Security, Spoken

Latest Episodes:

How Microsoft Tackles Russian Hackers—And Why It's Never Enough Aug 22, 2018

Show notes

Early Tuesday, Microsoft announced that last week it seized control of six domains owned by the Russian hacking group Fancy Bear, also known as APT28. The hackers had used the sites to mount midterm election-related phishing campaigns, similar to those Fancy Bear launched during the 2016 United States election season. It's the most prominent, publicly known effort to proactively identify and thwart Russian election hacking efforts—and Microsoft's in a unique position to pull it off.

Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Inside the Research Lab Teaching Facebook About Its Trolls Aug 21, 2018

Show notes

In late July, a group of high-ranking Facebook executives organized an emergency conference call with reporters across the country. That morning, Facebook’s chief operating officer, Sheryl Sandberg, explained, they had shut down 32 fake pages and accounts that appeared to be coordinating disinformation campaigns on Facebook and Instagram.

Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Taking Away John Brennan's Clearance Threatens National Security Aug 21, 2018

Show notes

In a move that has shocked career national security officials, President Trump stripped former CIA Director John Brennan of his security clearance this week, and announced he was considering doing so for a host of others. The move so enraged retired Navy Admiral William McRaven—the man who oversaw the killing of Osama Bin Laden—that he wrote an op-ed telling Trump to revoke his clearance too, in solidarity with Brennan.

Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

How to Protect Yourself Against a SIM Swap Attack Aug 20, 2018

Show notes

A spate of hacked Instagram accounts. A $220 million lawsuit against AT&T. A bustling underground crime ring. They all have roots in an old problem that has lately found new urgency: SIM card swaps, a scam in which hackers steal your mobile identity—and use it to upend your life. At its most basic level, a SIM swap is when someone convinces your carrier to switch your phone number over to a SIM card they own. They’re not doing it for prank call cover, or to rack up long-distance charges.

Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

A Bot Panic Hits Amazon's Mechanical Turk Aug 20, 2018

Show notes

For the past week, psychologists all over America have been freaking out. The cause of their agita was an observation by a psychology graduate student from the University of Minnesota named Max Hui Bai. Like many researchers, Bai uses Amazon’s Mechanical Turk platform, where individuals sign up to complete simple tasks, such as taking surveys for academics or marketers, and earn a low fee.

Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

To Identify a Hacker, Treat Them Like a Burglar Aug 17, 2018

Show notes

Imagine someone robs your house. The savvy culprit didn't leave behind fingerprints, shoe prints, or any other discrete, identifying details. Still, police manage to link the crime to a series of burglaries that happened the next town over, because of the criminal's behavior. Each robbery occurred in the same way, and in each case, the perpetrator stole many of the same items.

Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

At DefCon, the Biggest Election Threat Is Lack of Funding Aug 17, 2018

Show notes

Now in its second year, the Voting Machine Hacking Village at the DefCon security conference in Las Vegas features a new set of voting machines—all of which will actually be used in the 2018 midterm elections—for attendees to analyze and attack. But as eager attendees get to work familiarizing themselves with the devices and revealing their weaknesses, another call has emerged from the Village as well: Finding bugs is great. But you also need the money to fix them.

Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Imposter Fortnite Android Apps Are Already Spreading Malware Aug 16, 2018

Show notes

Two weeks ago, Epic Games CEO Tim Sweeney confirmed that the Android version of Fortnite, largely seen as the most popular game in the world, would not be available through the Google Play Store. Instead, fans would have to install it from the web. The announcement drew heaps of attention—not least of which came from peddlers of malware. Fortnite only became broadly available on Android this week.

Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Google Tracks You Even If Location History's Off. Here's How to Stop It Aug 15, 2018

Show notes

If, like most people, you thought Google stopped tracking your location once you turned off Location History in your account settings, you were wrong. According to an AP investigation published Monday, even if you disable Location History, the search giant still tracks you every time you open Google Maps, get certain automatic weather updates, or search for things in your browser. There's a way to stop it—but it takes some digging.

Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Invisible Mouse Clicks Let Hackers Burrow Deep into MacOS Aug 15, 2018

Show notes

One way operating system developers try to protect a computers's secrets from probing hackers is with an appeal to the human at the keyboard. By giving the user a choice to “allow” or “deny” a program’s access to sensitive data or features, the operating system can create a checkpoint that halts malware while letting innocent applications through.

Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices