Passwords of Plenty*: what 442773 leaked Yahoo! accounts can tell us
If a service leaks your credentials, your options are limited, but changing all your passwords to something harder to guess/break is never a bad idea.
LinkedIn security woes – and what to do about it
This morning when I logged into LinkedIn I was greeted with several front page references to the reported hacking of the site, and instructions for changing my password, which I did immediately. This is a good time to change all of your social media passwords, making sure you create a fresh password that is hard
Spam campaign uses Blackhole exploit kit to install SpyEye
This article was written in collaboration with my colleague Jean-Ian Boutin. The Wigon botnet (also known as Cutwail) is being used in a massive spam campaign. A multitude of ruses are used to get the user to click on a link: fake LinkedIn or Facebook notifications, free Windows licenses, fake deliveries etc. The links are
Facebook Video Calls powered by Skype
With Facebook's launch of video chat powered by Skype underway and enabling a new level of communication on its platform, we take a look at permission settings and privacy options.
LinkedIn Privacy: An Easy How‑to Guide to Protecting Yourself
Introduction LinkedIn is a social network platform whose specialty is connecting professionals together to build relationships and create business opportunity. Recently the company became publicly traded and grabbed the attention of the world as its initial public stock offering more than doubled on the first day. Here we focus tools and options for user privacy
Facebook Privacy: An Easy How‑to Guide to Protecting Yourself
Introduction As the sun is setting and I breathe some of the night time air I am inspired to write about Facebook. Yes, *the* Facebook, the third largest country if it were a physical place with boundaries under a common rule of law and government. When many people use a service such as this, it
LinkedIn Security and The Rapture
What do these two topics have in common? More than you might think. The obvious is that neither has arrived yet. There is no proof of existence of either, you have to take it on faith. Neither will be here tomorrow… take my word for that. A story at http://www.reuters.com/article/2011/05/23/uk-linkedin-security-idUSLNE74M02820110523 explains how dreadfully poor security
Ten Ways to Dodge Cyber‑Bullets (Part 6)
[Part 6 of an occasional series, updating a blog series I ran in early 2009 to reflect changes in the threat landscape. This series will also be available shortly as a white paper.] Social Networks Can Be Very Anti-Social Don’t disclose sensitive information on websites like FaceBook or LinkedIn if you can’t be sure that you
Cybersecurity Awareness Month – Awareness for the Next Generation
“Now may I suggest some of the things we must do if we are to make the American dream a reality. First, I think all of us must develop a world perspective if we are to survive. The American dream will not become a reality devoid of the larger dream of brotherhood and peace and
Armor for Social Butterflies
I was speaking with our friend David Perry at Trend Micro about the insecurity of social networking services and what steps users could take to strengthen their security online. In the course of our conversation, we came up with a list of simple steps you could take to better protect yourselves. Be careful about whom you
Self‑Protection part 9
It occurs to me that I should make it clear that this “top ten” isn’t in any particular order. Like the other “top ten” suggestions by the research team that are likely to find their way here in the near future, they’re all significant issues that need thinking about. Point 9 (a short one!) is, don’t
10 Ways to Protect Yourself: Part 6
Don’t disclose sensitive information on public websites like FaceBook or LinkedIn. Even information that in itself is innocuous can be combined with other harmless information and used in social engineering attacks. Rather than expand on that point, for now, I’m going to point to another “10 ways to protect yourself” resource: the more good advice