Group items tagged

"Hackers can use maliciously rigged PDF files to hack into corporate systems hosting the BlackBerry Attachment Service, according to a warning from the makers of the popular smartphone. Research in Motion (RIM) issued an advisory with patches for multiple flaws in the PDF distiller service and warned and an attacker could exploit the issues by simply e-mailing a booby-trapped PDF file to a BlackBerry user. The vulnerabilities exist in the PDF distiller of some released versions of the BlackBerry Attachment Service component of the BlackBerry Enterprise Server:"

On Wednesday, February 11, 2009, the Data Protection Working Party, an independent European advisory body on data protection and privacy, released its Working Document 1-2009 (.pdf) on pre-trial discovery for cross border civil litigation. The Working Document attempts to reconcile the tension between U.S. discovery rules and the European Union's Directive 95/46/EC (.pdf), which outlines the EU's privacy requirements. What follows is a summary of the Working Document and an analysis of how it begins to bridge the gap between U.S. discovery rules and the European privacy framework. The Working Document offers guidance to EU data controllers responding to U.S. discovery requests. As the Working Document explains, those controllers often find themselves in a bind. On the one hand, U.S. law allows for broad discovery, which may require a controller to provide, or "process," personal data of customers or employees. On the other hand, Article 7 of EU Directive 95/46 limits a member state's authority to process such data. Under Article 7, a member state may process personal data only if one of six identified grounds for processing applies. The Working Document considers the Article 7 grounds most likely to supply a legitimate basis for compliance with a discovery request - namely 1) consent, 2) necessary for compliance with a legal obligation, and 3) necessary for the purposes of a legitimate interest, where such interests are not "overridden by the interests for fundamental rights and freedoms of the data subject." Recognizing that the "interests of justice would be served by not unnecessarily limiting the ability of an organisation to act to promote or defend a legal right," the Working Document suggests that the third basis - necessary for the purposes of a legitimate interest - will often provide a ground for processing data in response to a U.S. discovery request.

Compared to other key corporate executives, CEOs appear to underestimate the IT security risks faced by their own organizations, according to a survey of C-level executives released today by the Ponemon Institute. The Ponemon survey (download PDF) of 213 CEOs, CIOs, COOs and other senior executives reveals what appears to be a perception gap between CEOs and other senior managers concerning information security issues. For instance, 48% of CEOs surveyed said they believe hackers rarely try to access corporate data. On the other hand, some 53% of other C-level executives believe that their company's data is under attack on a daily or even hourly basis. The survey also found that the top executives were less aware of specific security incidents at their companies than other C-level executives and are more confident that data breaches can be easily avoided. Ponemon found that CEOs tend to view data protection efforts as vital to maintaining good customer satisfaction levels and to the company's brand image. The other managers, however, were more likely to say that the most important role for data security efforts is to satisfy regulatory requirements. The survey also found that CEOs and other top managers differed in their opinion of who is responsible for protecting corporate data. While eight out of 10 respondents said they believe there is one person responsible for data protection in their organization, there was a sharp difference of opinion on just who that person was. More than half of the CEOs said that CIOs are responsible for protecting data at their companies; only 24% of other senior managers felt the same way. And 85% of respondents said someone else would be held responsible for a data breach. "On the issue of accountability, we found that while people acknowledged that data breaches were a problem, very few people felt that if [their company] suffered a breach, they would be held responsible," said Larry Ponemon, founder of the Ponemon Institute.

Compared to other key corporate executives, CEOs appear to underestimate the IT security risks faced by their own organizations, according to a survey of C-level executives released today by the Ponemon Institute. The Ponemon survey (download PDF) of 213 CEOs, CIOs, COOs and other senior executives reveals what appears to be a perception gap between CEOs and other senior managers concerning information security issues. For instance, 48% of CEOs surveyed said they believe hackers rarely try to access corporate data. On the other hand, some 53% of other C-level executives believe that their company's data is under attack on a daily or even hourly basis. The survey also found that the top executives were less aware of specific security incidents at their companies than other C-level executives and are more confident that data breaches can be easily avoided. Ponemon found that CEOs tend to view data protection efforts as vital to maintaining good customer satisfaction levels and to the company's brand image. The other managers, however, were more likely to say that the most important role for data security efforts is to satisfy regulatory requirements. The survey also found that CEOs and other top managers differed in their opinion of who is responsible for protecting corporate data. While eight out of 10 respondents said they believe there is one person responsible for data protection in their organization, there was a sharp difference of opinion on just who that person was. More than half of the CEOs said that CIOs are responsible for protecting data at their companies; only 24% of other senior managers felt the same way. And 85% of respondents said someone else would be held responsible for a data breach. "On the issue of accountability, we found that while people acknowledged that data breaches were a problem, very few people felt that if [their company] suffered a breach, they would be held responsible," said Larry Ponemon, founder of the Ponemon Institute.

First quarter federal reports show Google lobbied on the electronic medical records provisions of the federal economic stimulus act, contradicting the Internet giant's earlier claims that Consumer Watchdog's report of its effort was "100 percent false." Google's report shows a total expenditure of $880,000 on lobbying during the period including on "online health-related initiatives; issues relating to online personal health records, including in connection with H.R. 1: American Recovery and Reinvestment Act of 2009." Google also contracted with an outside firm, the Podesta Group, which independently reported lobbying for Google on "health information technology" and "online privacy." King and Spalding LLP also independently reported lobbying for Google on "online health-related initiatives, including health information technology provisions in H.R. 1, The American Recovery and Reinvestment Act." After the nonprofit, nonpartisan Consumer Watchdog reported the "rumored" lobbying in January, Google contacted a charitable foundation about withdrawing Consumer Watchdog's funding. In a letter to Google CEO Eric Schmidt released today, Consumer Watchdog said the company owes the group an apology. Read Consumer Watchdog's letter here: http://www.consumerwatchdog.org/resources/LtrSchmidt042209.pdf. "It is now clear from public records that Google was lobbying Congress relating to online personal health records in connection with the economic stimulus act... What else could Google have been seeking except to be excluded from the Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act (HIPAA) provisions on privacy and forbidding sale of records? Please tell us," wrote Jamie Court, Consumer Watchdog president and John M. Simpson, consumer advocate. "There is a simple way to resolve this," the letter said. "Publicly release all the substance of Google's lobbying efforts on H.R. 1. Google knows the drill: organize the information and make it universally accessible and useful."

Individuals have been at risk of having their personal information stolen and used to commit identity-related crimes long before the emergence of the Internet. What the Information Age has changed, however, is the method by which identity thieves can access and exploit the personal information of others. One method in particular leaves hundreds of thousands, and in some cases tens of millions, of individuals at risk for identity theft: large scale data breaches by skilled hackers. In this method, criminals remotely access the computer systems of government agencies, universities, merchants, financial institutions, credit card companies, and data processors, and steal large volumes of personal information on individuals. Such large scale data breaches have revolutionized the identity theft landscape as it relates to fraud on existing accounts through the use of compromised credit and debit card account information. Large scale data breaches would be of no more concern than small scale identity thefts if criminals were unable to quickly and widely distribute the stolen information for subsequent fraudulent use (assuming, of course, that the breach would be quickly detected). Such wide-scale global distribution of stolen information has been made possible for criminals with the advent of criminal websites, known as "carding forums," dedicated to the sale of stolen personal and financial information. These websites allow criminals to quickly sell the fruits of their ill-gotten gains to thousands of eager fraudsters

Like this http://www.hdfilmsaati.net Film,dvd,download,free download,product... ppc,adword,adsense,amazon,clickbank,osell,bookmark,dofollow,edu,gov,ads,linkwell,traffic,scor,serp,goggle,bing,yahoo.ads,ads network,ads goggle,bing,quality links,link best,ptr,cpa,bpa. www.killdo.de.gg

A couple in Pittsburgh whose lawsuit claimed that Street View on Google Maps is a reckless invasion of their privacy lost their case. Aaron and Christine Boring sued the Internet search giant last April, alleging that Google "significantly disregarded (their) privacy interests" when Street View cameras captured images of their house beyond signs marked "private road." The couple claimed in their five-count lawsuit that finding their home clearly visible on Google's Street View caused them "mental suffering" and diluted their home value. They sought more than $25,000 in damages and asked that the images of their home be taken off the site and destroyed. However, the U.S. District Court for Western Pennsylvania wasn't impressed by the suit and dismissed it (PDF) Tuesday, saying the Borings "failed to state a claim under any count." Ironically, the Borings subjected themselves to even more public exposure by filing the lawsuit, which included their home address. In addition, the Allegheny County's Office of Property Assessments included a photo of the home on its Web site. The Borings are not alone in their ire toward the Google Maps feature. As reported earlier, residents in California's Humboldt County complained that the drivers who are hired to collect the images are disregarding private property signs and driving up private roads. In January, a private Minnesota community near St. Paul, unhappy that images of its streets and homes appeared on the site, demanded Google remove the images, which the company did. However, Google claims to be legally allowed to photograph on private roads, arguing that privacy no longer exists in this age of satellite and aerial imagery. "Today's satellite-image technology means that...complete privacy does not exist," Google said in its response to the Borings' complaint Not long after the feature launched in May 2007, privacy advocates criticized Google for displaying photographs that included people's faces and car license

(PDF) Information security is a critical consideration for any organization that depends on information systems and computer networks to carry out its mission or business. It is especially important for government agencies, where the public's trust is essential. The dramatic expansion in computer interconnectivity and the rapid increase in the use of the Internet are changing the way our government, the nation, and much of the world communicate and conduct business. Without proper safeguards, they also pose enormous risks that make it easier for individuals and groups with malicious intent to intrude into inadequately protected systems and use such access to obtain sensitive information, commit fraud, disrupt operations, or launch attacks against other computer systems and networks.

Exactly one week after the Heartland Payment Systems (HPY) breach was first announced to the public, the first lawsuit has been filed against the payments processor. The class action lawsuit filed Tuesday by Chimicles & Tilellis LLP of Haverford, PA in the U.S. District Court for the District of New Jersey on behalf of Woodbury, MN resident Alicia Cooper, asserts that Heartland "made unreasonably belated and inaccurate statements concerning the breach." The complaint says Heartland does not appear to be offering any credit monitoring services or other relief to consumers affected by the breach. Chimicles & Tilellis' complaint also says in addition to the questionable timing of the announcement of its breach, (Read Heartland Class Action suit PDF) "there are materially misleading statements and omissions in Heartland's public description of the breach and its consequences." Heartland announced the breach in a press release on the same morning of President Barack Obama's inauguration. The law firm says it is suing on behalf of consumers whose sensitive financial information was compromised in the data breach at Heartland. The complaint raises a claim pursuant to the New Jersey Consumer Fraud Act, and asserts causes of action for negligence, breach of implied contract, breach of contracts to which Plaintiffs and Class members were intended third party beneficiaries, breach of fiduciary duty, and negligence. The payments processor did not disclose how many credit card account numbers were compromised as a result of the breach. Heartland is the fifth largest payment processor in the country and handles 100 million transactions per month for more than 250,000 small retailers, gas stations, restaurants and other small and midsized companies. The suit also states that Heartland only became aware of the breach after it was notified of patterns of fraudulent credit card activity by VISA and MasterCard. "Analysts have stated that the fact that Heartland did not detect th

A former Fannie Mae IT contractor has been indicted for planting a virus that would have nuked the mortgage agency's computers, caused millions of dollars in damages and even shut down operations. How'd this happen? The contractor was terminated, but his server privileges were not. Rajendrasinh Makwana was indicted on Tuesday in the U.S. District Court for Maryland (press report, complaint and indictment PDFs). From early 2006 to Oct. 24, Makwana was a contractor for Fannie Mae. According to the indictment, Makwana allegedly targeted Fannie Mae's network after he was terminated. The goal was to "cause damage to Fannie Mae's computer network by entering malicious code that was intended to execute on January 31, 2009." And given Fannie Mae-along with Freddie Mac-was nationalized in an effort to stabilize the mortgate market Makwana could caused a good bit of havoc. Makwana worked at Fannie Mae's data center in Urbana, MD as a Unix engineer as a contractor with a firm called OmniTech. He had root access to all Fannie Mae servers. The tale of Makwana malware bomb plot is a warning shot to all security teams and IT departments. Given the level of layoffs we've seen lately the ranks of disgruntled former employees is likely to grow. Is there any company NOT lopping off a big chunk of its workforce? And some of these workers may even have Makwana's access privileges and knowledge of the corporate network.

Federal regulators on Tuesday met to hear about whether the benefits of cloud computing justify increased regulation, as privacy activists claim, or whether such an approach would do more harm than good. "We need to be smarter about dealing with technology, and cloud computing is posing (a) risk for us," said Hugh Stephenson, deputy director for international consumer protection at the Federal Trade Commission's Office of International Affairs. The FTC convened the two-day meeting in its offices here, which follows a series of similar workshops held in previous years on topics like spam, privacy, and behavioral advertising. The agency may file lawsuits to halt "unfair or deceptive acts or practices," meaning that if cloud computing is not unfair or deceptive, the FTC would likely not have jurisdiction. To secure personal information on the cloud, regulators may have to answer questions such as which entities have jurisdiction over data as it flows across borders, whether governments can access that information as it changes jurisdiction, and whether there is more risk in storing personal information in data centers that belong to a single entity rather than multiple data centers. The current panoply of laws at the state, national, and international level have had insufficient results; FTC Commissioner Pamela Jones Harbour cited a 2008 PricewaterhouseCoopers information security survey (PDF) in which 71 percent of organizations queried said they did not have an accurate inventory of where personal data for employees and customers is stored. With data management practices that are not always clear and are subject to change, companies that offer cloud-computing services are steering consumers into dangerous territory, said Marc Rotenberg, executive director of the Electronic Privacy Information Center. Already, problems of identity theft are skyrocketing, he said, and without more regulation, data management services may experience a collapse analogous to that

As your day ticks by, it seems that everything you do can leave a data trail. From your purchases online to the resumes you post, to health care transactions made with your insurance cards, you probably are exposing your own personal data to possible snooping, fraud, or identify theft. "Having so much sensitive information available makes it even more difficult for other organizations to release information that is effectively anonymous," says Latanya Sweeney, associate professor of computer science, technology and policy, and director of Carnegie Mellon's Data Privacy Lab. Sweeney demonstrated that birth date, gender and 5-digit ZIP code is enough to identify 87 percent of people in the U.S. One year ago, Sweeney started to pull together a group of faculty who were looking at issues relating to privacy and security, and working toward possible solutions. In the Internet age, few areas of our private lives-and what U.S. Supreme Court Justice Louis Brandeis called "the right to be left alone"- remain untouched by technology. Lorrie Cranor, associate research professor in the School of Computer Science, and director of Carnegie Mellon's Usable Privacy and Security Laboratory, describes Carnegie Mellon as "the place to be for privacy research." She explains, "There's a concentration of researchers and experts here that you just don't find at any other university." So how do these Carnegie Mellon experts suggest you protect yourself when you find the information technology that drives your everyday life to be more sophisticated than you are? Here is a sample of some of their creative solutions-your wake-up call for keeping your data "self" both private and secure.

The following is an excerpt from the book The Truth About Identity Theft. In this section of Chapter 11: Social Engineering (.pdf), author Jim Stickley explains how easy it really is to hack a password. People often ask me how hard it is to hack a password. In reality, it is rare that I ever need to hack someone's password. Though there are numerous ways to gain passwords on a network and hundreds, if not thousands, of tools available to crack encrypted passwords, in the end I have found that it is far easier to simply ask for them. A perfect example of this type of attack was a medium-sized bank that I was testing recently. The bank's concern was related to the new virtual private network (VPN) capabilities it had rolled out to a number of its staff. The VPN allowed staff to connect directly to their secured network while at home or on the road. There is no doubt that a VPN can increase productivity, but there are some pretty major risks that can come with that convenience. The bank explained that the VPN was tied into its Active Directory server. For people who are not technical, basically this just means that when employees log in via the VPN, they use the same credentials they use to log on to their computer at the office. So I went back to my office, sat down, and picked up the phone. The first call I made was to find out the name of an employee in the IT department. I called the company's main line to the bank, pressed 0, and asked to speak with someone in the IT department. I was asked what I was calling about, so I told the employee I was receiving emails from that bank that seemed malicious. I could have used a number of excuses, but I have found that if you tie in an unhappy customer with a potential security issue, your call gets further up the food chain. In this case, I reached a man who I will call Bill Smith. I made up a story about the email, and after a few minutes, he was able to explain to me that I had called the wrong bank and it was actuall

Visa Inc. last week removed breached payment processors Heartland Payment Systems Inc. and RBS WorldPay Inc. from its list of companies that are compliant with the PCI data-security rules. But analysts said the move may be more about protecting Visa itself than about safeguarding payment card data. In a terse statement issued last Friday, Visa said it was removing Heartland and RBS WorldPay from its list of service providers compliant with PCI (download PDF) in response to the recent data breaches disclosed by each company. The decision to delist the two payment processors was based on "compromise event findings," Visa said without elaborating. The company added that it would "consider" putting Heartland and RBS WorldPay back on the compliant list, but only after they are recertified by a third-party assessor. Meanwhile, reports posted by online news site BankInfoSecurity.com and several blogs that follow the payment card industry also cited a March 12 letter from a Visa executive to banks notifying them that Heartland was now "in a probationary period" during which it would have to meet more stringent security requirements than usual. Strictly speaking, Visa's actions mean that merchants can't use either Heartland or RBS WorldPay to process payments if they themselves want to remain compliant with the PCI rules, which are formally known as the Payment Card Industry Data Security Standard (PCI DSS), said Gartner Inc. analyst Avivah Litan.

A former IT analyst at the Federal Reserve Bank of New York and his brother were arrested Friday on charges that they took out loans using stolen information, including sensitive information belonging to federal employees at the bank. Prosecutors allege that Curtis Wiltshire, 34, took out student loans totalling US$73,000 using the stolen information. His brother, Kenneth Wiltshire, 40, is charged with using the identities of two federal employees to try and obtain a loan for a 2006 Sea Ray 340 Sundancer speedboat. The charges (pdf) come two months after federal investigators found two 2006 student loan applications on a thumb drive attached to the work computer of Curtis Wiltshire, who had worked at the Reserve Bank for nearly eight years as an information and technical analyst. According to court documents, that investigation was unrelated to the fraud charges. Wiltshire was dismissed soon after the drive was found on around Feb. 15, prosecutors said. The charges were filed in the federal court in Manhattan. The two men could not be reached for comment Friday and the names of their lawyers were not included in the court documents. Curtis Wiltshire had "access to computer files containing information about employees of the [federal bank], including their names, dates of birth, Social Security numbers, and photographs," U.S. Federal Bureau of Investigation Special Agent Cordel James said in an affidavit filed in the case. Curtis Wiltshire was charged with bank fraud and identity theft and faces more than 30 years in prison if convicted. His brother was charged with mail fraud and identity theft and faces a maximum of 22 years in prison.

Veterans suffering anxiety and paranoia following the theft of a government hard drive containing the medical histories and Social Security numbers of 198,000 of their brethren cannot recover financial damages, a federal appeals court says. The 11th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals, in largely dismissing a class-action, ruled Wednesday that the veterans could recoup at least $1,000 under the Privacy Act if they could show financial damages, not mental anguish. What's more, the Atlanta-based court noted that the veterans - some already suffering post-traumatic stress syndrome from their Vietnam War days - likely could recover damages for mental anguish associated with the data breach if the lawsuit was before a different court. That's because the courts of appeal across the nation have issued conflicting interpretations of the Privacy Act of 1974, which allows people to sue the government for privacy breaches and recover "actual damages." Precedent in the 11th Circuit, which includes Alabama, Florida and Georgia, interprets "actual damages" as money losses only. So 198,000 veterans - whose life history was on a hard drive that vanished from a Birmingham, Alabama Veterans Administration hospital - are out of luck, even if their war-time paranoia was exacerbated by the breach. The 11th Circuit noted (.pdf) that the 5th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals and the 10th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals "do not restrict 'actual damages' under the Privacy Act to pecuniary losses." And the Supreme Court has refused to resolve the circuit splits.

"Want to know how much phone companies and internet service providers charge to funnel your private communications or records to U.S. law enforcement and spy agencies? That's the question muckraker and Indiana University graduate student Christopher Soghoian asked all agencies within the Department of Justice, under a Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) request filed a few months ago. But before the agencies could provide the data, Verizon and Yahoo intervened and filed an objection on grounds that, among other things, they would be ridiculed and publicly shamed were their surveillance price sheets made public. Yahoo writes in its 12-page objection letter (.pdf), that if its pricing information were disclosed to Soghoian, he would use it "to 'shame' Yahoo! and other companies - and to 'shock' their customers.""

"A key, centrist digital rights group is set to put out a report calling for strong federal privacy laws and guidelines to regulate the growing tracking and targeting of Americans online. It argues that the self-regulation approach that industry fights for just hasn't worked. The online ad industry has "historically failed to fully implement its self-regulatory principles," according to the 34-page draft report by the Center for Democracy and Technology. CDT is a centrist D.C. group that works with and is substantially funded by the tech industry, including companies like Facebook, Google and AOL that are deeply invested in targeted ads. "Recently revised self-regulatory principles still fall short (.pdf) even as written," charges the draft, obtained by Wired.com. These tough words spearhead a new tactic for a group more used to convening inside-the-Beltway tech policy forums than launching ACLU-style send-outraged-e-mail campaigns. The CDT, which splintered off from the rabble-rousing Electronic Frontier Foundation 15 years ago, is also planning to launch a "Take Back Your Privacy" campaign on Thursday, designed to garner support for its call for comprehensive federal privacy legislation. Dozens of tech firms, known and obscure, record users' behaviors as they interact with search engines, blogs, e-commerce sites and even government websites. The tracking goes on in the background with little knowledge by consumers and even less oversight from government authorities. The tech industry - like others subject to potentially blunt-forced government regulation - has argued that policing itself was enough to prevent egregious privacy intrusions that could proliferate without any real chance individuals would even be aware of them."