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Ubuntu 18.04?
by Peter Reutemann 24 Apr '18

24 Apr '18

Hi everyone Since April would be the usual month for an Ubuntu release, I was surprised that I hadn't heard anything so far. The following article mentions a release date of 26/4: https://fossbytes.com/ubuntu-18-04-bionic-beaver-release-date-features/ And according to the Ubuntu wiki, this still seems to be happening: https://wiki.ubuntu.com/BionicBeaver/ReleaseTaskSignup Cheers, Peter -- Peter Reutemann Dept. of Computer Science University of Waikato, NZ +64 (7) 858-5174 http://www.cms.waikato.ac.nz/~fracpete/ http://www.data-mining.co.nz/

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Google Accused of Showing 'Total Contempt' for Android Users' Privacy
by Peter Reutemann 23 Apr '18

23 Apr '18

'On the heels of a terse privacy debate, Google may have found another thing to worry about: its attempt to rethink the traditional texting system. From a report: Joe Westby is Amnesty International's Technology and Human Rights researcher. Recently, in response to Google's launch of a new messaging service called "Chat", Westby argued that Google, "shows total contempt for Android users' privacy." "With its baffling decision to launch a messaging service without end-to-end encryption, Google has shown utter contempt for the privacy of Android users and handed a precious gift to cybercriminals and government spies alike, allowing them easy access to the content of Android users' communications. Following the revelations by CIA whistleblower Edward Snowden, end-to-end encryption has become recognized as an essential safeguard for protecting people's privacy when using messaging apps. With this new Chat service, Google shows a staggering failure to respect the human rights of its customers," Westby contended. Westby continued, saying: "In the wake of the recent Facebook data scandal, Google's decision is not only dangerous but also out of step with current attitudes to data privacy."' -- source: https://tech.slashdot.org/story/18/04/23/1946251 Cheers, Peter -- Peter Reutemann Dept. of Computer Science University of Waikato, NZ +64 (7) 858-5174 http://www.cms.waikato.ac.nz/~fracpete/ http://www.data-mining.co.nz/

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“Drupalgeddon2” touches off arms race to mass-exploit powerful Web servers
by Peter Reutemann 22 Apr '18

22 Apr '18

'Attackers are mass-exploiting a recently fixed vulnerability in the Drupal content management system that allows them to take complete control of powerful website servers, researchers from multiple security companies are warning. At least three different attack groups are exploiting "Drupalgeddon2," the name given to an extremely critical vulnerability Drupal maintainers patched in late March, researchers with Netlab 360 said Friday. Formally indexed as CVE- 2018-7600, Drupalgeddon2 makes it easy for anyone on the Internet to take complete control of vulnerable servers simply by accessing a URL and injecting publicly available exploit code. Exploits allow attackers to run code of their choice without having to have an account of any type on a vulnerable website. The remote-code vulnerability harkens back to a 2014 Drupal vulnerability that also made it easy to commandeer vulnerable servers. Drupalgeddon2 "is under active attack, and every Drupal site behind our network is being probed constantly from multiple IP addresses," Daniel Cid, CTO and founder of security firm Sucuri, told Ars. "Anyone that has not patched is hacked already at this point. Since the first public exploit was released, we are seeing this arms race between the criminals as they all try to hack as many sites as they can." China-based Netlab 360, meanwhile, said at least three competing attack groups are exploiting the vulnerability. The most active group, Netlab 360 researchers said in a blog post published Friday, is using it to install multiple malicious payloads, including cryptocurrency miners and software for performing distributed denial-of-service attacks on other domains. The group, dubbed Muhstik after a keyword that pops up in its code, relies on 11 separate command-and-control domains and IP addresses, presumably for redundancy in the event one gets taken down.' -- source: https://arstechnica.com/information-technology/2018/04/drupalgeddon2-touche… Cheers, Peter -- Peter Reutemann Dept. of Computer Science University of Waikato, NZ +64 (7) 858-5174 http://www.cms.waikato.ac.nz/~fracpete/ http://www.data-mining.co.nz/

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Millions of Chrome Users Have Installed Malware Posing as Ad Blockers
by Peter Reutemann 19 Apr '18

19 Apr '18

'Andrey Meshkov, the cofounder of ad-blocker AdGuard, recently got curious about the number of knock-off ad blocking extensions available for Google's popular browser Chrome. These extensions were deliberately styled to look like legitimate, well-known ad blockers, but Meshkov wondered why they existed at all, so he downloaded one and took a look at the code. "Basically I downloaded it and checked what requests the extension was making," Meshkov told me over the phone. "Some strange requests caught my attention." Meshkov discovered that the AdRemover extension for Chrome -- which had over 10 million users -- had code hidden inside an image that was loaded from the remote command server, giving the extension creator the ability to change its functions without updating. This alone is against Google's policy, and after Meshkov wrote about a few examples on AdGuard's blog, many of which had millions of downloads, Chrome removed the extensions from the store. I reached out to Google, and a spokesperson confirmed that these extensions had been removed.' -- source: https://yro.slashdot.org/story/18/04/19/1946250 Cheers, Peter -- Peter Reutemann Dept. of Computer Science University of Waikato, NZ +64 (7) 858-5174 http://www.cms.waikato.ac.nz/~fracpete/ http://www.data-mining.co.nz/

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Ask Slashdot: Is There a Good Alternative to Facebook?
by Peter Reutemann 18 Apr '18

18 Apr '18

'Long-time Slashdot reader Lauren Weinstein argues that fixing Facebook may be impossible because "Facebook's entire ecosystem is predicated on encouraging the manipulation of its users by third parties who posses the skills and financial resources to leverage Facebook's model. These are not aberrations at Facebook -- they are exactly how Facebook was designed to operate." Meanwhile one fund manager is already predicting that sooner or later every social media platform "is going to become MySpace," adding that "Nobody young uses Facebook," and that the backlash over Cambridge Analytica "quickens the demise." But Slashdot reader silvergeek asks, "is there a safe, secure, and ethical alternative?" to which tepples suggests "the so-called IndieWeb stack using the h-entry microformat." He also suggests Diaspora, with an anonymous Diaspora user adding that "My family uses a server I put up to trade photos and posts... Ultimately more people need to start hosting family servers to help us get off the cloud craze... NethServer is a pretty decent CentOS based option." Meanwhile Slashdot user Locke2005 shared a Washington Post profile of Mastodon, "a Twitter-like social network that has had a massive spike in sign-ups this week." Mastodon's code is open-source, meaning anybody can inspect its design. It's distributed, meaning that it doesn't run in some data center controlled by corporate executives but instead is run by its own users who set up independent servers. And its development costs are paid for by online donations, rather than through the marketing of users' personal information... Rooted in the idea that it doesn't benefit consumers to depend on centralized commercial platforms sucking up users' personal information, these entrepreneurs believe they can restore a bit of the magic from the Internet's earlier days -- back when everything was open and interoperable, not siloed and commercialized. The article also interviews the founders of Blockstack, a blockchain-based marketplace for apps where all user data remains local and encrypted. "There's no company in the middle that's hosting all the data," they tell the Post. "We're going back to the world where it's like the old-school Microsoft Word -- where your interactions are yours, they're local and nobody's tracking them." On Medium, Mastodon founder Eugene Rochko also acknowledges Scuttlebutt and Hubzilla, ending his post with a message to all social media users: "To make an impact, we must act." Lauren Weinstein believes Google has already created an alternative to Facebook's "sick ecosystem": Google Plus. "There are no ads on Google+. Nobody can buy their way into your feed or pay Google for priority. Google doesn't micromanage what you see. Google doesn't sell your personal information to any third parties..." And most importantly, "There's much less of an emphasis on hanging around with those high school nitwits whom you despised anyway, and much more a focus on meeting new persons from around the world for intelligent discussions... G+ posts more typically are about 'us' -- and tend to be far more interesting as a result." (Even Linus Torvalds is already reviewing gadgets there.) Wired has also compiled their own list of alternatives to every Facebook service. But what are Slashdot's readers doing for their social media fix? Leave your own thoughts and suggestions in the comments. Is there a good alternative to Facebook?' -- source: https://tech.slashdot.org/story/18/03/25/0039218 Cheers, Peter -- Peter Reutemann Dept. of Computer Science University of Waikato, NZ +64 (7) 858-5174 http://www.cms.waikato.ac.nz/~fracpete/ http://www.data-mining.co.nz/

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Microsoft’s bid to secure the Internet of Things: Custom Linux, custom chips, Azure
by Peter Reutemann 18 Apr '18

18 Apr '18

'The drive to connect everything to the Internet and build the Internet of Things has created a new security nightmare. Millions of devices with little to no active maintenance are now permanently online, enabling the creation of massive botnets as the devices go unpatched and unloved. Microsoft today announced its solution: Azure Sphere.' -- source: https://arstechnica.com/gadgets/2018/04/microsofts-bid-to-secure-the-intern… Cheers, Peter -- Peter Reutemann Dept. of Computer Science University of Waikato, NZ +64 (7) 858-5174 http://www.cms.waikato.ac.nz/~fracpete/ http://www.data-mining.co.nz/

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When Two Secure Systems Make An Insecure Combination
by Lawrence D'Oliveiro 13 Apr '18

13 Apr '18

Just goes to show <https://www.schneier.com/blog/archives/2018/04/obscure_e-mail_.html> that two separate systems may be reasonably secure in their own right, but the interaction between them can create unexpected vulnerabilities.

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Cyber-Espionage Groups Are Increasingly Leveraging Routers in Their Attacks
by Peter Reutemann 12 Apr '18

12 Apr '18

'Catalin Cimpanu, reporting for BleepingComputer: Cyber-espionage groups -- also referred to as advanced persistent threats (APTs) -- are using hacked routers more and more during their attacks, according to researchers at Kaspersky Lab. "It's not necessarily something new. Not something that just exploded," said Costin Raiu, director of Global Research and Analysis Team (GReAT) at Kaspersky Lab, in a webinar today. "We've seen a bunch of router attack throughout the years. A very good example is SYNful Knock, a malicious implant for Cisco [routers] that was discovered by FireEye but also threat actors such as Regin and CloudAtlas. Both APTs have been known to have and own proprietary router implants." But the number of APTs leveraging routers for attacks has gone steadily up in the past year, and the tactic has become quite widespread in 2018. For example, the Slingshot APT (believed to be a US Army JSOC operation targeting ISIS militants) has used hacked MikroTik routers to infect victims with malware.' -- source: https://tech.slashdot.org/story/18/04/12/1932248 Cheers, Peter -- Peter Reutemann Dept. of Computer Science University of Waikato, NZ +64 (7) 858-5174 http://www.cms.waikato.ac.nz/~fracpete/ http://www.data-mining.co.nz/

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Some Android Device Makers Are Lying About Security Patch Updates
by Peter Reutemann 12 Apr '18

12 Apr '18

'Security patches for smartphones are extremely important because many people store personal data on their devices. Lots of Android phones out there get regularly security patches, but according to a new report, some of them are lying about the patches that they've actually gotten. According to a study by Security Research Labs, some Android phones are missing patches that they claim to have. Wired explains that SRL tested 1,200 phones from more than a dozen phone makers for every Android security patch released in 2017. The devices tested include ones from Google, Samsung, Motorola, LG, HTC, Xiaomi, OnePlus, Nokia, TCL, and ZTE. The study found that outside of Google and its Pixel phones, well-known phone makers had devices that were missing patches that they claimed to have. "We found several vendors that didn't install a single patch but changed the patch date forward by several months," says SRL founder Karsten Nohl.' -- source: https://tech.slashdot.org/story/18/04/12/1851203 Cheers, Peter -- Peter Reutemann Dept. of Computer Science University of Waikato, NZ +64 (7) 858-5174 http://www.cms.waikato.ac.nz/~fracpete/ http://www.data-mining.co.nz/

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AMD Releases Spectre v2 Microcode Updates for CPUs Going Back To 2011
by Peter Reutemann 11 Apr '18

11 Apr '18

'Catalin Cimpanu, writing for BleepingComputer: AMD has released CPU microcode updates for processors affected by the Spectre variant 2 (CVE-2017-5715) vulnerability. The company has forwarded these microcode updates to PC and motherboard makers to include them in BIOS updates. Updates are available for products released as far as 2011, for the first processors of the Bulldozer line. Microsoft has released KB4093112, an update that also includes special OS-level patches for AMD users in regards to the Spectre v2 vulnerability. Similar OS-level updates have been released for Linux users earlier this year. Yesterday's microcode patches announcement is AMD keeping a promise it made to users in January, after the discovery of the Meltdown and Spectre (v1 and v2) vulnerabilities.' -- source: https://tech.slashdot.org/story/18/04/11/1826222 Cheers, Peter -- Peter Reutemann Dept. of Computer Science University of Waikato, NZ +64 (7) 858-5174 http://www.cms.waikato.ac.nz/~fracpete/ http://www.data-mining.co.nz/

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