09/05/2008 by swordfish.

Facebook is to add a slew of new safeguards to protect young users from sexual predators and cyber bullies.

At the heart of the changes are efforts to ban convicted sex offenders from the site and finding better ways to verify users’ ages and identities.

The agreement was announced by Connecticut Attorney General Richard Blumenthal in a deal along with other attorneys general around America. “This marks another watershed towards social networking safety,” he said. It will “protect kids from online predators and inappropriate content,” he added.

It comes on the heels of a similar comprehensive agreement that 49 states and Washington, DC, made with MySpace last January.

Source: BBC Technology News

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Posted in MySpace, Social Networks, Facebook, Security | Print | No Comments »

08/05/2008 by swordfish.

Almost 500,000 people have been caught out by a booby-trapped media file, says security firm McAfee.

The fake file poses as a music track, short video or movie and has been widely seeded on file-sharing networks to snare victims.

McAfee said the fake media file outbreak was the largest it had seen for about three years.

Those running the fake file get bombarded with pop-up ads and risk compromising the safety of their PC.

The fake file or trojan has been widely distributed on the eDonkey and Limewire file-sharing networks. The file has many names and is written in different languages to trick people into downloading it.

Here are some of the many file names that hope to get you hooked into downloading the malicious file:

• girls aloud st trinnians.mp3
• changing times earth wind .mp3
• heartbroken fast t2 ft jodie.mp3
• meet bambi in kings harem.mp3
• paralyized by you.mp3
• pull over levert.mp3

So watch out if you frequent file sharing networks!

Source: BBC Technology News

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Posted in McAfee, Virus Attacks, Security | Print | No Comments »

23/04/2008 by swordfish.

Nearly 100 leaks of sensitive personal information have been reported to the data-protection watchdog in the last six months.

Organisations are continuing to lose sensitive personal data - despite high-profile cases such as the HM Revenue & Customs (HMRC) data breach — and the Information Commissioner’s Office (ICO) has warned chief executives to protect staff and customers’ personal information following an “alarming number” of security breaches reported to his office in the past six months.

Since the security breach at HMRC in November last year, the ICO said it has been notified of almost 100 data breaches by public, private and third-sector organisations. The public sector accounted for 62 breaches and the private sector for 28.

The ICO said half of the private-sector breaches were reported by financial institutions. Of the public-sector lapses, almost a third occurred in central government, and a fifth in the NHS.

Source: ZDNet

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04/04/2008 by swordfish.

Microsoft’s regular patch Tuesday update is set to bring five critical patches when it rolls around on 8 April.

Among the critical patches two will focus on Internet Explorer, two will affect Windows and one Microsoft Office, the company has revealed in its advance security bulletin. Each of the five will address flaws that could lead to remote code executions from malicious websites.

Patch Tuesday will also bring three “important” updates for Windows, addressing potential spoofing and elevation of user privileges.

The critical flaws affect all versions of Windows, including Vista, which could be seen as something of an embarrassment for the company just a month after it released its first Service Pack for the operating system.

Posted in Office Tools, Software, Microsoft, XP, Vista, Security, Web Browsers | Print | No Comments »

28/03/2008 by swordfish.

A recent security lapse on Facebook which allowed access to private photo libraries highlights what can go wrong if companies use public social networking sites without security, experts warn.

Users’ pictures, including those of Facebook founder Mark Zuckerberg and socialite Paris Hilton, were exposed on the site, even though the photos were tagged as being visible only to the member and associated friends.

David Lavenda, vice president of marketing and product strategy at web security firm WorkLight, said: “Just imagine what would happen if a business-to-consumer document such as an employment contract were to leak in this way.

Source: VNUNET

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11/03/2008 by swordfish.

Millions of serviceable computers in the UK end up in landfill sites rather than being recycled, a study has claimed.

The research, sponsored by Fujitsu Siemens Computers (FSC), found that 12.5 million unwanted PC’s and laptops have not been reused or recycled by their owners.

The survey found that one in four machines are taken to tips and more than one million computers have been dumped in household rubbish or the countryside.

This is clearly a growing problem and our PC Help articles can help you deal with the disposal, or reuse, of your old computers in a much ‘greener’ way.

Disposing of old PC Equipment.

How to reuse an old PC.

Source: ZDNet

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Posted in Security, Web Site News, Technology News | Print | 1 Comment »