hacker

SAN FRANCISCO--About 30 people listened intently on a recent Thursday night to short presentations on linear algebra and beer brewing, watched a demo of an iPhone cyberspace shooter game, and learned how to make a light staff (acrylic rod, LED, resistor, tape, no soldering required).

For the last talk, a speaker billed as "Dr. Baron Mikheil von Burstein, esq." explained how to pull off his interactive public art specialty--swings that hang in the aisles on the underground trains in the Bay Area Rapid Transit (BART) system.

"I installed it publicly, illegally and got away with it," … Read more

Last week at the Hacker Dojo in Mountain View, Calif., developers partnered with Google, Yahoo, NASA, and the World Bank to exchange ideas and work on solutions for responding to natural disasters and other emergencies.

Random Hacks of Kindness is the first in a series of planned events that seek to use technology to solve real world problems related to crisis and disaster relief. By first working with governments and non-governmental organizations to better understand the immediate needs of rescuers and communities following a critical emergency, these programmers are work directly to solve communication issues and to better facilitate the … Read more

MOUNTAIN VIEW, Calif.--Google, Microsoft, and Yahoo may be tough competitors when it comes to Internet software and services, but they are putting their differences aside to build a developer community to tackle bigger picture problems like saving lives in emergencies.

The companies have joined with NASA, the World Bank, and PR agency SecondMuse to organize the first-ever Random Hacks of Kindness event, which was held at a warehouse space-cum community center called Hacker Dojo this weekend. For two days, coders worked on ways to use technology to help solve real-world problems, such as how people can get information and … Read more

A group of Eastern Europeans was charged with hacking into the network of payment processor RBS WorldPay and using counterfeit debit cards at ATMs around the world to steal more than $9 million, the U.S. Justice Department said on Tuesday.

Four of the defendants allegedly collaborated to break into the RBS WorldPay network on November 4, 2008, where they got access to the account numbers for prepaid payroll cards used by employees to withdraw salaries from ATMs, according to the indictment from a federal grand jury in Atlanta. The defendants allegedly reverse-engineered the PINs associated with the accounts from … Read more

A hacker in the Netherlands broke into some jailbroken iPhones and sent text messages to the owners asking them to pay to find out how to secure their phones, according to postings in a Dutch forum called Tweakers.net.

One of the victims posted a screenshot from his iPhone of the SMS received. It said: "Your iPhone's been hacked because it's really insecure! Please visit doiop.com/iHacked and secure your iPhone right now! Right now, I can access all your files."

The URL provided now displays a message indicating that it was reported for spam or phishing abuse and has been deactivated.

Ars Technica reports that before the page was removed, it asked that victims send 5 euros ($7.36) to a PayPal account and then await an e-mail with instructions on how to secure the phone. The fix probably would involve restoring the factory settings, according to the Ars Technica post.

"If you don't pay, it's fine by me," the hacker's page said. "But remember, the way I got access to your iPhone can be used by thousands of others--they can send text messages from your number (like I did), use it to call or record your calls, and actually whatever they want, even use it for their hacking activities! I can assure you, I have no intention of harming you or whatever, but, some hackers do! It's just my advice to secure your phone."… Read more

Ashampoo FireWall Free is an easy-to-use program that lets users to their computers from unwanted connections to the Internet. Though it may not be the most robust firewall available, it's a great choice for novice users who know they want protection but aren't sure how a firewall should be configured.

The program's interface is sleek and intuitive, with its functions neatly organized in tabs. Users don't have to do much to configure the program initially; it will automatically notify users when an application attempts to connect to the Internet and ask whether users want to allow … Read more

A 28-year-old Miami man who made millions breaking into computer networks and stealing credit card numbers pleaded guilty on Friday and agreed to forfeit more than $2.7 million in restitution, as well as a condo, jewelry, and a car.

Albert Gonzalez, a former federal government informant and the alleged ringleader of one of the largest known identity theft cases in U.S. history, pleaded guilty as expected to 19 counts of conspiracy, computer fraud, wire fraud, access device fraud, and aggravated identity theft related to theft of credit and debit card data from TJX Companies (owner of T.J.… Read more

Albert Gonzalez, the alleged ringleader of one of the largest known identity theft cases in U.S. history, has agreed to plead guilty to all 19 counts of related charges against him, according to court documents filed Friday.

Gonzalez, 28, of Miami, was accused in August 2008 of helping steal millions of credit card and debit card numbers from major U.S. retail chains. Among the retailers hacked were TJX Companies (owner of T.J.Maxx), BJ's Wholesale Club, OfficeMax, Boston Market, Barnes & Noble, Sports Authority, Forever21, and DSW.

Under the plea agreement filed with the U.S. … Read more

Kaspersky Anti-Virus does a better-than-average job of keeping your PC safe, but it lacks the robust feature set of its more-expensive sibling. Several new features have made it into this version along with expected upgrades to the anti-virus engine, but one of the best--the Safe Run program sandbox--is sorely missed.

New features in the 2010 edition include a behavioral-based detection system called the Urgent Detection Sytsem. The UDS uses the anonymous data Kaspersky customers who choose to participate in submitting their system scans for analysis. In fact, the UDS must be opted-out of--there's a check box and data collection … Read more