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If you use Zoom video conferencing software on your Mac computer—then beware—any website you're visiting in your web browser can turn on your device camera without your permission. Ironically, even if you had ever installed the Zoom client on your device and simply uninstalled it, a remote attacker can still activate your webcam. Zoom is one of the most popular cloud-based meeting platforms that provide video, audio, and screen sharing options to users, allowing them to host webinars, teach online courses, conduct online training, or join virtual meetings online. In a Medium post published today, cybersecurity researcher Jonathan Leitschuh disclosed details of an unpatched critical security vulnerability (CVE-2019-13450) in the Zoom client app for Apple Mac computers, which if combined with a separate flaw, could allow attackers to execute arbitrary code on the targeted systems remotely. Jonathan responsibly reported the security vulnerability to the affected company ov

Apple Mac Computers are considered to be much safer than Windows at keeping viruses and malware out of its environment, but that's simply not true anymore. It's not because Mac OS X is getting worse every day, but because hackers are getting smart and sophisticated these days. The bad news for Mac users is that malware targeting webcams and microphones has now come up for Mac laptops as well. Patrick Wardle, an ex-NSA staffer who heads up research at security intelligence firm Synack, discovered a way for Mac malware to tap into your live feeds from Mac's built-in webcam and microphone to locally record you even without detection. Wardle is the same researcher who has discovered a number of security weaknesses in Apple products, including ways to bypass the Gatekeeper protections in OS X. Wardle also released a free tool called RansomWhere? earlier this year that has generic detection capabilities for Mac OS X ransomware variants. Wardle is scheduled to present h

Identities now transcend human boundaries. Within each line of code and every API call lies a non-human identity. These entities act as programmatic access keys, enabling authentication and facilitating interactions among systems and services, which are essential for every API call, database query, or storage account access. As we depend on multi-factor authentication and passwords to safeguard human identities, a pressing question arises: How do we guarantee the security and integrity of these non-human counterparts? How do we authenticate, authorize, and regulate access for entities devoid of life but crucial for the functioning of critical systems? Let's break it down. The challenge Imagine a cloud-native application as a bustling metropolis of tiny neighborhoods known as microservices, all neatly packed into containers. These microservices function akin to diligent worker bees, each diligently performing its designated task, be it processing data, verifying credentials, or

Should you put a tape or a sticker over the lens of your laptop's webcam? Yes, even Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg and FBI Director James Comey do that. Covering your laptop's webcam might be a hell cheap and good idea to guard against hackers and intruders who might want to watch your private life and environment through your devices. In fact, Comey recently came out defending his own use of tape to cover his personal laptop's webcam. People Are Responsible for Their Safety, Security & Privacy During a conference at the Center for Strategic and International Studies, when Comey was asked that he still put tape over his cameras at home, he replied: "Heck yeah, heck yeah. And also, I get mocked for a lot of things, and I am much mocked for that, but I hope people lock their cars… lock your doors at night. I have an alarm system. If you have an alarm system you should use it, I use mine." Comey went on to explain that it was common practice at

What do you do to protect your 'Privacy' and keep yourself safe from potential hackers? Well, Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg just need a bit of tape to cover his laptop webcam and mic jack in order to protect his privacy. Yes, Zuck also does the same as the FBI Director James Comey . Zuckerberg posted a photo on Tuesday to celebrate Instagram's 500 Million monthly user milestone, but the picture end up revealing about another security measure he takes to ensure that nobody is spying on him – and it's surprisingly simple. Some eagle-eyed observers quickly noticed that the MacBook Pro on Zuckerberg's desk in the background of the image has the tape covering not only the webcam, but also the laptop's dual microphones. While some tried to argue that it was not Zuckerberg's desk, Gizmodo pointed out that Zuckerberg has posted videos, live streams and images from there before, so it seems like a safe assumption. So, Zuckerberg joins FBI director Jam

What do you do to protect your ' Privacy ' while using your computer? FBI Director James Comey uses tape to cover up his laptop webcam to ensure Privacy. Yes, you heard it right. During the Q&A session at Kenyon College last week, Comey said that he uses tape to cover his laptop webcam in order to mitigate the danger of secret surveillance. While giving a speech about encryption and privacy, Comey repeated his argument that " absolute privacy " hampers the law enforcement and has never existed in America – until now, when by default encryption offered by big tech giants created boundaries where law enforcement can't enter, even with a court order. This isn't the first time Comey made this kind of statement. Comey has always suggested tech companies to adopt encryption techniques that help federal agencies intercept end-to-end encrypted communications when necessary. But after his speech, Comey said something that generated hilarity

Once again, a new revelation showed the ugly side of the Government who are conducting Global Mass surveillance and previous documents leaked by the whistleblower Edward Snowden have defaced the US Intelligence Agency NSA , who were taking care of a number of projects like PRISM, XKeyscore, DROPOUTJEEP , and various others to carry out surveillance of millions of people. Now, it has been revealed that the US National Security Agency ( NSA ) helped its British counterpart, the Government Communications Headquarters ( GCHQ ), to allegedly capture and store nude images and others from webcam chats of millions of unsuspecting Yahoo users, The Guardian reported. Documents handed to the Guardian by the former NSA contractor Edward Snowden show that the GCHQ's worked with the US intelligence agency NSA on a joint project dubbed as ' Optic Nerve '. The project carried out a bulk surveillance program , under which they nabbed webcam images every five minutes from random Yahoo

A College 19-year-old college student and Hacker from Temecula, California has been arrested for hacking the webcams of Miss Teen USA ' Cassidy Wolf ' and other women to extort nude photos and videos from them. Earlier this year Cassidy Wolf received an anonymous email in which the sender claimed to have stolen images from the camera on her home computer. According to the complaint, he threatened to turn her " dream of being a model ... into a ..... " Jared James Abrahams , 19 years-old man forced several women to strip. Based on an investigation launched in March the FBI raided THE suspect's home in June, seizing computers, cell phones and hacking software. Abrahams is accused of hacking the computers of several young women and charged with extortion, that could send him to federal prison for up to two years. Abrahams used malicious software to disguise his identity in order to capture nude photos or videos of victims through remote operat

A former NSA software developer is saying he has identified how major camera systems used by industrial plants, prisons, banks and the military could be hacked to freeze a frame and would allow hackers to spy on facilities or gain access to sensitive computer networks. Craig Heffner, that there were zero day vulnerabilities in digital video surveillance equipment from firms, including Cisco Systems, D-Link and TRENDnet. He has discovered hundreds of thousands of surveillance cameras that can be accessed via the public Internet. " Somebody could potentially access a camera and view it. Or they could also use it as a pivot point, an initial foothold, to get into the network and start attacking internal systems. " Heffner said. Wrost thing, probably NSA is also aware of these vulnerabilities . They could use it as a pivot point, an initial foothold, to get into the network and start attacking internal systems. He said he doesn't plan on revealing the vulne

No longer limited to Hollywood movies about cybercrime, webcam hacking has stealthily and aggressively broken into average households  " I've heard a hacker could access my webcam and watch me in front of my computer. Could this really happen? " YES, other than using a Remote administration tools, it is also technically possible using new Flash based flaw in Google Chrome. According to a recent report by security researchers, there's a big problem in Google Chrome's integrated Flash player. The proof-of-concept posted by Egor Homakov. When the play button is pressed, the user is actually allowing for his/her webcam to grab video and audio from a compromised computer without getting the user's permission. " This works precisely like regular clickjacking - you click on a transparent flash object, it allows access to Camera/Audio channel. Voila, attacker sees and hears you, " Homakov warned.  These kinds of virtual hacks have been taking place for years.

The FBI Tuesday announced the arrest of Karen 'Gary' Kazaryan , a 27-year old man, who is said to have blackmailed more than 350 women after convincing them to strip off in front of their webcams has been arrested in the US. He was arrested in Glendale, California on Tuesday after being indicted on 15 counts of computer intrusion and 15 counts of aggravated identity theft, and faces a possible 105 years in the Big House if convicted. The FBI described the alleged blackmail as " se*tortion ". He is accused of hacking into the victims accounts and changing their passwords, locking them out of their own online accounts. He then searched emails or other files for naked or semi-naked pictures of the victims, as well as other information, such as passwords and the names of their friends.  He then posed online as the women, sent instant messages to their friends and somehow, persuaded those friends to get undressed so that he could view and take pictures of the

In march 2011 CERT-Georgia has Discovered Cyber Espionage Attack Incident on country of Georgia.  Advanced Malicious Software was Collecting Sensitive, Confidential Information about Georgian and American Security Documents and then uploading it to some of Command and Control Servers. After a challenging investigating by CERT-Georgia researchers they found that this attack was linked Russian Official Security Agencies, Moreover investigators was able to turn on the webcam of mastermind behind the malware and they caught him on camera. Hacker hack some Georgian news sites and inject " Georbot Botnet " behind that, after visiting that page most of the readers get infected and malware take control of their systems. Malware was able to send any file from the local hard drive to the remote server, Steal certificates, Record audio using the microphone and web cams,  Scan the local network to identify other hosts on the same network. Malware was also using  CVE-2010-0842, CVE-20