  |
|
||||
|
Spying Takes Center StageBy Pedro HernandezOctober 6, 2006
 FTC Takes a Bite out of SpywareWill millions in fines scare spyware pushers into looking for another line of work? Unlikely. However, the FTC is starting to bare its teeth and it may be a sign that the government's tolerance to online hucksters is rapidly dwindling. Last month, the FTC slapped a $2 million fine on a spyware operation based in California. The crew, comprised of, Enternet Media, Conspy & Co., Lida Rohbani, Nima Hakimi and Baback Hakimi would ensnare users via pop-ups that promised to patch their buggy browsers or by offering music files and assorted online novelties. What users got instead were spyware infections that dutifully relayed details of their online activity to third parties at the cost of system performance and reliability. Now, they are effectively shut down. Whether it signals the end of spyware remains to be seen. HP Spying ScandalThough one outfit got their comeuppance, it was spying of a different sort that dominated tech headlines last month. Word came out that HP was spying on its board members to get to the bottom of some leaks to the press. Aside from the legal drama that ensued, the scandal added a new word to the IT security lexicon: pretexting. Pretexting, without putting too fine a point on it, is the act of obtaining records (in this case phone records) via subterfuge. Private investigators fooled phone companies into providing the records by providing info only account holders ought to have. To make matters worse, it looks like HP was seriously considering planting spies in news organizations - the living, breathing kind - as well as keyloggers. Despite the boardroom meltdown, it was larger than life personalities, some seemingly tailor-made for a tell-all book or screenplay, that added a dash of intrigue to the proceedings. They include Thomas J. Perkins, the wealthy rebel board member, a (now ex-) high-flying chairwoman, Patricia Dunn, and a new CEO, Mark Hurd, that has been successfully steering the languishing tech giant into a correction course after the glitzy reign of Carly Fiorina. All these elements have attracted attention -- too much attention from HP's standpoint. Now the FTC is looking into matters and criminal charges are flying fast and furious. Even Congress wants a piece of the action. How it ultimately plays out is anyone's guess. One thing is certain, corporate boardrooms will be feeling the effects in the years to come. Tough Month for MicrosoftA zero-day forced Microsoft to issue on off-schedule patch last month. Though September's Patch Tuesday fixed its share of big-ticket bugs, it was an XML flaw that had security watchers up in arms. No sooner than an exploit for a VML buffer overflow was discovered in IE did a zero-day pop up online. Unlike most malware that relies on unpatched systems or careless users, this was troubling because fully patched browsers could succumb to the code. Even those that avoid the seedier parts of the Web could become infected from hacked sites or spam that displayed in the preview panes of email clients that relied on IE to render HTML. Odds and Ends
eSecurity Planet Threat Alerts
...more alerts (archive here).
|
|
|
|
  |
|
|
||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
Rethinking the Datacenter
Putting the Green into IT
Managing the Modern Network
Evaluating Software as a Service for Your Business
Is Your Disaster Recovery Plan Good Enough? 
Email
Print
Digg This
Add to del.icio.us
