There are now more mobile devices than people on our planet. The amount of personal data we share through mobile devices is also increasing. So it is not surprising that cyber-criminals want a piece of…
The blanket term “hack” can encompass a whole range of attacks – but what are they?
Anant N S
Last week, we woke to news that the largest cyber attack ever was underway in Europe, with reports of global internet speeds falling as a result of an assault on the anti-spamming company Spamhaus.
In…
The RBA has been the subject of hacking attacks – but that is not unusual.
AAP/Sergio Dionisio
You’ll have seen the fallout this week regarding a so-called “spearphishing” attack on the Reserve Bank of Australia (RBA) in 2011. As with most media reports on cyber-attacks, this one appears to have…
Basic tenets of internet security are being ignored by some users and website developers.
dustball
By Philip Branch, Swinburne University of Technology
Yesterday the ABC was attacked, supposedly in response to the network giving coverage to an Australian visit by the controversial Dutch politician Geert Wilders.
A Twitter user, “Phr0zenMyst”, claimed…
Julia Gillard has presented a coherent plan for an uncertain future.
AAP/Lukas Coch
The central problem for defence and security planners right now is uncertainty. The clarity of the Cold War is gone, new threats such as terrorism have come, and seemingly peaked, and what the rise of…
Online stalking gets far too much attention, but it’s worth making some changes to prevent it happening to you.
Flickr/Ed Yourdon
Recent cases of online abuse against Charlotte Dawson and NRL player Robbie Farah have attracted considerable media attention and triggered public debate about how to respond to this issue.
But how big…
Australia’s place in the online world is changing, with significant consequences.
lintmachine
Yesterday afternoon the Australian Senate passed the Cybercrime Legislation Amendment Bill 2011 following amendments suggested by the Labor Party.
It’s been more than a year since the bill was first introduced…
Keep your friends close and your enemies, wherever possible, at bay.
Karat
On September 22, 23-year-old college student Cody Kretsinger was arrested by the FBI for his part in the hack of Sony Pictures Entertainment by the high-profile hacking group LulzSec.
The hack resulted…
Are reactions against the infamous hacking group a sign of generational conflict?
JacobDavis
It’s a scene reminiscent of a thousand police dramas: the FBI arrived at the door of 20-year-old journalism student Mercedes Haefer, guns drawn, at 6am one morning last July.
She was still in her pyjamas…
Has TeaMp0isoN missed the point with its latest hacking stunt?
Kerim Okten/AAP
By Philip Branch, Swinburne University of Technology
The hacking of BlackBerry’s official blog by the mysterious collective TeaMp0isoN raises serious questions.
This black-hat hacking group, founded in 2009, has so far claimed responsibility for more than…
Hacktivists remove choice from consumers – and in their own way lay down the law.
anonmunich
As you’ll know by now, hacktivist group Anonymous has vandalised the home page of the Syrian Ministry of Defense, posting a message which started: “To the Syrian people: the world stands with you against…
What would Hunter S. Thompson have made of DefCon 2011?
Profound Whatever
Las Vegas has a long association with people on the fringe of society but even Hunter S. Thompson’s characters Raoul Duke and his drug-soaked Samoan lawyer would have found visitors to the DefCon hacker…
Why isn’t more being done to keep our sensitive information from prying eyes?
sinus iridium
Participation in Australian society involves providing information about yourself to both public and private sector organisations.
Such information may be sensitive, which raises important questions…
At least 72 major organisations were hacked in “Operation Shady Rat”.
Gilderic (Recovering)
It’s official: we have entered a brave new world.
On Tuesday (US time), IT Security company McAfee announced the discovery of the most extensive hack-attacks ever seen, which the company referred to as…
A successful attack on PayPal could cause havoc.
[!!!] Sweet Peas Photography [!!!]
In a joint statement published earlier this week, hacking groups Anonymous and LulzSec urged readers to boycott e-commerce giant PayPal, claiming:
“PayPal continues to withhold funds from WikiLeaks, a…
Increased intelligence data adds more noise, but not always more useful information.
ssoosay
Commentary from some sections of the IT community on the recent killings in Norway reminds us national security is still haunted by two visions:
1) With enough data it will be possible to comprehensively…
Great headlines … shame about the reality.
Australian Federal Police/AAP
By Philip Branch, Swinburne University of Technology
Another day, another hacking exploit makes headlines.
This time it’s a “self-taught, lone hacker”, David Cecil, apparently known online as “Evil”, who allegedly broke into Platform Networks' site, one…
Who are middle-men in the global spam network?
freezelight
Spam is everywhere. Its persistence is attributable to gullible internet users, to well-known software giants and, ultimately, to money.
Unfortunately, spam is not going to be vanquished through use of…
Cyber crime is a growth industry, if you have the head for it.
Truthout.org
By Philip Branch, Swinburne University of Technology
The hacking stories just keep on coming. Of course, The News of the World is the big one at the moment, matched, for the moment at least, by the hacking of The Sun’s website by celebrity – and proficient…
Not sharing your password is one of the basic rules for online safety.
Michael Reynolds/EPA
On July 4, a hacker took control of one of the Twitter accounts of US broadcaster FoxNews.com and sent out several tweets announcing President Obama had been shot.
Because it was a national holiday and…
Imagine a world where spam didn’t exist. It isn’t hard to do.
AJC1
We’ve all received them: emails offering special prices on Viagra, offering fortunes we didn’t know we had, offering links to fantastic websites we simply must visit right away.
Annoying as! But the technology…
If you’re concerned about the data on your phone, there are a few things you can do.
Daniel Barry/EPA
The Apple iPhone feature of logging and storing users' location information has attracted worldwide attention.
But discussions about location privacy aside, a more basic question needs to be asked: how…
In the fight against cyber crime, a winning move is proving hard to find.
dlkinney
Cyber security has been in the news a lot lately. Corporate giants have had their data stolen, intelligence agencies have had their websites taken down and hacker groups have become household names.
Closer…
By Philip Branch, Swinburne University of Technology
Computer hacker group LulzSec are in the news again. The team has carried out successful hacks on the PlayStation Network, PBS and the US Senate but the latest – which took down the CIA website for several…
Does Sony have unique vulnerabilities, or has it just been unlucky?
Everett Kennedy Brown/EPA
Recent high-profile cyber attacks have dented the image of Japanese technology giant Sony and left millions of customers worried about the security of their personal information.
An attack in April resulted…
There’s every chance your computer has been compromised.
TTC Press Images
Today, Australia’s Labor Government announced it had started working on a national cyber security strategy, to be released as a white paper in the first half of next year.
This comes amid growing concern…
Is it time to get tougher on hackers, whatever their motivations?
Philippe Huguen/AFP
PRIVACY – Who are hackers and what do they want from you?
Pop culture would have us believe they live in dank basements, wear black leather from head to toe and have pseudonyms such as Warlock or Neo…
