When Donald Trump's presidential campaign publicly stated last week that it had been successfully targeted by Iranian hackers, the news may have initially seemed like a sign that the Middle Eastern country was particularly focused on the candidate whom it perceived to take the most hawkish approach to its regime. …
Read More »USPS Text Scammers Duped His Wife, So He Hacked Their Operation
The flood of text messages started arriving early this year. They carried a similar thrust: The United States Postal Service is trying to deliver a parcel but needs more details, including your credit card number. All the messages pointed to websites where the information could be entered. Like thousands of …
Read More »The $11 Billion Marketplace Enabling the Crypto Scam Economy
As the crypto scam commonly known as “pig butchering” has exploded into a full-blown criminal industry that steals tens of billions of dollars a year, an entire ecosystem has formed around it. That sub-industry offers tools and data for finding and tricking targets, money laundering services to help liquidate stolen …
Read More »How to Spot a Business Email Compromise Scam
Don't close this tab! I know there are few combinations of words less interesting than business, email, and compromise. I may as well have written an article about fiber, socks, and responsibility. But this isn't a boring article; it's an article about email con artists who, according to the FBI, …
Read More »I Stopped Using Passwords. It’s Great—and a Total Mess
For two years, my Netflix password has been: tricke22ry-notiLonal-freely-soSak-lice-slacken. Yes, really. It is a strong, unique password, and it ticked boxes for reducing the chances of me getting hacked. But for all its security protections, the password was a nightmare to type into an onscreen TV keyboard, and it constantly …
Read More »Scammers Are Ruining Facebook Marketplace
This year, I decided to get rid of my Amazon starter couch and buy a real one. So I listed the generic, velvet-green futon on Facebook Marketplace, thinking some college students or recent New York transplants would happily scoop it up at a discounted price. Since September, I have received …
Read More »A New Trick Uses AI to Jailbreak AI Models—Including GPT-4
When the board of OpenAI suddenly fired the company’s CEO last month, it sparked speculation that board members were rattled by the breakneck pace of progress in artificial intelligence and the possible risks of seeking to commercialize the technology too quickly. Robust Intelligence, a startup founded in 2020 to develop …
Read More »Okta Breach Impacted All Customer Support Users—Not 1 Percent
In late October, the identity management platform Okta began notifying its users of a breach of its customer support system. The company said at the time that about 1 percent of its 18,400 customers were impacted by the incident. But in a massive expansion of this estimate early this morning, …
Read More »The Weird, Big-Money World of Cybercrime Writing Contests
Cybercriminals can be inventive—especially if there’s money on the table. One hacker has penned a 50-page essay on how to invest in cryptocurrency and sell at the right time to make a profit. Another put together a guide for how to create a fake version of blockchain.com that could be …
Read More »GitHub’s Hardcore Plan to Roll Out Mandatory Two-Factor
You’ve heard the advice for years: Turn on two-factor authentication everywhere it’s offered. It’s long been clear that using only a username and password to secure digital accounts isn’t enough. But layering on an additional authentication “factor”—like a randomly generated code or a physical token—makes the keys to your kingdom …
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