Biometrics | Breaking Cybersecurity News | The Hacker News

Apple on Monday released a new developer beta of iOS and iPadOS with support for end-to-end encryption (E2EE) in Rich Communications Services ( RCS ) messages. The feature is currently available for testing in iOS and iPadOS 26.4 Beta, and is expected to be shipped to customers in a future update for iOS, iPadOS, macOS, and watchOS. "End-to-end encryption is in beta and is not available for all devices or carriers," Apple said in its release notes. "Conversations labeled as encrypted are encrypted end-to-end, so messages can't be read while they're sent between devices." The iPhone maker also pointed out that the availability of RCS encryption is limited to conversations between Apple devices, and not other platforms like Android. The secure messaging test arrives nearly a year after the GSM Association (GSMA) formally announced support for E2EE for safeguarding messages sent via the RCS protocol. E2EE for RCS‌ will require Apple to update to ‌RCS‌ Un...

It's time once again to pay our respects to the once-famous cybersecurity solutions whose usefulness died in the past year. The cybercriminal world collectively mourns the loss of these solutions and the easy access they provide to victim organizations. These solutions, though celebrated in their prime, succumbed to the twin forces of time and advancing threats. Much like a tribute to celebrities lost in the past year, this article will look back at a few of cybersecurity's brightest stars that went dark in the past year.  1. Legacy Multi-Factor Authentication (MFA) Cause of Death: Compromised by sophisticated phishing, man-in-the-middle (MitM), SIM-swapping, and MFA prompt bombing attacks. The superstar of access security for more than twenty years, legacy MFA solutions enjoyed broad adoption followed by almost-universal responsibility for cybersecurity failures leading to successful ransomware attacks. These outdated solutions relied heavily on SMS or email-based codes o...

The Dutch Data Protection Authority (Dutch DPA) has imposed a fine of €30.5 million ($33.7 million) against facial recognition firm Clearview AI for violating the General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR) in the European Union (E.U.) by building an "illegal database with billions of photos of faces," including those of Dutch citizens. "Facial recognition is a highly intrusive technology that you cannot simply unleash on anyone in the world," Dutch DPA chairman Aleid Wolfsen said in a press statement. "If there is a photo of you on the Internet – and doesn't that apply to all of us? – then you can end up in the database of Clearview and be tracked. This is not a doom scenario from a scary film. Nor is it something that could only be done in China." Clearview AI has been in regulatory hot water across several countries, such as the U.K., Australia, France, and Italy, over its practice of scraping publicly available information on the internet to ...

Meta, the parent company of Facebook, Instagram, and WhatsApp, agreed to a record $1.4 billion settlement with the U.S. state of Texas over allegations that it illegally collected biometric data of millions of users without their permission, marking one of the largest penalties levied by regulators against the tech giant. "This historic settlement demonstrates our commitment to standing up to the world's biggest technology companies and holding them accountable for breaking the law and violating Texans' privacy rights," Attorney General Ken Paxton said . "Any abuse of Texans' sensitive data will be met with the full force of the law." The development arrived more than two years after the social media behemoth was sued for unlawfully capturing facial data belonging to Texas without their informed consent as is required by the law. The Menlo Park-based company, however, did not admit to any wrongdoing. Tag Suggestions, as the feature was originally c...

Google on Wednesday announced that it's making available passkeys for high-risk users to enroll in its Advanced Protection Program ( APP ). "Users traditionally needed a physical security key for APP — now they can choose a passkey to secure their account," Shuvo Chatterjee, product lead of APP, said . Passkeys are considered a more secure and phishing-resistant alternative to passwords. Based on the FIDO Authentication standard, the technology is designed to secure online accounts against potential takeover attacks by ditching passwords in favor of biometrics or a PIN. Passkeys can simultaneously act as a first- and second-factor, entirely obviating the need for a password. Earlier this May, the tech giant revealed that passkeys are being used by over 400 million Google accounts. High-risk users , who are at an elevated exposure to cyber-attacks because of who they are and what they do (e.g., journalists, elected officials, political campaign staff, human rights ...

An analysis of a hybrid biometric access system from Chinese manufacturer ZKTeco has uncovered two dozen security flaws that could be used by attackers to defeat authentication, steal biometric data, and even deploy malicious backdoors. "By adding random user data to the database or using a fake QR code, a nefarious actor can easily bypass the verification process and gain unauthorized access," Kaspersky said . "Attackers can also steal and leak biometric data, remotely manipulate devices, and deploy backdoors." The 24 flaws span six SQL injections, seven stack-based buffer overflows, five command injections, four arbitrary file writes, and two arbitrary file reads. A brief description of each vulnerability type is below - CVE-2023-3938 (CVSS score: 4.6) - An SQL injection flaw when displaying a QR code into the device's camera by passing a specially crafted request containing a quotation mark, thereby allowing an attacker to authenticate as any user in th...