security

Data breaches are nothing new when it comes to various websites and social networks. Recently a cybercriminal forum has begun selling access to what it claims to be a database of phone numbers that belong to Facebook users. The bot network claims to allow customers to look up phone numbers using an automated Telegram bot. The data reportedly appears to be several years old but still represents a cybersecurity and privacy risk for those who own the numbers.

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While leaks of Apple's next hardware products have become more common and more easy-flowing, its software remains closely guarded secrets kept behind locked doors. This security by obscurity strategy has worked in Apple's favor in keeping some malicious actors out but has also thwarted attempts by third-party security researchers to help improve the software. At least that's the goal that Corellium has with its contested iOS virtualization tool that it is now making available even to individual customers.

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Although there is no shortage of password managers promising better protection for online accounts and apps, that often means you will have another piece of software to maintain and mind apart from your web browser. Modern browsers, of course, now have their own password management systems that does pretty much the same things, just for website and web apps. With Chrome version 88, however, Google is stepping up the security game with additional features to its password protection that will let users know if they're not applying best security practices.

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WhatsApp is pushing back its controversial privacy policy change, delaying the date by which users must agree to the new terms over what the Facebook-owned messaging platform described as "misinformation" about how it shares data. Concerns began earlier in January, after an upcoming policy update seemingly required WhatsApp users consent to some of their data being passed over to Facebook.

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Secure messaging service Signal is down this morning, with users reporting an inability to log into their account and check their encrypted messages. The company reported a huge influx of new registrations over the past week, accelerated by chatter that Facebook-owned WhatsApp planned to share user data with its social network parent.

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Amazon's Ring has introduced a new technical preview that brings end-to-end encryption for the company's doorbells and security cameras, the company has announced. The new encryption is available as an opt-in security feature for those who want to keep their camera footage private in a more secure, but less convenient, way.

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2020 ended with the rather big and bad cybersecurity news around the SolarWinds exploit that laid bare many government and company emails. If you thought that 2021 would be more positive, that clearly isn't the case given the news of the past few days. In terms of cybersecurity, the year is starting off rather poorly for owners of Ubiquiti routers, security cameras, and other IoT products as the company started reaching out to owners to tell them to change their passwords after discovering a rather serious security breach on a third-party cloud server.

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We saw tech companies last year scrambling to put out new products that try to address the elephant in the room that is the COVID-19 coronavirus. Those ranged from air purifiers to UV-C gadget sterilizers to even face masks with filters and fans. The risks of contracting the virus, however, doesn't just revolve around the air that we breathe but also the surfaces we touch. That has also given way to products and procedures that remove the need for touch contact, like Arlo's upcoming Touchless version of its Video Doorbell.

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Samsung was one of the first smartphone makers that eyed in-screen fingerprint sensors but it was one of the last to actually adopt it. Even then, the technology it used ended up being more than disappointing. First introduced in its 2019 lineup, the fingerprint scanners that used Qualcomm's ultrasonic fingerprint sensor technology was proven to be susceptible to being fooled by screen protectors. It turns out, Samsung's 2020 Galaxy Note 20 phones were just as vulnerable to that trick.

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Intel has launched a new facial recognition system, aiming to bring Face ID-style biometric access to ATMs, smart locks, and more. Intel RealSense ID pulls together an active depth sensor to scan the user's face, with a special neural network running on a local chipset for increased security without PINs, passwords, or having to scan your fingerprint.

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The word "hacking" has had a rather tumultuous history. Originally associated with trees and plants, the word took on a more playful tone in the 60s before becoming synonymous with "cracking" in more recent times. Although it now carries largely negative connotations, hacking is sometimes described with different shades, some of which make security-oriented activities like penetration testing sound more interesting and more fun. It is perhaps in the spirit of the latter that a few hardware geeks have banded together to create the Flipper Zero, described appropriately as a Tamagotchi for hackers.

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Security researchers discovered that more than 100,000 Zyxel firewalls had a hardcoded, backdoor admin-level account baked in that could've given hackers root access to the devices. Security researchers say that the backdoor accounts could've given hackers access via the SSH interface or web administration panel. The team from Eye Control says this is as bad as vulnerabilities get.

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