Articles by John P. Mello Jr

U.S. federal law enforcement authorities on Tuesday busted an insider trading ring that obtained market-timing information from overseas data thieves In two indictments unsealed by the U.S. Department of Justice in Brooklyn, N.Y., and Newark, N.J., nine people were charged in federal court with carrying out an international scheme to hack into thre...

The China-based hacking team that has been infiltrating U.S. government and business computer systems appears to be behind two newly discovered attacks -- this time on travel reservation processor Sabre and American Airlines, Bloomberg Business reported last week Sabre confirmed that its systems -- which contain sensitive records on as many as a bi...

Infamous security researcher Sammy Kamkar last week demonstrated a gadget that can intercept wireless signals to unlock cars and garage doors. Kamkar showed off the device, which cost him just US$32 to make, at the DefCon conference in Las Vegas Dubbed "RollJam," the wallet-sized gadget works like this:...

Google last week asked French regulators to withdraw a demand to universally delist from search results links to information about French citizens who wish to be forgotten on the Internet Any European can ask to have certain links about them removed from search results that appear in Europe, and Google will grant those requests if they meet specifi...

Demand for cybersecurity professionals continues to far outpace supply, according to aBurning Glass Technologies report released last week Cybersecurity hiring remains concentrated in government agencies and among defense contractors, the third annual cybersecurity job market report notes, but hiring has started to boom in industries handling consu...

Apple is in discussions to become a mobile virtual network operator in both Europe and the United States, where it's already running a trial of its service, Business Insider reported Monday The MVNO idea may not advance beyond the test phase -- and if it does, it won't happen for some time -- at least five years, according to the report....

Apple is working on a service that will enlist Siri to transcribe voice mail messages for iPhone users, Business Insider reported Monday Apple employees reportedly are testing the service in preparation for a 2016 rollout, possibly as a new feature in iOS 10....

Some proposed federal rules on the export of security tools created a tumult in cybersecurity circles -- a tumult that's pushed the rules into limbo The comment period for the rules, which the U.S. Department of Commerce first aired in May, ended July 20 -- and although the regulations have noble intentions, they also could have dire consequences....

Collecting health and fitness data through wearable devices is raising concerns among consumers about the security of that information Twenty-five percent of more than 3,500 consumers who participated in a recent survey did not believe their personal health data was safe on fitness trackers or in health-tracking apps, reported Healthline....

Best Buy on Monday said it would begin selling the Apple Watch in 100 of its stores on Aug. 7, as well as on BestBuy.com. As the holiday season rolls in, it expects to expand that number to 200 Sixteen models will be available at the Best Buy outlets, including the Apple Sport and Apple Watch models in 38- and 42-millimeter sizes. Best Buy also wil...

A type of fraud spreading through the mobile universe could cost advertisers more than US$1 billion globally this year, according to a July 2015 study released by Forensiq The fraud, called "mobile device hijacking," uses installed apps to rapidly load ads that no one sees -- but the fraudsters collect money for the ads as if they had been viewed....

The resignation of U.S. Office of Personnel Management Director Katherine Archuleta is drawing mixed reactions from the cybersecurity community Archuleta's departure on July 10, in the wake of a massive data breach resulting in the theft of the personal information of more than 22 million people, is being characterized by security pros as everythin...

PayPal on Monday returned to the Nasdaq as an independent company, no longer tethered to eBay PayPal debuted at a market value 1.4 times its former parent -- US$46.6 billion -- while eBay's capitalization shrunk to $34 billion....

Email has made communicating with elected officials easy, but the Electronic Frontier Foundation this week launched a new tool that is going to make it easier yet The tool, which resides at Democracy.io, allows you to send an electronic missive to your U.S. representative and senators with a minimum of clicks. Typically, you'd have to go to your le...

Swipes, taps, cursor movements and other ways of interacting with electronic devices can be used to protect online merchants from Net fraudsters Many people are familiar with biometric authenticators like irises, fingerprints and voices, but it turns out that how we behave with our machines can be a means of authenticating our identities, too....

News consumption on Facebook and Twitter has increased significantly in the last two years, according to a report released Tuesday by the Pew Research Center and the Knight Foundation Almost two-thirds (63 percent) of Twitter and Facebook members surveyed said they got news from those social networks. For Twitter, that's an 11 point increase from 2...

Ninety-two percent of worldwide profits from smartphones go to Apple, according to press reports citing data released Monday by Cannacord Genuity Samsung is a distant second with 15 percent of the profits. The numbers add up to more than 100 percent, due to companies in the mix that break even or lose money on their smartphone business....

Apple on Thursday released to consumers a preview of the latest versions of its mobile and desktop operating systems -- iOS 9 and OS X El Capitan -- which contain a number of new features, including a revamped two-factor authentication scheme The latest release of iOS also contains two new smart folders. One automatically collects any photos captur...

After a glorious first week of sales following its introduction in April, sales have slid rapidly for the Apple Watch, according to data from Slice Intelligence Sales have plummeted to fewer than 20,000 units a day, down from an average of 200,000 a day during its launch week, when it sold 1.5 million units, reported Slice, which measures online pu...

With so many cybersecurity pros drowning in an ever-rising tide of hack attacks on their computer systems, an emerging approach to defending those systems may be the life preserver they've been looking for The approach doesn't involve beefing up perimeter defenses, carefully scrutinizing network traffic, or applying analytics to employee behavior -...