encryption Archives

encryption

The Internet of Things: Legal Woes for CIOs | CIO

August 22, 2014 Paul Roberts

Stephanie Overby over at CIOs has an interesting piece today on the legal pitfalls that Internet of Things adoption may hold for chief information officers (CIOs). While the prospect of more, intelligent devices holds great promise for organizations across the economy, Overby notes that there are also risks – especially when it comes to the wholesale harvesting of customer data. “Many of the legal issues are not well understood even by sophisticated privacy practitioners,” the article quotes Christopher Wolf, a partner at the law firm Hogan Lovells saying. “In the world of sensors rather than computer screens, the legal issues are challenging.” CIOs are advised to consider “self-regulating” around issues like privacy, security and consent, to stay on the right side of the evolving law. CIOs should scrutinize every decision to collect user information and ask whether the benefits to collecting the data outweigh the potential costs, especially in the event of […]

Report: Android Shield Adds Invisible Encryption To Mobile Apps

August 19, 2014 Paul Roberts

Wired reports on a team from Georgia Tech that has designed software that acts as an overlay on Android smartphones’ communication applications, encrypting communications to and from those apps, while mimicking their user interface. The researchers describe the technology as a “transparent window” over apps that prevents unencrypted messages from leaving the user’s device. “The window acts as a proxy between the user and the app. But the beauty of it is that users feel like they’re interacting with the original app without much, if any, change,” says Wenke Lee, the Georgia Tech professor who led the developers. “Our goal is to make security that’s as easy as air. You just breathe and don’t even think about it.” The researchers call their prototype Mimesis Aegis, or M-Aegis, Latin for “mimicry shield.” They plan to present their research at the Usenix Security conference this week. Read more via Wired: This Android Shield Could […]

Vulnerable Mobile Software Management Tool Reaches Into IoT

August 5, 2014 Paul Roberts

You could be forgiven for never having heard of Red Bend Software. The company is small – just 250 employees- and privately held. Red Bend’s headquarters is a suite of offices in a nondescript office park in Waltham, Massachusetts, just off Route 128 – America’s “Silicon Highway.” But the company’s small profile belies a big footprint in the world of mobile devices. Since 2005, more than 2 billion devices running the company’s mobile management software have been sold worldwide. Today, the Red Bend is believed to control between 70 and 90 percent of the market for mobile software management (MSM) technology, which carriers use to service mobile devices. The software enables mobile carriers to do critical tasks, including firmware-over-the-air (FOTA) software updates, mobile device configuration and other on-device changes. Red Bend counts many of the world’s leading companies in the mobile, enterprise and manufacturing sectors as clients, including Intel, Qualcomm, Samsung, Sharp, LG, Sony, Huawei, China Mobile and Lenovo. For the most part, Red […]

PasswordsCon Preview: Passwords Are Dead. Long Live Passwords.

July 31, 2014 Paul Roberts

I had an opportunity to sit with Per Thorsheim, co-founder of PasswordsCon about next week’s Passwords14 Conference in Las Vegas, Nevada. If you haven’t checked it out before, PasswordsCon is the world’s premiere technical conference that is just focused on the security of passwords and pin codes. PasswordsCon is a one-of-a-kind event: bringing together folks whose specialty is cracking and defeating password security with security experts whose interest is in shoring up protections for sensitive data. This year’s conference, which is sharing space with the B-Sides Las Vegas Conference on August 5 and 6. PasswordsCon has earned a reputation for being the launching pad for some eye-popping new tools for password cracking. Back in 2012, we reported on a 25 GPU device that radically lowered the bar to cracking even the strongest passwords protected with weaker encryption algorithms, like Microsoft’s LM and NTLM, obsolete. Among other things, the Conference will feature […]

Micro Survey of Smart Home Devices Finds Much To Fault

July 30, 2014 Paul Roberts

Larry Dignan over at ZDNet is writing about a new survey by HP’s Fortify application security division that finds 70 percent of Internet of things devices have exploitable software vulnerabilities. Some caveats: HP makes its conclusions based on scans of “10 of the most popular Internet of things devices.” That’s a very small sample size that could (greatly) skew the results one way or the other. So take this with a grain of salt. You can download the full survey here. (PDF) [Read Security Ledger coverage of Internet of Things here.] According to Dignan, HP found 25 vulnerabilities per device. Audited devices included TVs, Webcams, thermostats, remote power outlets, sprinklers, door locks, home alarms, scales and garage openers. One of each, from the sound of it. The findings, assessed based on the OWASP Internet of Things Top 10 list and vulnerability categories, account for the devices as well as cloud and […]