Was the Dyn DDoS attack actually a script kiddie v. PSN?

The massive DDoS attack that disrupted the internet address-lookup service Dyn last week was perhaps pulled off by a script kiddie targeting PlayStation Network and using Mirai malware to assemble a massive IoT botnet, according to research by Flashpoint.“Flashpoint assesses with moderate confidence that the most recent Mirai attacks are likely connected to the English-language hacking forum community, specifically uses and reads of the forum “hackforums.net,” according to a blog by Allison Nixon, director of security research at Flashpoint.She says the company has discovered the infrastructure used in the Dyn attack also targeted “a well-known video game company” that she doesn’t name. A post on hackforums.net seems to agree with this possibility. It indicates the target was PlayStation Network and that Dyn was hit because it provides DNS services to PSN. Going after the name servers (NS) that provide lookups for PSN would prevent traffic from reaching PSN.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here

Was the Dyn DDoS attack actually a script kiddie v. PSN?

The massive DDoS attack that disrupted the internet address-lookup service Dyn last week was perhaps pulled off by a script kiddie targeting PlayStation Network and using Mirai malware to assemble a massive IoT botnet, according to research by Flashpoint.“Flashpoint assesses with moderate confidence that the most recent Mirai attacks are likely connected to the English-language hacking forum community, specifically uses and reads of the forum “hackforums.net,” according to a blog by Allison Nixon, director of security research at Flashpoint.She says the company has discovered the infrastructure used in the Dyn attack also targeted “a well-known video game company” that she doesn’t name. A post on hackforums.net seems to agree with this possibility. It indicates the target was PlayStation Network and that Dyn was hit because it provides DNS services to PSN. Going after the name servers (NS) that provide lookups for PSN would prevent traffic from reaching PSN.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here

Dyn attack: US Senator wants to know why IoT security is so anemic

The security around the development of Internet of Things products is weak and U.S. Sen. Mark R. Warner (D-Va.) today sent a letter to the Federal Communications Commission (FCC), the Federal Trade Commission (FTC) and the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) to ask why and what can be done to fix the problem. Sen. Mark Warner (D-VA) In the letter Warner, who is member of the Senate Select Committee on Intelligence and co-founder of the bipartisan Senate Cybersecurity Caucus, asked questions such as: What types of network management practices are available for internet service providers to respond to DDoS threats? And would it be a reasonable network management practice for ISPs to designate insecure network devices as “insecure” and thereby deny them connections to their networks, including by refraining from assigning devices IP addresses?To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here

Dyn attack: US Senator wants to know why IoT security is so anemic

The security around the development of Internet of Things products is weak and U.S. Sen. Mark R. Warner (D-Va.) today sent a letter to the Federal Communications Commission (FCC), the Federal Trade Commission (FTC) and the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) to ask why and what can be done to fix the problem. Sen. Mark Warner (D-VA) In the letter Warner, who is member of the Senate Select Committee on Intelligence and co-founder of the bipartisan Senate Cybersecurity Caucus, asked questions such as: What types of network management practices are available for internet service providers to respond to DDoS threats? And would it be a reasonable network management practice for ISPs to designate insecure network devices as “insecure” and thereby deny them connections to their networks, including by refraining from assigning devices IP addresses?To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here

18% off Blue Snowball iCE Condenser Microphone – Deal Alert

At home, a dorm, or in the office, the Snowball iCE USB microphone delivers crystal clear high quality audio for vocals, podcasts, narrations, Skype calls, and everything else in between. Simply mount Snowball iCE on the included adjustable stand, plug the USB cable into your Mac or PC and that’s it. You’re ready to sit back and start recording crystal-clear audio for any project. The Snowball iCE mic currently averages 4.5 out of 5 stars on Amazon from over 1,700 people (read reviews). Its typical list price of $59.99 has been reduced 18% to $49.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here

Apple sales, profits fall again but a brighter outlook ahead

Apple recorded its third consecutive quarter of lower revenue as it fought lower demand for the iPhone and tough competition from lower-priced competitors.Revenue in the quarter, between July and September, was US $46.9 billion, down 9 percent on the same period last year and exactly in line with analyst estimates. Net income came in at $9 billion, down 19 percent, the company said Tuesday.Apple CEO Tim Cook called the results "strong" and said he was "thrilled with the customer response to iPhone 7, iPhone 7 Plus, and Apple Watch Series 2, as well as the incredible momentum of our Services business."+ ALSO ON NETWORK WORLD: Why is Apple letting Macs rot on the tree? +To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here

AWS quietly launches tool for migrating on-premesis apps to the cloud

Amazon is trying to simplify the process of moving legacy applications to the cloud with a new service that it quietly launched this week.  The aptly named Server Migration Service is designed to help IT teams set up the incremental replication of virtual machines from their on-premises infrastructure to Amazon's cloud.More companies are adopting the public cloud to take advantage of performance benefits and cost savings. But getting legacy apps into the cloud can be a pain, especially for those applications that require high uptime but take time to migrate. Server Migration Service helps simplify that process and may lead to additional cloud adoption.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here

TrickBot Banker Insights

A new banking trojan, TrickBot, has seemingly risen from the ashes left behind by the November 2015 takedown of Dyreza/Dyre infrastructure and the arrests of threat actors identified by Russian authorities. Dyreza was used to target customers of over 1000 U.S. and U.K. banks and other companies during the peak of operations. Researchers at Threat Geek […]

Intel wants to make its IoT chips see, think, and act

Rolling out the internet of things means using devices as our eyes and ears and even asking them to make decisions for us. The chips at the heart of those devices play critical roles, and on Tuesday some of them got better at their jobs.While ARM introduced two minuscule processor architectures with security features borrowed from larger chips, Intel unveiled its Atom E3900 chips with improved computer vision and industrial-grade timing.The E3900s are designed for a wide range of applications, including manufacturing and surveillance, and they’ll soon be joined by a version specifically for vehicles, called the A3900.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here

IDG Contributor Network: Your network, IoT, cloud computing and the future

My previous series of posts talked about a present problem for anyone deploying on the internet: what do you need to measure when deploying into the cloud and how do you measure cloud performance?But planning and deployment issues are not restricted to just the immediate-term questions I was tackling there. Anyone in charge of a network has to think about how that network will evolve. The next articles in this series will be about the internet of the future and will suggest ways in which the internet seems likely to develop.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here

How to approach keeping your IoT devices safe

Nothing is safeImage by Shardayyy With the recent take down of DYN and Brian Krebs’ web site, cybercriminals have found a way to use your own devices to bring the Internet to its knees. Portnox’s CEO Ofer Amitai provides some ways to keep those devices safe from these attacks.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here

How to approach keeping your IoT devices safe

Nothing is safeImage by Shardayyy With the recent take down of DYN and Brian Krebs’ web site, cybercriminals have found a way to use your own devices to bring the Internet to its knees. Portnox’s CEO Ofer Amitai provides some ways to keep those devices safe from these attacks.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here

Financial experts forecast more bad news for Apple

Later today Apple will once again announce a sales decline for its biggest product lines, including the iPhone, the company's financial powerhouse, according to more than two dozen analysts.The September quarter results will be highlighted by a 6% year-over-year reduction in iPhone sales, making the third consecutive quarter of smartphone slump. The good news? The contraction will be less than half of the two previous quarters.Apple's continued problems were spelled out by Philip Elmer-DeWitt, who runs the subscription-based Apple 3.0 website. Elmer-DeWitt has been collecting data from financial analysts for years -- starting when he blogged for Fortune -- and the seven independent and 21 institutional experts he queried forecast a drop in unit sales of the iPhone, iPad and Mac, and another decline in total revenue.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here

IBM looks into the future of A.I. at World of Watson

LAS VEGAS -- In the past five years, IBM's artificial-intelligence-fueled Watson has gone from being a game show champion to operating in such industries as finance, retail, health care and pure research.In another five years, Watson will be helping a doctor diagnose a patient's symptoms and a company CEO calculate whether to buy a competitor.That's the word coming from IBM executives speaking Tuesday at the opening of the IBM World of Watson conference here."The technology is not even moving fast. It's accelerating. It's moving faster and faster every day," said John Kelly III, senior vice president of Cognitive Solutions and IBM Research. "Honestly, it blows my mind and I'm an optimist."To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here

Rise of the IoT machines

Friday’s distributed denial-of-service attack on domain name service provider Dyn may have seemed like the end of the world for millions of Netflix, Twitter and Spotify users, but security professionals say the service disruption was merely a nuisance attack – although an eye opening one – compared to the potential damage that can be unleashed by billions of unsecure IoT devices.“It’s really just the tip of the iceberg,” says Nicholas Evans, vice president and general manager within the Office of the CTO at Unisys, where he leads its worldwide applied innovation program. “You can grade the threat intensity as the IoT devices become more autonomous, like self-driving cars, or more controllable, like some of factory-type devices that actually manipulate the physical environment. That’s where the real threat is.”To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here

Rise of the IoT machines

Friday’s distributed denial-of-service attack on domain name service provider Dyn may have seemed like the end of the world for millions of Netflix, Twitter and Spotify users, but security professionals say the service disruption was merely a nuisance attack – although an eye opening one – compared to the potential damage that can be unleashed by billions of unsecure IoT devices.“It’s really just the tip of the iceberg,” says Nicholas Evans, vice president and general manager within the Office of the CTO at Unisys, where he leads its worldwide applied innovation program. “You can grade the threat intensity as the IoT devices become more autonomous, like self-driving cars, or more controllable, like some of factory-type devices that actually manipulate the physical environment. That’s where the real threat is.”To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here