If you're sick of the unmanageable onslaught of spy ware ad ware and other nasties such as browser hijacks, then you should try Microsoft’s latest software acquisition.

Formerly known as GIANT AntiSpyware, this version of the award winning software is free to Windows users while in Beta.While the current version appears to have no difference to its originator other than re-branding, Microsoft is releasing regular signature updates.

Where can I get Microsoft Windows AntiSpyware?
http://www.microsoft.com/athome/security/spyware/software/default.mspx

Recently a flaw in two of Microsoft Office’s applications was revealed by a researcher Hongjun Wu from the Institute for Infocomm Research, Singapore. Microsoft’s response to the issue has been rather inadequate; the so called 'RC4 flaw' could allow data to be recovered from files that have version history.

Interview at Techworld.com with Phil Zimmermann:
http://www.techworld.com/security/news/index.cfm?NewsID=3027

Following a report on the Australian whirlpool forums, there is a new possible worm in the wild. Similar to ‘Slammer’ and ‘SQLSnake’ in that it targets vulnerable MySQL servers, there is potential for this new worm to wreak havoc.

 SANS Internet Storm Center is suggesting that a rise in port 3306 scans could be a result of this new worm. Apparently the worm creates a file called ‘spoolcll.exe’.

Recommendation:

Until this worm has been identified and a hotfix or solution provided, it is recommended that Admin’s of Windows MySQL systems keep a close eye on their boxes and the above file appearing on their machines.

Symantec, one of the world’s largest security software firms famous for the Norton brand name is expected to announce a plug-and-pay email security email appliance in conjunction with its partner IronPort.

IronPort looks to be part of a four year deal to bundle Symantec software with its appliances.

As information security becomes a more and more lucrative market, analysts are suggesting that a long term relationship to be unlikely. For now though, Symantec will be increasing their user base and strengthening their market share.

Developers of the Mozilla Thunderbird project say they have developed an anti-phishing tool that will be included in the next release of their popular open source email application.

This new virus is reportedly utilizing the latest CNN headlines to make its email subject lines appear more legitimate.

The attachment with the email, when executed will install a back door Trojan and a keystroke logger could also snare a victim's log-in information.

Sophos who has identified the virus is classifying it as a worm.

This is not the first worm to use the concept of dynamic content to appear legitimate.

Financial services companies remain the most frequent targets of online phishing schemes, according to the latest figures released by an organisation working to fight the scams.

The Anti-Phishing Working Group (APWG) is reporting 9,019 unique scams just over the course of December 2004. This equates to a 6 percent increase over the previous month. Compared with the 2,625 reported attacks during July 2004, this number indicates a 38 percent increase in six months.

Netcraft a British web monitoring firm has released a toolbar for Internet Explorer that can help people avoid Phishing scams.

Called the Netcraft Toolbar, the free-of-charge plug-in to Microsoft's popular IE browser uses Netcraft's database of web site information to show several attributes of any visited site, including its country location, longevity, and popularity.

Apple Computer released its first security patch of 2005 this week in order to plug some holes in its Mac OS X operating system.

Security Update 2005-001 for Mac OS X addresses issues with Apple's "at" commands, library (libxml2), ColorSync, Safari and Mail programs as well as specific problems found in PHP and third-party supplied "SquirrelMail."

According to the SpamHaus Project--a U.K.-based antispam compiler of blacklists that block 8 billion messages a day -- a new piece of malicious software has been created that takes over a PC for the purpose of sending spam.

’Bluesnarfing’ is the theft of information from a wireless device through a Bluetooth connection. Bluetooth is a high-speed but very short-range wireless technology for exchanging data between desktop and mobile computers, personal digital assistants (PDAs), and other devices. By exploiting a vulnerability in the way Bluetooth is implemented on a mobile phone, an attacker can access information -- such as the user's calendar, contact list and e-mail and text messages -- without leaving any evidence of the attack.

A Miami businessman is suing Bank of America over $90,000 he says was stolen from his online banking account in a case that highlights the thorny question of who is responsible when a customer's computer is hacked into.

Joe Lopez, 42, said in a complaint filed Thursday in Circuit Court in Miami that Bank of America was negligent and failed to protect him from online banking risks it knew about.

From the SAM website:
SAM is a program to monitor (in real-time) the number of alerts generated by Snort. Having recently set up Snort and ACID I felt like there was something missing.

Snort was great for identifying suspicious traffic and ACID was great for digging in to the details but I needed something that was a little higher overview and able to sounds alarms if certain conditions were met.

For instance if I was attacked 100 times in a 5 minutes period. SAM does not replace Snort or ACID but rather it compliments them.

Where can I get SAM and SNORT?:
SAM - http://freesoftware.lookandfeel.com/sam/
SNORT - http://www.snort.org/

Microsoft on Thursday gave early warning that next week's monthly dose of security bulletins and patches will be among its biggest ever.

According to the Advance Notification service, which pre-announces upcoming patches but limits the information disclosed, next Tuesday's roundup will include 13 security bulletins, at least three of which will be marked "Critical" the Redmond, Wash.-based developer's most dire warning.

Scammers are taking advantage of recent news that Microsoft is asking users to verify that they have a legitimate copy of Windows, a security firm said Friday.

According to Websense Security Labs, e-mails bearing the spoofed address of security@microsoft.com and with the heading "Microsoft Windows Update" ask recipients to update and/or validate both the Windows' serial number and the customer's credit card information on a Web site.

A 24-year-old former American Online software engineer pleaded guilty Friday to stealing 92 million screen names and e-mail addresses and selling them to spammers, setting off an avalanche of up to seven billion unsolicited e-mails.

The soft-spoken Jason Smathers of Harpers Ferry, W. Va., entered the plea to conspiracy charges in U.S. District Court in Manhattan, where he was likely to face from 18 months to two years in prison at a May 20 sentencing.

The FBI said Friday it has shut down an e-mail system that it uses to communicate with the public because of a possible security breach.

The bureau is investigating whether someone hacked into the www.fbi.gov e-mail system, which is run by a private company, officials said.

A worm spreading via the MSN Messenger instant messaging client carries a piggyback payload that's even more dangerous: a second worm that opens a backdoor and lets hackers hijack the PC.

The newest variant of the Bropia worm -- tagged as Bropia.f, Bropia.g, Bropia.e, or Bropia.j by various anti-virus firms in an unusual display of naming chaos -- spreads through MSN Messenger. Users who receive the file and open it see a mildly-funny .jpg of a roasted chicken posed to resemble a naked sunbather, complete with tan lines.

Hacker group "Shmoo" demonstrated an amazing new browser exploit to the audience of Shmoocon.
The exploit allows ANY domain name to be hi-jacked from a link, including its SSL secure addresses.

Their example showed a joke page being masked by eBays address. Surprisingly enough its not Microsoft Internet Explorer this time that is venerable. All other browsers however are currently susceptible to the attack.

RSA Security is preparing to deliver a powerful authentication solution for the long-neglected small to medium-sized business (SMB) market. Called the RSA SecurIDR Appliance, the two-factor authentication appliance will be formally announced Thursday. It will be demonstrated at next week's RSA Conference, in San Francisco.

More than half of 2,000 European consumers surveyed in a recent Capgemini study say they had privacy worries about radio-frequency identification tags. European consumers participating in the study by the business and IT consulting firm consider legislation on privacy protection as the key that would make them more likely buy RFID-enabled products.

Other factors survey respondents considered crucial: the ability to disable RFID tags at the store after purchase, a customer opt-in/opt-out choice regarding information collected via the tags, and clear labels that state the tag is RFID-enabled.

About 80% of mobile phone users worldwide have received spam, according to a study of consumers and mobile operators released Wednesday. That's bad news for mobile operators because most of the users who have received mobile spam blame the operators, according to the study. More specifically, the study found that users are more likely to change operators than mobile phone numbers to fight mobile spam.

Symantec on Tuesday released patches for a vulnerability found in a large number of its products, including flagship titles such as BrightMail AntiSpam, AntiVirus Corporate Edition, and its 2004 consumer slate.

According to rival Internet Security Systems' X-Force research group, which discovered the flaw, the bug is in the DEC2EXE module of the Symantec Antivirus Library, a part of the scanning engine that's able to peek into compressed executable files squeezed with the UPX (Ultimate Packer for eXecutables) format.

Pfizer Inc. and Microsoft Corp. said on Thursday they filed parallel lawsuits against Web site operators and spam advertisers that sell illegal versions of Pfizer's Viagra.

The companies said the lawsuits follow a seven-month investigation to discover the identity of two Web site operators together with those advertising them via spam e-mails.

It didn't take hackers long to start banging hard on the vulnerabilities Microsoft disseminated Tuesday.
Just a day after the Redmond, Wash.-based developer rolled out a dozen advisories containing 16 vulnerabilities, 10 of them tagged as "Critical," exploit code has gone public for one, Microsoft said late Wednesday.

Malware aimed at disabling Microsoft Corp.'s anti-spyware product has been discovered by security experts who expect the virus to be the first of many to follow.

The Trojan horse, which is also designed to steal online banking passwords from Windows computers, was discovered by security experts at Sophos Plc and Symantec Corp.

Along with the plethora of patches released Tuesday, Microsoft also revised its free Windows Malicious Software Removal Tool for the first time, and as promised earlier, automatically added it to Windows XP users' download lists when they accessed Windows Update.

The tool, which debuted last month, has been enhanced so it now detects and deletes -- or tries to -- all instances of the Korgo, Netsky, Zafi, and Randex worm families.

Sutter, California, the only grade school in this rural town, is requiring students to wear radio frequency identification badges that can track their every move. Some parents are outraged, fearing it will take away their children's privacy.

The badges introduced at Brittan Elementary School on Jan. 18 rely on the same radio frequency and scanner technology that companies use to track livestock and product inventory. Similar devices have recently been used to monitor youngsters in some parts of Japan.

The days running up to Feb. 14 are when employees are at the greatest risk of running afoul of company e-mail policies, a message firm said Tuesday.

Clearswift warned workers not to fall for the e-mail and Web security pitfalls that are prevalent around Valentine's Day.

As part of an aggressive drive to expand channel sales, security vendor McAfee this week will launch a deal registration program for eligible channel partners selling certain high-end products.

The deal registration program applies to some 500 solution providers selling the company's intrusion prevention solution (IPS) and antivirus appliances.

The Liberty Alliance Project on Friday unveiled the public draft release of a framework for identity-based web services.

The latest release of ID-WSF 2.0 is the first of three that will each add greater depth to the identity-management framework. The final specification including all three releases is expected to be available by end of the year.

Security vendor McAfee, Inc. this week launched an on-line Wi-Fi security scanning service and said that it is developing a standalone WLAN security product that will be released later this year.
 
The company's free online WiFiScan product was launched this week on the company's Web site. It downloads an ActiveX control that scans your wireless network and warns about potential security breaches and describes how to fix them. It can detect, for instance, the presence of an Evil Twin threat, as well as what networks and network-enabled devices are near-by.

Computer hackers captured the names, Social Security numbers and other information of more than 30,000 students and staff at George Mason University earlier this month, school officials said Monday.

The university, which is in Fairfax, near Washington D.C., discovered on Jan. 3 that intruders had hacked into a server containing the protected information, school spokesman Daniel Walsch said. He said the university notified all students and staff.

Technology executives from some of the U.S.'s biggest computer software and hardware companies on Thursday urged the Bush administration to create a national commission on organized cybercrime.

The 15 chief technology officers -- from companies such as Adobe, Dell, HP, Microsoft, IBM, Veritas, Symantec, and McAfee -- met with members of Congress, White House officials, and their counterparts in federal agencies to plead their case.

Virus makers will push into the virgin territories of cell phones, handhelds, and embedded computers, perhaps even those used in cars, IBM's annual security report said this week.

IBM's 2004 Global Business Security Index both summarizes the year past -- something virtually every major security vendor has done during December and January -- and puts the spotlight on the trends it sees for 2005.

Hewlett-Packard on Friday rolled out a software add-on for its ProLiant servers and HP BladeSystem that shuts down the inside-the-network spread of worms or viruses within milliseconds.

With the catchy name of Virus Throttle, the software eschews the traditional anti-virus technique of comparing possible malicious code against a database of signatures, and instead watches for virus-like behavior and then quarantines the infected machine until an administrator can figure out what's going on.

Security vendor Symantec Monday unveiled a new version of its flagship anti-virus software that includes tools to remove spyware and repair any resulting damage. The product, Symantec AntiVirus Corporate Edition 10.0, was launched at the RSA Conference in San Francisco.

While Symantec's anti-spyware capabilities come months after competitors McAfee and Check Point Software Technologies launched their own wares, the Symantec product is the first to feature spyware repair tools. According to Kevin Haley, group product manager, this is precisely what sets the Symantec product apart.

Netcraft has the story that Mozilla has decided to drop support for international domain names in future versions of its Firefox Web browser. The decision comes after demonstrations by the Schmoo Group that the feature can be used to aid in phishing scams and other browser naughtiness.

The attack can be disabled in Firefox and Mozilla by setting 'network.enableIDN' to false in the browser's configuration (enter about:config in the address bar to access the configuration functions). The Mozilla development team today made this the default setting. Users who want IDN support will be able to turn it on, but will be warned about the risks involved.

At the 14th annual RSA Conference in San Francisco on Tuesday, Microsoft chairman and chief software architect Bill Gates highlighted some of the company's progress toward its Trustworthy Computing initiative, which began more than three years ago. Before a standing-room-only crowd, Gates also outlined some of the company's short-term plans to help its customers bolster their security.

In the opening keynote, Gates said Microsoft will release Internet Explorer 7 later this year with improved security capabilities, including anti-phishing technology. The new version of IE had been slated to be released as part of the next version of Windows, not due until next year, but the company decided to release it sooner to improve security.

The Los Angeles Times is reporting that the good folks at Macrovision have unveiled a new system that will thwart 97% of existing DVD copying software while maintaining compatibility with existing DVD players.

Macrovision claims that DVD copying results in $1 billion loss for studios out of $27.5 billion in sales. With piracy resulting in only 4% loss, why are the studios making such a big deal? The article also reports (mistakenly) that the market is pressing 100s of billions of DVD annually.

Who's buying all those DVDs?" I'm skeptical of their claims, since historically Macrovision's anti-copying measures have been little more than easily circumvented snake oil, but maybe this time they've got their plan down.

SAN JOSE, Calif. (AP) -- Unwanted programs that spy on PC users, deliver pop-up ads and track Web surfing habits will be a hot topic at a security conference that's usually more focused on viruses, hackers and the encryption of sensitive information. So-called spyware and adware have been around for years but have largely been viewed as more of an annoyance than a security threat.

Symantec and McAfee leveraged the RSA Conference Monday to launch enterprise-wide battles against spyware. Both major security vendors touted new enterprise anti-spyware solutions.

As recently as a year ago, attention to spyware was low on the enterprise totem pole, said David Friedlander, a senior analyst with Forrester. Not so now. In 2005, he predicted, 65 percent of U.S. companies will purchase or upgrade anti-spyware software, making the category the most-purchased security technology for the year.

A Louisianan has pleaded guilty to sending an email virus that caused WebTV users' computers to dial the 911 emergency service without their knowledge.

David Jeansonne of Metairie, Louisiana admitted he sent email to 20 WebTV subscribers carrying a virus in an attachment in July 2002. Once opened, the attachment changed the dial-in telephone number in the user's WebTV box to 911. The next time the user attempted to log in to WebTV, the computer dialled 911 instead of the local modem telephone number supplied to the user by WebTV to access its servers in Santa Clara.

"This prompted unnecessary emergency police dispatches at numerous locations around the country in July 2002," said the U.S. Attorney's office for the Northern District of California in a statement.

"At least 10 WebTV users reported that the local police either called or visited their residences in response to the unnecessary 9-1-1 calls."

The 44-year-old man faces up to 10 years in prison and a fine of $250,000.

During his keynote speech at the at the RSA Security Conference Bill Gates announced that the Microsoft AntiSpyware will be offered for free.

'We've looked hard at the nature of this problem, and made a decision that this anti-spyware capability will become something that's available at no additional charge for Windows users -- both the blocking capability, and the scanning and removal capabilities.'

A HITHERTO OBSCURE security expert and software colossus, based in Redmond and called Microsoft has warned of a new generation of spyware that is almost impossible to detect.

According to Computerworld, Volish experts told the RSA security conference that system monitoring programs, or "kernel rootkits", are undergoing a transformation at the moment.

Security experts have raised the risk assessment to medium on the recently discovered Mydoom.bb@MM worm, also known as Mydoom.bb, after receiving reports that the infection is spreading in the wild.

According to McAfee's Avert antivirus team, more than 50 reports of the virus being stopped or infecting users from the field have been recorded. Most of these reports have arrived from the US, though Avert has also received reports from Australia and the UK.

RUSTON, La. (AP) -- The way you type is as unique as your eye color or speech patterns and can be used instead of a password to protect your computer, researchers at Louisiana Tech and Penn State say.

Their discovery will bring Louisiana Tech its first direct royalty income, university president Daniel D. Reneau said in signing a joint licensing agreement with BioPassword Inc. of Issaquah, Wash.

Microsoft has begun reminding users who last year blocked the installation of Windows XP Service Pack 2 (SP2) that a deadline is fast approaching. On April 12, all blocking mechanisms will expire and Windows XP and XP SP1 systems will automatically download and update to SP2.

"The intent of this alert is to provide you with a reminder about the upcoming deadline around the date on which Automatic Update (AU) and Windows Update (WU) will deliver Windows XP SP2 regardless of the presence of the blocking mechanism," said Microsoft.

Microsoft will start beta testing its all-in-one Microsoft Update in mid-March, according to an e-mail to potential beta testers. Microsoft is looking for a cross-section of users familiar with not only Windows, but also Office, SQL Server, and Exchange.

Tuesday, Microsoft's chairman and chief technologist announced Microsoft Update, a consolidated update service that would blend now-separate sites and services for the company's operating systems and applications.

A variation of the infamous Nigerian scam starring Saddam Hussein and various henchmen is circulating via e-mail, said a U.K. security firm Friday.

According to BlackSpider Technologies, spam hitting the U.K. is offering a share in the private fortunes of Hussein and his closest aids in return for hiding large amounts of money in British bank accounts.

"Cabir" is the name of the first Mobile Phone Virus in the U.S. 8 Months ago, it was first discovered in the Philippines. So far the virus has spread to twelve countries, and could pose as a threat to 1.5 billion cell phone users.  
 Mikko Hypponen, the director of "Finish Anti-Virus" Stated that the main problem occurring from the virus is damage to the battery.

It is thought that the very first transfer of the virus was in an gadget store. Two cell phones in a window were infected by a passer-by. Using Bluetooth to make the transfer, It's possible that other cell phones in the area could have been infected.

Build a big user base and the malicious-code writers will come. That's the logic that analysts and security software companies alike are following as they warn that smartphones and other mobile devices will become significant targets for security threats in 2005. In response, antivirus company Trend Micro is offering a free download and updates for one of the first software products for protecting smartphones and other handheld devices.

Trend Micro Mobile Security software is available at www.trendmicro.com/ mobilesecurity and will remain free until June 2005. On its initial release, the software supports Microsoft's Windows Mobile 2003 operating system. In January, an update will support the Symbian OS 7.0 with UIQ 2.0/2.1. The software works very much like antivirus software on a PC and also protects against SMS (Short Message Service) spam.

A Microsoft presentation at this week's RSA Conference has some observers concerned about a recurring nightmare of computer security: Rootkits.

A rootkit is a malicious program that uses system hooks to conceal its presence on the system. For instance, it monitors if the user opens the Windows Task Manager in order to keep itself out of the list of processes. It filters directory listings to remove its own files from them. The rootkits could be everywhere, living among us, and we wouldn't know!

With a powerhouse like Microsoft becoming a direct competitor, they could get squeezed out.

Last week, Microsoft Chairman Bill Gates (news - web sites) confirmed plans to sell antivirus products to both consumers and big businesses by the end of the year. But the Redmond company is mum on cost and features.

If Microsoft Corp. doesn't do more to stem Internet attacks, the company risks further alienating customers unhappy with the multitude of threats already facing its ubiquitous software.

Sell its own security products, on the other hand, and Microsoft faces a potential backlash from some of its allies — the companies that now provide an extra layer of security for its Windows operating system, Internet Explorer browser and other products.

Spam accounted for more than 80 percent of business e-mails last year, and the arms race against it continues this year. Of particular interest to enterprises is the SMTP gateway, or edge protection, to stop not only spam but also spam precursors such as directory harvest attacks.

Microsoft Corp., of Redmond, Wash., earlier this month acquired e-mail security vendor Sybari Software Inc. with plans to add Sybari's anti-spam and anti-virus software to its server products, including Exchange.

Microsoft Corp.'s Belgian subsidiary has launched an electronic ID card pilot program and is looking to integrate authentication for e-ID cards into future versions of the MSN Messenger instant messaging service.

Microsoft Belgium on Monday announced a new Electronic ID Early Adopter program. Under the program, Microsoft will be working with local software vendors to develop e-ID-based applications. Microsoft's MSN division will develop one such application—an authentication service for MSN, according to Microsoft officials.

T-Mobile commented on their security. Apparently someone might have knew her account password and gain access to her data. Maybe her PC is hacked?

T-Mobile is investigating the reported disclosure of Paris Hilton's information.

T-Mobile's computer forensics and security team is actively investigating to determine how Ms. Hilton's information was obtained. This includes the possibility that someone had access to one of Ms. Hilton’s devices and/or knew her account password.

Given the sensitivity of the situation, and to protect our customers' information, we are not able to provide specific details of the investigation at this point.

The merged Symantec Corp. and Veritas Software Corp. will become a leader in more than a half-dozen product categories. The post-merger Symantec will be not only a dominant security vendor but also a front-runner in backup, recovery and utility computing.

To capitalize on that opportunity, the merged company must integrate two disparate product portfolios, ease investor worries and convince enterprise customers that bringing security and backup together will help them manage their networks more efficiently.

The FBI reports that unsolicited e-mails which look like they come from fbi.gov contain attachments with a computer virus in them. The FBI is investigating this matter. It says its unrelated to a security breach that happened earlier this month.

The e-mails state that recipients have been to illegal web sites and that "Internet Fraud Complaint Center" is monitoring how they use the internet.

The FBI states: "Recipients of this or similar solicitations should know that the FBI does not engage in the practice of sending unsolicited e-mails to the public in this manner."

A critical vulnerability was spotted Thursday in the anti-virus engine used by Trend Micro's entire line of client, server, and gateway security products, the third such disclosure this month of flaws in major security firms' software.

As in the other two instances with Symantec and F-Secure, the Trend Micro vulnerability was discovered by Internet Security Systems, an Atlanta-based security provider, and revolved around the processing of a compressed file format.

Opera Software ASA on Friday released the second beta version of the next release of its desktop browser, which includes a new anti-spoofing feature.

The latest beta, available for download through the Opera site, displays security information inside the address bar that can help the user determine the legitimacy of a website. By clicking on the small, yellow security bar, the user can get information on the validity of the site's security certificate.

On the heels of the release of Firefox 1.0.1, officials at Mozilla Foundation on Thursday laid out the near-term roadmap for updates to that browser, as well as the Mozilla suite and the Thunderbird e-mail client.

Next on the release track, said Aza Dotzler in a posting to the Mozilla site, will be Thunderbird, the stand-alone e-mail client that the foundation's pitching as a Microsoft Outlook replacement. Like Firefox's update Thursday, Thunderbird 1.0.1 will be a minor upgrade, and should hit the Internet the middle of next week, Dotzler said.

Mozilla 1.7.6, may also ship next week, Dotzler added, and will include many of the same security fixes as in Firefox 1.0.1 and Thunderbird 1.0.1. "I'm usually overly-optimistic but I think we can get that out next week too," wrote Dotzler in his posting.

The first beta of Mozilla 1.8 will appear after that, with beta 2 expected in about three weeks.

Mozilla 1.8, Firefox 1.1, and Thunderbird 1.1 are all on schedule to ship by the middle of the year.

It may not be the second Tuesday of the month -- Microsoft's normal day to release security bulletins and patches -- but the Redmond, Wash.-based developer has posted a critical fix to Windows XP Service Pack 2 (SP2) on its Windows Update site, and pushed it to users relying on Automatic Update.

The problem, which has actually been public since December 2004, also affects Windows Server 2003 and Windows XP Tablet PC Edition 2005. In some cases, installing third-party anti-virus or firewall software -- Microsoft didn't name makers or package titles -- can bring down the operating system in a Blue Screen of Death with a cryptic error that reads "Stop 0x05 (INVALID_PROCESS_ATTACH_ATTEMPT)."

While Mozilla Firefox has slowed its growth pace, the open-source browser still is making enough inroads to knock Microsoft's Internet Explorer below 90 percent user share for the first time in three years.

Web browser user-share data released Monday show that Firefox's rate of growth has dropped slightly since its Version 1.0 release. The browser had been increasing about one percentage point a month since November, but the pace has fallen this month, reports Web analytics provider WebSideStory Inc.

Following the lead of a number of European banks and financial institutions, eTrade Financial Corp. on Tuesday announced that it plans to offer its online banking customers the option of using RSA Security Inc.'s SecurID tokens as an added layer of security for online transactions.

This deal makes eTrade the first major financial institution in the United States to offer two-factor authentication to its customers, a service that many security experts and chief security officers in the financial industry see as a necessity if online banking is to continue to expand. Many banks in the U.K. and Europe offer two-factor authentication options for their customers, including a variety of different one-time password solutions.

Anti-virus vendors are raising the alarm over another batch of Bagle worm mutants crawling through e-mail networks.

The latest variants have been equipped with Trojan horse downloaders and new propagation techniques that have led to wide distribution, according to a warning from Lynnfield, Mass.-based Sophos Inc.

COLORADO SPRINGS, Colo. — The National Security Agency has specified elliptic-curve cryptography (ECC) for a wide range of key agreement and digital signature tasks.

Only about one in five companies is "completely prepared" for the next virus attack, according to the results of a survey of 150 IT professionals who manage software updates for their companies. The biggest problem when businesses are hit by a virus is user downtime.

The survey, completed last month by research firm InsightExpress and commissioned by SupportSoft Inc., a developer of software for managing software updates, portrays patch management as an ongoing issue that poses a variety of risks.

For example, patching still takes a week or longer at about a quarter of companies. That compares with 19% of respondents who say their IT organizations distribute patches to all computers within hours and 57% that do the job in days.

Microsoft is giving security administrators a day off next Tuesday.

One month after releasing a whopping dozen bulletins to cover 17 security flaws in a range of products, Microsoft Corp. announced that there would be no new advisories this month.

Online auctioneer eBay, a prime target for phishing schemes, has been used as an unwitting accomplice. A flaw in eBay's server configuration paves the way for spoofing attacks when a specially crafted URL, which is a valid eBay link, is used to redirect users to a malicious Web site.

eBay was made aware of the issue several days ago, but has not yet corrected the problem, which can be used to exploit the trust relationship between eBay and its users.

BOSTON (AP) -- A computer hacker gained access to internal admissions records at Harvard, Stanford and other top business schools, then helped applicants log on and learn their fate weeks ahead of schedule, officials said Thursday.

Few of the people who followed the hacker's directions managed to find out if their applications have been accepted, according to school officials. But many of them could end up getting rejected now that the schools are checking to see who tried to exploit the security breach.

An article at CNN discusses the how Phishers have moved beyond the typical email scam.

Last month, Secunia (Danish security firm) documented a case where a phisher somehow modified a windows host file so that when you type in the correct url in the address, it redirects you to the phisher site.

Worms and spyware are being built for the purpose of phishing, and it is also believed that phishers are attempting to compromise domain name servers.

If one of these go down millions could lose their security instantly, even if they themselves have maintened the security of their computers.

A typical company with 3,000 employees spends $2 million to $7 million combating spam each year, according to research firm Gartner.

One of the fastest-growing Internet threats, spyware, is expected to drive these costs even higher.

Research firm IDC expects anti-spyware spending to climb from $31 million in 2004 to $305 million by 2008.

In an effort to resurrect its maligned managed security service effort, McAfee will unveil this week a new service to provide small and midsize businesses with hosted antivirus protection.

Available only to solution providers in McAfee's SecurityAlliance partner program, the new Partner Security Service gives solution providers a more flexible contract under which to work and offers expanded upselling opportunities, the partners said.

Directory harvest attacks, brute-force assaults on enterprise e-mails systems by spammers hoping to score valid addresses, were at an all-time high in February, a message security vendor reported this week.

According to Redwood City, Calif.-based messaging filtering firm Postini, DHAs were launched by spammers at a crippling rate.

Doomsday scenarios regarding PDA and wireless viruses have been circulating since 2000, when the first PDA-specific virus, Phage 1.0, surfaced. 2001 was to be the year of the wireless virus, according to both IDC and Gartner. Four years later, the soothsayers are back, proclaiming the dangers of these airborne attacks. Should we listen this time?

Last year, two new worms surfaced--skulls.a and cabir.a--that had a far greater impact on the popular psyche than on systems. Cabir.a was clearly devised as a proof of concept. The worm's only danger was that it dramatically reduced battery life for Bluetooth devices. Why were these harmless viruses being trumpeted as signs of a forthcoming mobile Armageddon?

Spyware doesn't just install itself by magic — although it can certainly seem that way. Typically, users need to visit a spyware-infested site and take some action to cause a spyware module to be installed. Sometimes just clicking to exit an annoying popup will do it. Knowing when to click — and more important, when not to click --— takes some experience and knowledge.

Knowledge and a few key tools will give you confidence to help keep your systems spyware-secure.

Over the years, banks have taken numerous steps to increase personal security in the ATM lobby. First, to get in, you need to swipe a card or have someone hold the door for you.

Then, in a canny move designed to cut down on extraneous traffic, the banks have removed all of the ink from the courtesy pens attached to the fixtures. Finally, they've installed rearview mirrors on the ATMs to give you a moment's warning that you're about to be robbed.

Identity theft continues to be consumers' top complaint, and ID theft-related complaints are on the rise. Consumers filed 246,570 total identity theft-related complaints in 2004, up from 215,093 in 2003, according to government statistics released in February by the Federal Trade Commission.

Bank-related identity theft comprised 18 percent of all ID theft complaints.

The National Security Agency built a version of Linux with more security tools that its technologists believe could help make the country's computing infrastructure less vulnerable.

They've won over the Linux developer community with the changes. But success depends on its adoption by U.S. companies and government agencies, something that remains very much in doubt.

For more than a decade, the National Security Agency has worked on a way to use a computer's operating systems to control how software applications and users can access data. The agency succeeded years ago in creating these "mandatory access-control" features for specialized operating systems, but very few users deployed them.

Taking a gamble in 2000 on the emerging Linux operating system, NSA started applying its security approach to the open-source code. The result is Security Enhanced Linux, which it hopes can raise the nation's overall level of cybersecurity.

Using passwords and identifications from legitimate customers, thieves broke into databases owned by information company LexisNexis and stole personal information on about 32,000 U.S. citizens, the company's corporate parent said Wednesday.

The incident was the second breach of personal data announced in the last month by a major data broker. ChoicePoint Inc. in February said scam artists had tricked the Alpharetta, Ga., company into handing over 145,000 records containing Social Security numbers and other personal information on people in 50 states.

In the LexisNexis case, the names, addresses and Social Security and drivers' license numbers of 32,000 individuals were stolen from the company's recently acquired Seisint unit, Anglo-Dutch publishing company Reed Elsevier Group PLC said in a statement. LexisNexis officials were assisting U.S. law enforcement officials in investigating the incident.

Database archiving vendor Princeton Softech has announced a major new release of its Archive for Servers and Relational Tools product focusing on security enhancements.

Version 6.0 now allows organizations to better define who has access to specific data and specify business policies for archiving.

These types of enhanced security features are a step forward for database archiving, said Raymond Paquet, a vice president at Gartner Inc. in Stamford, Conn.

The explosion of Wi-Fi networks both in businesses and in public hotspots is needlessly exposing businesses and individual users to security risks because proper precautions aren't taken, according to research released Thursday by RSA Security.

The report, which studied wireless networks in major U.S. and European cities, found that more than one-third of businesses with wireless networks are susceptible to intrusion from unwanted sources.

The U.S. House of Representatives moved on its anti-spyware bill Wednesday by unanimously voting it out of committee and sending it to the House floor for consideration.

In a vote of 43-0, the Energy and Commerce Committee passed the Spy Act (Securely Protect Yourself Against Cyber Trespass Act), but only after one final amendment that specifically called out "Web bugs" (which also go by "Web beacons") as legal. Wednesday's amendment also legalized persistent, embedded advertisements, something that was forbidden in earlier editions of the bill.

Hundreds of thousands of Web sites running Windows NT 4 remain -- and will remain -- at risk from attack via a vulnerability patched for other operating systems a month ago, a U.S.-based security firm and a British-based Web monitoring vendor said Thursday.

The bug in a key Windows protocol, Server Message Block (SMB), was patched for Windows XP, Windows Server 2003, and Windows 2000 in February, but because NT 4 had reached the end of its support lifecycle December 31, 2004, no public fix was issued by Microsoft.

If money is the root of all evil, then hackers are evil incarnate. According to a security intelligence firm, more than half the cyber-attacks conducted in 2004 were carried out by criminals interested in only one thing: money.

iDefense, a Reston, Va.-based supplier of security intelligence to both corporations and government agencies, delved into its private database of more than 100,000 malicious code attacks to publish analytical findings publicly for the first time, said Ken Dunham, the company's director of research.

Although Microsoft didn't release any new security bulletins in March, it did post revisions Tuesday of two critical vulnerabilities from earlier in 2005 to provide patches for obsolete operating systems.

The two patches add Windows 98, Windows 98 SE, and Windows Me to the list of those fixed against a pair of vulnerabilities in January and February of this year.

Some useful citizen has created an installer that will nail IE with spyware, even if a surfer is using Firefox (or another alternative browser) or has blocked access to the malicious site in IE beforehand. The technique allows a raft of spyware to be served up to Windows users in spite of any security measures that might be in place.

Christopher Boyd, a security researchers at Vitalsecurity.org, said the malware installer was capable of working on a range of browsers with native Java support. "The spyware installer is a Java applet powered by the Sun Java Runtime Environment, which allows them to whack most browsers out there, including Firefox, Mozilla, Netscape and others. In the original test, only Opera and Netcaptor didn't fall for the install but Daniel Veditz, who is the head of Mozilla security, has since confirmed to me that this will also work in Opera and Netcaptor," he explained.

As more worms targeted Microsoft's MSN Messenger last week, a threat center devoted to tracking instant-messaging hacks released statistics that put numbers to what IM users already know: Instant-message threats are on the rise. According to the IMlogic Threat Center--an effort by vendors such as IMlogic, McAfee, and Symantec--IM and peer-to-peer exploits have exploded in 2005 and have grown 50% each month so far. The threat center has warned of more than 30 widespread incidents of IM or peer-to-peer viruses, worms, or other malicious code so far this year, Jon Sakoda, IMlogic's chief technology officer, said in a statement. Most--81%--were aimed at instant messengers.

Contrary to popular wisdom, Windows appears to be more secure than a popular version of Linux, according to an upcoming report from two security researchers.
The researchers found that Windows Server 2003 actually had fewer security vulnerabilities identified last year than Linux and that the holes in Windows took less time to patch.

But the study is already attracting controversy for its methodology. Linux proponents note that the two systems have different configurations and are not easily comparable since they contain different functionality out of the box.

A company that allegedly scared users into buying its software by offering to eradicate nonexistent spyware has been ordered to cease and desist by a U.S. court, the Federal Trade Commission said Friday.
The FTC filed against Spokane, Wash.-based MaxTheater and its principal, Thomas Delanoy, to stop the company from touting SpyWareAssassin through bogus "scans" claiming the user's PC was infected with spyware.

According to the FTC, which was awarded a temporary restraining order by a U.S. District Court on Friday, SpyWareAssassin used Web sites, banner ads, and popups to drive traffic to its Web site where the company warned "...you WILL eventually experience credit card and/or identity theft and your computer will crash and cease working for good."

Desktop defenses against spyware are ineffective, said a survey released Monday, an opinion backed by a security analyst wired into the identity theft scene.

Security appliance maker Blue Coat polled more than 300 IT professionals whose companies are using desktop-based anti-spyware solutions from vendors such as Computer Associates, Webroot, Symantec, Lavasoft, Microsoft, and Spybot, and found that nearly three out of four reported that current programs "are ineffective in preventing spyware from infecting their networks."

The survey, which was conducted last month and included IT managers from around the world working in small-, medium-, and large-sized enterprises, also found that spyware was becoming an ever-bigger blight. Eight-four percent of those surveyed said that the spyware problem is worse, or at best the same, as it was three months ago.

The U.S. government will join select partners of Microsoft in receiving security patches as early as a month before they become generally available. The early-access program, already available to some customers, provides beta test versions of patches so customers can be prepared when vulnerabilities are publicly disclosed.

Microsoft signed a $500 million software deal with the U.S. Air Force last year, which stipulated that the Air Force will join the Security Update Validation Program and test patches before they are officially released. In turn, the military will become a beta tester for Microsoft's updates.According to the Wall Street Journal, the Air Force will first receive the prerelease patches, which, following testing, will be distributed to other government agencies by the Department of Homeland Security.

Symantec on Tuesday released updated hotfixes for several of its gateway products that suffer from a vulnerability hackers have already used to poison DNS caches and redirect users to malicious sites.

Although Symantec released patches earlier this month for its Gateway Security 5300 and 5400 Series, the Windows and Solaris editions of its Symantec Enterprise Firewall, 7.0.x and 8.0, and its Symantec VelociRaptor, the new fixes "further hardens the DNSd for protection against an additional potential vector identified by Symantec engineers during our post-analysis," said the Cupertino, Calif.-based security firm in a bulletin on its Web site.

Spyware has reached such epidemic proportions that legislators in the US Congress as well as state legislatures are responding to public outrage by drafting bills to prohibit its distribution, stem abusive practices and protect Internet user privacy. Unfortunately, pending and recently enacted anti-spyware laws are considerably flawed and could actually cause more harm than good. In fact, many experts believe we'd be better off if we'd simply put more effort into enforcing existing laws that prohibit fraud and deceptive business practices. And nearly all knowledgeable parties acknowledge that spyware is a technology problem that requires a technology solution.
New Laws, Plenty Of Flaws

Three pieces of legislation are receiving attention and attracting most of the debate.

- Bill S.2145, the SPY BLOCK Act, seeks to "to regulate the unauthorized installation of computer software, to require clear disclosure to computer users of certain computer software features that may pose a threat to user privacy, and for other purposes.... "

McAfee released a new tool that helps small and midsize businesses centralize management of protection against viruses and spyware. The tool, dubbed the McAfee ProtectionPilot, was unveiled Wednesday and is part of the new McAfee SMB Editions product suites.

According to David Roberts, senior vice president of channels for North America at the Santa Clara, Calif.-based vendor, the new product will be sold exclusively through the channel.

"This is designed to make it easy for channel partners to get into managed services for the small- and medium-size business market," he said. "As we looked at the needs of the SMB customer, we realized that it was best to let our channel partners help them out."

Specifically, the ProtectionPilot gives customers a graphical dashboard that coordinates realtime virus and spyware information from all over the network. It also boasts a threat information monitor that automatically shows emerging viruses of medium and higher importance as identified by McAfee AVERT.

At least a million machines are under the control of hackers worldwide, said security experts in Germany, indicating that the bot and botnet problem is worse than anyone thought.
Using only three computers as "honeypots," machines deliberately left open to attack, thus attracting hackers and their bots so researchers can capture data on their actions, German security analysts at Aachen University were able to identify more than 100 botnets during a three-month project. Those botnets ranged in size from only a few hundred compromised PCs to several of up to 50,000 systems.

The volume, the Honeynet Project researchers said, was staggering. Even using conservative estimates, they projected over a million PCs worldwide are currently under the control of hackers running botnets.

Picture the world of voice traffic on the Internet as a dark and forbidding place, rife with mobsters, con artists and shadowy sellers of dubious products.

Now picture getting hundreds of calls from these people every day. Imagine your worst day ever of telemarketing, back before the Do Not Call list, and then magnify it 10 times over.

That's the depressing future of VOIP (voice over IP), according to a report just released by the Burton Group. According to analyst Daniel Golding, the report's author, low costs brought on by outsourcing and offshoring, coupled with VOIP communications that are essentially free, can bring you exactly that kind of future, unless you take precautions.

Microsoft will be doing a lot to make developers and customers happy with its pending Internet Explorer release, if partner sources with inside information on the IE 7.0 browser are right. But there's one area where Microsoft won't be winning a lot of applause.

The company will continue to drag its feet by refusing to provide full support for the CSS2 (Cascading Style Sheets Level 2) W3C (Worldwide Web Consortium) standard, Microsoft partners say.

Sources claiming familiarity with Microsoft's IE 7.0 plans said the company will add some additional CSS2 support to its new standalone browser.