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October 1, 2015, was the end of the deadline for U.S. citizens to switch to Chip-enabled Credit Cards for making the transactions through swipe cards safer. Now, a group of French forensics researchers have inspected a real-world case in which criminals played smart in such a way that they did a seamless chip-switching trick with a slip of plastic that it was identical to a normal credit card. The researchers from the École Normale Supérieure University and the Science and Technology Institute CEA did a combined study of the subject, publishing a research paper [ PDF ] that gives details of a unique credit card fraud analyzed by them. What's the Case? Back in 2011 and 2012, police arrested five French citizens for stealing about 600,000 Euros (~ $680,000) as a result of the card fraud scheme, in spite of the Chip-and-PIN cards protections. How did the Chip-and-Pin Card Fraud Scheme Work? On investigating the case, the researchers discovered that the n...

For most of us Hacking is Technological in Nature. But, we usually forget the most important element of hacking that makes a successful hack from 10% to over 90%... ... The Human Element . And here the Social Engineering comes in. Social Engineering deals with non-technical kind of intrusion and manipulation that relies heavily on human interaction rather than technology. Social Engineering is popular because the human element is frequently the weakest part of a system and most prone to mistakes. Most businesses and organizations spend a ton of money on the latest shiny technology that promises to fix their security issues while humans are giving hackers the easiest way to get in. Impact of Social Engineering  Social Engineering has been the primary cause of a number of the most high profile cyber-attacks in recent years. The impact of it on an organisation could result in economic loss, loss of Privacy, temporary or permanent Closure, loss of good...

Hackers have come after your phone, your computer, and your car . Now hackers are coming after your home refrigerators, Smart TVs , and eventually KETTLES . Yes, your kettle turns out good for more than just heating up water or making coffee for you– they are potentially a good way for hackers to breach your wireless network. Also Read:   How to Weaponize your Cat to Hack Neighbours' Wi-Fi Passwords . Ken Munro, a security researcher at PenTest Partners, has managed to hack into an insecure iKettle , which was proclaimed " the world's first WiFi kettle " by its developers, and stolen a home's Wi-Fi password. Besides boiling water, the iKettle can connect to a user's home WiFi network. It also comes inbuilt with an Android and iOS app that allows the user to switch on the kettle and boil the water from other location. However, the biggest security flaw resides in the Android iKettle app that keeps the kettle's password as the defa...

It's inevitable. Most security threats eventually target privileged accounts. In every organization each user has different permissions, and some users hold the metaphorical keys to your IT kingdom. If the privileged accounts get compromised, it can lead to theft or sabotage. Because these accounts control delicate parts of your IT operations, and it is important to know who has privileges, what privileges they have, when they received access, and what activity they've done. This is where Security Information and Event Management (SIEM) software comes in handy. SIEM Monitors and Alerts on Privileged Account Activity Comprehensive monitoring of privileged accounts can be challenging because you need to monitor users who are administrators, users with root access, and users with access to firewalls, databases, services, automated processes, etc. With every additional user, group, and policy monitoring account activity gets increasingly difficult. On top of mo...

Yes, Google wants you to keep your bits and bytes as safe as possible through encryption. With the launch of Android 5.0 Lollipop last year, Google wanted to make full disk Encryption mandatory , but unfortunately, the idea did not go too well. However, Google thinks the idea will go right this time, and it will try again to require full-disk encryption by default for devices that release with the newest Android 6.0 Marshmallow and higher versions. Google has published the new version of the Android Compatibility Definition Document ( PDF ), mandating Android encryption with a couple of exceptions in Android 6.0 Marshmallow. The document reads: "For device implementations supporting full-disk encryption and with Advanced Encryption Standard (AES) crypto performance above 50MiB/sec, the full-disk encryption MUST be enabled by default at the time the user has completed the out-of-box setup experience." New smartphones and tablets that ship with Androi...

Apple is cleaning up its iTunes App Store again – for the third time in two months – following another flood of iOS apps that secretly collect users' personal information. Researchers discovered more than 250 iOS apps that were violating Apple's App Store privacy policy , gathering personal identifiable data from almost one Million users estimated to have downloaded those offending apps. The offending iOS applications have been pulled out of the App Store after an analytics service SourceDNA reported the issue. After XcodeGhost , this is the second time when Apple is cleaning its App Store. Malicious iOS Apps Stealing Users' Private Info The malicious applications were developed using a third-party software development kit (SDK) provided by Youmi, a Chinese advertising company. Once compiled and distributed on Apple's official App Store, those apps secretly accessed and stored users' personal information, including: A list of apps installed on the victim's phone Serial nu...

Security researchers have uncovered a new piece of Adware that replaces your entire browser with a dangerous copy of Google Chrome , in a way that you will not notice any difference while browsing. The new adware software, dubbed " eFast Browser ," works by installing and running itself in place of Google Chrome The adware does all kinds of malicious activities that we have seen quite often over the years: Generates pop-up, coupon, pop-under and other similar ads on your screen Placing other advertisements into your web pages Redirects you to malicious websites containing bogus contents Tracking your movements on the web to help nefarious marketers send more crap your way to generating revenue Therefore, having eFast Browser installed on your machine may lead to serious privacy issues or even identity theft. What's Nefariously Intriguing About this Adware? The thing that makes this Adware different from others is that instead of taking contr...

A self-described teenage hacker has claimed to have hacked into personal AOL email account of Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) Director John Brennan and swiped sensitive top-secret data. It's Really a major embarrassment for Brennan as well as the CIA. The hacker, who describes himself as an American high school student, called the New York Post to describe his exploits. According to the teenage hacker, Brennan's private email account held a range of sensitive files, which includes: His 47-page application for top-secret security clearance Social Security numbers (SSNs) and personal information of more than a dozen top US intelligence officials A government letter discussing " harsh interrogation techniques " used on terrorist suspects Sensitive Information Leaked The teenage hacker operates with under the Twitter name " Crackas With Attitude " with Twitter handle @_CWA_ . He confirmed the Post that he also controlled the...

Recently, Chinese iOS developers have discovered a new OS X and iOS malware dubbed XcodeGhost that has appeared in malicious versions of Xcode, Apple's official toolkit for developing iOS and OS X apps. The hack of Apple's Xcode involves infecting the compiler with malware and then passing that malware onto the compiled software. This is a unique approach because the hack does not attempt to inject attack code into a single app, and then try and sneak that past Apple's automated and human reviewers. Instead, the malicious code is infected on Xcode itself, which is used by software developers to craft and develop the apps for iOS and OS X operating system. The primary behavior of XcodeGhost in infected iOS apps is to collect information on devices and upload that data to command and control (C2) servers. Once the malware has established a foothold on infected devices, it has the ability to phish user credentials via fake warning boxes, open specific URLs in a ...

Facebook just launched a new notification feature that will alert you if the social network strongly suspects that your account is being hijacked or targeted by hackers working in the interest of a nation-state. The message, which you can see below, recommends users to turn ON " Login Approvals ," so that their Facebook accounts can only be accessed using stronger two-factor authentication. Facebook insists that some necessary steps are already taken to secure users' Facebook accounts that may be targeted by hackers, but the company has also stepped up to directly warn its users when a government-sponsored attack is under away. In a blog post published Saturday, Facebook Chief Security Officer (CSO) Alex Stamos announced that this step to secure accounts is necessary "because these types of attacks tend to be more advanced and dangerous than others." Stamos added that "it's important to understand that this warning is not related t...

Microsoft wants Windows 10 users to use its Edge browser , and the company is pulling every trick out to make it happen. In a newly leaked Windows 10 preview release ( build 10568 ) , Microsoft has added a new prompt that appears whenever you try to switch away from default apps, including Microsoft Edge . Considering the wide adoption of Microsoft's newest operating system Windows 10, it seems that users are still hesitant in adopting Edge browser that comes bundled with  Windows 10 . To help encourage a higher adoption of Microsoft's default apps bundled with Windows 10, the software giant seems to be taking some steps. Come, Give Microsoft Edge A Shot!  If you already have Microsoft Edge as your default browser, then installing another rival browser, such as Google Chrome or Mozilla Firefox , and switching the defaults will make a dialog box with " Give Microsoft Edge a shot " appear. The prompt highlights some of the latest features in ...

We are back with THN Weekly RoundUp to spread lights on last week's top cyber security threats and challenges, just in case you missed any of them (ICYMI). Last week, we came to know about many security threats including how Google records and stores our Voice searches, How hackers can use Radio-waves to control our Smartphones from 16 feet away and How did the NSA break Trillions of Encrypted connections. Also, some of last week's news included USB Killer v2.0 and a real-life Thor-like Hammer . I recommend you to read the entire news (just click ' Read More ' because there's some valuable advice in there as well). Here's the list: 1. Google OnHub Router Runs on Chrome OS; Here's How to Root it Google OnHub Router runs Chrome operating system, the same Linux-based OS that powers Google Chromebook laptops and desktops. Google OnHub is a modern wireless router designed by Google and TP-Link. It operates networks on both t...