
TechNewsWorld: U.S. Officials Warn of Lax Cyber Defense04-Dec-03 17:46 ET
Story Highlights:“U.S. Cyber Security Division director Amit Yoran, warmly embraced by the IT security community as head of the nation’s cyber security when appointed in September, warned this week that more sophisticated and potentially disruptive cyber attacks could be looming. Yoran said that even against previous attacks that have been less sophisticated, the government failed to protect its own systems adequately.”
VNUnet: Fault Found at Linux Core05-Dec-03 10:45 ET
Story Highlights:“Linux users have been advised to upgrade to the latest stable kernel, after the discovery of a critical vulnerability in the core code. System administrators will have to oversee kernel upgrades to remove the flaw, provisionally called CAN-2003-0961, which enables attackers to gain root access to vulnerable machines, yielding complete control, according to security analysts. But worm attacks are unlikely, as the exploit requires a local user account.”
Silicon.com: Spam Email Targets UK Police Force with Denial-of-Service Attack05-Dec-03 11:29 ET
Story Highlights:“Malicious spammers have hit Cambridgeshire police with a denial-of-service attack by threatening recipients of the email to charge their credit cards unless they call a ‘customer service’ number that is actually the main switchboard number for the force.Silicon.com was alerted to the attack by several readers who received the spam email this morning, which claims to come from a non-existent company called ‘Huntingdon Mail Order’ with the subject line ‘transaction receipt.’ It says the recipient’s credit card is about to be billed for 399.95 for a 40GB iPod MP3 player.”
ComputerWeekly.com: Sobig Tops Sophos 2003 Virus Charts04-Dec-03 11:48 ET
Story Highlights:“The Sobig e-mail worm, which struck in August, was the most prolific virus of 2003, according to a top 10 list of viruses published by antivirus software company Sophos. The Sobig-F variant accounted for almost 20% of virus reports to Sophos in 2003, easily beating Blaster, which notched up 15%. A Blaster derivative, Nachi, also known as Welchia, took third place, followed by Gibe at number four and Dumaru in the fifth spot.”
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