ET Is Out There And He Has An IP Address And A Rap Sheet

Great story found in the USAToday about a  guy named Melin who had a laptop with some personal information stolen.  He then monitored the SETI(at)home database that was installed on the stolen laptp to see if the laptop would "talk" to the Berkeley servers. Well you guessed it, the laptop checked in several times within a week, and Melin collected and forwarded the IP addresses to the Minneapolis Police Department.  ET is out there and he has an IP address...and now a rap sheet.

Symantec Offers Zero-Day Protection That Doesn't Rely On Threat Signatures

Beginning in February, Symantec's will provide Symantec Online Network for Advanced Response (SONAR) as a free add-on to Symantec's Norton AntiVirus 2007 and Norton Internet Security 2007 products.  According to this article in InfoWorldThis zero-day protection tool will look at the behavior of programs running on the computer in order to decide whether they are malicious versus Symantec's traditional signature-based antivirus protection techniques, which compare the program's code to a database of known malware. The software is based on technology received from its acquisition of WholeSecurity in 2005.

Anatomy of a DNS DDoS Amplification Attack

"Anatomy of a DNS DDos Amplification Attack" is a great article that describes in great detail the nuts and bolts of DNS DDos attack and how to survive and reduce the threat of this devastating attack.  For security experts and professionals this is a must read as this particular type of attack can affect large parts of the Internet and cost millions and millions of dollars. 

Microsoft To Release Patch For Zero-Day XML Flaw On November 14th

On November 14th, Microsoft will release a important bulletin with a "critical" fix for a security hole in its XML Core Services software, the company stated on its Web site Thursday morning. This particular vulnerability is a zero-day flaw that's already being exploited for attacks.  This fix is part of their monthly security patch strategy that provides advanced notification of potential threats and fixes. 

Problems With The Voting Today? Report it!

If you experience any issues or irregularities in voting today...dont hesitate, call 1-866-OUR-VOTE, the hotline for the National Campaign for Fair Elections. EFF lawyers and many others are standing by across the country to take legal action to remove malfunctioning voting machines, keep polls open, etc.

New Zero-day Exploit For Microsoft Systems Has Appeared

Their are reports of a vulnerability in the XMLHTTP 4.0 ActiveX Control for Windows.  This control is part of Microsoft XML Core Services 4.0.  Microsoft reports that it is aware of limited attacks that are attempting to use the reported vulnerability.   See link below:

http://www.microsoft.com/technet/security/advisory/927892.mspx

More Web flaws in 2006

According to a story by Robert Lemos of Security Focus, "The latest data from the Common Vulnerabilities and Exposures (CVE) project shows the latest numbers from the vulnerability database found that 4,375 security issues had so far been cataloged in the first nine months of 2006, just shy of the 4,538 issues documented last year."

Big Brother Knows No Limits

As reported on new Scientist, the NSA is moving forth with its plans to monitor the web, including online social networking data.  After all their bad press of recent you would think they would tread lightly around this thorny issue...but of course not our big brother. LOL...

Common Passwords and Issues

Nice article on the Bruce Schneier Weblog discussing intersting trends found from a list of 100,000 passwords for a German dating site.

Wired Article - Everyone Wants to 'Own' Your PC

Great article on Wired.com discussing the different companies trying to own you PC.  Everyone from Sony and their infamous "rootkit' to Microsoft and many others.  The author notes the market forces at work in this seeming violation of your privacy and how some of them get around this issue.

Funny bug on Google's China Site

Bruce Schneier on his weblog tells of a funny bug on Google's China Site that allows you to bypass China's sensors if your enter the search term in all capitals.  Nice...