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The OWASP Hackademic Challenges Project is an open source project that helps you test your knowledge on web application security. You can use it to actually attack web applications in a realistic but also controlable and safe environment. On the left menu you can see all attack scenarios that are currently available. You can start by picking one! This is a Customized version of the OWASP Hackademic Challenges only for OWASP Appsec Europe 2011 The competition starts on 21st April and will run for 4 weeks until 15th May. Each week a series of challenges are going to be released according to the schedule below: Week 1 (21st April) Week 2 (28th April) Week 3 (5th May) Week 4 (12th May) Once the competition is over, the winner ( first place in the Top 10 ) will get a free ticket to OWASP Appsec Europe 2011 Let the challenges begin!

A top United States federal lab was the victim of a "silent" cyberattack earlier this month, news outlets are reporting The Oak Ridge National Laboratory in Tennessee was the victim, according to Nextgov.com. The lab is an energy department laboratory that studies nuclear fusion, supercomputing, and other areas. Ironically, "one of the core competencies of the lab is cybersecurity research," according to a quote on Wired. The attack prompted a shutdown of e-mail and Internet access at the facility. The attack vector used to break into Oak Ridge's network is known as an advanced persistent threat, or APT. Nextgov describes it thus: " APTs typically infiltrate a target by e-mailing its employees messages purportedly from legitimate associates that ask the employee to submit personal information, such as passwords, and then harvest this information to access the systems they are after. Once inside the network, the perpetrators often try to extract data -...

 Former Cisco Engineer Arrested for Hacking ! A former Cisco engineer was arrested last year on charges of hacking into his former employer's network and is currently awaiting extradition in Canada. The charges against Peter Alfred-Adekeye, a British national who worked for Cisco before leaving to start his own company, were reported in local Vancouver media this week. Alfred-Adekeye was arrested in May 2010 in Vancouver, on 97 counts of accessing a protected computer without authorization based on a complaint returned by a Secret Service Special Agent. The networking giant alleged that its former engineer used another employee's credentials to log into one of its restricted websites and download software. In 2008, Alfred-Adekeye's new company, Multiven, based in Redwood City, California, filed an antitrust lawsuit against Cisco, claiming that it is stifling competition by forcing its customers to sign service contracts to receive software bug fixes. Multiven p...

Microsoft discloses vulnerabilities in Chrome and Opera Microsoft has issued two advisories on Chrome and Opera, detailing remote code execution and information disclosure vulnerabilities. The disclosure is the result of the Microsoft Vulnerability Research (MSVR) system going live, which is one of the core items within their Coordinated Vulnerability Disclosure (CVD) program. On Tuesday, Microsoft issued an MSRV Advisory related to use-after-free memory errors in Google’s Chrome, which, if exploited, would have triggered a crash and allowed remote code execution in the browsers sandbox. “When attempting to parse specially crafted Web content, Google Chrome references memory that has been freed. An attacker could exploit the vulnerability to cause the browser to become unresponsive and/or exit unexpectedly, allowing an attacker to run arbitrary code within the Google Chrome Sandbox,” the advisory explains. Google has addressed the issue in a patch delivered last September. Vers...

German software developer Ashampoo Hit by Data Breach ! German software developer Ashampoo has notified its customers about a data breach incident that resulted in the exposure of their names and email addresses. According to an announcement posted on the company's website, unidentified hackers broke through its security systems and gained unauthorized access to a server. "We discovered the break-in and interrupted it instantly. The security gap through which the hackers gained access was closed immediately," said Ashampoo's CEO Rolf Hilchner. "At the same time we reported this incident to the police. Further investigations are underway. Unfortunately, the traces of the well-concealed hackers currently disperse abroad," he added. Fortunately, the hackers did not obtain access to billing information as this data is not stored on the company's servers. In addition to its software development business, which includes anti-malware, firewall and ...

Siemens Assisted with Stuxnet 's Development, claimed by Iran ! A senior Iranian official accuses Siemens of willingly assisting the Stuxnet creators by providing the source code necessary for them to exploit its software. Iran's state news agency, the Islamic Republic News Service (IRNA), quotes Brigadier General Gholam Reza Jalali as saying the German engineering giant played a part in the development of the world's most sophisticated malware. "Siemens should explain why and how it provided the enemies with the information about the codes of the SCADA software and prepared the ground for a cyber attack against us," Jalali told IRNA. "It was a hostile action which could have inflicted serious damage on the country if it had not been dealt with in a timely manner," he added. Jalali's remark might be a result of a The New York Times report that pointed at Israel and the US as likely Stuxnet creators and mentioned that Siemens worked in 2008 ...

DDOS attack on Change.org from China ! Change.org, an online petitioning platform, has come under an ongoing distributed denial of service (DDoS) attack originating from China after the site hosted a call urging Chinese authorities to release artist Ai Weiwei from custody. The attacks, which started late Sunday, have nearly brought down the site, according to Change.org founder Ben Rattray. DDoS attacks work by using hundreds or thousands of hacked computers to send traffic to a website, overwhelming it with data so it becomes inaccessible to normal users. Change.org said the current attack originates from an expanding group of computers primarily based in China, and has yet to stop. This is the first time the site has been hit with a DDoS attack. Change.org has been hosting a online petition calling for the release of Chinese artist Ai Weiwei, who is currently under arrest. The petition has attracted almost 100,000 people from 175 countries, making it one of Change.org'...