Monthly Archives: February 2016

Hackers News

Hollywood Hospital Pays $17,000 Ransom to Hacker for Unlocking Medical Records

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Ransomware has seriously turned on to a noxious game of Hackers to get paid effortlessly.

Once again the heat was felt by the Los Angeles-based Presbyterian Medical Center when a group of hackers had sealed all its sensitive files and demanded $17,000 USD to regain the access to those compromised data.
The devastation of the compromised files can be pitched as:
  • Compromised emails
  • Lockout Electronic Medical Record System [EMR]
  • Encrypted patient data
  • Unable to carry CT Scans of the admitted patients
  • Ferried risky patients to nearby hospitals
…and much more unexplained outcomes.
The hospital had confirmed that the Ransomware malware had hit its core heart a week before, potentially affecting the situation to grow much worse.

Hospital End up Paying $17,000

As the situation was grown out of wild, the hospital paid 40 Bitcoins (Roughly US $17,000) to the Ransomware Criminals to resume their medical operations after gaining the decryption keys.
“The quickest and most efficient way to restore our systems and administrative functions was to pay the ransom and obtain the decryption key,” the hospital CEO Allen Stefanek said in a letter.
All the electronic medical system were restored back soon after unlocking the encrypted file locks.
The Ransomware had stolen the nights of many network administrators, as they would be often blamed to fight up this nasty threat; instead of blaming staffs who click the illegit links in their e-mail.

The FBI Advises Victims to Just Pay the Ransom

Last year, even the FBI advised paying off the Ransom amount to the ransomware criminals as they had not come up with any other alternatives.
Several companies had got webbed in the Ransomware business including a US Police Department that paid US $750 to ransomware criminals three years back.
Criminals often demand the ransom in BTC (their intelligent move) for the surety of not getting caught, as Bitcoin transactions are non-trackable due to its decentralized nature.
So until and unless a permanent solution evolves, users are requested not to click malicious or suspected links sent via an unknown person.
The frequent payment to Ransomware encourages the hackers in the dark to stash the cash and develop a more enticing framework for the next target.
But affecting a medical system is a heinous crime as hospitals are acting as a bridge between life and heaven.

Panda Security

The 5 best online services to sign up to

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Few things give us more piece of mind than signing up for a service that you can cancel whenever you want and at no extra cost.

What we all want is to be able to try it out during a certain period and, if we like it, sign up for it fully. If after a few weeks we realize that the service doesn’t offer us what we need, we also want to be able to unsubscribe just as easily as we signed up.

This is why we want to present 5 of the online services that we use the most, although we’re sure you already know of a few of them.

The 5 best online services to sign up to

Netflix

PandaSecurity online services Netflix

You’ve surely heard of Orange is the New Black or House of Cards. Both of these give us a fair idea of what to expect if we sign up to this entertainment service. For a monthly fee you have multimedia content, especially TV series and films. You can try it for free and, later, sign up for a plan that best suits you.

Evernote

PandaSecurity onlines services Evernote

Taking something down on your phone and later forgetting it is there in front of us is something that happens to us all. If you want a solution to these mental lapses then Evernote is the tool for you. You can download it on any device and synchronize it across them. Also, if you want to use it on a more professional basis, it offers a professional version that allows you to scan business cards, edit PDFs, and save emails.

Spotify

PandaSecurity servicios online Spotify

It’s probable that you know the benefits of Spotify and that you’re already a user, but have you tried the Premium version? We recommend that you try out the free monthly trial, although we guarantee that you won’t be able to live without it after! You can download music, listen offline, avoid any ads, and most importantly, all of your music is stored in just one place.

Amazon

PandaSecurity online services amazon

If you’re already using Amazon for all your purchases, then you need to check out Amazon Premium. You can carry out all the purchases that you like and without having to worry about postage charges. As always, you can try it for free for a month and if you are convinced, become one of their millions of VIP customers. One thing, though… be careful with your purchases – with no postal charges, it’s very easy to go overboard on the purchases!

And, as we don’t want to miss out on all this, we invite you to try out our new online service:

Panda Protection Service

With Panda Protection Service you will have the best antivirus protection for an unlimited number of devices (computers, tablets or smartphones) and the advantage of being able to sign up for as long as you want. Forget about yearly subscriptions; Panda Protection Service’s monthly plan gives you total freedom and the first month even comes for free. You can also cancel your subscription whenever you want with no extra cost involved.

PandaSecurity online services panda protection service

Features of Panda Protection Service

  1. Protect your family
  • Control the browser for all your devices (PCs, tablets, mobiles)
  • Block inappropriate content
  • Protect your home network from intruders
  • Keep your photos and personal files private
  • Locate your devices at any time
  • Control the applications downloaded on your mobile devices
  1. Looks after your privacy
  • Keep your personal and banking data safe
  • Enjoy a real-time antivirus protection
  • Protect all your devices that are connected to a Wi-Fi network with instant alerts
  • Manage the passwords to all your accounts and always have them on hand
  • Remotely wipe your device in the event of loss or theft
  1. Optimize your devices
  • Know the location of your devices in real-time
  • Remotely block and delete files
  • Possibility of identifying the thief in event of mobile theft
  • Optimize the performance of your devices (PCs or mobiles) and improve battery life
  • Anti-theft system alerts

Also, as with all of our antiviruses, Panda Protection Service comes with the best security guarantee – should you get infected, we will offer a full refund.

Do you want to try our multiplatform antivirus for free?

The post The 5 best online services to sign up to appeared first on MediaCenter Panda Security.

Hackers News

Apple vs. FBI — Google Joins Tim Cook in Encryption Backdoor Battle

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Apple vs. FBI — Google CEO Joins Apple in Encryption Backdoor Battle

In the escalating battle between the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) and Apple over iPhone encryption, former National Security Agency (NSA) contractor Edward Snowden and Google chief executive Sundar Pichai just sided with Apple’s refusal to unlock iPhone.

Yesterday, Apple CEO Tim Cook refused to comply with a federal court order to help the FBI unlock an iPhone owned by one of the terrorists in the mass shootings in San Bernardino, California, in December.

Here’s What the FBI is Demanding:

The federal officials have asked Apple to make a less secure version of its iOS that can be used by the officials to brute force the 4-6 digits passcode on the dead shooter’s iPhone without getting the device’s data self-destructed.
Cook called the court order a “chilling” demand that “would undermine the very freedoms and liberty our government is meant to protect.” He argued that to help the FBI unlock the iPhone would basically providing an Encryption Backdoor that would make the products less secure.

Backdoor for Government, Backdoor for All

However, Apple is worried that once this backdoor gets created and handed over to the FBI, there would be chances that the backdoor will likely get into the hands of malicious hackers who could use it for evil purposes.
Although many politicians, including Donald Trump, have slammed Apple’s decision, Google has stepped up and taken a public stand in support of Apple’s decision.
“I agree 100 percent with the courts,” Trump said in a statement. “But to think that Apple won’t allow us to get into her cell phone, who do they think they are? No, we have to open it up.”

Google Sided with Apple

In a series of tweets late Wednesday, Pichai sided with Apple while saying “forcing companies to enable hacking could compromise users’ privacy” and “requiring companies to enable hacking of customer devices & data. Could be a troubling precedent.”

However, Pichai took more than 12 hours to talk about this burning issue, after Edward Snowden pointed out that Google had not yet stepped forward to speak up on his stand.

“The @FBI is creating a world where citizens rely on #Apple to defend their rights, rather than the other way around,” Snowden tweeted on Wednesday. Snowden called on Google to stand with Apple, saying, “This is the most important tech case in a decade.”

Pichai’s stance is basically: 

The technology companies will give its customers’ data to law enforcement when it is required to, but the companies will not put in a “Backdoor” for the government.
While the statements made by Pichai is not quite as forceful as Cook’s statement published in an open letter to its customers, we can assume both Google and Apple are together, at least in the sense that the federal agencies are asking too much.

Security

Ubuntu Security Notice USN-2902-1

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Ubuntu Security Notice 2902-1 – Yves Younan discovered that graphite2 incorrectly handled certain malformed fonts. If a user or automated system were tricked into opening a specially- crafted font file, a remote attacker could use this issue to cause graphite2 to crash, resulting in a denial of service, or possibly execute arbitrary code.