Articles by John P. Mello Jr.

Mammoth tomes about high-tech entrepreneurs with a secretive bent are almost a sure bet to stir up a hornet's nest of controversy when they're published. That's certainly been the case with Brad Stone's The Everything Store about CEO Jeff Bezos and Amazon. The twist here is that the critic in the point position for Amazon is Bezos's wife, MacKenzie...

Using social engineering to distribute malware is a favorite of hackers. That's because it unloads the burden of infecting a computer onto its operator. By duping an Internet innocent into making just one errant click, an online bandit can inflict a world of hurt Socially engineered malware attacks attempt to deceive a user into downloading malicio...

A federal judge in Idaho appears to have had a fit of hacker madness In a case involving a former employee and his bosses over software for protecting the nation's critical infrastructure from cyberattacks, federal district court Judge B. Lynn Winmill found the employee's privacy rights could be ignored because he was a self-proclaimed hacker....

Strong encryption and natural language search can be like oil and water. That's because encrypted data can't be digested by your typical search engine. However, CipherCloud announced a solution to that knotty problem last week The latest version of the 3-year-old company's cloud-based service includes something it's calling "searchable strong encry...

A press freedom advocacy group announced Tuesday it would be taking charge of a project started by Aaron Swartz to protect whistleblowers leaking confidential documents to journalists The Freedom of the Press Foundation will provide in-site installation of the DeadDrop technology, renamed "SecureDrop," as well as support for news organizations that...

When Russian authorities nabbed the alleged master hacker behind the Blackhole malware kit last week, they sent a shockwave through the digital underground As soon as news spread that Blackhole's author, known as "Paunch," and his partners had been arrested, the malware apparently began to suffer. Blackhole, typically updated once or twice a day, w...

The company that brought Apple-style elegance to the lowly home thermostat is attempting to do the same for the common smoke detector Nest Labs, founded by Apple emigres Tony Fadell and Matt Rogers, on Tuesday announced Nest Protect, a US$129 combination smoke and carbon monoxide detector with more smarts than others in the market....

If you want to prolong your email's stay with the NSA, just encrypt it Among the documents leaked by whistleblower Edward Snowden is one describing the National Security Agency's treatment of communication it intercepts authored by U.S. citizens. In short, if the domestic communication is in plain text, it has a five-year shelf life. If it's encryp...

After three years of wrangling with Google over its alleged anticompetitive business practices, the European Union has suggested there may be some light at the end of the tunnel "We have reached a key moment in this case," European Commission Vice President Joaquin Almunia, who is responsible for competition policy, said at a Parliament hearing Tu...

Almost all cyberattacks these days require an element of social engineering. Spammers are always looking for that hot button to induce a click on a link or an attachment. Drive-by artists continually experiment with poisoned banner ads designed to steer the curious into an online dark alley. Spearphishers put together persuasive pitches pretending to be friends or a trusted institution...

New York Gov. Andrew Cuomo on Tuesday unveiled a plan to identify existing Park-n-Ride facilities, rest stops and parking areas on the state's highways as "Texting Zones." There's nothing now -- other than impatience -- preventing drivers from pulling off the road into those areas to read and send text messages, but with the new initiative, appropr...

Allowing workers to use personal phones and tablets to do their jobs has created security risks in the workplace, but those risks can be minimized if they're managed What should such a risk management program do? "The first step is you have to protect the device," IBM Application, Data and Mobile Security Director Caleb Barlow told TechNewsWorld....

Microsoft revealed Tuesday it was investigating a previously unknown security flaw affecting all versions of its Web browser, Internet Explorer Hackers have attempted to exploit the vulnerability in targeted attacks on users of versions 8 and 9 of the browser, the company reported in a security advisory....

Web applications have become attractive targets for hackers because they allow bad actors to maximize the reach of their mischief with a minimum of effort That's what originally attracted the Internet underworld to programs like Windows and Adobe Acrobat, and it's what continues to attract them to Java. A vulnerability in one of those programs can ...

As America crawls toward retaliation against Syria for its government's use of chemical weapons on its citizens, debate rages over what form it should take. Could cyberweapons be part of such an action? "Cyberweapons are just another piece of our military arsenal and should be considered along with every other military option," security expert and...

Sony introduced its QX10 and QX100 lens-style cameras on Wednesday. The devices, which look like very thin point-and-shoot cameras, can connect to a smartphone wirelessly and use the phone's display as a real-time viewfinder ...

The Japanese government on Tuesday announced it would be allocating US$473 million to help the operator of the Fukushima nuclear power plant, Tokyo Electric Power Company (TEPCO), build an ice wall to prevent water being used to cool it from poisoning the surrounding groundwater Currently, it's estimated that more than 79,000 gallons of contaminate...

If there's one attack surface that's attracting growing attention from digital marauders, it's a system's endpoints. With the proliferation of devices accessing corporate networks, securing connections can be a defender's nightmare Endpoints have an allure for attackers because they offer multiple attack vectors, such as social engineering attacks,...

Facebook on Monday released transparency reports of government requests for its users' data Privacy groups hailed the move as a positive step forward -- rare praise for the company, which has had a checkered relationship with those groups over the years.

Standards can be a way to get organizations to do things you want them to do, but oftentimes they don't get them to do much more The writers of payment-card standards appear to have been acutely aware of that phenomenon when the PCI Security Standards Council previewed their new PCI DSS 3.0 standard earlier this month....