chat messages. VoIP and chat system Skype has been targeted by another worm, sending chat messages to harvested contacts posing as links to pornographic images, which in fact download and install copies of the worm. The new malware has been variously dubbed ‘Pykspa.D’, ‘Skipi.A’, ‘Ramex.a’ and ‘Pykse.b’. The fake…
-
Yahoo!-owned ad firm serves up trojans
Infectious flash adverts displayed on major sites. Advertising supplied by ad firm Right Media , a company bought out by web giant Yahoo! earlier this year after an initial investment in October 2006, has been serving up ads which use exploits to drop malware onto vulnerable systems. The ads are thought to have appeared on…
Got any book recommendations?