The Security Ledger with Paul F. Roberts

Recent Posts

Welcoming A New Sponsor: Duo Security

January 6, 2014 Paul Roberts

Those of you who pay close attention to The Security Ledger may have noticed some new artwork gracing our home page in recent days. It is with great pleasure that I note the addition of our newest sponsor: Duo Security Inc., a maker of two-factor authentication technology. I followed Duo from its earliest days, but my interactions with the company picked up after last year’s RSA Conference in San Francisco, when I had the chance to get briefed by CEO Dug Song about the company’s technology and how Duo was leveraging consumer-driven trends like BYOD (bring your own device) to solve vexing enterprise identity and authentication problems. Duo, which is based in Ann Arbor, Michigan, sells a hosted two-factor authentication service that leverages the cloud and mobile devices to provide a secure login experience using something you know (a password) and something you hold (a mobile phone). The Duo platform […]

Famed Hacker Barnaby Jack Died Of Accidental Overdose

January 3, 2014 Paul Roberts

Barnaby Jack, the world-renowned hacker who was found dead in his San Francisco apartment in July died of an accidental overdose of cocaine, heroin and prescription drugs, according to a report released by the San Francisco Medical Examiner’s office. The news was first reported by the website theverge.com. Jack, a 36-year-old New Zealand resident was found unresponsive in bed, surrounded by bottles of pills, empty bottles of beer and champagne and evidence of “illicit drug use,” the Medical Examiner’s report states. Jack had traces of cocaine, heroin, Xanax, and Benadryl in his system at the time of death. Jack was one of the most gifted security researchers of his generation. The head of embedded device security at the firm IOActive, Jack electrified audiences with his demonstrations of vulnerabilities in devices such as ATMs and implantable insulin pumps. In a now-famous “Jackpotting” demonstration, he demonstrated a remotely exploitable hole affecting bank automated teller machines […]

US CERT Warns About Point-of-Sale Malware

January 3, 2014 Paul Roberts

With news of the breach of big-box retailer Target Inc. still in the headlines, the U.S. Computer Emergency Readiness Team (CERT) issued a warning about the danger posed by malicious software targeting Point of Sale (POS) systems. CERT issued an advisory (TA14-002A) on Thursday asking POS owners to take steps to secure the devices, and telling consumers to beware. The warning comes after a string of reports that suggest that malware attacking point of sale systems is on the rise. In December, researchers from Arbor Networks said they had detected an “active PoS compromise campaign” to steal credit and debit card data that used the Dexter and Project Hook malware. Dexter is a Windows-based program that was first discovered in December, 2012 by Seculert, an Israeli security firm. It is still not known whether malware played a part in the huge theft of credit card data from Target Inc. That […]

Are We Even Trying To Defend The Internet of Things?

January 2, 2014 Paul Roberts

Josh Corman has been a frequent mention on this blog. Josh, who is the Director of Security Intelligence at Akamai Technologies, joined me on the first episodes of Talking Code, speaking about application security and The Internet of Things. He talked candidly about the role that platform security played in his thinking about buying a new car. Well, a few months have passed and now Josh has the new car. But now that he has it, he’s thinking more than ever about the security problem as it pertains to the Internet of Things. In this video, from a TEDx event in Naperville, Illinois (right outside Chicago), Josh talks about his evolving theory of security on the Internet of Things. The IoT, he says, is a “tidal wave” of change that will transform our lives – connecting every aspect of life via software. But this growing amalgam of Internet connected stuff […]

NSA Toolbox Included Hacks For Juniper, Cisco, Dell

December 31, 2013 Paul Roberts

The German magazine Der Spiegel made headlines this week with its story detailing the US National Security Agency’s (NSAs) offensive hacking capabilities. The story is based on classified NSA documents absconded with by former contractor Edward Snowden and lays bare a Webster’s Dictionary full of classified hacking tools and programs. Among the highlights of the story: + The NSA developed and deployed a wide range of hacking tools that could compromise hardware from leading IT and networking equipment makers including Cisco Systems, Juniper Networks and the Chinese vendor Huawei and Dell Inc. + The NSA tools were designed to provide persistent access that allowed the NSA to monitor activity on the compromised endpoint, avoid detection by third party security software and survive software and firmware updates. One such tool, DEITYBOUNCE, provided persistent access to Dell’s PowerEdge servers by “exploiting the system BIOS” and using “System Management Mode to […]