Well, we sent 59 Tomahawk cruise missiles smack into a Syrian airbase this week. But other stuff happened too!
The week started off with some clever hack revelations, including a backdoor that Russians have used for two decades, and an ATM hack that just takes a drill hole and $15 worth of gear. And some particularly industrious hackers took over a Brazilian bank's entire online footprint for a few hours. Spies got their own cool new app that you can't play with. Top-secret iOS spyware popped up on Android too. And drones are behaving badly again.
Then there's the Trump news. Despite what you've heard, it's perfectly normal for Susan Rice to have asked for "unmasking" in her previous gig as Barack Obama's national security adviser. Devin Nunes stepped aside from the investigation he kept upending. And DHS and CBP picked a very dumb fight with Twitter that they backed down from in less than a day.
And there’s more. Each Saturday we round up the news stories that we didn’t break or cover in depth but that still deserve your attention. As always, click on the headlines to read the full story in each link posted. And stay safe out there.
This week, stun-gun company Taser got a new name to reflect its new focus. Axon, as it’ll now be known, will hand out free body cameras to police officers, plus a free one-year subscription to its online evidence-management platform, with an eye to signing them up to hefty long-term contracts. It’s not often one sees such a clear-cut Panopticon—for-profit situation as this, but that’s 2017 for you.
Android and iOS aren’t the only mobile operating systems in town. Samsung has also made investments in Tizen, an alternative OS that powers everything from smart TVs to smartwatches. Oh, and it’s a security nightmare, according to a new study. Researcher Amihai Neiderman says he found no fewer than 40 zero-day vulnerabilities in Tizen, meaning dozens of potential exploits that Samsung was previously unaware of. According to Neiderman, the mistakes also hint at Samsung’s relative inexperience with software—one that could prove costly to its customers, if it can’t patch those holes.
A Wi-Fi chipset from Broadcom that occupies a seat at all kinds of Android (and iOS) devices has a vulnerability that leaves those smartphones exposed to a full takeover, according to research from Google’s Project Zero team. Apple patched the bug in iOS 10.3.1, and Android will offer the fix in this month’s security update, but older devices and newer ones whose updates lag could be easy prey to the attack for a while. Be safe!
According to KrebsOnSecurity, video game retailer GameStop appears to have been compromised between last fall and this February. The company’s not saying exactly what information has been exposed, but it appears that credit card data at the very least has been pilfered. If you’re a GameStop loyalist, check your statement for anything suspicious.
