LAS VEGAS — In a city filled with slot machines spilling jackpots, it was a “jackpotted” ATM machine that got the most attention Wednesday at the Black Hat security conference, when researcher Barnaby Jack demonstrated two suave hacks against automated teller machines that allowed him to program them to spew out dozens of crisp bills. The demonstration was greeted with hoots and applause. In one of the …  Read More →

Federal regulators lifted a cloud of uncertainty when they announced it was lawful to hack or “jailbreak” an iPhone, declaring Monday there was “no basis for copyright law to assist Apple in protecting its restrictive business model.” Jailbreaking is hacking the phone’s OS to allow consumers to run any app on the phone they choose, including applications not authorized by Apple. The Electronic Frontier Foundation... 

A controversial remote administration program that a Pennsylvania school district installed on student-issued laptops contains a security hole that put the students at risk of being spied on by people outside the school, according to a security firm that examined the software. The LANrev program contains a vulnerability that would allow someone using the same network as one of the students to install malware on the laptop that could remotely control... 

Over a month has elapsed since the years-long investigation and prosecution of TJX hacker Albert Gonzalez came to a dramatic end, with Gonzalez sentenced to 20 years in prison for the largest identity theft case in U.S. history. Stephen Watt Now a little-noted postscript to that high-profile case is unfolding away from the media spotlight,  as a handful of convicted accomplices in Gonzalez’s schemes, who’ve been free on bail since... 

The hackers who breached Google’s network last year were able to nab the source code for the company’s global password system, according to The New York Times . The single sign-on password system, which Google referred to internally as “Gaia,” allows users to log into a constellation of services the company offers — Gmail, search, business applications and others — using one password. The hackers, who are still... 

If TJX hacker Albert Gonzalez had gone to trial instead of pleading out, one man would have been the primary witness against him — accomplice Damon Patrick Toey. Toey, identified often in court documents simply as “PT,” provided information that investigators say likely helped persuade Gonzalez to plead guilty last year to multiple crimes, which prosecutors are calling the most serious and largest identity-theft crimes ever prosecuted.... 

BOSTON — A hacker who helped TJX hacker Albert Gonzalez and others gain access to corporate networks was sentenced to 7 years and one day on Monday . Christopher Scott, 27, pleaded guilty to breaching the wireless access points of several retailers between 2003 and 2007 to siphon credit and debit card numbers, which he then passed to Gonzalez. Prosecutors say that together the men pilfered nearly 20 million credit and debit cards, which... 

BOSTON — Convicted TJX hacker Albert Gonzalez was sentenced to 20 years and a day, and fined $25,000 on Friday for his role in breaches into Heartland Payment Systems, 7-Eleven and other companies. The sentence will run concurrently with a 20-year sentence he received on Thursday in two other cases involving hacks into TJX, Office Max, Dave & Busters restaurants and others, so it adds only one day to his total prison term. Restitution... 

BOSTON — Convicted TJX hacker Albert Gonzalez was sentenced to 20 years in prison on Thursday for leading a gang of cyberthieves who stole more than 90 million credit and debit card numbers from TJX and other retailers. The sentence for the largest computer-crime case ever prosecuted is the lengthiest ever imposed in the United States for hacking or identity-theft. Gonzalez was also fined $25,000. Restitution, which will likely be in the... 

A computer security professional who sold Internet Explorer exploit code to credit card hacker Albert Gonzalez was sentenced Tuesday in Boston to three years probation and a $10,000 fine. Jeremy Jethro, 29, was paid $60,000 by Gonzalez for a zero-day exploit against Microsoft’s browser, “the purpose and function of which was to … enable the conspirators to unlawfully gain access to, and redirect, individual’s computers,”... 

Humza Zaman, a co-conspirator in the hack of TJX and other companies, was sentenced Thursday in Boston to 46 months in prison and fined $75,000 for his role in the conspiracy. The sentence matches what prosecutors were seeking. Zaman, a 33-year-old former programmer at Barclays Bank, was charged with laundering between $600,000 and $800,000 for hacker Albert Gonzalez, who is currently awaiting sentencing on charges that he and others hacked... 

Intel is the latest U.S. corporation to acknowledge that it was hacked in January in a sophisticated attack that occurred at the same time that Google, Adobe and others were targeted. The giant California-based chipmaker was rumored to have been among some 34 companies that were targeted, but said on Tuesday there was no evidence to tie its hack to the attack on Google and others. “We did not see the kind of broad-based attack as described... 

NEW YORK (Reuters) – Recent cyber attacks on Google and other American corporations have been traced to a top Chinese university as well as a school with ties to the Chinese military, The New York Times reported on Thursday, citing people involved in the investigation. Those people told the Times that the Chinese schools involved are Shanghai Jiaotong University and the Lanxiang Vocational School. They said the attacks may have started... 

Google is teaming up with the National Security Agency to investigate the recent hack attack against its network in a bid to prevent another assault, according to The Washington Post . The internet search giant is working on an agreement with the controversial agency to determine the attacker’s methods and what Google can do to shore up its network. Sources assured the Post that the deal does not mean the NSA will have access to users’... 

It’s been three weeks since Google announced that a sophisticated and coordinated hack attack dubbed Operation Aurora recently targeted it and numerous other U.S. companies. Until now we’ve only known that the attackers got in through a vulnerability in Internet Explorer and that they obtained intellectual property and access to the Gmail accounts of two human rights activists whose work revolves around China. We also know a few...