Ryan Naraine

Who will find the first major security flaw in Windows Vista? Will it be released as zero-day? Is there an end in sight to the botnet menace? Is spam close to being canned? Just who are these criminals phishing for your credit card data? Those are just a handful of the hot-button topics that will […]

TGIF Links du jour: Inside the Vista proof-of-concept; Month of Apple Bugs reaction; Google makes money from phishing attacks; Is Intel indirectly sponsoring an anti-OLPC Web site?

Proof-of-concept exploit code for a privilege escalation vulnerability affecting all versions of Windows—including Vista—has been posted on a Russian hacker forum, forcing Microsoft to activate its emergency response process. Mike Reavey, operations manager of the Microsoft Security Response Center, confirmed that the company is “closely monitoring” the public posting, which first appeared on a Russian […]

Mozilla has shipped a “highly critical” Firefox update to correct multiple security bugs that could cause cross-site scripting, information disclosure, denial-of-service and system access attacks.

The hacker behind the MoKB (Month of Kernel Bugs) plans to take a big bite out of Apple Computer’s insecurities.

MOSCOW—Clickety, clack. Clickety, clack. The rhythmic sounds of fingers tapping away at keyboards are coming from Eugene Kasperskys “woodpeckers,” who make up a virus-hunting crew responsible for tracking computer threats in real time and who work around the clock to write and ship virus definition updates to millions of computer users. This is Kaspersky Labs […]

Microsoft’s security response team is trying to verify the accuracy of reports that underground hackers are selling zero-day exploits for Windows Vista.

After five-and-a-half years of maintaining IP addresses of verified open SMTP relays, ORDB.org is calling it quits, citing irrelevance as the main reason.

Microsofts use of code-scrambling diversity to secure Windows Vista is getting crucial support from major OEM partners. The Redmond, Wash., software maker has persuaded major U.S. computer makers—including Dell, Gateway and Hewlett-Packard—to make default changes at the BIOS level to allow a new Vista security feature called ASLR (Address Space Layout Randomization) to work properly. […]

Links du jour: A sampling of useful security stories that may have slipped through the cracks …

Underground hackers are hawking zero-day exploits for Microsofts new Windows Vista operating system at $50,000 a pop, according to computer security researchers at Trend Micro. The Windows Vista exploit—which has not been independently verified—was just one of many zero-days available for sale at an auction-style marketplace infiltrated by the Tokyo-based anti-virus vendor. In an interview […]

German researcher Stefan Esser has quit the PHP Security Response Team in disgust, accusing the open-source group of hiding the slow response time to fixing vulnerabilities and, even worse, refusing to fix known flaws for months.