Entries by Robert Siciliano

Yahoo! Hacked: 15 Tips To Better Password Security

In light of the Yahoo Voices hack where 450,000 passwords have been compromised, it’s time again to let the world know what they are doing wrong when it comes to passwords. CNET pointed out that: 2,295: The number of times a sequential list of numbers was used, with “123456″ by far being the most popular password.…

Is A Password Enough? A Closer Look at Authentication

Yahoo reported the theft of some 400,000 user names and passwords to access its website, acknowledging hackers took advantage of a security vulnerability in its computer systems. The Mountain View, California-based LinkedIn, an employment and professional networking site which has 160 million members, was hacked and suffered a data breach of 6 million of its…

NFC at the Summer Games Could Be Exploited

NFC is an acronym for near field communication, a wireless technology that allows devices to talk to each other. In the case of a mobile wallet application, those devices would be a mobile phone and a point of sale device at a checkout counter. Visa is testing out its NFC service PayWave contactless payment service…

Will The Rise Of Tablets Affect Security Measures In The Workplace?

With unit sales of smartphones and tablets eclipsing those of desktop and notebook PCs, cybercriminals will continue setting their sights on mobile, and increased mobile Internet use will continue exacerbating security and data breach issues in the workplace. The issues of “BYOD” or Bring Your Own Device to work is plaguing IT managers everywhere. While…

One-Third of Banking Account Takeover Attempts Successful

The Financial Services Information Sharing and Analysis Center (FS-ISAC), which works with the Department of Homeland Security, has released a study indicating that attacks on customer bank accounts have increased considerably in recent years. The FS-ISAC, in collaboration with the American Bankers Association, surveyed large financial institutions to collect data on fraud attempts. The responding…

The Role Of The CIO: What’s Really at Stake

The Chief Information Officer (CIO) has become as important as the CEO. It’s a pivotal position that often can make or break the success of a corporation. As criminal hackers have launched various campaigns against numerous organizations, the CIO has become much more than an information officer. They are the guardian of corporate secrets, instrument…

Do You Know What Your Teens Are Doing Online?

A new study called “The Digital Divide: How the Online Behavior of Teens is Getting Past Parents” (conducted by Tru Research and commissioned by McAfee) shows an alarming 70% of teens have hidden their online behavior from their parents, up from 45% in 2010. And yet half of parents live under the assumption that their teen tells them everything he/she does…

Protect Your Gaming Account As You Would Your Bank Account

Most people are aware of the need to protect their financial accounts, and generally take at least some degree of care to prevent criminals from accessing their money. Protecting your online game account, on the other hand, might not be such an obvious priority, but when accounts created for playing massively multiplayer online games are…

Ode to the Nigerian Scammer

Most of us would never fall for a Nigerian email scam. The obvious “scammer grammar” and outlandish requests would tip us off, as would the supposed Nigerian origin of the message, since we’re probably familiar with the typical claims about Nigerian royalty. So you might wonder why these scammers persist in such an obvious ruse,…