PayPal and Mailpile, the scrappy secure mail startup ended the week on a high note: hugging it out (via Twitter) after the online payments behemoth froze more than $40,000 in payments to the crowd-funded startup then donated $1,000 to the project, to boot. But making it right with the tiny secure email firm is just the beginning of the story at PayPal, which is making the whole mix-up as something of an object lesson in how it needs to change to address a fluid and fast-moving online payments market. First, some background: Mailpile, of Reykjavík, Iceland, has raised more than $145,000 in a month-long campaign on the crowd funding web site Indiegogo.com to build a “fast, web-mail client with user-friendly encryption and privacy features.” Beginning on Saturday, PayPal froze more than $40,000 of those donations, suspecting fraud. The company’s spokespeople told company executive Brennan Novak that it wanted to see […]
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With Settlement, FTC Issues Warning On IP-Enabled Cameras
The U.S. Federal Trade Commission (FTC) made one of its strongest statements to date on the issue of consumer privacy in the fast-emerging market for “smart” electronics: settling a complaint with the maker of SecurView, a line of home surveillance cameras that, it turned out, were just as easily used to spy into the homes of SecurView customers. In a statement on Wednesday, the FTC said that it settled a complaint against TRENDnet, the maker of the SecurView home security cameras. The FTC had charged the Torrance, California company with misrepresenting the security of its products. TRENDnet sold “faulty software that left (the cameras) open to online viewing” by anyone who knew the device’s IP address. Under the terms of its settlement with the Commission, TRENDnet must stop misrepresenting the “security, privacy, confidentiality, or integrity of the information that its cameras or other devices transmit,” as well as “the extent […]
U.S. Cyber Security Framework Is Good News-For Hackers
Ralph Langner, the renowned expert on the security of industrial control- and SCADA systems, warns that the latest draft of the U.S. Government’s Cyber Security Framework (CSF) will do little to make critical infrastructure more resistant to devastating cyber attacks. Writing on his blog, Langner said that a draft of the National Institute of Standards and Technology’s (NIST’s) Preliminary Cybersecurity Framework does little to compel critical infrastructure owners to improve the security of their systems, or guarantee uniform (and robust) cyber security standards in the critical infrastructure space. NIST released the latest draft of the CSF late last month (PDF). But Langner, writing on Wednesday, likened the framework to a recipe that, if used by three different chefs, produces three totally different dishes…or just a messy kitchen. “A less metaphorical words, a fundamental problem of the CSF is that it is not a method that, if applied properly, would lead to predictable results,” […]
Insecure At Any Speed: Are Automakers Failing The Software Crash Test?
Editor’s Note: You can view the rest of my conversation about application and supply chain security, featuring Joshua Corman of Akamai and Chris Wysopal of Veracode by visiting Veracode’s web site. – PFR You’re in the market for a new car, and you’ve made a list of the features you want: a cool, tablet style interface for the audio and navigation system, side impact airbags for the front and rear compartment, a pop-up third row of seating. Heck, maybe you even want to hold out for the automatic seat temperature control that some Lexus cars now come with. While you’re at it, how about some secure software, too? That last item probably isn’t on most buyers’ check list today, but it may be soon, according to two, prominent security experts: Chris Wysopal, of Veracode, and Joshua Corman of Akamai. Speaking on Talking Code, an exclusive video hosted by The Security Ledger […]
That ARM-Sensinode Buy: What Does It Mean For Security And IoT?
We wrote last week about the decision of chip-maker ARM to buy the small(ish) Finnish software maker Sensinode Oy, which has become a big player in the market for software that runs low power devices like embedded sensors. The deal makes sense at the 100,000 foot level – ARM makes chips that power embedded devices, Sensinode makes the software that is powered by them. Perfect. But the deal actually works at a bunch of different levels, as I learned from a conversation with Michael Koster, the co-founder and lead architect at the group The Open Source Internet of Things (OSIOT). Koster is an authority on The Internet of Things and has helped create open-source toolkits and APIs that promote interaction among intelligent devices. Koster said that ARM’s purchase of Sensinode is as much about both firms’ investment in emerging IoT standards for low-powered, intelligent devices like Constrained Application Protocol (CoAP) […]
