The Federal Trade Commission is running a competition “to foster breakthrough ideas on preventing, monitoring, and evaluating malicious voice cloning.” [...]

Interesting article about a surprisingly common vulnerability: programmers leaving authentication credentials and other secrets in publicly accessible software code: Researchers from security firm GitGuardian this week reported finding almost 4,000 unique secrets stashed inside a total of 450,000 projects submitted to PyPI, the official code repository for …

This is interesting : For the first time, researchers have demonstrated that a large portion of cryptographic keys used to protect data in computer-to-server SSH traffic are vulnerable to complete compromise when naturally occurring computational errors occur while the connection is being established. [...] The vulnerability occurs when there are errors …

This is a current list of where and when I am scheduled to speak: I’m speaking at the AI Summit New York on December 6, 2023. The list is maintained on this page. [...]

Sad story of Tokelau, and how its top-level domain “became the unwitting host to the dark underworld by providing a never-ending supply of domain names that could be weaponized against internet users. Scammers began using.tk websites to do everything from harvesting passwords and payment information to displaying pop-up …

Artificial intelligence will change so many aspects of society, largely in ways that we cannot conceive of yet. Democracy, and the systems of governance that surround it, will be no exception. In this short essay, I want to move beyond the “AI-generated disinformation” trope and speculate on some of …

Really interesting article. As usual, you can also use this squid post to talk about the security stories in the news that I haven’t covered. Read my blog posting guidelines here. [...]

Article based on a Mozilla report. [...]

Selling miniature replicas to unsuspecting shoppers: Online marketplaces sell tiny pink cowboy hats. They also sell miniature pencil sharpeners, palm-size kitchen utensils, scaled-down books and camping chairs so small they evoke the Stonehenge scene in “This Is Spinal Tap.” Many of the minuscule objects aren’t clearly advertised. [...] But …

This is an excerpt from a longer paper. You can read the whole thing (complete with sidebars and illustrations) here. Our message is simple: it is possible to get the best of both worlds. We can and should get the benefits of the cloud while taking security back into …

Gene Spafford wrote an essay reflecting on the Morris Worm of 1988—35 years ago. His lessons from then are still applicable today. [...]

The Flipper Zero is an incredibly versatile hacking device. Now it can be used to crash iPhones in its vicinity by sending them a never-ending stream of pop-ups. These types of hacks have been possible for decades, but they require special equipment and a fair amount of expertise. The …

It’s not actually alive, but it twitches in response to soy sauce. As usual, you can also use this squid post to talk about the security stories in the news that I haven’t covered. Read my blog posting guidelines here. [...]

Another example of a large and influential state doing things the federal government won’t: Boards of directors, or other senior committees, are charged with overseeing cybersecurity risk management, and must retain an appropriate level of expertise to understand cyber issues, the rules say. Directors must sign off on …

Apple has warned leaders of the opposition government in India that their phones are being spied on: Multiple top leaders of India’s opposition parties and several journalists have received a notification from Apple, saying that “Apple believes you are being targeted by state-sponsored attackers who are trying to …

Ukraine is using $400 drones to destroy tanks: Facing an enemy with superior numbers of troops and armor, the Ukrainian defenders are holding on with the help of tiny drones flown by operators like Firsov that, for a few hundred dollars, can deliver an explosive charge capable of destroying …

The islands of Åland are an important tax hack : Although Åland is part of the Republic of Finland, it has its own autonomous parliament. In areas where Åland has its own legislation, the group of islands essentially operates as an independent nation. This allows Scandinavians to avoid the notoriously …

And seafood in general : A squid ship is a bustling, bright, messy place. The scene on deck looks like a mechanic’s garage where an oil change has gone terribly wrong. Scores of fishing lines extend into the water, each bearing specialized hooks operated by automated reels. When they …

Fascinating story of a covert wiretap that was discovered because of an expired TLS certificate: The suspected man-in-the-middle attack was identified when the administrator of jabber.ru, the largest Russian XMPP service, received a notification that one of the servers’ certificates had expired. However, jabber.ru found no expired …

Interesting article about the Snowden documents, including comments from former Guardian editor Ewen MacAskill MacAskill, who shared the Pulitzer Prize for Public Service with Glenn Greenwald and Laura Poitras for their journalistic work on the Snowden files, retired from The Guardian in 2018. He told Computer Weekly that: As …

Microsoft has announced an early access program for its LLM-based security chatbot assistant: Security Copilot. I am curious whether this thing is actually useful. [...]

The industry pushed back : Despite the EPA’s willingness to provide training and technical support to help states and public water system organizations implement cybersecurity surveys, the move garnered opposition from both GOP state attorneys and trade groups. Republican state attorneys that were against the new proposed policies said …

Susan Landau published an excellent essay on the current justification for the government breaking end-to-end-encryption: child sexual abuse and exploitation (CSAE). She puts the debate into historical context, discusses the problem of CSAE, and explains why breaking encryption isn’t the solution. [...]

They’re too big and we can’t recreate their habitat. As usual, you can also use this squid post to talk about the security stories in the news that I haven’t covered. Read my blog posting guidelines here. [...]

If an AI breaks the rules for you, does that count as breaking the rules? This is the essential question being taken up by the Federal Election Commission this month, and public input is needed to curtail the potential for AI to take US campaigns (even more) off the …