Android Gets Fix For KRACK WiFi Vulnerability

November 17th, 2017

Last month, a new WiFi security vulnerability known as "Krack" was discovered by a security researcher named Mathy Vanhoef. It was about as serious as a security flaw could be, enabling hackers to clone a router and funnel traffic through it, either monitoring all the activity on the network, or, if they wanted to be more destructive, conducting all manner of "man in the middle" attacks against anyone on the network.

Facebook Has A Major Problem With Fake Accounts

November 16th, 2017

Facebook has been in hot water with evidence mounting that hordes of fake accounts were used to spread misinformation about the recent presidential election.

In addition to sparking congressional hearings, it also prompted Facebook and the other major social media companies to do a deep dive into their own active accounts and get a better sense of just how large and pervasive the problem was.

Touch And Vibration May Be The Fingerprints Of The Future

November 15th, 2017

Researchers at Rutgers University have hit upon a novel idea that could be a game-changer in terms of biometric identification. The team published a paper entitled "VibWrite: Towards Finger-input Authentication on Ubiquitous Surfaces via Physical Vibration," and demonstrated a prototype of the device at the Association for Computing Machinery (ACM) conference in Dallas, Texas.

New Ransomware “BadRabbit” Starting To See Infections In The US

November 14th, 2017

You may not have heard of the new strain of ransomware known as BadRabbit. If you haven't, it's because the overwhelming percentage of BadRabbit attacks have been occurring in Russia, which accounts for 71 percent of all known infections at present. Unfortunately, there have been a few infections reported in the United States, which may be a harbinger of things to come.

Report Shows Small Percentage Of Employees Know About Ransomware

November 11th, 2017

The statistics are alarming. Ransomware is fast becoming the favored hobby horse of hackers worldwide. Barely a week goes by that a new strain isn't introduced into the wild, with expensive, and often tragic consequences. Right now, the average amount paid by office workers impacted by a ransomware attack is $1400, a figure that continues to creep higher.

Data Breach Costs Hilton $700,000 In Settlement

November 10th, 2017

Hilton Hotels is in hot water, having recently been fined a hefty $700,000 in an agreement with the states of New York and Vermont over the company's mishandling of a pair of recent data breaches.

According to official statements released by investigators, the company was found to have made two glaring errors: failing to maintain reasonable data security, and failing to notify victims of the data breach in a timely manner.

Android Bug Found In Adaptive Icons

November 9th, 2017

Do you use apps that employ the new "Adaptive Icons" feature introduced in Android Oreo? If so, be aware that there's a serious flaw in the code that could send your device into an infinite bootloop, leaving you no alternative but to restore the device to factory default settings, which will almost certainly result in at least some lost data.

Yet Another Credit Card Breach For Hyatt

November 8th, 2017

Hotel giant Hyatt is in the crosshairs again, having suffered its second data breach in two years. Hyatt's security team recently confirmed the breach as having occurred between March 18 and July 2 of 2017.

While the company has yet to release any information detailing the number of impacted users, simply stating that it was a "small percentage of guests," we do know that the following information was stolen:

• Credit card numbers
• Cardholder names
• Expiration dates
• And internal verification codes

Of note, no other personal information was obtained, so your name, address, birthdate, etc.

Watch Out For New Facebook “Trusted Friend” Scam

November 7th, 2017

If you can't trust your friends, who can you trust?

No one, apparently.

There's a new scam on Facebook that's making waves, and it's one you should be mindful of. You may get an "urgent message" from someone you know, asking for your help in recovering their Facebook account.