Murdock Media Web Sites hacked!

Now here is scary news!

The most powerful media empire on earth - Rupert Murdoch's -which should have good Web site security has been totally hacked and hosed! Can you imagine how easy it is to hack YOU!? Beware. Look over your shoulder. These are dangerous cyber times for everyone!

Note - Murdoch is not dead from a drug overdose! (Picture = screen shot)

Start of NY Times article quote:

"The hacking group Lulz Security claimed responsibility for a string of attacks on Web sites belonging to the News Corporation on Monday. Among the attacks, the hacking group planted a fake article about the death of Rupert Murdoch, the chairman of the News Corporation, on one of the company’s newspaper sites.

The fake article appeared on a page at new-times.co.uk, which had apparently been used to inform readers about a new design for the site of The Times of London. It said Mr. Murdoch had died from a drug overdose.

Mr. Murdoch’s company is facing a sweeping scandal in Britain, set off by revelations that journalists at his newspapers hacked into voice-mail accounts in search of news.

After posting the fake article, LulzSec apparently altered the Web site of The Sun, another Murdoch paper, so that it sent site visitors to the article. Soon after, the Sun site instead forwarded visitors to the LulzSec Twitter page.

LulzSec also claimed it had changed the DNS addresses for all of News International’s Web sites, making them completely inaccessible to the public. DNS refers to the Domain Name System, which is a directory that connects Web site names to numerical Internet addresses.

When News International, the British newspaper division of the News Corporation, posted what appeared to be a statement about the hacking of The Sun’s site on its corporate site, those who tried to read the statement were also sent to the Twitter page. The sites of News International, The Sun and The Times were all unreachable later in the evening." end of NYT article quote.

http://bits.blogs.nytimes.com/2011/07/18/lulz-security-says-it-hacked-news-corporation-sites/?hp

Steffen Schmidt

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New Report on Cybersecurity

FYI the latest report by the CSIS Commission, titled Cybersecurity Two Years Later, was issued in January 2011 and called for “an expanded ability to use intelligence and military capabilities for defense against advanced foreign threats.” (http://csis.org/publication/cybersecurity-two-years-later)

It's worth a read because it outlines the overall threats as well as the "call to arms" on how we need to defend, in this case against national security threats. Most of the issues raised also apply to personal and corporate ID and information security protection.

The threats continue and grow so our own vigilance also needs to keep pace with these new developments. the bad guys keep inventing new ways to breach our defenses. We need to keep up with better protection and countermeasures.

Also worth reading:

A Human Capital Crisis in Cybersecurity

Technical Proficiency Matters

Steffen Schmidt, July 17, 2011

On Line Shopping Scam and ID theft

The big story is how easy it was for Rupert Murdock's News of the World to hack into peoples computers, voice mail, and other targets. This is a HUGE warning to all of us on the vulnerabilities of our Internet activities and tools. More on this later as I just returned from a trip to Europe including London and have a lot to share! For now here is my news of the day.

"Police investigating a massive online shopping scam have arrested around 90 people across Romania.

The suspects are accused of cheating online shoppers of an estimated $20m (£12.4m) by selling fictitious goods on sites such as eBay and Craigslist.org.

Hundreds of victims, most of them in the United States, paid for their purchases, but never received them.

Prosecutors say the fraudsters used false identities to transfer money back to Romania from abroad."

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-europe-14152042

D'ya like shopping on line? D'ya trust those web sites mentioned above? Are you a little less comfortable now? GOOD! Our job is to make you an "Internet Skeptic."

Steffen Schmidt

PS. Check out our short-course ID theft certification offered through the Iowa State University, College of Engineering and taught by Me and Michael McCoy so you know it's "golden"!

PPS It looks GREAT on anyone's resume who will be dealing with sensitive data.