Security Snippets - September 2019
Hot Topics
This newsletter contains links to online news articles and websites.
Join us Friday, October 19, 2018, as we celebrate National Cybersecurity Awareness Month. Bring your lunch to Phoenix City Hall, Assembly Rooms A-C, from 11:00-1:00 to hear about current cyber threats and how to protect yourself. Our special guest is a genuine (ethical) hacker from the Arizona Cyber Warfare Range. Come with questions and learn about the weaknesses he exploits.
Facebook hasn't been in the news for two days so somebody hacked them. The attackers exploited a feature in Facebook's code that allowed them to take over nearly 50 million user accounts. Time to reset your passwords!
Cybercrime/Hacking
Phoenix 3TV/CBS 5 posted a nice article about how Arizona computers are being used for cyber warfare. And check out the video interview with Snippet's friend, Brett Scoot of the Arizona Cyber Warfare Range.
You may start hearing the term, "deepfakes" soon. It's a technique that combines and superimposes existing images and videos onto source images or videos. It takes air brushing up to an 11, as this video shows. Deepfakes is a growing, scary trend that can be used to create fake news and malicious hoaxes. Here's another example of a President Obama PSA (warning: contains strong language).
Home/Personal Issues
Do your kids play online video games? If so, get involved and monitor their use. Child predators are using the games' chat features to target kids.
Did you know bad guys and scammers can spoof email addresses? Well, they can also spoof phone numbers, and you're probably getting at least two spoofed robocalls a day. The FCC is finally cracking down on the scammers. In the meantime, Consumer Reports describes how to fight robocalls.
You can now freeze your credit for free and issue year-long fraud alerts to help protect your identity.
Legislation
A Michigan mother was arrested after "stealing" her teen daughter's cell phone as a form of discipline. Don't worry, the prosecutor dismissed the charges.
California recently passed a Consumer Privacy Act (CaCPA) to give its residents' control over what personal information businesses collect and share. This is the first law of its type in the nation (CA also passed the country's first privacy breach notification law, SB1386, that many states used as a model for their laws). CaCPA puts pressure on tech firms, so they offered to help write a "toothless" federal law to preempt CaCPA (and other states following CA's lead).
Privacy/ID Theft
Here's how to remove yourself from people search sites and erase your online presence. Warning: No matter what the article says, once info is out there. You can't totally remove your digital footprint, but you can make it harder for folks to find you.
While Snippets does not officially recommend or disparage any vendor, product, or service, Snippets will definitely not get life insurance from John Hancock. They are now selling only interactive polices that track fitness and health data through wearable devices and smartphones. If Hancock is successful, expect other insurance carriers to require monitoring - and where will it end?
Best Practices/Risk Management
Bad guys are impersonating celebrities to scam fans out of millions of dollars.
Do you do your banking online? Here's a nice reminder of safeguards to protect your online banking. Unfortunately, there's nothing new, which is why Snippets calls it a reminder).
Snippets loves this. Security professionals get a text from CNN's Wolf Blitzer offering $300,000 yearly to come on to "The Situation Room with Wolf Blitzer" and act as security commentators. All we have to do is pay $3,000 via Western Union to get security clearance and approval.
Quotes of the Month
"The most likely way for the world to be destroyed, most experts agree, is by accident. That's where we come in; we're computer professionals. We cause accidents."
- Nathaniel Borenstein
"Men do not like to admit to even momentary imperfection. My husband forgot the code to turn off the alarm. When the police came, he wouldn't admit he'd forgotten the code... he turned himself in."
- Rita Rudner
"Privacy snafus ar to social networks as violence is to football. The whole point of social network is to share stuff about people that's interesting, just as the whole point of football is to upend the guy with the ball. Every so often, someone gets paralyzed, which prompts us to add padding to the helmets or set new rules about tackling. Then we move on."
- Nicholas Thompson
Bonus!
Here's a reminder that loving each other is bigger than any political (or other) circus. This father/son duet with Andrea and Matteo Boccelli literally brought tears to Snippets' eyes.
Snippets loves this collection showcasing the lowest form of humor.
Questions and Feedback
Security Snippets is brought to you by the Arizona Counter Terrorism Information Center (ACTIC) and the Urban Area Security Initiative (UASI). Its purpose is to increase Arizona’s cyber resilience by helping you learn more about security and privacy so you can better protect yourself and your family.
Important: It is up to you to make sure you take the proper steps to secure your home networks and devices. The ACTIC is not responsible for your personal devices.
Contact Snippets at ACTIC Cybersecurity with any questions, to provide feedback, or to be added/removed from this distribution. Please note that this email address is not monitored 24x7.
Any views or opinions presented in this newsletter are solely those of the author and do not necessarily represent those of the ACTIC. Reference to any specific commercial product, process, service, link, or the use of any trade, firm or corporation name is for the information and convenience of the reader, and does not constitute endorsement, recommendation, or disparagement by the ACTIC.
Should You Trust the Links?
This email contains links. Should you trust them? Thanks for asking! So, let’s examine this message. It contains the ACTIC’s standard header, states its purpose is to increase your security awareness, and doesn’t threaten or ask you to respond immediately. The verbiage is conversational, rather than formal and attempts to be interesting and entertaining, as well as educational. And you probably signed up to receive this newsletter. Snippets says to trust it, but what do you think? Send an email to [email protected].
