Top 10 Stories

Arstechnica - It took just one day for a low-end, Internet-connected digital video recorder to become infected with malware that surreptitiously mined Bitcoins on behalf of the quick-moving attackers. The feat, documented in a blog post published Monday by researchers at the security-training outfit Sans Institute, was all the more impressive because the DVR contained no interface for downloading software from the Internet. The lack of a Wget, ftp, or kermit application posed little challenge...

  Help Net Security: Even though the data gathered by Microsoft points to the fact that cybercriminals now prefer deceptive tactics to exploits, it does not mean that the latter approach has been wholly abandoned. Malwarebytes' Jerome Segura reports that emails with attachments that are not malicious executables but regular documents that have been exploited are still a big thing.  

IB Times: It seems like the FBI is not quite finished with one of its most valuable assets, Hector Monsegur (aka Sabu) the former Anonymous and LulzSec member who had his sentencing postponed for a seventh time on Wednesday. Monsegur was due before Judge Loretta Preska in New York on Thursday but he has once again had his sentencing postponed, according to sources speaking to the Daily Beast website.  

Guardian: Target wants you to know that you can trust it again. Nearly seven months after the second biggest retailer in America ignored multiple alarm bells, allowing thieves to virtually hijack the cash registers at some 1,800 stores and siphon at least 40m credit and debit card records plus contact info for more than 70m customers, CEO Gregg Steinhafel is out, and the company has pledged to spend $100m upgrading the security of its checkout system. But Monday's...

Deutsche Welle: NSA whistleblower Edward Snowden is to testify before a German panel investigating the activities of the spy agency. However, the panel has not yet determined whether he may travel to Berlin for the hearing. German lawmakers agreed to call on NSA-whistleblower to provide public testimony. The parliamentary committee, comprised of representatives from Germany's four parties in the Bundestag, announced the decision on Thursday after deliberating over the matter for roughly two hours.  

CIO: CIOs and CSOs who need to present security issues to their board need to “leave acronyms at the door”, use PowerPoint presentations and tell stories, according to GPT Group CIO Greg Baster. Speaking on a cyber security panel at the CeBIT Australia conference – which included Australia Post's CISO, Troy Braban, and ANZ Banking Group's global head of technology risk & information security – David Fisher, Baster said that he tries to summarise cyber...

FTC: Snapchat, the developer of a popular mobile messaging app, has agreed to settle Federal Trade Commission charges that it deceived consumers with promises about the disappearing nature of messages sent through the service. The FTC case also alleged that the company deceived consumers over the amount of personal data it collected and the security measures taken to protect that data from misuse and unauthorized disclosure. In fact, the case alleges, Snapchat’s failure to secure its Find...

Dark Reading: Nearly 85 percent of enterprises are harboring malware, and a new bot emerges each day, new Check Point report says. Nearly three-fourths of enterprises have at least one bot-infected endpoint living in their corporate networks, and every three minutes a bot communicates with its command and control server. New data from Check Point Software Technologies highlights the botnet and malware infestation within the enterprise, with 84 percent of organizations found infected with malware,...

Daily Echo: A Hampshire doctors’ surgery has apologised after confidential data about more than 100 patients was made public. A major IT glitch resulted in information about patients at the Fordingbridge Surgery, including their names, addresses and NHS numbers, accidentally appearing online.  

Tripwire: The Australian Defence Force (ADF) is seeking to develop offensive cyber capabilities that will enable their military to disrupt the networks of potential adversaries, as well as making strategies for deception and disinformation by way of the Internet key elements of military operations. “Australia is an attractive target for a range of malicious cyber actors, from politically-motivated hackers and criminal networks to nation-states,” said Prime Minister Julia Gillard when discussing the National Security Strategy...