• Tag Archives computer security
  • Microsoft continues its legacy of spying on its windows users! Windows 10 Privacy Spy destroyer

    DISTROY WINDOWS 10 SPYING – Privacy Concerns

    Microsoft Windows 10 Software

    As we all know since windows 7 Microsoft has altered its operating system to be more user friendly and at the same time collect more user data on its customers, When windows 8 was launched , there were big changes including location platform and many more but now with the new Windows 10 release there are endless limitations on the collection of data being sent to Microsoft.

    Some group has released a piece of software which eliminates all apps, and blocks the data from being sent to Microsoft. I will not comment much on the software but see below what it does block.

    Also a new app by the name of DoNotSpy10 has been created by a German developer pXc-coding.

    Destroy Windows 10 Spying is an app that can block anonymous data being sent, remove apps that can’t be removed the standard way and more. I liked that it can remove some of the Windows default programs that can’t be removed under Apps & Features, an annoyance I immediately discovered since I prefer to “slim” down windows.

    I should note that there are still a few steps to complete, you’ll still need to go online to Microsoft’s site and opt out of the company’s invasive advertising tracking features when using DoNotSpy10 or other piece of software.

    It’s your own fault if you don’t know that Windows 10 is spying on you. That’s what people always say when users fail to read through a company’s terms of service document, right?

    Well, here is Microsoft’s 12,000-word service agreement. Some of it is probably in English. We’re pretty sure it says you can’t steal Windows or use Windows to send spam, and also that Microsoft retains the right to take possession of your first-born child if it so chooses. And that’s only one of several documents you’ll have to read through.

    Actually, here’s one excerpt from Microsoft’s privacy statement that everyone can understand:

    Finally, we will access, disclose and preserve personal data, including your content (such as the content of your emails, other private communications or files in private folders), when we have a good faith belief that doing so is necessary to: 1.comply with applicable law or respond to valid legal process, including from law enforcement or other government agencies; 2.protect our customers, for example to prevent spam or attempts to defraud users of the services, or to help prevent the loss of life or serious injury of anyone; 3.operate and maintain the security of our services, including to prevent or stop an attack on our computer systems or networks; or 4.protect the rights or property of Microsoft, including enforcing the terms governing the use of the services – however, if we receive information indicating that someone is using our services to traffic in stolen intellectual or physical property of Microsoft, we will not inspect a customer’s private content ourselves, but we may refer the matter to law enforcement.

    If that sentence sent shivers down your spine, don’t worry. As invasive as it is, Microsoft does allow Windows 10 users to opt out of all of the features that might be considered invasions of privacy.
    Some of the domains we know send anonymous information back to Microsoft include:
    vortex.data.microsoft.com
    vortex-win.data.microsoft.com
    telecommand.telemetry.microsoft.com
    telecommand.telemetry.microsoft.com.nsatc.net
    oca.telemetry.microsoft.com
    oca.telemetry.microsoft.com.nsatc.net
    sqm.telemetry.microsoft.com
    sqm.telemetry.microsoft.com.nsatc.net
    watson.telemetry.microsoft.com
    watson.telemetry.microsoft.com.nsatc.net
    redir.metaservices.microsoft.com
    choice.microsoft.com
    choice.microsoft.com.nsatc.net
    df.telemetry.microsoft.com
    reports.wes.df.telemetry.microsoft.com
    wes.df.telemetry.microsoft.com
    services.wes.df.telemetry.microsoft.com
    sqm.df.telemetry.microsoft.com
    telemetry.microsoft.com
    watson.ppe.telemetry.microsoft.com
    telemetry.appex.bing.net
    telemetry.urs.microsoft.com
    telemetry.appex.bing.net:443
    settings-sandbox.data.microsoft.com
    vortex-sandbox.data.microsoft.com
    survey.watson.microsoft.com
    watson.live.com
    watson.microsoft.com
    statsfe2.ws.microsoft.com
    corpext.msitadfs.glbdns2.microsoft.com
    compatexchange.cloudapp.net
    cs1.wpc.v0cdn.net
    a-0001.a-msedge.net
    statsfe2.update.microsoft.com.akadns.net
    sls.update.microsoft.com.akadns.net
    fe2.update.microsoft.com.akadns.net
    diagnostics.support.microsoft.com
    corp.sts.microsoft.com
    statsfe1.ws.microsoft.com
    pre.footprintpredict.com
    i1.services.social.microsoft.com
    i1.services.social.microsoft.com.nsatc.net
    feedback.windows.com
    feedback.microsoft-hohm.com

    feedback.search.microsoft.com
    rad.msn.com
    preview.msn.com
    ad.doubleclick.net
    ads.msn.com
    ads1.msads.net
    ads1.msn.com
    a.ads1.msn.com
    a.ads2.msn.com
    adnexus.net
    adnxs.com
    az361816.vo.msecnd.net
    az512334.vo.msecnd.net

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  • TripAdvisor’s Viator Hit by Massive 1.4 Million Payment Card Data Breach


    TripAdvisor’s Viator Hit by Massive 1.4 million Payment Card Data Breach

    TripAdvisor has reportedly been hit by a massive data breach at its Online travel booking and review website Viator, that may have exposed payment card details and account credentials of its customers, affecting an estimated 1.4 million of its customers.

    The San Francisco-based Viator, acquired by TripAdvisor – the world’s largest travel site – for £122 million (US$ 200 million) back in July, admitted late on Friday that the intruders have hacked into some of its customers’ payment card accounts and made unauthorized charges.

    The data breach was discovered in the bookings made through Viator’s websites and mobile offerings that could potentially affect payment card data.

    Viator said that the company has hired forensic experts to figure out the extent of the breach. Meanwhile, the company has begun notifying its affected customers about the security breach as said by the travel outfit in a press release.

    “On September 2, we were informed by our payment card service provider that unauthorized charges occurred on a number of our customers’ credit cards,” Viator wrote. “We have hired forensic experts, notified law enforcement and we have been working diligently and comprehensively to investigate the incident, identify how our systems may have been impacted, and secure our systems.”

    “While our investigation is ongoing, we are in the process of notifying approximately 1.4 million Viator customers, who had some form of information potentially affected by the compromise.”

    During investigation it found that the cybercriminals have broken into its internal databases and accessed the payment card data – including encrypted credit or debit card number, card expiration date, name, billing address and email address – of approximately 880,000 customers, and possibly their Viator account information that includes email address, encrypted password and Viator ‘nickname.’

    Additionally, the intruders may have also accessed the Viator account information, including email addresses and encrypted passwords, of over 560,000 Viator customers.

    According to the company, Debit-card PIN numbers were not included in the breach because Viator does not store them. The travel advisor said that they believe that the CVV number, the security numbers printed on the back of the customer’s credit card, were also not stolen in the breach.

    For those who are affected by the breach in United States, Viator is offering them identity protection and credit card monitoring services for free and and the company is also investigating the possibility of offering similar services to customers outside the country.

    Meanwhile, the company has warned its affected customers to regularly monitor their card activity and report any fraudulent charges to their card company. “Customers will not be responsible for fraudulent charges to their accounts if they are reported in a timely manner,” Viator said.

    Viator also recommends its users to change their password for the site, as well as all other websites that uses the same credentials.

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  • Tails Website has been hacked! Operating System Tails Hacked

    tails os website hacked the hacker news

    Just a few hours ago, the Official website of the Tails Operating System has been hacked and it appears that a self-proclaimed 17-year old hacker breached and defaced it.

    Tails is a Linux-based highly secure Operating System, specially designed and optimized to preserve users’ anonymity and privacy. Hacker, who named himself “Sum guy”, managed to access the website as administrator and edited the homepage content with the following message:

     

    Defaced Link: https://tails.boum.org/index.en.html. However, all other pages on the Tails website are working just fine, but at this moment it is not clear whether the hacker has also modified the OS Image or not. So readers are advised to do not download the Tails OS from the website, at least for a few days.

    Tails, also known as ‘Amnesiac Incognito Live System‘, is free software based on Debian GNU/Linux and you install it on a DVD or USB drive, boot up the computer from the drive. This allows you to work on a sensitive file on any computer and prevent the data being recovered after the computer is turned off.

    Tails was reportedly used by the NSA Whistle-blower Edward Snowden in discussions with journalists because it includes a range of tools for protecting your data by means of strong encryption.

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  • Zeus Trojan (or Zbot Trojan) steals confidential information from the infected computer.

    Pandemiya hacking trojan

    A new and relatively rare Zeus Trojan program was found which is totally different from other banking Trojans and has capability to secretly steal data from forms, login credentials and files from the victim as well as can create fake web pages and take screenshots of victim’s computer.

    Researchers at RSA Security’s FraudAction team have discovered this new and critical threat, dubbed as ‘Pandemiya’, which is being offered to the cyber criminals in underground forums as an alternative to the infamous Zeus Trojan and its many variants, that is widely used by most of the cyber-criminals for years to steal banking information from consumers and companies.

     

    The source code of the Zeus banking Trojan is available on the underground forums from past few years, which lead malware developers to design more sophisticated variants of Zeus Trojan such as Citadel, Ice IX and Gameover Zeus.

     

    But, Pandemiya is something by far the most isolated and dangerous piece of malware as the author spent a year in writing the code for Pandemiya, which includes 25,000 lines of original code written in C.
    Like other commercial Trojan, Pandemiya infect the machines through exploit kits and via drive-by download attacks to boost infection rate that exploit flaws in the vulnerable software such as Java, Silverlight and Flash within few seconds victim lands on the web page.

    Pandemiya’s coding quality is quite interesting, and contrary to recent trends in malware development, it is not based on Zeus source code at all, unlike Citadel/Ice IX, etc.,” researchers from RSA, the security division of EMC, said Tuesday in a blog post. “Through our research, we found out that the author of Pandemiya spent close to a year of coding the application, and that it consists of more than 25,000 lines of original code in C.

    Pandemiya Trojan using Windows CreateProcess API to inject itself into every new process that is initiated, including Explorer.exe and re-injects itself when needed. Pandemiya is being sold for as much as $2,000 USD and provides all the nasty features including encrypted communication with command and control servers in an effort to evade detection.The Trojan has been designed with modular architecture to load more external plug-ins, which allows hackers to add extra features simply by writing new DLL (dynamic link library). The extra plug-ins easily add capabilities to the Trojan’s core functionality, that’s why the developer charge an extra of $500 USD to get the core application as well as its plugins, which allows cybercriminals to open reverse proxies on infected computers, to steal FTP credentials and to infect executable files in order to inject the malware at start up.

     

    The advent of a freshly coded new trojan malware application is not too common in the underground,” Marcus writes, adding that the modular approach in Pandemiya could make it “more pervasive in the near future.

    The malware developers are also working on other new features to add reverse Remote Desktop Protocol connections and a Facebook attack module in order to spread the Trojan through hijacked Facebook accounts.

    HOW TO REMOVE PANDEMIYA TROJAN

    The Trojan can be easily removed with a little modification in the registry and command line action, as explained below:

      1. Locate the registry key HKEY_LOCAL_USER\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Run and identify the *.EXE filename in your user’s ‘Application Data’ folder. Note the name, and delete the registry value.
      2. Locate the registry key HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\System\CurrentControlSet\Control\Session Manager\AppCertDlls. Find the value with the same name as the *.EXE file in the previous step. Note the file name, and remove the value from the registry.
      3. Reboot the system. At this stage Pandemiya is installed but no longer running. Delete both files noted earlier. This will remove the last traces of the Trojan. Your system is now clean.

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