EGUSD Information Security

So how many of you knew there was such a thing as Cyber Monday? An invention of the National Retail Federation, Cyber Monday is the Monday following Black Friday. Just as Black Friday features all kinds of sales and promotions in the stores, Cyber Monday features sales and promotions by online retailers.

You can be sure that scammers, cyber criminals and identity thieves are ready to take advantage of people going online to search for bargains.  So let’s review a few online safety tips before venturing out on a virtual shopping trip.

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A new phishing scam is showing up and being caught by the district’s spam filters.  Please be wary of these scams in your personal e-mail accounts.

The scam comes posing as a message ostensibly from the Social Security Administration:

From: credentialj3@sermar.be [mailto:credentialj3@sermar.be]*
Sent: Mon 11/23/2009 5:28 PM
To: [Name Deleted]
Subject: Watch for errors on Social Security statement

Due to possible calculation errors, your annual Social Security statement may contain errors.

Use the link below to review your annual Social Security statement:

——————————————————————
This e-mail has been sent from an auto-notification system that cannot accept incoming e-mail.

If you click on the link, it takes you to a page that requests you “verify” your personal information, including your Social Security number. If you are foolish enough to do so, the site will say that it is generating a report on your account status.  You will then be asked to download a file called “statement.exe”, which is presented as a self-extracting ZIP archive.  In reality it is a Trojan called Zeus that will steal any banking information on your computer and turn your machine into a “zombie”, part of a bot-net controlled by criminals without your knowledge.

Pleast note a couple of characteristics of this phishing message.  First, the sender could be from any number of domains, but it will NOT be from “ssa.gov”, the domain of the Social Security Administration.

Second, if you hover your mouse over the link, you will see that the domain address of the link STARTS with “http://statements.ssa.gov”.Sounds official, right?  But remember that the true domain of a web URL is the last two components of the URL before the first “/”.  For example, in the address “http://www.egusd.net/”, the domain is “egusd.net”.  Looking more closely at the URL from the phishing e-mail I examined, the URL was “http://statements.ssa.gov.ujilld.be/”. So the actual domain this URL is directed to is “ujilld.be”, which is located somewhere in Belarus. The scammers added the “statements.ssa.gov” to the beginning of the URL to fool the unwary.

Finally, remember that agencies like the Social Security Administration will neve ask for your information in this manner.  If you receive e-mails like this and are concerned, go to the phone book and look up the number of the agency in question and call them. 

Happy Thanksgiving!

Well, it is that time of year again, the time when our thoughts turn to Christmas, when we give thanks for our blessings, when we look forward to spending time with loved ones – and the time when criminals roll out the latest versions of their scams to separate you from your money.

To help you avoid becoming a victim during this holiday season, McAfee has come up with a list of the “12 scams of Christmas” to be on the lookout for.  You can read the whole list on CNet.com.

I am on vacation this week, so this may be my only post this week. Have a safe and wonderful holiday with your friends and family.

Okay, I admit it. Microsoft’s reputation for security sucks.  Whether it is caused by rushing their products to market, poor programing practices or because Microsoft’s dominant position in the market make it the primary target of malware authors, Windows has been full of holes. 

Of course, it has come a long way from Windows 98, which had no security to speak of.  Since that time, Microsoft has made a continuing effort to improve, with mixed success.  Some “improvements”, such as Vista’s implementation of User Account Control (UAC) were so frustrating to users that they turned it off rather than deal with it.  With Windows 7, they seem to have made some significant strides.  In fact, the first patch Tuesday after the release of Windows 7 contained no critical security updates – a first for a new Microsoft OS.

Nevertheless, even if Windows 7 proves to be much more secure than previous Windows versions, there are still holes that need to be closed.  Some holes, such as bugs in the code, must be closed by installing patches and updates.  Others have to be closed through proper configuration and good account management.

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While Mac users may not be as susceptible to infections of malware such as viruses or Trojans, they are just as likely to be a victim of cyber crime as Windows users, according to a survey commissioned by security firm ESET.

This is because the most common cause of cybercrime losses are due to “phishing” attacks.  Users are equally at risk to these ploys, regardless of the operating system they use. “Phishing” attacks rely on social engineering methods to get users to reveal information about themselves, and are not dependent upon any specific software or operating system vulnerabilities.

Read more at SC Magazine Online.

Trying to select a single security product to meet all of your needs generally doesn’t work well for the home user.  Today we will take a look at the various security  features needed, and take a look at some free or low-cost options to meet those needs.

Yesterday’s post dealt with some behavioral changes you can make to minimize your exposure to malware.  Today, we will get back on the topic of a layered defense, and discuss some of the layers involving security apps to protect against various types of threats.  As you will see, the threats are so diverse that one product can hardly hope to meet all of the needs, especially in the consumer market.  You want to make sure your computers are protected against malware, spyware, intrusion (hacking) and against access to inappropriate or harmful web sites.

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I have had a couple of people ask if I could send out regular e-mails about any new posts on the blog.  That way they could just review the summary and decide if they were interested, without needing to go to the blog each day to check for updates.

While I suppose I could do that, it would generate a lot of extra email for those who have no interest in this blog.  The better solution would be for those who would like to stay up to date on the latest phishing alerts, scams, and other security information to add an RSS feed of this blog to their Outlook mailbox. This would allow new updates to be sent directly to their Outlook mailboxes for review.

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Here is another e-mail forwarded to me from a district employee, a variation of the Nigerian scam:

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One of our district employees forwarded to me an e-mail they received that purported to be from the GMail tech support team:

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Locking the doors and windows does little good if you allow the open the door without knowing who is coming in.

To continue a bit with the home security metaphor from yesterday, the best locks in the world cannot protect your belongings if you invite the thief into your home. For that reason, most of us have peepholes or windows that we can look out before we open the doors.  If it is someone we don’t know, someone that looks suspicious, we may not open the door.  We certainly would not invite them in. We would want to know who they are and what their intentions were before we would trust them in that way.

In the area of computer security, however, we often allow access to our computers to unknown intruders all of the time.  These intruders can take the form of viruses, Trojans, worms, spyware, adware, bots and other forms of malware.  And while these intruders can sometimes make their way in despite all of our defenses, all too often we allow them in through the front door by our own actions.

So what are the actions we take to invite these unwanted guests into our computers?  And how do we change our habits to deny them access?

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