News

• Bug bounty hunters reveal eight vulnerabilities in Google services

  Security researchers unveiled eight vulnerabilities in Google services during the Hack in the Box conference in Amsterdam on Thursday -- but they claim to have discovered more than 100 such bugs over the past few months.

• McAfee reports big spike in malware

  PC malware had its "busiest quarter in recent history," according to McAfee's quarterly security report released Wednesday.

• Bredolab botnet author sentenced to 4 years in prison in Armenia

  The creator of the Bredolab malware received a four-year prison sentence in Armenia on Monday for using his botnet to launch DDoS (distributed denial-of-service) attacks that damaged multiple computer systems owned by private individuals and organizations.

• Banking malware monitors victims by hijacking webcams and microphones, researchers say

  A new variant of SpyEye malware allows cybercriminals to monitor potential bank fraud victims by hijacking their webcams and microphones, according to security researchers from antivirus vendor Kaspersky Lab.

• Is it really time to run AV on your Mac?

  No matter which way you slice the numbers, the sheer volume and variety of Windows malware makes running XP, Vista or 7 without antivirus far more risky than running any version of Mac OS X without antivirus.

• 15 bad apps sneak past Google’s ‘bouncer’

  Despite Google’s best efforts to prevent malware entering its official market, Google Play, it let 15 data-stealing apps slip by, according to security vendor, McAfee.

• The week in security: Flashback, brethren continue assault

  Malware authors continued to pull new cards from their bags of tricks, with suggestions a new approach uses JavaScript to look for mouse movements, indicating that the visitor is a real person and not a security vendor’s automated malware scanner. In the absence of mouse movement, no malware will be offered.

• The week in security: 600,000 reasons for Mac users to be afraid

  Cyber-attacks may have been adjudged to be one of the most serious security threats facing the world, and the nasties out there were certainly doing their part to make sure we didn't forget it. Credit-card payments processor Global Payments said that fewer than 1.5 million cards were affected by the recent data theft, but struggled with its corporate messaging in the wake of the significant breach. .

• Cross-browser worm spreads via Facebook, security experts warn

  Malware writers have used Crossrider, a cross-browser extension development framework, to build a click-fraud worm that spreads on Facebook, security researchers from antivirus firm Kaspersky Lab said on Monday.

• Wikipedia warns users about malware injecting ads into its pages

  Visitors to Wikipedia who see advertisements on the site have most likely fallen victim to a browser-based malware infection, Wikimedia Foundation, the organization operating the website, said on Monday.

• Amnesty International's UK website compromised to infect visitors with cyberspying malware

  The U.K. website of Amnesty International, a human rights watchdog organization, was compromised by hackers, who used it to infect visitors with a remote access Trojan horse program known as Gh0st RAT, security firm Websense reported on Friday.

• APT attackers are increasingly using booby-trapped RTF documents, experts say

  Booby-trapped RTF documents are one of the most common types of malicious Microsoft Office files that are used to infect computers with advanced persistent threats (APTs), according to security researchers from Trend Micro.

• FBI issues warning on hotel Internet connections

  The FBI today warned travelers there has been an uptick in malicious software infecting laptops and other devices linked to hotel Internet connections.

• Police-themed ransomware starts targeting US and Canadian users

  A ransomware application that locks computers and asks their owners to pay fines for allegedly violating several laws through their online activity is targeting U.S. and Canadian users, malware experts from security firm Trend Micro said on Wednesday.

• Financial malware tricks users with claims of free credit card fraud insurance

  A piece of financial malware called Tatanga attempts to trick online banking users into authorizing rogue money transfers from their accounts as part of the activation procedure for a free credit-card fraud insurance service purportedly provided by their banks, security researchers from Trusteer said Tuesday.Tatanga is an online banking Trojan horse that was first discovered in May 2011. It is able to inject rogue Web pages into browsing sessions and affects nine different browsers, including Internet Explorer, Mozilla Firefox, Google Chrome, Opera and Safari.The malware is known to use social engineering techniques against victims in order to bypass security measures enforced by banks, like one-time passwords (OTPs) or transaction authorization numbers (TANs).A new Tatanga configuration detected recently by Trusteer displays a rogue message inside the browser when the victim authenticates on their bank's website, claiming that their bank is offering free credit-card fraud insurance to all customers.The message claims that the new service is provided in partnership with Visa and MasterCard and covers losses that might result from fraudulent online transactions performed with the victim's credit or debit card. The malware grabs the user's real account balance, rounds it up, and presents the result as the allegedly insured sum.The rogue message includes a bank account number that's supposed to be the victim's new insurance account opened by the bank. However, in reality, this account belongs to a money mule -- an individual paid to receive money from fraudulent activity on behalf of cybercriminals -- said Ayelet Heyman, a security researcher at Trusteer, in a blog post Tuesday.The user is told that to activate the service they need to authorize a transaction from their bank account to their new insurance account. In order to do this, they need to input the transaction authorization code sent by their bank to their mobile phone number.This code allows the malware to finalize the rogue transfer in the background and send the victim's money to the money mule. "In all likelihood, the victim does not expect any funds will be transferred out of their account," Heyman said.The maximum sum that is transferred by the malware in a single transaction is €5,000 or about US$6,500. "We can assume that fraudsters have identified this amount (5,000 Euros) as the upper threshold that triggers the bank to address the transaction as high risk," Heyman said via email.The rogue message displayed by the Tatanga configuration analyzed by Trusteer is written in Spanish, which suggests that it targets users in Spain or other Spanish-speaking countries. The company hasn't seen a version of this attack in a different language yet, but the malware is known to have targeted users in other European countries and the U.S. in the past, Heyman said via email.The Trusteer researcher advises users to call their banks over the phone and check the validity of sudden announcements or requests that appear on banking websites. If an online banking website suddenly starts asking users for sensitive information like card security codes or PIN numbers, it's most likely because of a malware infection, he said via email.Users should also install the security software recommended or supplied by their financial institution and should use some type of browser-based security solution that prevents financial fraud, Heyman said.