Protect yourself from targeted phishing attacks, malware, spyware, and more. Bad actors and their tactics continue to become more and more sophisticated. Ensure that you change default passwords, always use encryption, learn about safe browsing habits, and maintain security for your home or business network.
In mid-2013, British Prime Minister, David Cameron, began a push to block pornographic material on the Web in UK households. Under the new legislation, porn would be filtered by default and citizens would have to opt-in to view such adult content. Enforcement of such an ambitious initiative comes with many content categorization and technical challenges, not just in the UK, but within any internet service provider infrastructure.
Wi-Fi hotspots commonly found in many American coffee shops, restaurants and other popular after-school hang outs are providing kids with what they demand – free Internet access. This may help keep them connected with family or friends, in addition to sparing parents from costly data plan overages, but the complimentary Web access was proven to come with a twist in an Adaptive Mobile independent study. The adult, dating, extremist, drug, gambling and other similarly objectionable content typically blocked at home by some type of parental controls solution is easily accessible by kids at these Wi-Fi locations.
The Anti-Phishing Working Group (APWG) released their quarterly Phishing Attack Trends Report for the first quarter of 2013. Payment Services were reported as the most phished industry sector, followed by Financial Services.
I got my hands on a copy of a Northwestern University research paper titled “Evaluating Android Anti-malware against Transformation Attacks.” After digging into it, my zveloLABS colleagues and I decided to conduct an experiment of our own based on the information provided in the research paper.
The Internet Watch Foundation has celebrated a major milestone. It has taken action against its 100,000th URL containing inappropriate child sexual abuse content. In addition, the IWF reports it has aided the rescue of at least 12 children in the past two years. The body’s 2012 accomplishments deserve some praise.
In early 2013, zvelo deployed a new approach to detect spam web pages. These web pages have little value and consist mostly of meaningless content and links, sometimes objectionable in nature, or worse yet they can be used to host and spread malware. Spam web pages continue to sprout online and following are some interesting trends about the types of web content spammers are targeting, which zveloLABS has mapped out.
The Dow Jones Industrial Average recently dropped by about 145 points and the S&P 500 index lost $136.5 billion dollars in value after a tweet from the Associated Press claimed that an explosion had taken place in the White House and that President Obama was injured. The tweet turned out to be false and stemmed from a hacked Associated Press Twitter account. The precedent has been set for us to take a long, hard and uncomfortable look at the challenges we face when relying on automated trading systems that gauge and react to public sentiment and that end with drastic results.
Consumers will soon know exactly how much of their personal information is being collected online, by whom, and may one day be able to correct errors or opt-out entirely from such activity. The name of the game is “privacy” and thanks to a combination of recent investigative reporting and pressure from advocacy groups, regulatory entities and politicians, the urgency to reach this point is now mainstream news.
A renewed sense of urgency to secure information, networks and electronic devices in order to thwart advanced hacking techniques loomed over the 2013 RSA conference floor in San Francisco. The harsh realization that traditional security measures simply don’t cut it anymore was confirmed by various keynotes and casual hallway conversations between peers.
Here are some simple web safety tips, warnings and general practical knowledge intended for the common Internet user.