Periodic password changes are likely to do more harm than good. In a largely overlooked post published late last month, Microsoft said it was removing periodic password changes from the security baseline settings it recommends for customers and auditors. After decades of Microsoft recommending passwords be changed regularly, Microsoft employee Aaron Margosis said the requirement is an “ancient and obsolete mitigation of very low...
Earlier this year, Apple updated iOS to block passcode cracking tools like GrayKey (used by police and government law enforcement officers). But the original iOS 11.4.1 patch wasn’t perfect, with researchers still finding ways around it. That seems to have changed with the release of iOS 12 last month, which a recent Forbes report notes appears to have completely blocked the GrayKey tool, preventing...
A massive data breach targeting adult dating and entertainment company Friend Finder Network has exposed more than 412 million accounts. The hack includes 339 million accounts from AdultFriendFinder.com, which the company describes as the “world’s largest sex and swinger community.” That also includes over 15 million “deleted” accounts that wasn’t purged from the databases. On top of that, 62 million accounts from Cams.com, and...
The old-fashioned password gets little respect from hackers these days. In fact, it’s barely a speed bump for them to get past. The hacker can find your password or even the answers to your “security” questions for sale on the internet black market. UnifyID, a participant in this year’s TechCrunch Disrupt SF Battlefield competition, sees a system that’s hopelessly broken — and they think...
21st century chaos fills our lives with distractions, flashing lights, reminders, leaving many yearning to simplify aspects of our lives – but passwords should not be included in this. Taking a serious look at how you set up your password can make the difference between a strong barrier to your accounts or a paper thin wall that easily hacked. If your password doesn’t look...
Data thieves used a massive “botnet” against professional networking site LinkedIn and stole member’s personal information, a new lawsuit reveals. The Mountain View firm filed the federal suit this week in an attempt to uncover the perpetrators. “LinkedIn members populate their profiles with a wide range of information concerning their professional lives, including summaries (narratives about themselves), job histories, skills, interests, educational background, professional awards, photographs and...
If you don’t already have iOS 9.3.3, you better download and install it — quick. Cisco Talos, a security and research group, recently discovered a bug in Mac and iPhones that allows hackers to steal passwords with a single text message. The researchers at Cisco Talos alerted Apple, and the tech company immediately worked on a patch, which was released this week. “This is...
Not two weeks ago, LinkedIn made big data breach news when hackers claimed to have more than 100 million usernames and passwords up for sale. Fortunately, the data wasn’t new, coming from a breach that happened four years ago. What was new was the size of the list that was up for sale, nearly 20 times the size of the 6.5 million passwords that...
In the grab bag of Google/Alphabet’s big projects for 2016 is Project Abacus. It’s basically the company’s plot to kill the password in cold blood, by replacing it with smartphone user authentication via an uncrackable collection of biometric readings. Abacus would lock or unlock devices and apps based on a cumulative “trust score” — as your phone continually monitors and recognizes your location patterns,...
By now many of you have heard of LulzSec. You may have heard of their recent activities such as launching DDoS attacks against gaming sites to hacking into government affiliated web sites. They have also been using Twitter to talk about what they’re doing along with cracking a few jokes. Recently, the group obtained a long list of e-mail addresses and approximately 62,000 passwords....
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