Computer scientists from UC Davis university have developed an Android app named TouchLogger that logs keystrokes using a smartphone’s sensors to measure the locations a user taps on the touch screen.

Researchers have demonstrated that it is possible to log individual keystrokes entered on a smartphone’s on-screen keyboard using device’s built-in accelerometer (also known as the gyroscope). The researches were able to correlate the movements of the phone with individual keystrokes on an all-numeric keypad with an accuracy of about 70%. With minor refinements, the researchers believe they can expand the effectiveness of TouchLogger.

Applications like these can be potentially dangerous as an application does not require special privileges to access the device’s accelerometer. Major smartphones, like Apple’s iPhone, RIM‘s Blackberry, etc. give a user the freedom to define special permissions for applications to define their level of access. Usually within these  permissions not much importance is given to those pertaining to the device’s movements.

The developers of TouchLogger created this application for a PoC to be presented at HotSec’11, San Francisco. Presentation video available here (mp4) and the paper can be downloaded from here. A preliminary evaluation of the tool was done using HTC Evo 4G smartphone.

Following table shows the distribution of inference results which are evident for the app being correct 70% of the time.

The scientists noted that the W3C recently published a specification for web applications to access accelerometer and gyroscope sensors using JavaScript. They are in the process of extending their work into a full research project.

A less original, but rather more effective approach is taken by Android malware called GingerMaster. It uses a root exploit called GingerBreak to permanently compromise the smartphone. According to security researcher Xuxian Jiang, GingerMaster is the first piece of malware to deploy a root exploit for Android 2.3.3 “Gingerbread”. It is concealed in repackaged legitimate apps and registers a receiver which will be
notified when the smartphone has finished booting. Once installed, it then launches a background service.

We are proud to announce the release of the First book by our friend Vivek Ramachandran, founder of http://securitytube.net

The book is titled “BackTrack 5 Wireless Penetration Testing Beginner’s Guide” and is available @ amazon.

The book is written with a lot of care and keeping beginners in mind and the writing style will help anyone to jump start and learn fast on this topic. We all have been loving the videos created by Vivek and we are thankful to him for creating this nice book for all.

Link to book: BackTrack 5 Wireless Penetration Testing Beginner’s Guide

Enjoy

UPDATE: India shipping is available from http://www.packtpub.com/backtrack-5-wireless-penetration-testing-beginners-guide/book
UPDATE: BackTrack 5 Wireless Penetration Testing Beginner’s Guide is now available @ Flipkart.com too
 

via Wikipedia

Microsoft has announced advance notification for 13 security bulletins to address 22 vulnerabilities in Windows XP/7/Vista/Server 2008, Office, Internet Explorer, .NET and Visual Studio for August 9, 2011.

Two among 13 bulletins are rated as critical [highest severity] to prevent attacks related to remote code execution. Check the bulletin summary below

Security Bulletin Summary

Full version of Microsoft Security Bulletin Advance Notification for August: http://www.microsoft.com/technet/security/bulletin/ms11-aug.mspx.

This spreadsheet has been making its rounds online and contains details of DEFCON & Black Hat presentations along with authors, youtube links, links to presentations etc.

Many Thanks to Javier Bassi

Image via Wikipedia

An MoU has been signed by Deputy Secretary for the US Department of Homeland Security, Jane Holl Lute and R Chandrashekhar, secretary for India’s Department of Information Technology for working together on cyber crime  and data consolidation.

As part of the MoU, the following agencies will be working together along with the cyber security communities:

• Indian Computer Emergency Response Team (CERT-In)
• Department of Information Technology
• Ministry of Communication and Information Technology
• Computer Emergency Readiness Team (US-CERT)

Manan Kakkar reported on ZDnet

http://www.zdnet.com/blog/india/india-and-us-to-work-together-on-datagov-and-against-cyber-crime/633

Related articles

• India and US to work together on Data.gov and against cyber-crime (zdnet.com)
• US, India Sign Cybersecurity Agreement (circleid.com)
• India and US sign pact to improve collaboration on cyber security issues (thenextweb.com)
• U.S. Signs Cybersecurity Pact With India (techdailydose.nationaljournal.com)

Image via CrunchBase

As Microsoft April Advance Security Bulletin

Today Microsoft will be pushing huge updates and patches for multiple vulnerabilities across different versions of Microsoft Windows, Microsoft Office and Developer tools like .NET etc

Total of 64 vulnerabilities will be fixed across 17 bulletins from which 9  bulletins are rated as critical.

So get ready to install or plan for deploying the updates and another round of reboot to secure your machines from already disclosed vulnerabilities

Hey & who said IE6 is dead? I still see updates for IE6 in this Microsoft bulletin…..

Image via Wikipedia

“Certain information being extracted from RSA’s systems”. Thats what RSA’s executive chairman Art Coviello admitted.

There is a possiblity that encryption seed details related to RSA SecureID might have been compromised which would leave only the PIN as the confedential detail in case of commonly used 2 factor authentication tokens.

Details – http://www.channelweb.co.uk/crn-uk/news/2035401/rsa-security-breach-sparks-reseller-concern

Image by Getty Images via @daylife

Since the massive earthquake (on 11^th March 2011) and destructive tsunami hit Japan there has been a tsunami of online scams. Online scammers are exploiting users with fake videos, malware serving websites and with pleas for donations to make money from this tragedy.

Few tips to avoid falling prey to such scams
————————————————
–> Don’t click on any suspicious video link on Facebook mentioning Japan earthquake or tsunami. e.g: miracle survival, raw footage.

–> Don’t install any new anti-virus from pop-up alerts.

–> Ignore emails asking for donation unless you are sure about sender credentials. Don’t click on any link in email to donate money or share your financial information e.g: Credit/Debit card number, Bank login details etc.

–> Hundred’s of new web domain related to Japan-tsunami or earthquake has been registered in last few days. It’s not easy to ensure authenticity of such sites, and recommended to visit known and trusted sites for information.

–> Don’t download any attachments from emails related to japan disaster.

–> and if you are a windows user , keep your anti-virus and firewall updated.

–> Visit Google webpage dedeciated for Japan Earthquake and Tsunami Info

Reach out to affected through legitimate and trusted channels for any help or donations.

Surf securely.

Last week Microsoft launched a deathwatch for its 10 year old Internet Explorer 6 browser to ensure that IE6 is “gone for good”.

According to Microsoft, IE6 still has a 12% global usage share, with almost half of that in China with 5.9% usage. Other countries with a higher-than-average IE6 share include South Korea, India and Taiwan.

As part of this drive, Microsoft wants to bring IE6′s share under 1%. That site, ie6countdown.com , shows Net Applications’ usage share numbers for IE6 in 43 countries, including the China, U.S., India, as well as the browser’s current global share.

For more details see:

http://www.ie6countdown.com/

Sound interesting & weird right?

ioSafe new rugged hard disk can withstand

• gunshots
• submersion in water (fresh/salt)
• fire
• needless to mention drops & mishandling

Now that’s called as “data security’

Here’s a small video on “tests”  it goes through

Remember, you still need protection from cyber criminals & malicious users. You can try TrueCrypt for that