News

Privacy and data protection

• February 08, 2022 08 Feb'22

  Porn sites will be legally required to verify users’ ages

  Porn sites could be legally obliged to verify that their users are 18 or over under proposed online safety rules, in UK government’s second attempt to prevent children from accessing pornography online

• February 08, 2022 08 Feb'22

  Right to disconnect and less monitoring key to better remote work

  The World Health Organisation and International Labour Organisation warn against invasive workplace surveillance and promote right to disconnect in joint briefing on how to promote healthy and safe remote working

• February 03, 2022 03 Feb'22

  BlackCat crew supposedly behind OilTanking ransomware heist

  Preliminary reports from Germany’s national cyber authority indicate the recent OilTanking ransomware attack may have been the work of the BlackCat group

• February 03, 2022 03 Feb'22

  Crisp supply shortage looms after KP Snacks hit by ransomware

  Supplies of Hula Hoops and many other snack brands are under threat after a ransomware attack on the systems of KP Snacks

• February 03, 2022 03 Feb'22

  French Supreme Court raises constitutional questions over EncroChat hacking secrecy

  Conseil Constitutionnel to decide whether ‘defence secrecy’ over state EncroChat cryptophone hacking breaches French constitution

• February 02, 2022 02 Feb'22

  Mechanism underlying cookie popups found in breach of GDPR

  A fundamental element of the mechanism by which the advertising industry requests tracking consent from web users has been found in breach of the General Data Protection Regulation

• February 02, 2022 02 Feb'22

  Reforms needed to tackle economic crime, says Treasury Committee

  The Treasury Committee is disappointed at progress towards tackling economic crime and fraud in both the online and offline worlds, and is calling for more action

• February 02, 2022 02 Feb'22

  British Council data exposed by third-party cyber failure

  The British Council entrusted confidential data on its students to a third-party and was let down

• February 01, 2022 01 Feb'22

  Met Police faces legal action over Gangs Matrix

  Campaign group Liberty is taking legal action against the Met over its use of the Gangs Matrix, claiming it is driven by racial stereotypes and disproportionately affects people from black and minority ethnic backgrounds

• January 31, 2022 31 Jan'22

  Data on children of armed forces personnel exposed in breach

  Data on 4,142 children of serving armed forces personnel was exposed in a data breach at the Ministry of Defence

• January 28, 2022 28 Jan'22

  Cyber skills gap affecting data privacy practice, finds ISACA

  Organisations are struggling to fill both legal and technical privacy roles, with potentially damaging consequences, according to a report

• January 28, 2022 28 Jan'22

  Korean researchers invent silk-based security device

  Experts from the Gwangju Institute of Science have built a digital security device based on natural silk fibres that they claim is practically unbreachable

• January 24, 2022 24 Jan'22

  WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange can ask Supreme Court to hear extradition appeal

  Senior judges said today that WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange can petition the Supreme Court to decide whether to hear an appeal against his extradition to the US

• January 21, 2022 21 Jan'22

  Tinder algorithm charging users more based on age

  Popular dating app Tinder could have broken data protection and equality laws by using personal data about people’s age to set different prices

• January 21, 2022 21 Jan'22

  Mandiant analysts: Russia-backed APTs likely to ramp up attacks

  More cyber attacks like those perpetrated against targets in Ukraine are to be expected, and they may become more destructive

• January 21, 2022 21 Jan'22

  ICO criticises government-backed campaign to delay end-to-end encryption

  Data protection watchdog warns that delaying end-to-end encryption will put children at risk

• January 21, 2022 21 Jan'22

  Cyber pros: Don’t revel in REvil’s downfall just yet

  The arrests of REvil’s alleged kingpins is a welcome step, but as with any disruption to cyber criminal activity, it is never wise to assume law enforcement action means the threat has passed entirely

• January 21, 2022 21 Jan'22

  Scam losses in Australia hit record high

  Australians lost a record A$323.7m to scams last year, with investment and romance scams accounting for the bulk of their losses

• January 20, 2022 20 Jan'22

  Ransomware attacks dropped 37% in December, claims NCC

  Latest monthly data reveals a significant decline in ransomware attacks at the end of 2021, but a new, emergent gang is making waves

• January 20, 2022 20 Jan'22

  Data of 515,000 vulnerable people stolen in Red Cross attack

  The International Committee of the Red Cross is probing a cyber attack that has already seen the personal data of hundreds of thousands of the world’s most vulnerable people compromised

• January 20, 2022 20 Jan'22

  Singapore to tighten digital banking security

  Banks in Singapore will have to put in place more stringent measures to combat the rise in online phishing scams targeted at bank customers in the city-state

• January 19, 2022 19 Jan'22

  Government funds charity campaign to warn big tech over the risks of encryption to children

  Barnardo’s and other charities begin a government-backed PR campaign to warn of the dangers end-to-end encryption poses to child safety, which has been criticised as being ‘one-sided’

• January 19, 2022 19 Jan'22

  Investigators find Beijing 2022 app riddled with security flaws

  Security flaws in Olympic app may put personal health data at risk of compromise in a man-in-the-middle attack

• January 18, 2022 18 Jan'22

  Police take down VPN linked to multiple ransomware hits

  German police led a multinational effort to seize and take down the LabVPN service, which was allegedly used by cyber criminals to facilitate ransomware attacks

• January 17, 2022 17 Jan'22

  ‘Russian-backed’ hackers defaced Ukrainian websites as cover for dangerous malware attack

  Kiev claims that a hacking group in Belarus – a close ally of Russia – was responsible for hacking Ukrainian government websites amid threats of military action

• January 12, 2022 12 Jan'22

  MEPs demand EU probe into Pegasus spyware abuse

  A group of European Parliament Members has called for an EU-wide investigation into NSO Group’s Pegasus spyware after it emerged EU member states may have used it

• January 11, 2022 11 Jan'22

  Banks accused of neglecting customer security measures

  Which? singles out Metro Bank, Virgin Money and TSB over insecure online banking processes

• January 11, 2022 11 Jan'22

  Companies propose scanning content pre-encryption to fight CSAM

  Firms working on the UK government’s Safety Tech Challenge have suggested that scanning content before encryption will help prevent the spread of child sexual abuse material – but privacy concerns remain

• January 11, 2022 11 Jan'22

  Proofpoint acquires Singapore data security startup

  Proofpoint’s acquisition of Dathena will bolster its data loss prevention capabilities, enabling organisations to better understand information risk through the use of AI

• January 10, 2022 10 Jan'22

  Ministry of Justice caught up in multiple cyber incidents

  Besides multiple disclosed data breaches, department was also affected by two ransomware attacks

• January 09, 2022 09 Jan'22

  Singapore retailer hit by data breach

  The personal data of OG’s basic and gold members stored in a database managed by a third-party service provider was reportedly compromised

• January 06, 2022 06 Jan'22

  France fines Facebook and Google over alleged cookie malpractice

  French data protection authorities clamp down on tech platforms for purposely making it more burdensome for users to decline tracking cookies

• January 05, 2022 05 Jan'22

  Judges to decide whether Assange can appeal against extradition as he reaches 1,000 days in jail

  Mexican president Andrés Manuel López Obrador urges US to treat WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange with humanity and to consider Mexico’s offer to grant Assange asylum

• January 03, 2022 03 Jan'22

  How APAC firms can stay ahead of cyber threats

  Organisations will need to develop behavioural detection, machine learning and threat hunting capabilities to keep pace with the onslaught of cyber attacks

• December 31, 2021 31 Dec'21

  Top 10 crime, national security and law stories of 2021

  Here are Computer Weekly’s top 10 crime, national security and law stories of 2021

• December 30, 2021 30 Dec'21

  Top 10 technology and ethics stories of 2021

  Here are Computer Weekly’s top 10 technology and ethics stories of 2021

• December 23, 2021 23 Dec'21

  Top 10 cyber security stories of 2021

  Cyber security dominated the headlines in 2021, making it hard to gain a clear picture of what to pay attention to. What is an IT buyer to do?

• December 20, 2021 20 Dec'21

  Top 10 artificial intelligence stories of 2021

  This year, artificial intelligence has moved to operationalisation, explainability and regulatory frameworks. Here are Computer Weekly’s top 10 artificial intelligence stories for 2021

• December 10, 2021 10 Dec'21

  Julian Assange can be extradited to the US to face espionage and hacking charges, court rules

  High Court overturns decision not to extradite WikiLeaks founder after US government gives assurances over his treatment

• December 09, 2021 09 Dec'21

  UK and US to collaborate on privacy innovation contest

  Joint UK-US innovation challenge contest centring on privacy-enhancing technology announced at Summit for Democracy in Washington DC

• December 08, 2021 08 Dec'21

  UK privacy chief denies conflict of interest in new role

  UK information commissioner will join a private law firm that represents technology companies she used to regulate, raising questions about conflicts of interest and drawing ‘revolving door’ criticisms

• December 08, 2021 08 Dec'21

  Number of .uk domain suspensions at record low

  Statistics from Nominet show how effective law enforcement action against cyber crime in the UK is paying off

• December 02, 2021 02 Dec'21

  Millions of credit card details for sale on dark web for as little as 75p

  The credit card details of millions of people from across the world can be bought by criminals using the dark web for as little as $1

• December 01, 2021 01 Dec'21

  Kaspersky introduces cyber policy for bionic devices

  Cyber firm Kaspersky has become one of the first organisations in the world to develop and implement a security policy covering the use of bionic devices and other forms of human augmentation

• November 30, 2021 30 Nov'21

  Compliance, device management a challenge for NHS cyber teams

  Information gleaned by asset visibility specialist Armis reveals that despite improvements, some daunting security challenges still dog the NHS

• November 30, 2021 30 Nov'21

  HP patches bugs in over 150 printer models

  More than 150 HP multifunction printers are at risk of compromise through a series of newly disclosed vulnerabilities, one of them wormable

• November 29, 2021 29 Nov'21

  ICO warns facial recognition company Clearview AI it could face £17m fine over privacy breaches

  The UK’s information commissioner has issued a preliminary decision to fine Clearview over £17m for breaching UK data protection law and invited the company to make representations

• November 29, 2021 29 Nov'21

  British Army picks Immersive Labs for cyber training

  The British Army will make Immersive Labs’ security training platform available to all serving personnel

• November 26, 2021 26 Nov'21

  UK’s surveillance culture may be normalising use of tech for abuse

  Intense surveillance of public spaces by UK authorities may be playing a part in the normalisation of cyber stalking in intimate relationships

• November 25, 2021 25 Nov'21

  Government must prove its plans to police encryption work, says ex-cyber security chief

  Ciaran Martin, the former UK cyber security chief, says the government must explain how it can access encrypted communications without damaging cyber security and weakening privacy