anonymous

Symantec tells customers to disable PCAnywhere

Symantec is urging customers to disable PCAnywhere until it issues a software update to protect them against attacks that could result from the theft of the product's source code.

Someone broke into Symantec's network in 2006 and stole source code for PCAnywhere, which allows customers to remotely connect to other computers, as well as Norton Antivirus Corporate Edition, Norton Internet Security and Norton SystemWorks, the company said last week. Earlier this month, hackers in India affiliated with the Anonymous online activist group said they had gotten the code off servers run by Indian military intelligence.

Hackers have threatened … Read more

Rumor Has It, Ep. 17: Instagram helps us care about Windows Phone

It's Tuesday again, and this time we are prepared.

On today's show, code in iBooks 2 points to possible Retina Display iPad; Casio does something other than make keyboards; our favorite people on Earth, analysts, comment on the upcoming year for Netflix; and we have a couple guesses about who Anonymous will attack next.

Also next week, or maybe the week after, is Humiliation Day. You know what's different about this Humiliation Day? For once, Karyne isn't the big loser. If you have any Humiliation Day ideas for Emily, or if you have any ideas about … Read more

Anonymous: Facebook is next, on January 28

"While it is true that Facebook has at least 60,000 servers, it is still possible to bring it down."

These are the words of the anonymous voice that purports to represent Anonymous in a video posted to YouTube today.

"An online war has begun between Anonymous, the people, and the government of the United States," the narrator begins. The reason: SOPA, PIPA and other perceived threats to Internet rights.

In order to bring down Facebook, the video asks for everyone who understands and supports Anonymous' position to participate in this online protest. This is a … Read more

Anonymous tricked people into joining Web site attacks

If you clicked a link distributed by Anonymous yesterday, you may have unwittingly helped the online activists in their attacks against U.S. government and entertainment industry sites that were organized to protest proposed antipiracy legislation.

Anonymous has launched distributed denial-of-service attacks, designed to shut down Web sites, against government and corporate sites in the past. Typically, supporters download software called Low Orbit Ion Canon (LOIC) that directs their computer to repeatedly try to connect to a target Web site. So many digital knocks on the door, as it were, can shut a site down so no one can get … Read more

The 404 976: Where we're making ghosts turn red (podcast)

Megaupload users (the legal kind) are upset with the FBI's decision to shut the site down yesterday before anyone had a chance to back up their files.

In response to the lawsuit, Anonymous hit back with several denial-of-service (DOS) attacks that brought down several government-run Web sites including those for the Department of Justice and the FBI, as well as Universal Music and the Motion Picture Association of America.

Today we're chatting about yesterday's Apple iBookstore announcement and what it'll mean for schools and the future of education. We'll also spend some time looking at the Megaupload arrests, and run through the top 10 questions kids ask that puzzle parents, like "Why is the sky blue?" and "How do airplanes stay in the air?"… Read more

Anonymous goes nuclear; everybody loses?

In the aftermath of Wednesday's SOPA/PIPA blackout protests, the Internet community amassed quite a bit of goodwill, flexed its muscles in a friendly, humorous, civil-disobedience kind of way, and, remarkably, even managed to change quite a few minds.

Just 24 short hours later, Anonymous legions nuked that goodwill and took cyber security into thermonuclear territory. The real question now is: were they played?

As I write this, #OpMegaUpload is in full effect. The Internet is seemingly coming down all around me. Global Internet traffic is fluctuating between 13 percent and 14 percent above normal, and, as you can … Read more

What hath #OpMegaUpload wrought?

Web-site attacks ranged far and wide this afternoon, with online activists allegedly taking aim at more than a dozen Web sites of organizations with ties to controversial piracy legislation.

The attack, dubbed "Operation MegaUpload" comes on the heels of seven people being named in an indictment, and four taken into custody on online piracy charges. One of those was Kim DotCom, aka Kim Schmitz, the founder of file hosting and sharing site MegaUpload.

The effort, which Anonymous claims to be "the largest scale attack ever," did not manage to bring down a handful of its targets … Read more

DOJ, FBI, entertainment industry sites attacked after piracy arrests

Online activists angered over antipiracy legislation in Congress as well as today's indictment of operators of popular file-hosting site MegaUpload attacked the sites of the U.S. Department of Justice, the FBI, Universal Music, and the Motion Picture Association of America, shutting them down at least temporarily, and were targeting many others.

"The Largest Attack Ever by Anonymous - 5,635 People Confirmed Using #LOIC Bring Down Sites!" the AnonDaily Twitter account read, referring to the Low Orbit Ion Cannon (LOIC) tool Anonymous supporters use to launch distributed denial-of-service (DDOS) attacks on sites.

Apparently Anonymous tried a … Read more

Anonymous targets military-gear site in latest holiday hack

In what its calling another round of "LulzXmas festivities," an Anonymous-affiliated hacktivst group today is claiming yet another breach and posting of customer information.

On Christmas Day the target was security think tank Strategic Forecasting, or Stratfor. This time it was SpecialForces.com, a Web site that sells military gear.

"Continuing the week long celebration of wreaking utter havoc on global financial systems, militaries, and governments, we are announcing our next target: the online piggie supply store SpecialForces.com," the group wrote in a Pastebin posting today.

The hackers said they breached the SpecialForces.com site … Read more

Secret subpoena aimed at Twitter user not so secret anymore

Massachusetts authorities apparently thought that asking nicely would suffice to keep secret their subpoena for information on a Twitter user involved with Occupy Wall Street. They thought wrong.

So when the Suffolk County District Attorney's office sent its request to Twitter, its subpoena ended up in the inbox of the DA's target, following a decision by Twitter to share it as part of its privacy policy.

The user in question goes by the handle @p0isAn0N, who last week posted the document in full on Scribd. Dated December 14, the subpoena requests IP address information about the accounts of @… Read more