Security

Wed
08
Oct
John Lister's picture

MS Offers Free Win10 Security Updates in Europe

Microsoft has announced it will provide one year of no-strings free Extended Security Updates (ESUs) for Windows 10 users in the European Economic Area (EEA). Unlike the rest of the world, there's no need to follow any special conditions. Windows ... 10: The End is Near The end-of-support date for Windows 10 is October 14, 2025. Beyond this date, devices will no longer receive crucial security patches unless they are enrolled in the ESU program. Microsoft has shifted policy several times, originally suggesting the ESU was - as with previous Windows editions - only for businesses. It then offered ... (view more)

Fri
26
Sep
John Lister's picture

'SlopAds' Malware Scam Uses Creative Tactics

Researchers say a malware operation involving 224 malware-laden Android apps was particularly creative. They used a combination of tactics to disguise the malware and hide it from Google and security researchers. Human Security, which revealed ... details of the operation, has labeled the operation as "SlopAds". Its ultimate goal was to hijack phones and tablets to make bogus clicks to make it look like a user has viewed an ad on a site operated by the scammers. They then collect revenue from advertisers who are unaware no human saw their message. (Source: humansecurity.com ) The researchers say ... (view more)

Wed
10
Sep
John Lister's picture

Apple Calendar Trick Used in PayPal Phishing Scam

Emails which appear to come from Apple email servers may be carefully crafted spam. Scammers have found a way to abuse Apple's calendar tools to disguise the spam and bypass filters. The spam is getting to many more recipients than usual as the ... messages appear to come from the user noreply[@]email.apple.com. It appears to be convincing enough that some spam filter systems are treating it as coming from a legitimate source within Apple, which is clearly not something most people would want blocked. The trick behind the spam is that the original message isn't sent as a standard email. Instead ... (view more)

Mon
08
Sep
John Lister's picture

iOS WhatsApp Users: Check For Updates

iOS WhatsApp users should make sure their app is up to date following a dangerous security attack. The technique is particularly effective but fortunately seems to be highly targeted so far. It's been described as a zero-click attack, meaning a ... phone could be comprised simply by a user receiving a message. That's different to most messaging-based attacks which require a user to open an attachment or image, or to click on a link. The issue affects the Mac, iPhone and iPad apps for WhatsApp and is the result of a particularly unfortunate combination of two vulnerabilities. One is with WhatsApp ... (view more)

Fri
22
Aug
John Lister's picture

RIP: AOL Finally Drops Dial-Up Internet

AOL dial-up Internet is ending in September. It lasted 34 years, long after a peak when it handled a claimed 40 percent of US online traffic. Exactly how many people were still subscribing is unclear. Several surveys in recent years estimated around ... 250,000-300,000 dial-up users in the United States, which AOL dominated in the remaining market. A couple of smaller companies do still offer the service in limited areas. AOL will continue as a business but is now primarily offering security tools. (Source: bbc.co.uk ) While many Infopackets readers likely remember dial-up, for the few who have ... (view more)

Fri
15
Aug
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WhatsApp Deletes Millions of Scam Accounts

WhatsApp says it has taken down more than 6.8 million accounts linked to "criminal scam centers." It says scammers are using complex methods that use multiple apps to avoid being detected by any one of them. The company, owned by Meta (which also ... owns Facebook), says this isn't just a case of lone actors pulling off scams. It says many are the work of full-blown organized crime gangs which exploit forced labor workers - quite often they are used in sextortion and pig butchering schemes . While the specifics of the scams change, for example getting people to "invest" in cryptocurrency or ... (view more)

Mon
21
Jul
John Lister's picture

Amazon Cancellation Email May Be a Scam

Amazon has warned customers that emails offering them the chance to cancel their Prime membership are scams from fraudsters. It's a targeted attack that is, to say the least, unfortunate for the company. According to Amazon, the bogus emails claim ... Amazon is raising the price of the Prime membership program and giving them the chance to cancel before it takes effect. The emails include a button marked "cancel subscription". As is common with such scams, clicking the button takes the user through to a fake Amazon page that asks the user for personal details along with details of the payment ... (view more)

Mon
14
Jul
John Lister's picture

Browser Extensions Laced With Malware

More than two million Chrome and Edge users installed extensions that later turned into malware. The 18 extensions all delivered their advertised functionality but some unwanted bonus features. Extensions (known as add-ons in Edge) are a third-party ... tool for web browsers that interact with the browser to bring additional features. Most have perfectly legitimate uses, for example sending the text of a long article on a web page to the user's Kindle e-reader, or blocking ads. Because the tools have varying levels of access to a user's browser and online activity, security is a must. That's why ... (view more)

Fri
04
Jul
John Lister's picture

Microsoft Praises Teenager for Security Research

A boy who started hunting computer bugs aged 13 has been dubbed Microsoft's youngest security researcher. 'Dylan' is the reason the company lowered its minimum age for officially reporting security vulnerabilities. Everything we know about the boy ... comes from a Microsoft report, which notes he is currently in his junior year at high school. Because of his age, it appears reporters don't consider it appropriate to try to independently verify any of the details. (Source: microsoft.com ) According to Microsoft, Dylan was a tech enthusiast for a young age, but became more interested in security ... (view more)

Mon
23
Jun
John Lister's picture

16 Billion Passwords Leaked

A collection of 16 billion login credentials has been discovered by security researchers. Despite the huge number, the researcher say the real problem is just how commonly records appear online. The discovery was made by Cybernews which assigned ... researchers to trawl as many online locations as possible to discover records. They found 30 datasets, of which just one had been widely known about and reported in the media. (Source: cybernews.com ) The datasets ranged from one of "just" 16 million records to one, apparently made up of details of Portuguese speakers, which had 3.5 billion records. ... (view more)

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