-----Original Message----- From: NIPC Watch [mailto:nipc.watch@private] Sent: Monday, January 06, 2003 8:34 AM To: Information Technology; Cyber Threats Subject: [Cyber_threats] Daily News 01/06/03 January 03, Government Computer News Hacker of federal Websites could spend a decade in jail. NASA's inspector general has announced that William Douglas Word of Pelham, Alabama faces up to ten years in prison after pleading guilty to defacing sites of NASA, Defense Department agencies, Interior Department and the International Trade Commission, among others, according to a grand jury indictment handed down in the U.S. District Court for the Northern District of Alabama. Much of the criminal activity occurred in late 1999, the inspector general said. The NASA Office of Inspector General (OIG) investigated the crime together with the Defense Criminal Investigative Service, the Naval Criminal Investigative Service and the FBI. James E. Phillips, U.S. attorney for the Northern District of Alabama, prosecuted the case. Word "was rolled up in a group of hackers that decided to turn themselves in after we got close to confronting them," a NASA official said. "This was the typical hacker case where they were demonstrating their skills." Word is to be sentenced April 24. Source: http://www.gcn.com/vol1_no1/daily-updates/20766-1.html January 03, CNN Mystery man named in Xbox hack contest. A longtime Microsoft opponent has emerged as the mystery backer and mastermind behind a contest that offers $200,000 to anyone who successfully hacks into the software giant's Xbox video game console, a top technology news site reported. Michael Robertson, a former dot-com entrepreneur and now chief executive of U.S. software company Lindows.com, revealed himself as the anonymous donor and contest's creator in an interview on Thursday with CNET News.com. Last July, Robertson anonymously dangled the prize money to any programmers who could successfully hack into the Xbox and adapt it so that it would run on the Linux operating system, an emerging competitor to Microsoft's Windows operating system. Robertson recently extended the deadline as no group has fully mastered the challenge. The hack contest goes beyond a sporty challenge. Linux proponents have long charged that its freely distributed operating system, designed and modified by mainly unaffiliated groups of programming enthusiasts, is an important step for the future development of computing devices. They argue that the market dominance of Windows, which is the operating system on more than 90 percent of all PCs, gives Microsoft and a small number of its business partners unfair and anti-competitive control in the design of the growing number of devices that come equipped with computing capabilities. Robertson's firm Lindows.com is a start-up that aims to promote the use of the Linux open-source operating language in computer systems, a move that would challenge Microsoft's dominant Windows operating system. Source: http://www.cnn.com/2003/TECH/fun.games/01/03/bounty.game.reut/ind ex.html January 02, National Journal's Technology Daily IT systems key to success of Department of Homeland Security. Strong information technology systems will be crucial to the success of the new Department of Homeland Security, according to the General Accounting Office (GAO). The GAO report (03-260), released December 24, found that federal agencies have made progress in addressing their homeland security missions since the September 11, 2001, terrorist attacks, and that information sharing between federal agencies has increased. But GAO said federal agencies still face many challenges, such as improving their collaboration with state and local officials and with the private sector. Twenty-two existing federal agencies and offices will move into the new DHS, which also will include an Office of State and Local Coordination and a liaison official for the private sector. GAO estimated that the full transition to the new department could take five to 10 years, and recommended that the Office of Management and Budget (OMB) work with the department to implement the appropriate management systems. "Strong financial and information technology systems will also be critical to the success of [the DHS] and oth er organizations with homeland security missions." Source: http://www.govexec.com/dailyfed/0103/010203td3.htm January 02, ZDNet Virus hoaxes continue to fool computer users. Fuelled by concern over genuine threats such as Klez, Bugbear and Magistr, computer users are continuing to fall for false warnings of non-existent viruses. These hoaxes typically warn the reader not to open an e-mail with a certain subject line, or to immediately delete a particular file on their hard drive, because they contain a virus. They will also tell the reader to forward the warning to their friends and colleagues. Even though these hoaxes didn't encourage the reader to delete files from their machine, they are harmful because they waste both time and bandwidth. All the major anti-virus companies include information on such hoaxes on their Web sites. Source: http://zdnet.com.com/2100-1105-979042.html Virus: #1 Virus in USA: WORM_KLEZ.H Source: http://wtc.trendmicro.com/wtc/wmap.html, Trend World Micro Virus Tracking Center [Infected Computers, North America, Past 24 hours, #1 in United States] Top 10 Target Ports:137 (netbios-ns), 1433 (ms-sql-s), 80 (http), 139 (netbios-ssn), 27374 (asp), 135 (???), 53 (domain), 4662 (???), 445 (microsoft-ds), 21 (ftp) Source: http://isc.incidents.org/top10.html; Internet Storm Center _______________________________________________ Cyber_Threats mailing list Cyber_Threats@listserv http://listserv.infragard.org/mailman/listinfo/cyber_threats
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