Record Data Breaches in 2007
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The loss or theft of personal data such as credit card and Social Security numbers soared to unprecedented levels in 2007
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Networld World's Scott Bradner has gotten a good look at the Personal Data Privacy and Security Act Of 2007. He's much, much less than impressed.
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Satellite images of the world in 2007
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The Story: Even when there?s good news on the security front, there always seems to be bad news to balance it out. And while we think this news is important for you to know, it?s not an exception to the Good News/Bad News Syndrome.[ Slideshow: 2007's top underreported tech stories ]                                                    The use of e-mail-borne executable virus attachments dropped sharply in 2007. In particular, spammers have dialed back their use of so-called image spam, which tricks filters by embedding text within an attached image.According to IronPort Systems, outbreaks of viruses embedded in e-mail attachments totaled 860 in 2006 and 844 in 2005. But as of mid-October 2007, attacks totaled just 360. Dave Mayer, an IronPort product manager, said it?s likely that outbreaks will total 450 by the end of the year ? a drop of 47 percent. It appears that evildoers are moving on: ?Traditional viruses have been around for years, a long enough time to harden defenses against malicious attachments,? he said.Earlier in the year, IronPort, Symantec, and McAfee all noted that image spam, which appeared about two years ago, is waning, now that defenses have improved. Filters have now gotten better at scanning the contents of the attachments, leading spammers to link instead to images elsewhere.Mayer, whose company specializes in e-mail and Web security, says spammers are now placing those images on free photo-sharing sites ? the ones people use to send vacation photos to friends and family ? and embedding links to those images in their junk messages. These are difficult for spam filters to block because the same sites are used for legitimate photos as well.But as the abuse of e-mail attachments has declined, other types of threats have escalated. For example, outbreaks of macro viruses, aimed at Office-type applications, have risen by 50 percent to 60 percent while URL viruses climbed by at least 250 percent this year, IronPort found.The Bottom Line: It often seems as if the number of threats that you must be on guard against only increases, stretching your resources past the limits. But the truth is that threat profiles change over time, and some things you may be investing in are no longer as great a threat or are now handled by the tools you have in place. So, although you can?t get lax about security, you can focus more on newer threats.Complete list of 2007 underreported tech stories: 1.? Java is becoming the new Cobol 2.? Sun Microsystems is back in the game 3.? Hackers take aim at Mac OS X 4.? There are some threats you can worry less about 5.? Companies may have found a way around H-1B visa limits 6.? Open source?s new commercial strategy 7.? End-to-end Ethernet finally arrives 8.? Blade servers arrive for the masses 9.? BI is dead; long live BI 10. Balance of power shifts to software buyers
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The University of California, Los Angeles, reports one or more computer hackers have accessed a database containing the personal information of 800,000 people.  The school said the central campus database was accessed between October 2005 and Nov.
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Graceful breakup announcements, photogenic small animals, outrageous slurs: a look back at 2007.
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Kaspersky warns 2007 will bring increase in extortion schemes to encrypt your data and hold it hostage.
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Data on more than 100 million U.S. consumers has been compromised in the past two years, according to the Privacy Rights Clearinghouse.
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Microsoft is now shipping System Center Data Protection Manager 2007, which provides recovery from disk and archive to tape.
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Two recently disclosed vulnerabilities that affect Internet Explorer 7 and Windows Vista could let hackers nab user data.
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Microsoft has warned of seven newly found flaws in its software that could allow an attacker to steal data and take over a personal computer running the Windows operating system.
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More than 1,700 state workers recently learned that some of their personal information, including their names and Social Security numbers, had been inadvertently posted on the Internet.
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Robert Vamosi talks with data loss expert Dan Geer about identity theft.
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Plagued by regular breaches in the security of personal data, federal agencies were ordered Tuesday to eliminate the unnecessary collection and use of Social Security numbers by early 2009
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New 2007 editions of products promise improved protection and better use of computing resources.
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U.S. government agencies need to take additional steps to protect against cybersecurity problems after a series of congressional hearings and reports exposed several weaknesses in 2007, representatives of Symantec said.The government sector, including state and local governments, accounted for 26 percent of data breaches that could lead to identity theft in the first half of 2007, according to Symantec&#39;s latest Government Internet Security Threat Report, published in September. The U.S. Government Accountability Office (GAO)&#160;also issued about a dozen reports in the last six months criticizing federal agencies for not fully implementing GAO&#39;s cybersecurity recommendations, noted Jim Russell, Symantec&#39;s vice president for the public sector.In addition, the House of Representatives Homeland Security Subcommittee on Emerging Threats, Cyber Security and Science and Technology hosted a series of hearings in 2007 focused on cybersecurity lapses at several government agencies, including the Department of Homeland Security and the State Department.&quot;You look at that, and you say, &#39;Why does that happen?&#39;&quot; Russell said.While U.S. agencies have a set of cybersecurity rules set out in the Federal Information Security Management Act of 2002 (FISMA), agencies aren&#39;t held accountable when they have breaches, Russell said. Agencies don&#39;t lose funding from Congress after cybersecurity incidents, he said.The federal cybersecurity rules don&#39;t have &quot;a whole lot of teeth,&quot; he added.The good news is that agencies can take more steps to fix problems, Russell said. The first step is to inventory their IT assets, a job several agencies haven&#39;t accomplished. That&#39;s not always easy, Russell said.&quot;Let&#39;s say I&#39;m an agency CIO,&quot; he added. &quot;My challenge is that my environment is so dynamic with the home workforce and telecommuting. I can see why it&#39;s a challenge to see what all the assets out there are.&quot;Russell also called on agencies to develop comprehensive cybersecurity plans, to do systematic vulnerability testing, and to have a data backup plan and back up frequently.Symantec expects that cybersecurity issues will come before Congress in 2008, particularly federal agency cybersecurity practices, said Kevin Richards, Symantec&#39;s federal government relations manager. This could be &quot;the year for information security for our federal agencies,&quot; he said.In December, Representative William Lacy Clay, a Missouri Democrat, introduced the Federal Agency Data Protection Act, which would require U.S. agencies to implement wireless data security measures. The bill would also require each U.S. agency to draft a plan to protect itself against the dangers of peer-to-peer file-trading networks, and it would give the director of the White House Office of Management and Budget new authority to establish information security policies.Clay&#39;s bill would write into law many OMB recommendations, Richards said. &quot;I always make the point that these are recommendations, and it&#39;s important to codify them,&quot; he said. &quot;It seems like our federal government IT security strategy is very reactionary and not proactive.&quot;That bill comes in addition to Federal Agency Data Breach Protection Act, which would require that federal agencies notify constituents whose data is lost or stolen. That bill, introduced last May, is sponsored by Representative Tom Davis, a Virginia Republican, in the House, and Senator Norm Coleman, a Minnesota Republican.Bills that would require private companies to notify customers when their personal information is stolen or lost seem to have stalled in Congress. But there still seems to be interest from lawmakers in agency cybersecurity and breach notification, Richards said. The hearings and information requests from Davis and other lawmakers are bringing to light multiple attacks and breaches at agencies, he said.&quot;There&#39;s no real mechanism requiring agencies to report breaches,&quot; Richards added. &quot;Now, [lawmakers] are dedicating more resources and giving better direction.&quot;
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In July Pfizer discovered a data breach that took place last year, informed employees only recently.