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Category — Phone tracking
Wi-Fi can be turned into IMSI Catcher to Track Cell Phone Users Everywhere

Wi-Fi can be turned into IMSI Catcher to Track Cell Phone Users Everywhere

Nov 04, 2016
Image Source: Libelium Here's a new danger to your smartphone security: Your mobile device can be hijacked and tracked without your knowledge. Remember Stingrays ? The controversial cell phone spying tool, also known as " IMSI catchers ," has long been used by law enforcement to track and monitor mobile users by mimicking a cellphone tower and tricking their devices to connect to them. Sometimes it even intercepts calls and Internet traffic, sends fake texts, and installs spyware on a victim's phone. Setting up such Stingrays-type surveillance devices , of course, is expensive and needs a lot of efforts, but researchers have now found a new, cheapest way to do the same thing with a simple Wi-Fi hotspot. Yes, Wi-Fi network can capture IMSI numbers from nearby smartphones, allowing almost anyone to track and monitor people wirelessly. IMSI or international mobile subscriber identity is a unique 15-digit number used for authentication of a person when movi...
Today NSA has Stopped its Bulk Phone Surveillance Program

Today NSA has Stopped its Bulk Phone Surveillance Program

Nov 30, 2015
Rejoice! From this morning, you can call freely to anyone, talk anything without any fear of being spied by the United States National Security Agency (NSA), as the agency is not allowed to collect bulk phone records . Until now we all are aware of the NSA's bulk phone surveillance program – thanks to former NSA employee Edward Snowden , who leaked the very first top secret documents of the agency in 2013. However, more than two years later of the first revelation, that bulk phone surveillance program has finally come to an end. End of Bulk Phone Surveillance Program The White House announced Friday evening on the intelligence community's official Tumblr that the NSA will officially be shutting down its bulk phone surveillance program by Sunday, November 29. Under this program, the US intelligence agency collected only the " metadata " that reveals data related to the called phone numbers (i.e. which numbers are calling and what time they ...
7 PAM Best Practices to Secure Hybrid and Multi-Cloud Environments

7 PAM Best Practices to Secure Hybrid and Multi-Cloud Environments

Dec 04, 2024Risk Management / Zero Trust
Are you using the cloud or thinking about transitioning? Undoubtedly, multi-cloud and hybrid environments offer numerous benefits for organizations. However, the cloud's flexibility, scalability, and efficiency come with significant risk — an expanded attack surface. The decentralization that comes with utilizing multi-cloud environments can also lead to limited visibility into user activity and poor access management.  Privileged accounts with access to your critical systems and sensitive data are among the most vulnerable elements in cloud setups. When mismanaged, these accounts open the doors to unauthorized access, potential malicious activity, and data breaches. That's why strong privileged access management (PAM) is indispensable. PAM plays an essential role in addressing the security challenges of complex infrastructures by enforcing strict access controls and managing the life cycle of privileged accounts. By employing PAM in hybrid and cloud environments, you're not...
THN Weekly Roundup — Top 14 Must-Read Cyber Security Stories

THN Weekly Roundup — Top 14 Must-Read Cyber Security Stories

Sep 07, 2015
We found a high concern for cybersecurity tactics and an increased awareness of the challenges that it brings. This week, we shared lots of stories with our readers, and to help them in identifying the biggest malware threats to their online safety. We are here with the outline of our last week stories, just in case you missed any of them ( ICYMI ). We recommend you read the entire thing ( just click ' Read More ' because there's some valuable advice in there as well ). Here's the list: ➢ How Hackers Can Hack Your Gmail Accounts? Getting smarter in their phishing tactics, hackers have found out ways to fool Gmail's tight security system by bypassing its two-step verification. Hackers are now using text messages and phone-based phishing attacks to circumvent Gmail's security and take over your Gmail accounts. — Read more . ➢ Not Just Windows 10, Windows 7 and 8 Also Spy on You Laughing at controversial data mining and privacy invasion featur...
cyber security

The AppSec & R&D Playbook: How to Align Security and Innovation

websiteBackslashApplication Security
AppSec vs. R&D? Bridge the gap with clear steps to streamline workflows and foster collaboration.
Samsung 'Find My Mobile' Flaw Allows Hacker to Remotely Lock Your Device

Samsung 'Find My Mobile' Flaw Allows Hacker to Remotely Lock Your Device

Oct 27, 2014
The National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST) is warning users of a newly discovered Zero-Day flaw in the Samsung  Find My Mobile  service , which fails to validate the sender of a lock-code data received over a network. The Find My Mobile feature implemented by Samsung in their devices is a mobile web-service that provides samsung users a bunch of features to locate their lost device, to play an alert on a remote device and to lock remotely the mobile phone so that no one else can get the access to the lost device. The vulnerability in Samsung's Find My Mobile feature was discovered by Mohamed Abdelbaset Elnoby (@SymbianSyMoh) , an Information Security Evangelist from Egypt. The flaw is a Cross-Site Request Forgery (CSRF) that could allow an attacker to remotely lock or unlock the device and even make the device rings too. Cross-Site Request Forgery (CSRF or XSRF) is an attack that tricks the victim into loading a page that contains a specially c...
Indian Government Wiretapping and started BlackBerry interception

Indian Government Wiretapping and started BlackBerry interception

Jan 05, 2013
According to a report, All major Indian telecom companies, including Bharti Airtel, Vodafone India and Tata Tele services, have agreed to share real-time interception of BlackBerry calls and data services on their networks with Security agencies to meet the December 31 deadline fixed by the Indian government . Research In Motion (RIM), the manufacturer of BlackBerry, has been directed to provide the resolution and web-browsing needs of the BlackBerry Internet Services. This is to be done in discussion with concerned service providers and law interception organisations. Earlier in 2011, the government set the deadline for RIM to come up with facilities for interception, or face closure of their operations in India. The security agencies in the country have been trying to get the company to install local servers so they could access and monitor the stream of messages going back and forth to implement better security in the country. The Ministry for Home Affairs ordere...
GPS based tracking service provided by Samsung vulnerable to thieves

GPS based tracking service provided by Samsung vulnerable to thieves

Dec 07, 2012
Samsung which is currently believed to the highest Smartphones Seller in the World is now providing a Remote tracking solution in all its smartphones to Track the lost phone with the name " Samsung Dive ". The Service is based on the Architecture which primarily acquires precise location of the smart phone using it GPS and other subsidiary location acquisition techniques. The Service is basically meant to be used by the users to track their phone in case of theft or lost phone. Security Researcher Jiten Jain discovered that this GPS based location tracking service provided by manufacturer (Samsung) is also vulnerable to Theft and Malwares. To use this inbuilt tracking Service, User has to simply create an account with Samsung (www.samsungdive.com). Users than have to enable remote services to track device and wipe data remotely. The permission can be disabled or modified only by the Samsung account holder after logging in and cannot be disabled by anyone else...
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