ICANN HACKED: Intruders poke around global DNS innards Domain-name overseer ICANN has been hacked and its DNS zone database compromised, the organization has said. Attackers sent staff spoofed emails appearing to coming from icann.org. The organization notes it was a "spear phishing" attack, suggesting employees clicked on a link in the messages that took them to a bogus login …
This is the most concerning part of the whole tale. You'd hope that ICANN staff were a bit more savvy than my grandmother.
What does it take to get into people's heads that if a link in an unexpected email (or whatever) leads to a login page, do not progress any further?
And any legitimate organisation that sends emails that do this should be publicly ridiculed. They are setting themselves, and their users, up as prime phishing targets.
"The organization notes it was a "spear phishing" attack, suggesting employees clicked on a link in the messages, and then typed their usernames and passwords into a bogus webpage, providing hackers with the keys to their accounts."
This can't be serious, if it is then maybe they should change their name to ICANT....
"ICANN hackers sniff..." Granted, the correct use of "cracker" isn't going to happen. I get that. But can you PLEASE choose phrasing which isn't confusing? Obviously you're talking about hackers (sic) who have hacked (sic) ICANN, not hackers who are part of ICANN, which is implied.
Thanks!
Well, 'cracker' is a racial epithet in the US, that's why the press avoids it.
I'd propose calling them 'diddlers' instead, but that has gained sexual connotations as well as its older meanings of time wasting, fraud and tinkering with things.
http://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/diddle
"Well, 'cracker' is a racial epithet in the US, that's why the press avoids it."
I'd say it was then about time that a lot of people grew up. It appears that anyone with enough time on their hands will eventually find a term, a word or a phrase which offends them.
In my book, if you decide to behave like a c**t then you have to accept to be treated like a c**t.
I put asterisks in place in order to avoid offending all the colts...
I'd say it was then about time that a lot of people grew up. It appears that anyone with enough time on their hands will eventually find a term, a word or a phrase which offends them.
In my book, if you decide to behave like a c**t then you have to accept to be treated like a c**t.
That's apparently why the Honda Fit is called the Honda Jazz in EMEA :)
If you can use "Cracker" in the derogatory useage (as "poor white trash") then other words becomes fair game. THAT's why it doesn't get commonly used. Otherwise you would have a reverse racism lawsuit faster than you could say Klan.
However, there are MANY interpretations and usages for Cracker, not all are derogatory. Some of us even enjoy the term as it points back to the Scots Irish that came here at the beginning of the US and later on.
Royal Institution Christmas lectures this year
Sparks will fly: How to hack your home
As normal the Guardian did not quite get it right, with hacker
"But it wasn’t. Because hacking has taken on a new identity – grown a Dr Jekyll to counter its Mr Hyde. “Hack” is now the byword for smart fixes and canny contraptions"
http://www.theguardian.com/technology/2014/dec/14/how-to-hack-your-home-danielle-george-christmas-lectures
Funny I always though that **WAS** hacking.
The 'hacker vs cracker' argument ship sailed a long time ago and mention of the 'c' word of those two makes me think of A Grand Day Out more than anything computery.
The good/evil attribution of 'hacker' is normally obvious from context and sometimes people even include words to make the difference really clear.
Conclusion : a waste of a perfectly good post, just like this one!
I remember years back, when selling on eBay, using PayPal and getting all this phishing email crap. Even then, I had enough sense to NEVER login through a link sent to my inbox. That should be RULE #1.
Seriously, ICANN, it is very concerning to the digital community that the keepers of the "Domains" did not have some basic protocol in place to prevent this from happening.
As in a "whip cracker"? So... blacks using it is calling white people "slave owners"? It's been quite a while since the literal reality, but if it's a substitute for outright calling them "racists", sad to say, but there's a good chance they are accurate. I'm with Khaptain.
What's a "colt"? <wink>
That's security 101, folks! Yes all you lazy buts will be forced to copy and paste the link in your browser but saves millions of dollars and/or hundreds of metric tons of embarrassment.
A big thanks to our visionary friends at Microsoft for bringing html and active content to plain text email.
Never did like the comment "subject 101" implies you should know it, there was a time not so long ago "subject 101" was a first year university subject, at least in the UK.
Also not sure how you get html and active content in a plain text email, my email client rejects anything that is not plain text, with a reject message "plain text only"(ish). Perhaps you misunderstood "security 101", Oh well, must go and review my commentard 101 course :-)
I'm not so sure you've understood "subject 101"
Yes, It *does* mean you should know it and ,yes, It does refer to first year Uni subjects , or high school, or "community college" the level is irrelevent. It simply means "first lesson". Whatever level you are studying at you should be able to handle lesson 1. Also Its usually used in a discussion where the participants are familiar with %subject% and hence above lesson1 (at whatever level)
My wife, who denies any degree of technical knowledge (but is an astute judge of people), would instantly reject an invitation to follow a link and provide login details. I do not believe we can trust those who failed a trivial test of common sense to administer systems and data sets critical to proper operation of the Internet naming and numbering system.
I think it's a reference to Sony once upon a time trying to (badly) put copy protection on a few thousand CD's, and because of that, they totally deserve to have their entire organisation gutted from the onside, and anyone working for them, or anyone indirectly working for them, their familes out of buisness and living on the streets.
Yes, believe it or not, there are idiots so brainwashed they believe total destruction of Sony is the only correct punishment for them indirectly putting a rootkit on the PC of somebody they have never met...
What a bizzare world we live in.
@AC
It's not just because of the root-kit fiasco that I will not buy anything Sony ever again. The root-kit thing was just a small example of the viscous, immoral, greed-driven corporate culture of Sony corp.
The fact that they have nothing but utter contempt for their customers, and see all of us as their enemy, is reason enough not to give them any of my hard earned money.
Yes, I'm one of those horrible people that hopes Sony does fail. Sony's employees will ultimately be better off working for another company that's not such a bunch of corporate scumbags. I can't believe they treat their employees any better than their customers (much worse, most likely).
Zone files are so important, and change so infrequently, that this should be a fully manual and offline process to complete. IE changes are sent via bonded courier (or another equally-secure method) to ICANN where an employee verifies the change by calling up the requester and confirming identification as well as each item modified.
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