Tag: password

Windows 8.1 to go RTM in “late August”

During its Worldwide Partner Conference in a rainy and humid Houston today, Windows CFO Tami Reller announced that Windows 8.1, the free update to Windows 8, will be made available to OEMs by “late August, ” with devices reaching the market by the holiday season. Windows 8 was released to manufacturing on August 1, 2012. Microsoft is promoting a faster release cadence across its entire range of products, and Windows 8.1 is arguably the first mass-market consumer product from the company that will benefit from this new release schedule. Read on Ars Technica | Comments

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Windows 8.1 to go RTM in “late August”

Mass-login attack on Nintendo fan site hijacks 24,000 accounts

Almost 24, 000 user accounts on Nintendo’s main fan site have been hijacked in a sustained mass-login attack that began early last month, the company said. The wave of attacks on Club Nintendo exposed personal information associated with 23, 926 compromised accounts, including users’ real names, addresses, phone numbers and e-mail addresses, according to a press release Nintendo issued over the weekend. The campaign began on June 9 and attempted more than 15.5 million logins over the following month. Attackers likely relied on a list of login credentials taken from a site unrelated to Nintendo. Club Nintendo offers rewards to Nintendo customers in exchange for having them register their products, answer surveys, and provide personal data. The site operates internationally and has about four million users in Japan, the primary region of most affected users. Things came to a head on July 2, when the wave of logins crested. By Friday, July 5, Nintendo had reset passwords on the site. Read 2 remaining paragraphs | Comments

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Mass-login attack on Nintendo fan site hijacks 24,000 accounts

Password complexity rules more annoying, less effective than lengthy ones

Few Internet frustrations are so familiar as the password restriction . After creating a few (dozen) logins for all our Web presences, the use of symbols, mixed cases, and numbers seems less like a security measure and more like a torture device when it comes to remembering a complex password on a little-used site. But at least that variety of characters keeps you safe, right? As it turns out, there is some contrary research that supports both how frustrating these restrictions are and suggests it’s possible that the positive effect of complexity rules on security may not be as great as long length requirements. Let’s preface this with a reminder: the conventional wisdom is that complexity trumps length every time, and this notion is overwhelmingly true. Every security expert will tell you that “Supercalifragilistic” is less secure than “gj7B!!!bhrdc.” Few password creation schemes will render any password uncrackable, but in general, length does less to guard against crackability than complexity. A password is not immune from cracking simply by virtue of being long—44,991 passwords recovered from a dump of LinkedIn hashes last year were 16 characters or more. The research we describe below refers specifically to the effects of restrictions placed by administrators on password construction on their crackability. By no means does it suggest that a long password is, by default, more secure than a complex one. Read 13 remaining paragraphs | Comments

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Password complexity rules more annoying, less effective than lengthy ones

Microsoft, like Google, asks secret court if it can publish data sharing total

In a new legal filing made public on Wednesday, Microsoft submitted a motion (PDF) to the notoriously secretive Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court (FISC) saying that the company “continues to seek—to correct the misimpression, furthered by such inaccurate media reporting, that it provides the United States Government with direct access to its servers and network infrastructure and, thereby, indiscriminately discloses Microsoft users’ information to the Government.” The filing was submitted on June 19, 2013, just one day after Google’s similar motion . Like Google, Microsoft said it “seeks to report aggregate information about [Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act] orders and [FISA Amendments Act] directives separately from all other local, state, and federal law enforcement demands.” Tech companies are presumably attempting to get FISC to allow them to release this information so that they can show there isn’t a hand-in-glove relationship between these corporations and the federal government. Read 2 remaining paragraphs | Comments

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Microsoft, like Google, asks secret court if it can publish data sharing total

Kim Dotcom says Dutch firm deleted “at least 40 petabytes” of Megaupload data

Kim Dotcom (right) shares a lighthearted moment with colleague Finn Batato. Chris Keall A week ago, we reported that Kim Dotcom publicly accused LeaseWeb, a Dutch hosting company, of suddenly deleting all of Megaupload’s servers. The founder of Megaupload continues to fight legal battles worldwide concerning the shuttering of his file-sharing site. And he  wrote on Twitter that “all user data & crucial evidence for our defense [was] destroyed ‘without warning.’” LeaseWeb, for its part, defended its actions. On Wednesday, TorrentFreak published a new e-mail from Dotcom’s attorney to LeaseWeb, showing that Megaupload did request preservation of all of its data. “Megaupload continues to request that LeaseWeb preserve any and all information, documentation, and data related to Megaupload—as destruction by LeaseWeb would appear to be in violation of amongst other things the applicable civil litigation data preservation rules and would interfere with evidence in a criminal matter all of which may subject LeaseWeb to varying degrees of liability,” Ira Rothken, Dotcom’s counsel, wrote. The passage appeared in an e-mail to LeaseWeb’s lawyer, A.H. “Bram” de Haas van Dorsser, in March 2012. Read 10 remaining paragraphs | Comments

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Kim Dotcom says Dutch firm deleted “at least 40 petabytes” of Megaupload data

Hands-on with Windows 8.1 Preview: Windows 8 done right

Late last month, Microsoft announced a raft of interface changes that Windows 8.1 would introduce. We’ve been giving them a spin. As you might guess from the name, Windows 8.1 is an update to (and improvement on) Windows 8. The new user interface introduced in that operating system—the Start screen, touch-friendly “Modern” apps, the charms bar—is retained in Windows 8.1. What we see is a refinement and streamlining of these concepts. The new Start screen is a pleasing evolution of the old one. The differences are visible as soon as you log in. In 8.1, the Start screen offers a lot more flexibility over layout and tile sizing. By default, the Weather tile takes advantage of this, using a new double-height tile size to show the forecasts for both today and tomorrow, in addition to the current conditions. Read 22 remaining paragraphs | Comments

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Hands-on with Windows 8.1 Preview: Windows 8 done right

Stow it no more: FAA easing ban on electronics during takeoff, landing

The words “please stow all electronic devices” may soon disappear from the scripts of flight attendants. The Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) is poised to lift its ban on the use of electronic devices aboard airline flights at elevations under 10,000 feet. It would also allow the use of e-readers, iPods, tablets, and phones in “airplane” mode even during take-offs and landings. The Wall Street Journal reports that the FAA is circulating a draft set of recommendations from an advisory panel that recommends relaxing the bans. Cell phone calls during flight would still be banned. T he report acknowledges that technology has changed dramatically since the FAA originally placed the ban on electronic devices during takeoff and landing back in the 1960s, when there were valid concerns about interference to aircraft communications from personal radios and other electronics.  The panel also admitted that having airlines each evaluate the safety of individual electronic devices before allowing them to be left on at low altitude “has become untenable.” Passengers are widely ignoring the ban already, and the FAA advisory panel’s report cited research that showed a third of airline passengers had “accidentally” left a device turned on for entire flights at least once. An FAA spokeswoman sent a statement to the Wall Street Journal that said that the FAA “recognizes consumers are intensely interested in the use of personal electronics aboard aircraft. That is why we tasked a government-industry group to examine the safety issues and the feasibility of changing the current restrictions. At the group’s request, the FAA has granted the two-month extension to complete the additional work necessary for the safety assessment.” Read on Ars Technica | Comments

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Stow it no more: FAA easing ban on electronics during takeoff, landing