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Court rejects US government appeal in case of Microsoft overseas email

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A US appeals court won’t revisit its decision to deny Department of Justice efforts to make Microsoft turn over customer emails stored overseas.

According to Grant Gross of the IDG News Service, the US Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit ruled in a 4-4 decision that it will not reverse its July decision to deny DOJ access to the email of a drug trafficking suspect stored on a Microsoft server in Ireland. Microsoft has fought the DOJ requests for more than three years.

The DOJ has argued that tech companies are trying to avoid valid warrants by storing customer data outside the US.

Judges “readily acknowledge the gravity of this concern,” the IDG News Service reported. But the 31-year-old US Stored Communications Act (SCA) doesn’t allow worldwide search under a US warrant, Judge Susan Carney wrote. She added:

We recognize at the same time that in many ways the SCA has been left behind by technology. It is overdue for a congressional revision that would continue to protect privacy but would more effectively balance concerns of international comity with law enforcement needs and service provider obligations in the global context in which this case arose.

In December 2013, a magistrate judge approved a search warrant for all emails and other information belonging to the Microsoft user under investigation. Microsoft tried to block the warrant for customer data held in Dublin, arguing that US courts lack the jurisdiction to issue extraterritorial warrants.

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News in brief: 1984 tops bestseller charts; Alexa pleases Trekkies; HP extends battery recall

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Your daily round-up of some of the other security stories in the news

Orwell’s classic tops bestseller charts

Fears of a dystopian future have driven George Orwell’s classic novel 1984 to the top of Amazon’s best-seller lists since the weekend, when a TV host sparred with President Trump’s adviser, Kellyanne Conway, over the definition of the word “fact”.

Conway told NBC’s Chuck Todd that White House spokesman Sean Spicer had used “alternative facts” when falsely asserting to reporters that the crowd in Washington DC “was the largest audience ever to witness an inauguration – period”.

Penguin Books told CNN: “We put through a 75,000-copy reprint this week. That is a substantial reprint and larger than our typical reprint for 1984.” At the time of writing, the book was the number one bestseller on Amazon.com and number three on Amazon.co.uk.

Beam me up, Alexa

If you’re in the Venn diagram where Star Wars geeks and home assistant enthusiasts interface, rejoice: Amazon has just added a new “wake word” to its Echo and Echo Dot home assistants that you’ll like.

The default word to alert your device that it should listen up is “Alexa”, and until the most recent update was pushed out, you could change that either to “Echo” or “Amazon” – handy if you were uncomfortable with issuing orders to a clearly female name, for example.

Now you can also wake up your Echo or your Dot by saying “Computer”. However, although there are some Star Trek tricks up the Echo and Dot’s sleeves (ask it to “set phasers to stun”), the technology isn’t quite at the same level as LCARS. Yet.

HP recalls another 101,000 laptop batteries

Samsung has been in the spotlight over the past few months with its exploding battery issues, but it’s not the only tech company to have had problems with overheating power sources: HP has had to expand its notebook battery recall to 101, 000 further units after recalling 41,000 units in June.

A notice from the US Consumer Product Safety Commission warns that the affected batteries “can overheat, posing fire and burn hazards”.

The initial recall affected ProBook, Envy, Presario and Pavilion models, as well as others bought between March 2013 and August 2015. That recall has now been extended to laptops sold between March 2013 and October 2016.

Catch up with all of today’s stories on Naked Security

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Article source: http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/nakedsecurity/~3/MokjkPrrHZM/

It’s that time of the year again: Texas school district blabs staff tax documents to phishers

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A school district in Texas says it lost sensitive tax information from every worker after a single employee was duped by a phishing attack.

Dallas-Fort Worth news station NBC5 reports that the Argyle school district is warning its workers that their W-2 tax forms were lost in a phishing attack. (Workers in America have just started receiving their W-2 forms from their employers so they can complete their tax returns for the year.)

According to the news station, the breach was the result of one employee who received an email claiming to be from the district superintendent. The worker responded to the message and attached the W2-s of all district employees as requested.

The station says that the FBI and IRS have been notified and are investigating the incident, but so far they have not found the suspect. The school district says it will be offering all employees a year of free identity theft protection service.

It is believed that the W-2 forms will be used (or re-sold) for the purpose of filing fraudulent tax returns. Armed with the personal information on those forms (including worker social security numbers and salary information), criminals could potentially file fraudulent tax claims and then pocket the refunds for themselves.

Last year, a wave of fake returns was spotted following the loss of user account info from an IRS help website.

A similar wave of attacks last year was attributed to a break-in at payroll processing company ADP, and in 2015 a loss of accounting data was blamed for the loss of AU$9m from fraudulent returns. ®

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Article source: http://go.theregister.com/feed/www.theregister.co.uk/2017/01/25/texas_school_district_loses_w2s/

Kaspersky cybercrime investigator cuffed in Russian treason probe

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A top cybercrime investigator at Kaspersky Lab has been arrested by Russian police investigating alleged treason.

Ruslan Stoyanov, head of the investigation unit at the Kaspersky Lab, is under investigation for a period predating his employment at the security software firm.

“This case is not related to Kaspersky Lab,” the company said. “Ruslan Stoyanov is under investigation for a period predating his employment at Kaspersky Lab. We do not possess details of the investigation. The work of Kaspersky Lab’s Computer Incidents Investigation Team is unaffected by these developments.”

Russian language reports by Kommersant link Stoyanov’s arrest to an investigation into Sergei Mikhailov, deputy head of the information security department of the FSB (the Russian national security service). Both were arrested in December as part of a probe over the receipt of money from foreign companies.

Prior to joining Kaspersky Lab in 2012, Stoyanov worked in the private sector and before that served as a major in the Ministry of Interior’s cybercrime unit between 2000 and 2006. Stoyanov worked as lead investigator into a Russian hacking crew that extorted UK bookmakers through running DDoS attacks and more recently investigating the Lurk cybercrime gang.

Forbes, citing unnamed Russian information security sources, said the case against Stoyanov was filled under article 275 of Russia’s criminal code, meaning it could be handled by a military tribunal.

Article 275 allows the Russian government to prosecute when an individual provides assistance to a foreign state or organisation regarding “hostile activities to the detriment of the external security of the Russian Federation”. This is a broadly defined offence that might be taken to cover the sharing of threat intelligence data with foreign law enforcement or intel agencies. ®

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Article source: http://go.theregister.com/feed/www.theregister.co.uk/2017/01/25/kaspersky_cybercrime_investigator_cuffed/

Linux nasty kicks weak, hacked gadgets when they’re already down

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Several thousand Linux devices have been infected with a new Linux-based trojan, Russian security software firm Doctor Web warns.

The Linux-Proxy-10 Trojan infects network devices running Linux, turning them into a platform for cybercrime that allows crooks to remain anonymous online. Black hats run freeware code called the Satanic Socks Server on infected devices.

Miscreants hack into devices that are running with default passwords or are already infected with Linux malware in order to plant the malware.

Back in 2004, the Sasser worm removed infections caused by the MyDoom mass mailer worm on compromised systems. This kind of red-on-red action is messy and chaotic.

Last year’s Mirai worm showed the carnage that could result from abusing compromised IoT systems. The appearance of a new trojan that – like Mirai – takes advantage of default user credentials to infect IoT devices is therefore bad enough, without considering the possibility of more strains of malware capable of easily spreading onto already hacked devices. ®

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Article source: http://go.theregister.com/feed/www.theregister.co.uk/2017/01/25/linux_proxy_10_trojan/

The Cyber Threat From Russia and China: Myths and Realities

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Please login or register.

Back to Dark Reading Crash Course Calendar.

Article source: http://www.darkreading.com/the-cyber-threat-from-russia-and-china-myths-and-realities/l/d-id/1327902?_mc=RSS_DR_EDT

Cloud Is Security-Ready But Is Your Security Team Ready For Cloud?

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Cloud computing has moved beyond the early adopter phase and is now mainstream. Here’s how to keep data safe in an evolving ecosystem.

By now, most of us in IT are well aware of the technical and business advantages that moving to a cloud-based data center provides: the ability to dynamically scale network capacity as demand changes, reduction in capex costs associated with implementing, maintaining and staffing a physical data center, and being able to let employees share data anytime, anywhere and on any device.

These are compelling benefits. But there is still a lingering hesitancy among some organizations considering a move to the cloud. In my experience, most concerns boil down to two factors: a reluctance to put trusted data on a network that’s not on the premises, and confusion around the costs and complexity of moving to the cloud. Let’s take a closer look at the pluses and minuses surrounding these issues. If that’s what’s keeping an organization from the cloud, I have three points to share that should help them clear up the “cloudiness” (pun intended) and shine light on the possibilities.

When It Comes To Security, The Cloud Is Ready
If there is one roadblock that keeps IT teams leery about the cloud, it’s cybersecurity. And while cybersecurity will always be a concern, when it comes to the cloud, the industry is well-prepared. Leading public cloud providers, like Amazon AWS and Microsoft Azure, have made significant investments in securing their cloud environments and both companies offer robust security resources to cloud customers via the Microsoft Azure Trust Center or Amazon’s AWS Cloud Security.

Cloud providers are also building an expansive ecosystem of security technology partners who can provide cybersecurity solutions for the public cloud and Software-as-a-Service. These solutions, if implemented as a cohesive platform and not an ad hoc collection of security devices that don’t work well together, can provide a consistent and seamless security experience to both cloud-based and physical networks through consistent visibility, policy, and enforcement across the network regardless of a user’s location. Another plus is the Cloud Security Alliance, an industry consortium of companies that provides excellent resources to help cloud adopters address security concerns and stay up to date on the latest developments in cloud technology

Are You Ready for the Cloud?
Specifically, have you or your security team completed the necessary due diligence to identify the specific security functions required by your cloud solution? For example, AWS supports several native services that provide log and network flow information, such as CloudWatch and CloudTrail. Tools like these are powerful and highly configurable, provided you know how to use them and what you want from them.

Many enterprises may want to consider a third-party provider to do the integration work. This type of third-party approach will provide security, visibility, support, and long-term operational scale. When selecting a cloud integration partner, look for partners with certifications in cloud technology from vendors and industry organizations alike; Amazon, HP, and Microsoft. All offer certifications for their cloud platforms, and industry groups like the Cloud Security Alliance and the SANS Institute also offer cloud security training and certification.

You May Already Be in the Cloud (Even If You Don’t Know It)
Businesses need to move fast these days, and departments within an organization may take it upon themselves to adopt cloud technologies without bringing IT into the loop. It’s a long-standing trend known as “shadow IT,” and it’s causing headaches as IT departments try to stay on top of which applications are operating on their network. For organizations that feel that shadow IT isn’t a concern for their organization, I would point you to a survey Brocade conducted last year in which 83 percent of CIOs surveyed said they had experienced some level of unauthorized provisioning of cloud services within their organizations. It would seem the old cliché “If you can’t beat ‘em, join ‘em” is especially relevant to the cloud.

One way to get employees to leverage cloud services in the appropriate way is to publish policy templates for cloud platforms. Sales team wants to implement Salesforce via the cloud? No problem, provided the service is used by employees in ways that comply with existing security policy.

Hybrid Cloud Can Hedge Your Bets
Not everything has to go to the cloud, and maybe it shouldn’t for now. However, there are advantages to hosting certain computing or service functions in the cloud. The cloud is highly iterative, and new technologies and capabilities are being added to cloud infrastructures every day. For example, cloud platform providers are routinely enhancing the security telemetry features of their platforms to provide customers with real-time data that can be used to improve security. Additionally, many of the technologies used to secure physical data centers like next-generation firewalls, and threat intelligence subscriptions can easily be applied to new cloud-based networks to seamlessly protect data as it moves between physical and cloud-based data centers.

With a hybrid cloud implementation, organizations can hedge their bets: keep existing hardware-based network and datacenters in place and support new applications or satellite offices via the cloud as a way to gradually embrace a full public cloud implementation. This approach is sound, provided you’re using a traditional security platform that supports cloud integration. Sticking to a single security platform in a hybrid scenario is important for consistent visibility, policy enforcement and automated reprogramming of security technology regardless of location, existing network or new public cloud segments. Trying to add cloud technology from vendor A to an existing security platform from vendor B could result in gaps in the overall security posture, especially visibility that could be exploited to penetrate network defenses.

Cloud computing has moved beyond the early adopter phase and is now mainstream. Any organization that isn’t taking advantage of the benefits the cloud provides runs the risk of falling behind competitors that have.

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Frank Mong is senior vice president of product, industry and solutions for Palo Alto Networks. In this role, he is responsible for directing product marketing, industry (vertical) marketing and overall solutions (platform) marketing for the company’s entire portfolio.
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Article source: http://www.darkreading.com/cloud/cloud-is-security-ready-but-is-your-security-team-ready-for-cloud/a/d-id/1327973?_mc=RSS_DR_EDT

Saudi Arabia Issues Alert On Shamoon 2

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A new variant of the 2012 data-wiping malware that paralyzed Saudi Aramco has emerged.

An alert issued by the telecom authority of Saudi Arabia warns of a new variant of the 2012 Shamoon malware that has attacked several Saudi organizations including the labor ministry and a chemicals firm, reports Reuters.

The 2012 virus, described by Former US Defense Secretary Leon Panetta as perhaps the most destructive in a private business, had had a crippling effect on oil company Saudi Aramco.

State TV Al Ekhbariya tweeted that several organizations were hit by Shamoon 2, although reports claim data was not compromised in the labor ministry attack. According to sources, companies in the country’s petrochemicals hub were a target of the virus and they responded by shutting down their networks.

Shamoon overwrites the master book record and wipes computer disks.

Cybersecurity firm CrowdStrike has attributed the attack to hackers likely working on behalf of the Iranian government.

Read full story here.

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Article source: http://www.darkreading.com/attacks-breaches/saudi-arabia-issues-alert-on-shamoon-2/d/d-id/1327968?_mc=RSS_DR_EDT

This Week On Dark Reading: Event Calendar

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Devote some time and headspace to improving your skills with these Dark Reading events.

Amid the relentless pelting of alerts and news about emerging threats, it’s difficult for a security pro to find any time for self-improvement. We know. However, the attackers are always upping their games. Why not devote a little time and a little headspace to upping yours?

Dark Reading has a variety of events to help you do just that:

THIS WEEK

Thursday, Jan. 23, at 1 p.m. E.T., we’ve got another session recorded from the Cybersecurity Crash Course at Interop, Monitoring and Measuring Enterprise Security Posture, (Registration required.), presented by Rafal Los, Managing Director, Solutions Research and Development, Optiv.

Over the years, most enterprises have acquired a plethora of tools to detect and/or block security threats. But how can organizations monitor these tools to detect potential threats and measure the security posture of the enterprise? In this crash course learn how to monitor and report on an enterprise’s security posture, and how to use the data from multiple security systems to track down sophisticated threats.

NEXT WEEK

Tuesday, Jan. 31, at 1 p.m. E.T., meet us as we kick off a three-part series, “Preparing For The Ransomware Onslaught.” The first installment, presented by independent security consultant Gal Shpantzer, focuses on Ransomware Prevention, and will provide techniques for stopping ransomware in its tracks before it can run rampant through your environment.

Thursday, Feb. 2, at 1 p.m. E.T., in another session from the Dark Reading Cybersecurity Crash Course, David Bradford, chief security strategy officer and director of strategic partnership development for Advisen, will tackle the question “Cyber Insurance: Does It Really Work?” He’ll break down some of the questions you should ask yourself, your legal team, and your cyber insurance provider to make sure your policy does what you think it should. (Registration required.)

COMING SOON

Tuesday, Feb. 28, beginning at 11:00 a.m., we’ll host our next Dark Reading Virtual Event and devote the day to tackling Cybersecurity: Costs, Risks, and Benefits.

Topics will include cyber insurance, measuring risk, measuring the security department’s performance, assessing the real costs of a data breach, and managing the everyday costs of an IT security department.

DOWN THE ROAD

Interop ITX is coming to the MGM Grand in Las Vegas May 15-19. The conference program is overflowing with security sessions this year. Plus, the Dark Reading team will be back with the Cybersecurity Summit – a two-day crash course that will bring security teams, from newbies to time-crunched pros, up to speed.

Article source: http://www.darkreading.com/cloud/this-week-on-dark-reading-event-calendar/a/d-id/1327950?_mc=RSS_DR_EDT

Man Guilty Of Hacking Celeb Accounts Gets Nine Months Behind Bars

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Illinois resident Edward Majerczyk illegally accessed around 30 celeb accounts and compromised photos and videos.

Illinois resident Edward Majerczyk, who pleaded guilty last September to computer hacking charges, has been sentenced by a US court to nine months in prison, Reuters reports. Majerczyk had admitted to hacking around 300 user accounts – including those of 30 celebrities – and gaining access to their private data.

Names of his celebrity victims were not officially confirmed but investigations began after actresses Jennifer Lawrence, Kirsten Dunst and Gabrielle Union and model Kate Upton complained of their private photos being leaked online.

Majerczyk confessed to obtaining login details of his victims through phishing attacks and accessing their iCloud backups, but no evidence of him being behind the actual leak of photos and videos was found. His lawyer said Majerczyk’s actions were the result of his suffering from depression.

His sentence begins February 27.