Google: Consumers Wary Of Security Updates

Average Internet users are wary of security updates, and consider even mistaken as a security risk, according to research ( pdf ) from Google. The Internet giant decided the security behaviour of 231 294 security experts and Internet users who are not experts to compare.

For example, among other things, to the top five security measures take any consideration of both groups. It shows that average Internet users underestimate the importance of security updates seriously. 35% of the experts called to install security updates as a security measure, while only 2% of users doing this. As a result, the installation of the patches is a security measure, with the largest difference between users and experts.


Further research into this behaviour shows that 39% of the experts shows automatically install updates, while among users is 29%. In addition, 25% of the experts said that updates are installed immediately. When the user, this is done by only 9%.According to the researchers did not make installing updates as timely as possible with bad past experiences or that users do not realise its effectiveness.

Passwords

The study also shows that password management is important for both users and experts, but there different approaches are used. The experts often use password managers. The difference between experts and users is a factor of three. 24% of users said for some accounts using a password manager, while it is 73% of the experts. Furthermore, users will find anti-virus software very important, while experts prefer other measures.

"Our results show that experts and non-experts take various measures to protect themselves on the Internet. The action of the experts be experts considered good advice, while the actions of the non-experts get mixed reactions from experts," said the researchers. They argue that there is room for improvement when it comes to identifying the main security and to then make this clear to users.

Julian Assange: Google Does To "Voluntary" Mass Surveillance

Google collects less information than the US National Security Agency, yet the way the software giant stores data and silvers as "voluntary" mass surveillance and "surveillance-capitalism" to describe, says WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange facing Der Spiegel .

According Assange is about one person of little worth, but have the data of one billion strategic value, similar to an oil pipeline. The large amounts of information collected are then used through a new economic model, called "surveillance capitalism," says the WikiLeaks founder.

Google also likes to give itself with "voluntary" mass surveillance through things at first glance away for free. Not only does this much information, it also changes the perception of users. By giving away services it seems that they are not a business, says Assange. "As companies do not have free things. They therefore seem wrongly to be a part of civil society."

Culture

The impact of Google goes beyond just collecting data about users, they affect those too. "They export a specific mindset of culture. You can visit the old term of" cultural imperialism "use, or the "Disneylandization "call of the Internet. Or maybe" digital colonisation "a better term," warns the WikiLeaks founder.

Companies like Google set as Assange new social rules about what activities are allowed and which information can be exchanged, or even how much of it a nipple may be displayed. Normally this would be part of the public debate and even policy makers. "But as soon as something is sufficiently controversial these organizations prohibit it. Even if it's not as controversial, but it affects their interests, then it is banned or partially prohibit

Hacking Team Warns Leaked Software

The Italian developer of government spyware Hacking Team, which was recently the victim of a major burglary, has issued a warning for the software that was stolen at the company and has appeared online.According to the Italian company has sufficient code captured by which malicious attack other Internet users.

"For Hacking Team could determine the attack who had access to the technology, which was only sold to governments and government agencies." Through the work of criminals were now "terrorists, extortionists and others" to use the technology, according to the warning from the company. It is the first reaction to the incident Hacking Team via the website has brought out. According to the Italian company, the resulting situation is very dangerous. Hacking Team would also check whether it is possible to reduce the risk.

In addition, the company expects that will take anti-virus companies measures. Hacking Team develops software that allows investigators computers of suspects can control remotely. Because of the incident investigation services were requested to make temporary use of the software. Meanwhile, we are working on an update so that investigators can monitor the systems that have been infected with software Hacking Team again.

Furthermore, the Italian company has denied the reports that backdoors are present in the software that can control it. "That's just not true. Our customers use the technology on their own computer, and are therefore customers need to take action to cease operations," the statement said.

Virus For Android Smart TVs Launched

An increasing number of television sets to have "intelligent" capabilities, which often means that they are connected via a mini-computer with the internet. There are several operating systems to drive the smart televisions, including Android TV Google.

The Russian anti-virus company Doctor Web already had a virus for Android smartphones, but now has a product specifically for smart televisions, media players and consoles launched that run on the operating system. "With the advent of the Internet of Things (IoT) era are not only computers and smartphones that run the risk of becoming infected, so they need anti-virus protection," said the virus fighter.

It would be particularly Android devices that are connected to the Internet and allow users to install software from unofficial marketplaces or USB drives that run according to Doctor Web risk. In case the Android TV device supports a remote control, the remote control can also be used to control the virus.

21 Virus Scanners Tested With Real Infected Links

To increase the effectiveness of virus outside of a test environment to test run the Austrian test lab AV-Comparatives every month a "real-world protection test", in which anti-virus programs are tested with real infected links on the Internet. 595 links were used for the test in May.

The malicious links to malware being or trying to install via a drive-by download malware silently on the system. These are exactly the same attack vectors that Internet users receive everyday lives. Since there are up-to-date software worked knew many of the URLs the drive-by download not perform. According to AV-Comparatives Internet users may also reduce the risk of malware by installing patches.

The virus scanners and Internet security suites were at the time of the test is also updated with the latest signatures. Stop only two scanners, Panda Free Antivirus and Trend Micro Internet Security, knew all the attacks without user interaction. F-Secure is also recognized all attacks, but the decision to block the malware left it in a number of cases over to the user.

Threat Track, Microsoft Security Essentials and Lava Software Ad-ware Free Antivirus + at the bottom end, with a detection of around 90%. It was also the "false positives" look, it wrongly detecting clean files as malware. Examples include F-Secure at that time gave 14 false alarms. Also Panda (7) and McAfee (6) go several times a mistake.

Ransomware Allows Victims To Recover From Error Files

A new ransomware variant that first appeared in late January and make the last month was increasingly active shows an error causing casualties without paying their files can be recovered. It is the Threat Finder ransomware which spreads through vulnerabilities in Java, Adobe Flash Player and Microsoft Silverlight that Internet users are not patched.

Once the ransomware encrypts which operates numerous files and asks here for 1.25 bitcoins, what with the current exchange rate is 259 euros. A researcher from Bleeping Computer discovered that the ransomware the Volume Shadow Copies are not removed from the computer, making it possible to access the files using the " Previous options can restore "of Windows, or a tool like Shadow Explorer .

Experts Divided On Risk Of Trackers On Porn Sites

In February warned a software engineer for the risk of trackers and other ways in which it can be followed online porn surfing habits of viewers, but experts are divided over how big the risk is real. Software engineer Brett Thomas suggested two months ago that the viewing habits on porn sites the next "big privacy scandal" can be. Many ways to websites and advertisers identify Internet users today and that is no different on porn sites.

This data could, for example end up using a hacked advertising company, tracker or porn site on the Internet. It does not matter if people such as "private browsing" to use to protect their browsing habits, so let experts opposite Vice Magazine know. Even if this option is enabled the user's IP address is on the website visited, and the trackers that are active thereon passed.

88% of the 500 most visited porn sites are active trackers. "If you look at porn on the Internet in 2015, even in incognito mode, you must assume that at some point your viewing habits public and will be linked to your name," said Thomas. In addition to the IP address has almost every computer to identify a unique fingerprint browser so that users are. "It is certainly cause for concern," said Justin Brookman, privacy expert of? Center for Democracy & Technology.

Alarmism

According to Cooper Quintin of the American civil rights movement EFF is possible that the viewing habits of one's membership in a porn site is known, but he calls the remark of Thomas later someone can easily put it online porn viewing habits of viewers on the Internet scaremongering. Vice Magazine porn sites also asked for a response, but received only sent a statement of PornHub. The site is on the 75th place of most visited websites on the Internet, just for Gmail.com , which stands on a 78th place.

The statement PornHub calls the assertion of Thomas not only utterly wrong but also dangerously misleading. According to the porn store the viewing habits of daily users would cost 3,600 terabytes. The searches of these data would be almost impossible and very time consuming. "The server logs PornHub contain only for a limited time the IP address and user agent, never a browser fingerprint," said a spokesman.

Google Allows Gmail SMTP SSL Certificate Expired Again

Google has the SSL certificate used for the domain smtp.gmail.com leave again expired , allowing Gmail users to send email through an email client all kinds of warnings received. It seems to be a human error, because the SSL certificate for imap.gmail.com it had been updated, so let users on the Google forum know.

In 2008, it happened even though that Google SSL certificate had expired . At the time, it took several hours before the problems were solved and advised Google users to email through the webmail interface. Again, it took a few hours before the domain had a renewed SSL certificate. This certificate expires on December 31, 2016, which some Internet users fear a repetition, as it lies on an American holiday, as this weekend.