In 1984, Congress passed a law called the
Computer Fraud and Abuse Act, in the wake of some
high profile incidents of hacking. Designed to prosecute hackers, the law is written vaguely enough that it has, in recent years, been used (with varying degrees of success) to
prosecute people violating terms of an employer's computer usage policies, or in the infamous case of
Lori Drew, a Terms of Service agreement.
But today, the 9th circuit court of appeals ruled that employees can not be prosecuted under the CFAA for violating an employer's computer use policies, dealing a blow to the Obama administration’s Justice Department,
which is trying to use the same theory to prosecute alleged WikiLeaks leaker Bradley Manning.
posted by to sir with millipedes
on Apr 10, 2012 -
29 comments
"
Hackers of the world are uniting and taking direct action against our common oppressors - the government, corporations, police, and militaries of the world" says LulzSec
(previously) in their latest release,
Chinga La Migra. "
We are releasing hundreds of private intelligence bulletins, training manuals, personal email correspondence, names, phone numbers, addresses and passwords belonging to Arizona law enforcement. We are targeting AZDPS specifically because we are against SB1070 (previously) and the racial profiling anti-immigrant police state that is Arizona."
#antisec is a new track from nerdcore rapper
ytcracker (previously)
posted by finite
on Jun 23, 2011 -
47 comments
People who use Sony
don't make very good passwords. "None of this is overly surprising, although it remains alarming. We know passwords are too short, too simple, too predictable and too much like the other ones the individual has created in other locations. The bit which did take me back a bit was the extent to which passwords conformed to very predictable patterns, namely only using alphanumeric character, being 10 characters or less and having a much better than average chance of being the same as other passwords the user has created on totally independent systems."
[more inside]
posted by -->NMN.80.418
on Jun 7, 2011 -
142 comments
Sony's PlayStation Network and Qriocity have been down since April 20 2011 due to an illegal intrusion. Today
Sony announced that user data - birthdate, user name, password, e-mail address, possibly credit card information, and more - has been compromised for its
69 million users, exposing them to identify theft amongst other things.
[more inside]
posted by Foci for Analysis
on Apr 26, 2011 -
285 comments
An anonymous hacking outfit called "Gnosis" has
infiltrated Gawker Media,
hijacking the front page and
leaking the company's internal chat logs, source code, and content databases along with the usernames, email addresses, and passwords of over 1.3 million users (including Gawker staff). The attack, which was motivated by
what the group describes as the "outright arrogance" with which the company's bloggers
taunted anonymous imageboard 4chan (semi-previously), affects every site in the Gawker network, including Gizmodo, Kotaku, Lifehacker, Jezebel, Deadspin, Jalopnik, and io9. While most of the leaked passwords are encrypted, more than 200,000 of the simpler ones in the torrent file have been cracked, and the links between account names and email addresses are in plaintext for all to see. Since
the integrity of Gawker's encryption methods remains in doubt, it is recommended that anyone who has ever registered an account on any Gawker property change their passwords immediately, especially if the same log-in information is used for other services.
posted by Rhaomi
on Dec 12, 2010 -
312 comments
Neurosecurity: security and privacy for neural devices. "An increasing number of neural implantable devices will become available in the near future due to advances in neural engineering. This discipline holds the potential to improve many patients' lives dramatically by offering improved—and in some cases entirely new—forms of rehabilitation for conditions ranging from missing limbs to degenerative cognitive diseases. The use of standard engineering practices, medical trials, and neuroethical evaluations during the design process can create systems that are safe and that follow ethical guidelines; unfortunately, none of these disciplines currently ensure that neural devices are robust against adversarial entities trying to exploit these devices to alter, block, or eavesdrop on neural signals. The authors define 'neurosecurity'—a version of computer science security principles and methods applied to neural engineering—and discuss why neurosecurity should be a critical consideration in the design of future neural devices."
[Via Mind Hacks]
posted by homunculus
on Jul 8, 2009 -
22 comments
Ever admired those hard-working hackers, toiling away to get you the programs you've always loathed to have? Have you ever dreamt of exploring the innards of someone else's computer but have held back due to those pesky legalities? If you said yes to either of the above questions or just want to play an online hacking simulation, then
SlaveHack is the website for you.
[more inside]
posted by flatluigi
on Dec 23, 2007 -
9 comments
The FBI on hacking vs. The Russians That is crazy! 100 hundred years for hacking computers when there are people that actually hurt other people - maliciously...
rapists, murderers, US politicians...
"If Russian hackers can be convicted on evidence obtained by the Americans through hacking, it means the U.S. secret services may use further illegal means of obtaining information in Russia and in other countries," an FSB spokesman told Interfax on Thursday.
Not only that, but the seriously...can this sort of thing just slide by?
posted by Kodel
on Aug 17, 2002 -
2 comments
Congress is about to consider an entertainment industry proposal that would authorize copyright holders to
disable PCs used for illicit file trading. "The measure would permit copyright holders to perform nearly unchecked electronic hacking if they have a "reasonable basis" to believe that piracy is taking place."
posted by mathowie
on Jul 23, 2002 -
40 comments
Hackers target Cell Phones With the connectivity of cell phones to the internet, hackers have begun to target cell phones, programming prank calls, placing calls to wherever and erasing the software in the phone.
posted by Lanternjmk
on Mar 11, 2002 -
7 comments
Microsoft's newest version of Windows.... billed as the most secure ever, contains several serious flaws that allow hackers to steal or destroy a victim's data files across the Internet or implant rogue computer software. The company released a free fix Thursday.
A Microsoft official acknowledged that the risk to consumers was unprecedented because the glitches allow hackers to seize control of all Windows XP operating system software without requiring a computer user to do anything except connect to the Internet.
posted by bkdelong
on Dec 20, 2001 -
60 comments
Silicon Valley backs Senate bill that would allow companies to report computer network attacks to the government without having to worry about the public finding out. The reasoning: it would encourage
more companies to report the problems and help the
government track down the culprits. A
similar bill is in the House.
posted by thescoop
on Sep 25, 2001 -
3 comments
Germany Plans Infowar Against Websites? So, Wired News reports that German Interior Minister Otto Schily has said publicly that Germany should stage denial-of-service attacks on right-wing websites housed in other countries. AOL versus Germany as WWWIII/InfoWar I?
posted by bclark
on Apr 9, 2001 -
6 comments
MSNBC hacked. That faith-based missle defense thing again. Check it out, good-looking hack. I might put up a mirror if it gets changed.
posted by lbergstr
on Feb 28, 2001 -
13 comments
If hacking and phreaking irc channels are any indication, hackers and phreaks don't get enough sex.
posted by dominic
on Jul 11, 2000 -
0 comments
They bagged the kid who was responsible for all those Denial-of-Service attacks a couple of months ago. He's Canadian.
Here's an interesting legal question: could the US extradite him? The crimes were committed in the US, but he was in Canada at the time he did it, since he worked through the Internet. Whose laws apply?
(By the way, I've seen no indication that the US is considering extradition; I was just curious whether they
could extradite him.)
posted by Steven Den Beste
on Apr 19, 2000 -
18 comments
Cyber Patrol hacker sells out for one dollar < I made
my political point and just don't want further annoyance... ...Mattel initiated legal action in e-mail subpoenas in mid-March and Skala and Jansson removed cphack from their sites, but not before urging computer activists to copy and distribute it.... ...Nevertheless, some mirror site operators think open source software protections make the issue moot. The court cannot impose an Internet ban because cphack was released under the
GNU General Public License... > perhaps you've seen this--the final decision will be interesting with repect to free speech and the
GNU GPL. something to watch anyhow.
posted by greyscale
on Mar 28, 2000 -
3 comments
DoS Attacks for Fun and Profit - It looks like the list has expanded quite a bit this week... enough that the FBI is going to hold a press conference today at 11
PST. This is almost enough to argue
against unlimited bandwidth for the average consumer. I hope they track the bastards down; not only does this impact the future success of eCommerce ventures, but it lends to stereotyping the technically elite as potential closet-evildoers.
posted by othermatt
on Feb 9, 2000 -
1 comment
Last night
Kevin Mitnick was on 60 minutes (the gist of the interview is
quoted here), and I have to say he came off as an utterly harmless geek. He was an information junkie that enjoyed the challenge of cracking firewalls. He never profited from his activities and the affected companies made up their monetary losses. It's a shame he was forced to waste away in prison instead of offer his security expertise to the affected companies.
posted by mathowie
on Jan 24, 2000 -
1 comment
If you had problems reaching MetaFilter over the weekend,
this is why. Some script kiddies launched some gnarly smurf attacks against the regional ISP that provides bandwidth for this site. Oh well, it gave me time to code. I've added lots of little enhancements (like user pages, a working search engine), but still have to get the archives working and expand the preferences page.
posted by mathowie
on Jan 19, 2000 -
0 comments
