Dominique Mosbergen The Huffington Post   iPhone Sexting App May Not Be Secure As You Think… There are a few good reasons why sending incriminating pictures, naked or otherwise, over the photo and video app Snapchat may not be such a great idea. Other than concerns about bullying and underage sexting, it’s becoming increasingly clear that Snapchat messages, once thought to be super secure because of their …

Catherine Solyom NationalPost Anonymous hackers have keys to the kingdom … The world needs to be concerned. Christopher Doyon, a.k.a. Commander X, sits atop a hillside in an undisclosed location in Canada, watching a reporter and photographer make their way along a narrow path to join him, away from the prying eyes of law enforcement. It’s been a few weeks …

Amber Corrin FCW.com   The Air Force plans to increase its Cyber Command workforce by 15 percent in 2014, according to the Defense Department. Gen. William Shelton, commander of Air Force Space Command, said he expects to receive orders next year from U.S. Cyber Command’s leadership to hire roughly 1,000 cyber specialists, mostly civilians. They would be added to the …

Chris Dougherty Virtual Threat Contributing Writer   Facebook accounts are an often overlooked gateway into an individual’s personal life.   We, as social networking users, have few reservations about posting our photos, location, plans to travel, private outbursts, and information regarding friends, family and work.  We include names, phone numbers, email addresses, GPS coordinates and the list goes on and …

  Chris Dougherty VirtualThreat.com, Contributing Writer   Kaspersky Lab has uncovered a cyber espionage campaign that is targeting diplomatic and government agencies around the world.  The campaign has been dubbed “Rocra”, short for “Red October”. As of this writing the malware at the heart of the attack is actively sending data to several command and control (C&C) servers.  According to domain registration …

Nicole Perlroth NYTimes Bits Blog   Anonymous, the loose collective of hackers, attacked the Web site of the Massachusetts Institute of Technology on Sunday, in a tribute to Aaron Swartz, the 26-year-old technology programmer who killed himself on Friday. Mr. Swartz, a passionate advocate for the freedom of information, helped create Reddit and RSS technology, and was something of an “Internet …

John Lister InfoPackets   The group behind a collection of ‘premium’ hacking tools is apparently charging hackers $10,000 a month for permission to use their exploit kit. The proceeds are helping fund rewards for anyone who shares information with the hackers about previously unknown software vulnerabilities. According to security firm Sophos, the ‘premium’ hacking kit is the work of a …

Chris Dougherty VirtualThreat Contributing Writer   Hackers with ties to Al-Qaeda terrorist cells in Somalia and the Philippines are targeting New York small businesses using international phone hacking scams.  The scams are costing the companies hundreds of thousands of dollars in phone charges each month. Senator Charles Schumer (D-NY) said that the hacker group has a connection to Syracuse and it …

  Chris Dougherty VirtualThreat Contributing Writer   Most people believe their phone conversations are private.  Well, they may not be as private as you think if your office or home is filled with hacked phones. Researchers at Columbia University have discovered a flaw in  telephones that allows a hacker to turn a phone’s microphone into a sophisticated recording device.  Using …

  Chris Dougherty VirtualThreat Contributing Writer   Why stay anonymous online?  In today’s society there are people and automated devices that are recording your deepest, most private thoughts and activities. Each day we voluntarily divulge the most intimate details of our lives through social networking accounts, email, banking apps, online games and more. In addition, governments and corporations can censor …