Author Archives: Admin

Heartbleed SSL Vulnerability

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Heartbleed, a play on words from the OpenSSL feature called “Heartbeat,” was discovered by a Google researcher and a Finland-based security company, Codenomicon.

Articles at the Washington Post and many other sources are pointing out the potential for widespread security problems.

The vulnerability could allow hackers to access encrypted data online, including sensitive data such as user names, passwords, credit card numbers and Social Security numbers. Some researchers believe that hackers might even have been able to access encryption keys that can unlock Internet traffic on a mass scale, even when the data have been stored for years.

Companies and government agencies have been scrambling for days to correct the flaw by updating software. Dozens of popular Web sites, including Yahoo, have proved vulnerable to data theft this week. Because the exploitation of the flaw leaves no traces, it is extremely difficult to know what sites were compromised between the introduction of the flaw in March 2012.

Test your server for the flaw using these resources:

More Americans say they have lost personal data

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The Pew Research Center reports that growing numbers of Americans report that they have experienced personal data loss.

Findings from a January 2014 survey show that:

  • 18% of online adults have had important personal information stolen such as their Social Security Number, credit card, or bank account information. That’s an increase from the 11% who reported personal information theft in July 2013.
  • 21% of online adults said they had an email or social networking account compromised or taken over without their permission.The same number reported this experience in a July 2013 survey.

Read the article.

Man Tosses Out Hard Drive Worth $8M

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kept trash

zen Sutherland via Compfight

Protect your files with Carbonite Online BackupI can’t think of a better reason to backup your documents than this story.  Imagine suddenly realizing the hard drive your threw out a few months ago contained the private key for Bitcoin that were purchased several years ago and had since risen in value to nearly eight million USD.  Read the sad story.

Back in 2009 the crypto currency purchase was worth a significant $6,000, but today the currency is valued at more than 1,000 times as much.  He had placed the hard drive in a drawer once he thought all of the files had been swapped out to a newer drive that was replacing that one due to an issue.  A news story about a site related to BTC caused him to remember that the digital currency was still on that drive.

A visit to the garbage dump did nothing but further discourage him.  After talking to the dump manager he realized the monumental task of digging through several feet of trash that had accumulated in that time period.  After a fleeting thought of mounting a rescue mission and how monumental that would be he gave up hope.

Can you say the word backup?

 

Email and Password Data Stolen from Adobe

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Adobe has reported that passwords, unencrypted emails and password reminder questions and answers were stolen from Adobe leaving customers wondering if other accounts will be compromised.   As we have stated time and time again people reuse passwords on most sites, so the stolen emails and questions are all that are needed to gain access to most web sites.

In many instances people write a hint to themselves that says “same as my Facebook password” or “same as my bank password.”

“The best advice is for people not to recycle the same password in multiple places,” Mr. Krebs said.

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