December 2008 Archives

I am indebted to GC Weekly for notice of this alarming announcement from the Herod Office and the respsnse from the No2AD campaign.

The government has published controversial plans for gathering data on individuals with new bionumeric technology, while helping small businesses. The use of bionumerics, or "people counting", will involve everyone registering in person at a national network of taxation offices. Everyone will travel to their family's town to enrol, a move which the government believes will boost the hard pressed tourism and donkey industries.

Were you good little boys and girls in 2008?

Are you entering the worst recession since  .... (pick your own date) with loyal customers and reserve funds in a bank/currency that has not yet collapsed? 

If not, Santa has a copy of Voltaire's Candide for you. 

The Internet Watch Foundation recently placed Wikipedia on its blacklist after a complaint that an article was carrying an image that was illegal under UK law. It rescinded the ban after a wave of complaints from the Internet community. The clash was sad but inevitable. The result is almost certainly a pyrrhic victory.

At a meeting of the steering committee of the Information Security Awareness Forum on tuesday I suggested we do a note on the Twelve Scams of Christmas and what to do about them. Below is the collective wisdom to date.

Twelve Phishers phishing
Eleven Spammers spamming
Ten Bots a' herding
Nine Virus writers coding
Eight Snoopers snooping
Seven Worms a' spreading
Six Crackers cracking
Five Tro-jan Horses
Four Logic bombs
Three Software patches
Two Denials of Service
And a hacker at your back door!

I will not name and shame the authors of the draft but thought it worthy of a wider audience - rather than wait on perfection - comments welcome - especially regarding additional links on how to address the scams. The links given are to Get Safe Online.

Do visit the ISAF website, especially the blog, for updates as the feedback comes in.