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| After Two Security Assessments I Must Be Secure, Right? The day of the penetration test report delivery is now at hand. Based on the previous assessments, you expect to receive nothing but positive information...... The Results Were Less Than Pleasing Most people are familiar with the term "Phishing". Dictionary.com defines the word Phishing as "the practice of luring unsuspecting Internet users to a fake Web site by using authentic-looking email with the real organization's logo, in an attempt to steal passwords, financial or personal information, or introduce a virus attack; the creation of a Web site replica for fooling unsuspecting Internet users into submitting personal or financial information or passwords". Although SPAM / unsolicited e-mail and direct web server compromise are the most common methods of Phishing. There are other ways to accomplish this fraudulent activity. Internet Router Compromise Makes For A Bad Day Instead of setting up a duplicate login site on an external system, then sending out SPAM in order to entice a customer to give up their user ID, password, and account numbers, another approach, a much more nefarious approach was taken. Phishing For Personal Or Financial Information No one, not the customer, nor the company had any idea that something nefarious was going on. No bells or whistle went off, no one questioned the error. Why would they, they could have put the wrong password in, or it was likely a typical error on a web page that everyone deals with from time to time. At this point, you can let your imagination take over. The attacker may not move forward and use the information collected right away. It could be days or weeks before it is used. Any trace of what actually took place to collect the information would most likely be history. What Do You Really Get Out Of Security Assessments Conclusion Quite frankly, I've never met a hacker (I know I will get slammed for using this term, I always do), that has a certification stating that they know what they are doing. They know what they are doing because they've done it, over and over again, and have a complete understanding of network systems and software. On top of that, the one thing they have that no class or certification can teach you is, imagination. About The Author
security - Google News Related Articles Make Money Online - Defend Against The Latest Scam First, let's do a little recap'. As I stated in the first part of the article, "Make Money Online - The Latest Scam Disclosed", "refund policy scammers" affect the websites that make money online by selling digital products by buying the product and asking for refunds, while keeping the product. Free Spyware Removal - Its Not As Easy As It Sounds Nobody wants to pay to remove spyware. At the very least, I don't. The blasted stuff shouldn't be on my computer anyway, so what ever would make me want to shell out cash to get rid of something that I shouldn't have in the first place? Social Engineering - The Real E-Terrorism? One evening, during the graveyard shift, an AOL technical support operator took a call from a hacker. During the hour long conversation the hacker mentioned he had a car for sale. The technical support operator expressed an interest so the hacker sent him an e-mail with a photo of the car attached. When the operator opened the attachment it created a back door that opened a connection out of AOL's network, through the firewall, allowing the hacker full access to the entire internal network of AOL with very little effort on the hacker's part. Spyware Protection Software Spyware protection software is the easiest way of removing spyware from your computer and keeping it away. It detects and removes all pieces of spyware and adware automatically. Spyware is extremely difficult to remove manually and should only be removed with spyware protection software. How Did This Happen to Me? Top 10 Ways to Get Spyware or Viruses on Your Computer If you use the internet, you have probably been infected with a virus, trojan or spyware. According to the SANS Internet Storm Center, the average unprotected PC is infected within 20 minutes of normal internet usage. Many people want to know what they did to get infected. Unfortunately, usually it was just one wrong click. All About Computer Viruses Your computer is as slow as molasses. Your mouse freezes every 15 minutes, and that Microsoft Word program just won't seem to open. Lottery Scam, What It is and how to Avoid It? Internet scams and frauds are on the rise! The quantity of scam emails with various fraud schemes any email account receives today is simply overwhelming! There is this infamous Nigerian 419 scam, which is by far the most widely circulated one. I wrote about it in one of our ezine articles not long ago. You can read about it here! And there are many other scams like Lottery, Letter of Credit, money transfer, black money conversion, real estate, fraudulent order and the list goes on and on. Phishing ? Its Signs and Your Options Phishing is the act of some individual sending an email to a user in an attempt to scam the user to release personal information. Is it easy to determine if it's a scam? Sometimes ? but not always. I hope to give you enough examples and information to help you to safeguard yourself from these unsavory individuals. Do You Know What your Kids Are Doing Online? It's a sad statistic, but hundreds of unsuspecting kids are lured away from home every year by strangers they meet in online chat rooms. Internet/Network Security Abstract Homogeneous symmetries and congestion control have garnered limited interest from both cryptographers and computational biologists in the last several years [1]. In fact, few steganographers would disagree with the investigation of spreadsheets. Our focus in this work is not on whether write-back caches and evolutionary programming [13] can cooperate to achieve this intent, but rather on exploring an analysis of Markov models (Eale). Is Shopping Online For Your Horse Gifts Safe? Shopping for horse gifts or other gift items on the internet is quick, convenient and is probably safer than you think. However, you still need to be aware that it is essential to vigorously protect your privacy and financial information when making purchases online. Blogs as Safe Haven for Cybercriminals? To blog or not to blog? Well, why not? Lots of people like either to write or to read blogs -- sometimes both. The much-quoted survey by the Pew Internet & American Life Project, says 27 percent read blogs. 38 percent of all Internet users at least know what a blog is. The survey was made in November 2004 and estimated that 32 million Americans to be blog readers by the end of 2004. So now there must be much more blog readers and writers. SPYWARE - Whos Watching Who? I am in the midst of Oscar Wilde's The Picture of Dorian Gray. "The basis of optimism is sheer terror." With that attitude, I praise their skills only for the mere sake of not wanting them to defile mine, or my business. The Risk Of Electronic Fraud & Identity Theft Electronic Fraud and Identity Theft ----------------------------------- Human beings are pretty sensible when presented with an imminent threat or risk. That is, if it's staring us directly in the face. Many threats and risk are presented in subtle ways, and it is these subtleties we tend to overlook. From Spyware with Love! It's late. You've been scouring the web for that perfect present for your Aunt Bess in Idaho. You finally find it at presents4aunties.com. The site looks a little rough on the edges, weird colors and such. But they have that gift you know will make Aunt Bess add you to her will. You purchase the gift, log off and head to bed. Tired but happy. 8 Surefire Ways to Spot an E-Mail Identity Theft Scam! The E-Mail Identity Theft Scam is running Rampant. These E-Mail Scam artists will go to great lengths to Get Your Bank Account information and Steal your Identity. Learn how to Protect To Yourself Now! Viruses, Trojans, and Spyware - Oh My! Have you ever had to call Symantec or McAfee to ask them how to remove a virus? Or have you spent hours online trying to figure out how to remove spyware, only to find out that you did something wrong and now your computer won't boot? I know your pain and frustration with just trying to use your computer without worry. As a computer technician at ARCH Computing Services, I know how hard it can be to pay someone to remove viruses and spyware. In fact that's how I started in the computer business. I didn't want to pay someone to fix the problems that I usually caused. A little voice in my head told me "I can build a computer, it doesn't look that hard!" Be Aware of Phishing Scams! If you use emails actively in your communication, you must have received various messages claiming to be from Ebay, Paypal and a number of banks. A recent email as if from U.S. Bank Corporation that I received contains the subject "U.S. Bank Fraud Verification Process" and in the body of the mail it says "We recently reviewed your account, and suspect that your U.S. Bank Internet Banking account may have been accessed by an unauthorized third party. Protecting the security of your account and of the U.S. Bank network is our primary concern. Therefore, as a preventative measure, we have temporarily limited access to sensitive account features. To restore your account access, please take the following steps to ensure that your account has not been compromised:". It continues with a link to a webpage, which looks very similar to original web page of the bank. What is Spyware? The most frustrating part of having Spyware on your computer is the sheer feeling of helplessness that is invoked. Your computer slows down, it no longer does what you instructed it to, it seems to have a mind of its own. You effectively have lost control of your computer. Spyware (also referred to as Adware or Malware) is software that is installed on your computer without your consent. Spyware software monitors or controls your computer use. It may be used to send you pop-up ads, redirect your computer to websites, monitor your Internet surfing, or record your keystrokes, which, in turn, could lead to identity theft. How To Prevent Spyware Attacking Your Computer Spyware is software or hardware installed on a computer without a user's knowledge. It gathers information and reports it back to its source. It ties up bandwidth, slows down CPU speed and generally is a nuisance.  |
