Interesting research: “ AI Models Can Provably Hide Arbitrary Capabilities ” Abstract: Capability evaluations aim to surface dangerous model behaviors before deployment, but their reliability depends on the assumption that hidden capabilities can be elicited. We show this assumption does not hold under adversarial conditions by constructing backdoor attacks that embed …
Interesting research : TL;DR: Chinese AI models now sit inside Western products, and some carry geopolitical triggers: tell the model who the code is for, and the security of what it writes changes. For the first time, we showed that this vulnerability lives in the model’s weights, and …
This article in Nature argues that it’s due to an overfishing of predators and warming sea temperatures. As usual, you can also use this squid post to talk about the security stories in the news that I haven’t covered. Blog moderation policy. [...]
The Indian CA eMudhra Limited has eight TLS certificates with laughably weak private keys : The compromised eMudhra keys were defective at a level that’s challenging the imagination of many of the engineers studying the incident. A normal size for a NIST P-384 elliptic curve cryptography private key contains …
PHP maintainers have released fixes for two critical vulnerabilities: PHP 8.5.12, 8.4.27, 8.3.36 and 8.2.35 fix two critical vulnerabilities that can allow unauthenticated remote code execution. All PHP users are strongly encouraged to update immediately. Who is at risk: all PHP …
There’s a new archive of all the papers from twenty-five years of the Workshop on Economics and Information Security (WEIS). Really nice resource. It’s fun to reread my 2002 essay on the economics of information security. [...]
Justin.sh is reporting on a confidential Cellebrite document that has been leaked to him: Cellebrite calls it Advanced Unlocks (AU from here on), not to be confused with the “advanced unlocking services” they’ve marketed for years. A press release from earlier this year confirms AU is a …
Interesting research : Abstract : Vision-language models (VLMs) can solve visual CAPTCHAs without task-specific training, but the agents built on them approach every challenge from scratch. For such an agent, the hundredth instance of a familiar puzzle costs as much time and compute as the first. Specialized detectors invert the trade-off …
New research shows that squid lived all around the globe even before the Cretaceous-Paleogene mass extinction event. As usual, you can also use this squid post to talk about the security stories in the news that I haven’t covered. Blog moderation policy. [...]
This is a problem: Any open model whose weights have been edited can carry a backdoor, whether it’s a task-specific fine-tune, a merged adapter or an abliterated build. We have abliterated models in the title because it’s the most popular reason people download modified weights without verifying …
Matthew Green has a new site that tries to estimate the number of cryptanalyst-hours that have been spent analyzing different public-key algorithms: Abstract: We estimate how much public cryptanalysis each public-key assumption has received, using the literature itself as the instrument. From roughly sixteen thousand candidate papers we classify …
This is a current list of where and when I am scheduled to speak: I’m speaking at ATTENTION: Democracy, Rebuilt in Montreal, Canada. The event runs October 21–23, 2026, and my talk is on Wednesday, October 21. I’m speaking at the University of Toronto in Toronto …
Matthew Green has been writing a rather pessimistic series of posts about the potential for AI systems to vastly outperform humans in cryptanalysis of both symmetric and public-key ciphers. I am more optimistic than he is. That is, I have stronger faith in the over-engineering cryptographers tend to do …
Another IoT cyberattack, this one in France: Hackers gained control of the software that regulates the temperatures of the refrigeration units, forcing some to warm to 50C (120F) overnight, according to one supermarket chain affected. [...] Normally, supermarket freezers go through a short period of defrosting overnight, in which temperatures …
In September, hackers from a group called ShinyHunters announced that they stole a trove of FBI data about its own agents. It was an intelligence disaster. Last week, the FBI arrested (alternate link ) someone associated with that crime. [...]
This essay was written with Seva Gunitsky, and originally appeared in Foreign Affairs. Two weeks after Moscow’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine in March 2022, the Russian TV Channel One editor Marina Ovsyannikova burst onto the set of the evening newscast. She held up a hand-drawn sign behind the …
Apple just released a system called “Reference Image.” It can verify the image is exactly as taken by an iPhone—new models only—without tying it to a specific iPhone or photographer. It can also verify that multiple images came from the same iPhone. Other industry solutions require a …
404Media is reporting (alternate link ) that a cyber-weapons arms manufacturer is exploiting a vulnerability in iOS to bypass its automatic reboot security feature. This is the feature that automatically puts an iPhone into a more secure state if it hasn’t been used for 72 hours. The new technology …
This one is from 1809, written by Napoleon’s nephew. [...]
The EU is recommending import controls to combat unregulated squid fishing in the Southwest Atlantic. I’m not optimistic. As usual, you can also use this squid post to talk about the security stories in the news that I haven’t covered. Blog moderation policy. [...]
St. Lucie County in Florida discovered ( alt link ) a dozen Flock cameras whose ownership it can’t identify, and that the county government had not permitted. I am reminded of the decade-old story of StingRay cell phone surveillance devices in Washington, DC, whose operators were also unknown. My guess …
This essay was written with Nathan E. Sanders, and originally appeared in The Guardian. New campaign finance disclosure data shines a light on which US political campaigns are using AI tools and how much they are spending on them. Candidates’, parties’ and committees’ spending reveals that AI is fast …
Researchers at Northeastern University, in collaboration with Consumer Reports, evaluated how much modern cars spy in their drivers: The new Northeastern study shows, for the first time, data flowing among the vehicles, the vehicle apps you download when you buy your car, and third-party companies, documenting exactly what kind …
AI systems are regularly completing tasks in ways that their prompters don’t want or intend. Some of them are disturbing, and some of them are dangerous. This is something I’ve been calling “ genie behavior,” because I think that really gets at the core of what’s happening …
Modern messaging apps allow users to link their phone accounts to their computer desktop. Eavesdroppers are taking advantage of this capability: Apps such as WhatsApp Web and Signal Desktop allow people to use their accounts on other devices, such as laptops or desktop computers. Germany’s Customs Office has …