NSA Data-Scooping: A Coming Backlash in Europe?

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Most European nations have long had stronger privacy laws than those in the United States. As a result U.S. Internet companies doing business there–incluiding Google, Microsoft, Yahoo, Facebook, and AOL–have signed on to so-called “safe harbor” principles, promising a European level of privacy protection. Now, of course, it appears they’ve also been providing gobs of data about some overseas customers to the U.S. National Security Agency (see “NSA Surveillance Reflects a Broader Interpretation of the Patriot Act”).

Among other fallout, it’s reasonable now to expect E.U. regulators and customers to go nuclear–and U.S. companies to face tough sledding ahead.

via NSA Data-Scooping: A Coming Backlash in Europe? | MIT Technology Review.

The birth of MMOs: World of Warcraft’s debt to MUD

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Before there were the current generations of MMOs there were MUDs – multi-user dungeons or ‘dimensions’. And before there were MUDs there was MUD: A multi-player, text-based game running off a mainframe at Essex University.

MUD (known as MUD1 since the release of its successor, MUD2) used an interface similar to that of single player text adventure games and transplanted it to a multi-player realm where players could live virtual lives, solving puzzles, collecting treasure and killing fantastic creatures (and/or each other). The game launched in 1978, developed by Essex students Roy Trubshaw and, later, Richard Bartle.

via The birth of MMOs: World of Warcraft’s debt to MUD – games – Software – Techworld.

The Pirate Bay Helps to Expose Copyright Troll Honeypot

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The Pirate Bay logs not only link Prenda to the sharing of their own files on BitTorrent, but also tie them directly to the Sharkmp4 user and the uploads of the actual torrent files.

The IP-address 75.72.88.156 was previously used by someone with access to John Steele’s GoDaddy account and was also used by Sharkmp4 to upload various torrents. Several of the other IP-addresses in the log resolve to the Mullvad VPN and are associated with Prenda-related comments on the previously mentioned anti-copyright troll blogs.

via The Pirate Bay Helps to Expose Copyright Troll Honeypot | TorrentFreak.

Microsoft outlines their system for used games, licenses, and family sharing

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The real question is how publishers will deal with used games, and the possibility of “transfer” fees. Suddenly online passes, or their equivalent, are being supported at the console level. One thing is for sure, this is not a good system for any retailer that relies on the sale of used games, and it’s going to be very hard to rent games as well.

via The PA Report – Microsoft outlines their system for used games, licenses, and family sharing.

U.S., British intelligence mining data from nine U.S. Internet companies in broad secret program

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Congress obliged with the Protect America Act in 2007 and the FISA Amendments Act of 2008, which immunized private companies that cooperated voluntarily with U.S. intelligence collection. PRISM recruited its first partner, Microsoft, and began six years of rapidly growing data collection beneath the surface of a roiling national debate on surveillance and privacy. Late last year, when critics in Congress sought changes in the FISA Amendments Act, the only lawmakers who knew about PRISM were bound by oaths of office to hold their tongues.

via U.S., British intelligence mining data from nine U.S. Internet companies in broad secret program – The Washington Post.

That will teach people not to put so much trust into the cloud.

Microsoft, FBI takedown Citadel botnet

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According to Microsoft pirated Windows XP product keys were used to spread the Citadel malware. Redmond isn’t claiming a full take down because of the sheer size of the botnet but, it is optimistic that the seized equipment will help it to strengthen defenses in the future.

via Microsoft, FBI takedown Citadel botnet – ParityNews.com: …Because Technology Matters.

Prior to take down of Citadel, Microsoft has been a key player in take down of other botnets like Bamital, Kehlios and Nitol botnet

Hacking into the Indian Education System

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Technically put, I merely needed to write a script to iterate through the various school IDs, check the different servers, and start with a student ID of 1 yet have a way to detect when there were no more students for a given school. I had to retrieve the resultant html files and parse them to extract all the useful information – Name, Date of Birth, ID, School, Marks.

via Hacking into the Indian Education System – On the Stepping Stone – Quora.

Several hours later, I had all the ISC and ICSE results on my very own computer, in a bunch of comma-separated value files. It was truly incredible. 26 megabytes of pure, magnificent data. An Excel file I couldn’t scroll to the bottom of. Just for kicks, I Ctrl+F’d a few names I knew and what do you know? There they were. Line after line of names, subjects and numbers. It was truly mesmerizing.

Under the Hood: Banking Malware

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After 48 hours (and two all-nighters in a row) I logged onto the (now really REALLY) infected computer, complete with shiny new malware updates. I surfed to Bank of America’s web page, and found what I was looking for– a Man-In-The-Browser attack in action!

via Under the Hood: Banking Malware » LMG Security Blog.

We cover malware network forensics, web proxies and flow analysis during Days 3-4 of the Network Forensics class. We’ll be teaching next at Black Hat USA, July 27-30. Seats are limited, so sign up soon!

White House effort targets ‘patent trolls’

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President Barack Obama spoke about the problem of patent litigation at a recent Google+ hangout, saying that patent trolls “don’t actually produce anything themselves” and instead develop a business model “to essentially leverage and hijack somebody else’s idea and see if they can extort some money out of them.”

via White House effort targets ‘patent trolls’ – Michelle Quinn – POLITICO.com.