Samsung launched its new flagship smartphones, the Galaxy S8 and Galaxy S8 Plus, at its Unpacked 2017 event on Wednesday in New York, with both IRIS and Facial Recognition features, making it easier for users to unlock their smartphone and signing into websites.
All users need to do is simply hold their Galaxy S8 or S8 Plus in front of their eyes or their entire face, as if they were taking a
Researchers have found a half-dozen flaws in popular printer models that allow attackers to do everything from steal print jobs to conduct buffer overflow attacks.
It’s not necessary to break into your computer or smartphone to spy on you. Today all devices in our home are becoming more connected to networks than ever to make our lives easy.
But what’s worrisome is that these connected devices can be turned against us, anytime, due to lack of stringent security measures and insecure encryption mechanisms implemented in these Internet of Things (IoTs)
There is a Samsung Explosion-Proof return kit for the Note 7. Not kidding!
The post One does not simply return the Note 7 … appeared first on Avira Blog.
One of the world’s largest smartphone makers is being sued by the Dutch Consumers’ Association (DCA) for its lack in providing timely software updates to its Android smartphones.
This doesn’t surprise me, though.
The majority of manufacturers fail to deliver software updates for old devices for years.
However, the consumer protection watchdog in The Netherlands, The Dutch
Samsung denies that Samsung Pay has been affected by an attack on LoopPay, a startup that it recently acquired to develop its mobile payment system.
The post Samsung reassures customers that Samsung Pay is safe appeared first on We Live Security.
It’s summertime in the Northern Hemisphere and many people are going on or planning their vacation. Beware of fake vacation packages and beautiful rental properties that are not as they seem. These Vacation scams can ruin your holiday, so read up before you become a victim.
More than 600 million Samsung phones were reported to be at risk because of a vulnerability found in the keyboard app SwiftKey. The best way to protect yourself is to use a virtual private network (VPN) when using an unsecured Wi-Fi hotspot. If you have a Samsung S6, S5, or S4, you need to read Samsung phones vulnerable to hacker attack via keyboard update.
As we learned from the Hola VPN service revelations, any old VPN service will not do. Hola was selling their users’ bandwidth and installing and running code on their devices without their knowledge or permission. Find out the details in Hola, Hola VPN users, you may have been part of a botnet!, and please share with an Hola user.
Mobile developer Martin Banas, attended Apple’s Worldwide Developers Conference in San Francisco. Besides spending lots of time standing in lines, he enjoyed meeting other developers and hearing the latest news about OS X El Capitan and Apple Pay. Weren’t able to attend, bit wish you could have? Martin’s conference report, Looking back at WWDC 2015, describes the event.
Remember the iCloud celebrity photo hack? There have been many theories bandied about since nude photos of female celebrities were posted on the web. We add our own two cents into the conversation. Avast security researcher Philip Chytry explains what he thinks the origin and motivation behind the hack was in iCloud celebrity photo hack: What’s happening?!
Major cybercrooks taken down
While the cybercrooks behind the iCloud hack have not been discovered, authorities had big wins this past week in other areas. The author and distributor of Blackshades malware was sentenced to nearly five years in a New York prison. A major cybercriminal organization responsible for banking Trojans Zeus and SpyEye was taken down. Read Businessman hackers brought down in USA and Europe.
More from the Edward Snowden files. It was revealed this week that U.S. and U.K. spy agencies were attempting to reverse engineer major antivirus companies software, including Avast’s. CEO Vince Steckler spoke to RT News about government spying in the computer age. You can read the article, Avast CEO speaks out about U.S. and U.K. spy agencies, and watch the interview here.
And if the real world of cybercrime is not enough, our favorite new show of the summer Mr. Robot debuted on the USA Network this past week. We excitedly watched the first episode then talked to Avast security expert, Pedram Amini, to find out Are the hacks on Mr. Robot real? or just Hollywood magic.
Samsung said today it will no longer automatically disable Windows updates on PCs and laptops it manufactures and will release a patch “within a few days.”
Yup, I get annoyed by the Windows Update popup reminders as well. Still – updating is important and at the end of the day I am quite happy that there actually are updates to patch vulnerabilities and fix issues. Which is why it is so shocking to find out that this time it’s not actual malware that is trying to disable it but a well know company: Samsung.
Microsoft MVP Patrick Barker discovered the issue when assisting a user with a Windows Update issue. According to him “it was figured out eventually after using auditpol.exe and registry security auditing (shown below later) that the program that was responsible for disabling Windows Update was Disable_Windowsupdate.exe, which is part of Samsung’s SW Update software.”
Luckily the Samsung SW Update tool does not come with PCs by default: Users have to download it from Samsung’s website and install it. But let’s be honest: If you buy a new laptop you often download available tools in order to keep the system up to date as easy as possible. According to VentureBeat doing so is a common practice since there were people complaining about having an update problem before.
Now, Baker even got in touch with Samsung, whose support team had to say the following: “When you enable Windows updates, it will install the Default Drivers for all the hardware no laptop which may or may not work. For example if there is USB 3.0 on laptop, the ports may not work with the installation of updates. So to prevent this, SW Update tool will prevent the Windows updates.”
Well. Disabling the Windows Update does seem a very crass solution when it comes to making sure your updates and drivers will not break with new Windows updates …
The post Samsung’s SW Update Says “NO” To Windows Update appeared first on Avira Blog.
600 million Samsung mobile devices are at risk. Image source: gadgets.ndtv.com
We rely on our apps. Everyday we use our favorite ones to check news, the weather for our next trip, and communicate with our loved ones. Some apps, especially the system ones, are continuously in use, even if they are not the foremost app on your screen. The keyboard is one of them.
Recently, a dangerous vulnerability was discovered in the most popular keyboard, SwiftKey. If you have a Samsung S6, S5, and even a S4 running the stock operating system, you’re at risk. The app always checks for language updates, but this process is not performed in a secure way. If you’re connected with an open or public Wi-Fi, your phone is at risk of a very common and dangerous Man-in-the-middle attack. Your connection will be compromised and all the Internet traffic could be eavesdropped upon. That includes the passwords you’re typing in the very same keyboard, your financial information, everything.
To insure your security, you need to use a VPN when on Wi-Fi, since that’s when most updates are scheduled to occur. You probably already know what a VPN is and how it works. If not, you can find a lot of information in our blog. Our product, Avast SecureLine VPN, creates an encrypted tunnel for the inbound and outbound data of your Internet connection, blocking any possibility of a Man-in-the-middle attack.
But the story does not end here. If you use SwiftKey on an unsecured Wi-Fi, the attacker could also download malware into your phone or tablet. That’s a job for Avast Mobile Security & Antivirus (AMS). Some users think that we don’t need a security product for our phones. They also think that security companies exaggerate the need for a security app just to sell their products. AMS not only scans the installation process of apps but also checks the Internet sites you’re visiting and malicious behavior of any file in your device. You can install Avast Mobile Security & Antivirus on your Android device for free from the Google Play store.
NOTE: At the writing of this post, a patch for the vulnerability was provided to mobile network operators by Samsung. SwiftKey wrote on their blog, “This vulnerability is unrelated to and does not affect our SwiftKey consumer apps on Google Play and the Apple App Store.”
