Security, Spoken

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Papua New Guinea Wants to Ban Facebook. It Shouldn't May 31, 2018

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Papua New Guinea, a small, island nation that shares a border with Indonesia, may soon turn off Facebook. The nation's communication minister suggested Tuesday that the government restrict access to the site for one month while it conducts research into issues like fake profiles, misinformation, and pornography. PNG will also reportedly explore creating its own, government-run alternative to Facebook. When the news reached Western outlets Tuesday, some people applauded.

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Security News This Week: T-Mobile Web Portal Exposed 74 Million Accounts May 30, 2018

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At the beginning of the year, revelations about a new type of processor vulnerability had far-reaching implications for devices all over the world, and this week researchers disclosed yet another of these so-called "speculative execution" flaws in Intel, AMD, and ARM chips.

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Former Trump Campaign Aide: My Russia Ties Are Not Nefarious! May 29, 2018

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Michael Caputo’s favorite novel is Mikhail Bulgakov’s The Master and Margarita, the story of the Devil’s visit to Moscow in the 1930s and all the oddball characters who surround him.

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Puppy Brain Scans Could Help Pick the Best Bomb Sniffers May 29, 2018

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If you've been in a large crowded place with a fair amount of security, you've probably seen bomb-sniffing dogs at work. (You may have even petted the puppers.) Dogs have long been used for detecting contraband and explosives, but attackers have made advances in body-worn explosive technology, forcing law enforcement to evolve too. This means enlisting a new type of canine defense: Vapor Wake dogs.

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How WIRED Lost $100,000 in Bitcoin May 28, 2018

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Back in 2013, when you could still mine bitcoins at home, WIRED was sent a small, sleek mining device manufactured by the now-defunct Butterfly Labs. We turned on the Roku-looking machine in our San Francisco offices and allowed it to do its job. A small fortune was soon amassed, now worth around $100,000. Then, we lost the money. Forever. Here's what happened to WIRED's 13 Bitcoins—and to the millions of others that have faced the same fate.

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Don’t Freak Out About That Amazon Alexa Eavesdropping Situation May 25, 2018

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On Thursday, Seattle news station KIRO 7 published a disconcerting story. A Portland family discovered that a snippet of private conversation had been recorded by an Amazon Echo and sent to a random person in their contact list. The report instantly sparked concern and outrage that Amazon's Echo smart speaker is listening to and recording much more than the company claims.

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Stealthy, Destructive Malware Infects Half a Million Routers May 25, 2018

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Home routers have become the rats to hackers' bubonic plague: An easily infected, untreated and ubiquitous population in which dangerous digital attacks can spread. Now security researchers are warning that one group of sophisticated hackers has amassed a collection of malware-infected routers that could be used as a powerful tool to spread havoc across the internet, or simply triggered to implode networks across the world.

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‘Significant’ FBI Error Reignites Data Encryption Debate May 24, 2018

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Law enforcement agencies including the FBI have long criticized data encryption as a threat to their ability to fight crime. They argue that encryption allows bad actors to "go dark," impeding agents’ ability to access the data of suspects, even with court orders or warrants. After years of raising the alarm about the going dark problem, though, officials have yet to convince privacy advocates that undermining encryption protections would do more good than harm.

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Facebook Is Beefing Up Its Two-Factor Authentication May 24, 2018

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Good news for those looking to secure their Facebook accounts: The social network says users can now sign up for two-factor authentication using apps like Duo and Google Authenticator, which will strengthen people's security on the site. Previously, you could only sign up for the feature with a phone number, though you could also enable tools like physical security keys and Facebook's own code generator that lives within the app itself.

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Security News This Week: California Charges Owners of Mugshots.com With Extortion May 22, 2018

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As is often the case, it was a week of mixed messages in security, with the White House eliminating its top cybersecurity policy roles at a crucial moment in geopolitics and the evolution of cyberwar. WIRED took a deep look at Robert Mueller's military service in Vietnam and his first year as special counsel, examining the Trump campaign’s interactions with Russia.

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