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Happy Holidays from Cybersecurity News!
Wishing all of my readers, followers, friends and family a safe and happy holiday season. Many thanks for your continued support and best wishes in the new year!
DHS Secretary Napolitano: Cybersecurity is a Collaborative Effort
Attaining an Internet that is both open and secure is a challenge that must be confronted, US Department of Homeland Security Secretary Janet Napolitano stated on Thursday.
“Cyberspace is fundamentally a civilian space,” Napolitano said during a keynote speech before a cybersecurity forum at the National Press Club. “And government has a role to help protect it.”
But according to Napolitano, that role should extend beyond DHS and other federal agencies and into the private sector, as well, where she said new public-private partnerships are already being formed to protect control systems that operate the nation’s critical infrastructure.
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Cyber Legislation Introduced Amidst Attacks
The numbers are out, according to eWeek, who recently published its list of the top 10 security stories of 2010. Not surprising: The Google-China hacking incident, the malicious computer worm Stuxnet and the wrath of WikiLeaks all top the list of cyber blunders we’ve seen over the past year.
Regarding the latter of the list-toppers, WikiLeaks continues to make news headlines this week, as its hacktivist supporters rage on, threatening to take down the websites of any anti-WikiLeaks affiliates who take action to condemn the controversial site and its founder Julian Assange.
According to the Associated Press, the British government fears that its websites are at risk of Wiki-backed attacks, as Assange, who is wanted in Sweden on allegations of rape, was scheduled to appear in British court today for his extradition hearing.
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More Notables Fall Victim to WikiLeaks Supporters’ Cyber Attacks
As WikiLeaks continues to take heat for exposing its latest batch of US government cables on the web, notable corporations and individuals that have taken action to condemn the website and its latest info-spew are also feeling the heat.
Rocked by a string of distributed denial-of-service (DDoS) cyber attacks derived from WikiLeaks supporters, MasterCard, Visa, PayPal, Amazon, and even Sarah Palin were latest to have their websites fall victim to the work of WikiLeaks hacker-backers.
According to Reuters, MasterCard and Visa were hit with the DDoS attacks “in apparent retaliation for blocking of donations to the WikiLeaks website.”
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Increase in Cyber Attacks Seen Around the Globe
Cyber attacks are on the rise in the US and beyond. According to the National Journal, a top official at the Department of Homeland Security on Tuesday said that the US government has seen an increase in cyber attacks intended to take control of the networks that navigate the nation’s critical infrastructure.
Including industrial facilities and pipelines on the list of targeted attacks, Greg Schaffer, assistant secretary for the DHS Office of Cybersecurity and Communications, said, “The government is tracking more and more cyber attacks that have a greater level of sophistication and are tailored to target specific types of industrial infrastructure, such as power grids,” the Journal reported.
Citing Stuxnet as one potential cyber threat, Schaffer would not comment on the attribution of the malicious computer worm, but noted that “defending information technology networks requires a balance between having protective measures but not impeding the ability of government workers to carry out their duties.”
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WikiLeaks Faces More Cyber Attacks, Congressional Condemnation
Earlier this week, Cybersecurity News reported on a weak cyber attack that briefly disrupted WikiLeaks, the controversial, whistleblowing website that recently took to posting thousands of secret US government documents on the Web.
But after repairing the site and releasing even more of its latest leaks, hackers have again stepped up to the digital plate to take a series of DDoS swings at WikiLeaks.
According to the New York Times this morning, the hackers also threatened to start launching larger attacks to include sites hosting WikiLeaks severs, including that of online shopping giant Amazon.com and EveryDNS.net, which hosts 500,000 domain names on the Web.
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