Global Cyber News Bits, October 21, 2009 from CommunityDNS
Provided by CommunityDNS, the information in this post consists of news items in the security-based Internet community.
ChoicePoint to pay $275,000 in latest data breach
Having already paid $15 million dollars after a 2005 data breach in which information on 163,000 people was compromised, resulting in 800 cases of identity fraud, the company was fined again for a 2008 data breach that resulted in personal information for 13,750 people being exposed.
An electronic security tool was turned off, used to monitor one of its databases. The switched-off monitor went unnoticed for 4 months. Unauthorized searches commenced for 30 days during the 4 month time period.
In addition to the fine ChoicePoint will need to provide reports to the FTC every two months for two years.
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Experts See Forecast Worsen for Cybercrime
As reported in News Bits, cybercrime has become organized. Cybercrime is now part of Organized Crime. While the technology behind such organized criminal activity becomes more sophisticated, organizations fighting cyber crime are also adapting.
Law enforcement has a five piece strategy for fighting cyber crime.
- Infiltrate organized cyber crime groups where possible.
- Follow the money trail used for purchasing stolen data.
- Track stolen data so cards can be shut down before used.
- Revoke IP addresses of the servers used by cyber criminals.
- Issue public advisories to help educate and warn people of online hazards.
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How is the Universal Service Obligation in Finland to be funded?
News Bits earlier reported that a new law passed in Finland declares broadband to be a legal right for its citizens.
With currently a 95% penetration, where will the money come from to connect the remaining 5% to the Internet?
First of all, the government has defined what is “acceptable” for Internet services. This minimum standards is to help the providers ensure they meet minimum level requirements.
Secondly, the cost of the service will come from the telecommunications operators, not directly from the citizens.
Third, the service providers will have the option to determine which technology they wish to use, whether that be DSL or wireless.
Fourth, FICORA (the Finnish Communications Regulatory Authority) would monitor pricing. If an unreasonable financial burden occurs for the any of the network providers FICORA will determine to what extent and request compensation for the network provider from state funds.
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Internet advertising appears to begin its comeback
With people spending more time online, organizations are spending more of their advertising budget towards online advertisement. Online advertisement is not only less expensive than other forms of advertisement, online ad spending is easier to quantify.
By 2013 Internet advertising is to increase to 19% of all advertising revenue worth nearly $87 billion. The top spot, however, remains with television advertising with 36% of the market, worth $168 billion followed by newspapers with 20% of the market worth $92 billion.
The interesting aspects to note are while the newspaper ad space is still predicted to retain its number 2 slot, it does so only after a slide from 28% of the market in 2004 down to 20%. On the flip side Internet advertising has increased from its 2004 level of 4% up to 19%.
Also, Internet ad sales can be directly related to visits as companies can pay for ads only when their ads are clicked on by Internet users.
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75% of Brits against cutting off illegal downloaders
While some countries have implemented “3-Strikes” laws that are aimed at punishing those found to be downloading illegal content by disconnecting such users from the Internet, Britain struggles with the issue. With the government in favor of implementing some form of punishment for illegal downloaders through Internet disconnection the government is looking to the ISPs to monitor and implement such actions.
ISPs, and now nearly 75% of Britain’s are opposed to having peoples’ Internet connectivity automatically cut-off for illegal downloading.
ISPs are against the process as it will cost an additional £1 million a day to implement. Citizens are not in favor of the automatic cutoff as they feel each case should be heard in court before judgment is passed. The British also feel that individual court cases would also protect users whose Internet connections were unknowingly used for purposes of illegal downloads.
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Verizon CEO slams Net neutrality
As the Net neutrality debate continues in the US, pressure continues to mount from people and organizations on both sides of the issue.
To continue the topic Verizon’s CEO and Vint Cerf lend their opinions to the topic. Verizon’s CEO is adamantly against the FCC taking 6 Internet principles and moving them towards official regulation. The CEO says such “… regulation would pit network providers against application providers in a way that would ruin the Internet’s potential for economic growth and societal change.” He also feels network providers would not be able to obtain a return on investment towards trying to keep pace with network and bandwidth needs. He also feels the FCC would be more constructive if it spent its time towards increasing the amount of available wireless spectrum.
Vint Cerf, who favors Net neutrality, feels “the issue is nondiscriminatory against applications and against consumer choice.” He further states that, “… the fundamental concern is that the provider of broadband service not be able to take advantage of that to act in an anticompetitive fashion against others that are trying to provide competitive applications using the same broadband facilities.”
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Filed under: 3-Strikes, Anycast, Broadband, Communications Infrastructure, Community DNS, CommunityDNS, Cyber defense, Cybercrime, Cybergang, Cybersecurity, DNS, DNS Resolution, E-commerce, FBI, FCC, Finland, FTC, Global resolution, ISP, Legal, malware, Net Neutrality, Organized Cybercrime, Resolution Service, Security, UK, US Government | Leave a Comment
Tags: 3-Stikes, Anycast, Business Continuity, Business resilience, ChoicePoint, Community DNS, CommunityDNS, Cyber Criminals, Data Breach, DNS, DNS Resolution, FBI, FCC, FICORA, Finland, Finnish Communications Regulatory Authority, FTC, Global resolution, Internet, Internet Advertising, Net Neutrality, Network Neutrality, Organized Crime, Organized Cyber Crime, Resolution Service, Security, UK, Universal Service Obligation, US Government, Verizon
