Government - Page 31

Update: US government lab offers grid computing toolkit

A new open-source software toolkit is available Tuesday to improve remote online scientific collaboration via grid computing. The Access Grid Toolkit from the U.S. Department of Energy's Argonne National Laboratory enables development of programs to share video, audio, data and text for real-time collaboration between people at different locations around the world.

• Brittany Day
• Aug 23, 2006

China fines its first spammer

The Chinese government has fined a company 5,000 yuan renminbi (

• Brittany Day
• Aug 22, 2006

Why You Should Care About The RIP Act

You may be more accurate than you think. The Regulation of Investigatory Powers Act, to give it its full name, gives the police and the security services the right to intercept our communications data. Scary stuff indeed. But wasn't there a big scandal about this a while ago? That's right. RIPA, as it's affectionately known by some, was passed in October 2000, in the face of widespread opposition that nearly brought the bill down.

• Brittany Day
• Aug 21, 2006

GAO: Passenger screening program not ready to take off

he Transportation Security Administration (TSA) needs to address security and privacy concerns before rolling out its Secure Flight program, according to the Government Accountability Office (GAO)

• Brittany Day
• Aug 09, 2006

Weak spots still hamper DHS info security

Despite improvements, the Homeland Security Department continues to display significant information security weaknesses that jeopardize the integrity and privacy of department IT programs, according to a new report released by DHS Inspector General Richard Skinner.

• Brittany Day
• Aug 08, 2006

Senate OKs Controversial Internet Treaty

The U.S. Senate Friday ratified an international treaty designed to ease investigation of cybercrime, but U.S. civil liberties groups say that signing the pact is a big mistake. The Council of Europe's Convention on Cybercrime, which began circulating in 2001, has been adopted by 41 other countries, including most of Europe as well as Canada and Japan. It is designed to harmonize laws on computer crime, which differ from country to country. Countries that sign the treaty agree to establish some common laws against criminal behavior online, such as attacks on computer networks, terrorist tactics, and exploitation of children. The language of the treaty is very broad and doesn't require the U.S. to write any new cybercrime laws.

• Brittany Day
• Aug 08, 2006

BLACK HAT - FBI: Cybercriminals Taking Cues From Mafia

The Web site offered to sell stolen credit card information for US$100, but it was the title of the poster that caught FBI agent Thomas X Grasso Jr.'s attention. The cybercriminal identified himself as a "Capo di capo" -- a boss of bosses, in Mafia parlance. As money has become the driving force behind online threats, cyber criminals have been taking a page from organized crime, adopting the same kind of organizational structures as these older crime groups, Grasso told an audience Friday at the Defcon hacker conference. Defcon immediately follows Black Hat, its sister show.

• Brittany Day
• Aug 07, 2006

E-voting security under fire in San Diego lawsuit

A lawsuit has grown out of alleged breaches in security procedures around electronic voting machines in San Diego County after a hotly contested congressional election, throwing a spotlight on the reliability of the machines themselves.

• Brittany Day
• Aug 04, 2006

FBI: Hackers Must Help Fight Web Mob

The FBI's point man for Internet crime wants hackers to join the fight against international gangs of Web mobsters. Dan Larkin, unit chief of the FBI's Internet Crime Complaint Center, used the spotlight of the Black Hat security conference here to call for a new level of trust and cooperation between security researchers and law enforcement, warning that online crime is being controlled by "very sophisticated, very organized" attackers.

• Brittany Day
• Aug 02, 2006

Worst Ever Security Flaw in Diebold Voting Machine

• Brittany Day
• Jul 31, 2006

Lords Committee to debate internet security

The House of Lords Science and Technology Committee is to investigate personal internet security. They are calling on members of the public with direct experience to get in touch.

• Brittany Day
• Jul 29, 2006

Net Neutrality Primer

The net neutrality debate is divided into two camps: Fighting against net neutrality are the telecom companies and cable providers, who provide Internet access to consumers. Opposing them are content providers like Google, Amazon, and non-profits like MoveOn.org and the National Religious Broadcasters. But what are they fighting about?

• Benjamin D. Thomas
• Jul 27, 2006

Coalition challenges US ruling over FBI net snooping

Sun Microsystems, Pulver.com and a coalition of civil liberties groups have filed an appeal against a US court ruling that would force technology companies to put

• Brittany Day
• Jul 25, 2006

If an ID number is stolen, why not get a new one?

Note: This article originally appeared in the New York Times If credit card companies can reassign new numbers, so should the government

• Brittany Day
• Jul 22, 2006

Gartner slams government security guidelines

Analyst firm Gartner has dismissed a tightening of security rules for US government agencies as a mere "public relations response" to recent high-profile incidents.

• Brittany Day
• Jul 22, 2006

Breach Rules Toughened For Federal Agencies

The White House's Office of Management and Budget instructed U.S. federal agencies to alert the US-CERT within one hour to any breach involving personally identifiable information, even if the possibility of a breach is only suspected. The memo (PDF), dated last week, is the fourth letter regarding information-security policy sent to government agencies in the past two months. Another memo (PDF), dated Monday, required that government agencies report any computer systems missing from their inventory and outline the results of an investigation into handling of personally identifiable information within their agency. An earlier memo mandated that agencies use encryption to protect sensitive data on laptops.

• Brittany Day
• Jul 19, 2006

IRS: Lack of fraud detection system cost nearly $300M

The lack of an automated refund fraud detection system that would have allowed the U.S. Internal Revenue System to screen 2006 tax returns could cost the agency between $200 million and $300 million, the IRS told the U.S. Senate Finance Committee last week.

• Brittany Day
• Jul 18, 2006

CSI survey: Data breaches still being swept under the rug

On the surface, the results of the 11th annual CSI/FBI Computer Crime and Security Survey are positive, with fewer companies reporting financial loss from data breaches compared to last year. But a majority of companies are still reluctant to report security breaches to law enforcement, suggesting that the survey isn't capturing the full extent of the problem.

• Brittany Day
• Jul 16, 2006

Cybersecurity still handled by a

It was one year ago that Homeland Security secretary Michael Chertoff announced a departmental reorganization that would create an assistant secretary for cybersecurity and telecommunications.

• Brittany Day
• Jul 13, 2006

US-Visit's RFID system needs better security, report says

The U.S. Visitor and Immigrant Status Indicator Technology (US-VISIT) program's RFID system has not done enough to secure personal data stored in its Automated Identification Management System (AIDMS) database, according to a recent partially-censored report issued by Richard Skinner, the inspector general of the Department of Homeland Security. US-VISIT is a program established in 2004 by DHS to control and monitor the entry, visa status and exit of foreign visitors to the U.S.

• Brittany Day
• Jul 13, 2006