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Windows has long been a hacker’s favorite target. Now Microsoft called for a Cybercrime Framework. With IE market share crashing like a BSOD and PowerPoint making the military stupid, Microsoft is laughing. Let’s laugh with them, or cry, or run scared….


Microsoft Windows has long been a hacker’s favorite target. The majority of computers have Windows as the operating system. Microsoft OS is the low hanging, easy-to-hack, fruit.

According to Microsoft’s Security Intelligence Report Volume 8, the company’s software scanned some 500 million PCs worldwide in the second half of 2009. Of those, Microsoft caught and cleaned 1.7 million more infected PCs in the second half than it did in the first half of last year. However, despite Microsoft tooting their own horn, their growing successes in removing malware from infected PCs is but a small dent in a larger trend of ballooning cyber threats and scams.

The digital divide is deep and gaping between security professionals and users. Researchers have studied the differing points of views in an attempt to bridge the great divide. But do prejudices on both sides make the chasm too wide and jagged to seal?

A digital divide exists between information security managers and users. IT/IS managers mainly regard users as an information security threat, while users regard themselves as an untapped resource for security work. Research suggests these greatly differing points of view tend to make management approaches to security that do not line up well with the dynamics of the users’ working day.

Different work situations and rationalities may explain the digital divide in organizations. The security professional operates at a distance from the everyday work tasks and vulnerabilities in the company, but put toe to the line in a digital attack when vulnerabilities require crisis management. Users, however, step up to the plate every day as required to keep the company going forward as productive and profitable. For users, it is often a case of feeling like all their rights and privileges are unjustly controlled.

Your right to privacy is shrinking, but it’s happening quietly without much publicity. Identity theft steals far more than your privacy.  So far in 2009, over 13 million records have been breached! Here are the top privacy breaches this year.

by Angie Porter
Cyberspace is the new Wild West frontier where sophisticated hacking is like having the fastest gun. Man-in-the-middle attacks are common place, while credit card PIN crackers lead the pack of cyber outlaws. Neither SSL websites nor the “smart” grid can be considered safe anymore. Lucifer, AKA a social engineer, may dwell on your friend’s list within instant messengers or social sites. Even if you manage to avoid tweeting your intentions, botnets, or clickjackers, the vast frontier of cyberspace is shrinking in regards to your privacy.