SecurityWeek

HAVANA - Colombia's leftist FARC guerrillas said Wednesday they have been victims of "cyber espionage," and suggested the US National Security Agency may be to blame. Recent revelations by former intelligence contractor Edward Snowden have exposed the NSA's far-reaching electronic surveillance of phone records and Internet traffic.

Trustwave has launched a new subscription-based, penetration testing service that lets businesses schedule, manage and adjust penetration tests through a cloud-based portal.

SAN FRANCISCO - There is a dark side to the Internet, and it can be used for evil as well as for good. A massive online bazaar hawking narcotics, weapons, forgeries, and other illicit items or services operated openly for years by relying on tools designed to safeguard privacy or foster a new world of Internet commerce.

WASHINGTON - The head of the National Security Agency said Wednesday the secretive intelligence service does not compile data on Americans' use of social networks, dismissing a media report as "wrong." General Keith Alexander told a Senate hearing that a New York Times article "jumped to the conclusion this was done on Americans, that's not true."

US Authorities Shut Down Silk Road Website, Arrest OwnerSAN FRANCISCO - US authorities said Wednesday they had arrested the owner of the Silk Road website, where illegal drugs were bought and sold using the virtual currency Bitcoin.

As the “Snowden leaks” continue in their revelations and unraveling of the twisted web of government surveillance, it is becoming clear that the foundation of trust in the Internet as a shared commons has been thoroughly undermined.

Visa on Wednesday said that it has made improvements to its payment processing system in order to better detect fraud. According to the company, enhancements its Visa Advanced Authorization (VAA) technology will enable financial institutions to more reliably know which transactions to decline in real time.

In kinetic warfare, tracing the path of an enemy missile is not difficult. In the domain of cyberspace however, attributing an attack to a particular source can be problematic.

OTTAWA - Electronic eavesdropping devices have been discovered at a former high-tech company campus in Ottawa slated to become Canada's new military headquarters, local media said Tuesday.

Arbor Networks, a company best known for its DDoS protection solutions, today announced scalability and performance improvements along with new "Flex Licensing" options for its Peakflow SP network intelligence and infrastructure availability solution.

Cigital, a provider of software security services and solutions, announced today that private equity firm LLR Partners has made a $50 million equity investment in the company.

In a previous SecurityWeek column in May of this year, I wrote about “Network Security Considerations for SDN”. As described in the article, SDN technology includes the separation of control plane from the data plane (onto a centralized controller), dynamic programmable flows via this centralized controller, and automation and orchestration for the various SDN components.

Experian announced on Tuesday that it has agreed to acquire 41st Parameter, a provider of web fraud detection solutions, for an undisclosed amount.

Researchers at Trend Micro say the amount of mobile malware and high-risk applications has now hit the 1 million mark. High-risk apps are defined by Trend Micro as apps that aggressively serve ads that lead to dubious sites. Among the one million apps the vendor found, 75 percent perform malicious routines, while 25 percent exhibit suspicious routines, including adware.

Researchers at Symantec sinkholed a portion of the notorious ZeroAccess botnet, disconnecting more than half a million machines from the control of cybercriminals.

Qualys, a provider of cloud-based security and compliance solutions, has released a new version of its free service designed to help users keep their browsers and plug-ins up-to-date to protect against dangerous online content and malware.

Until the first smartphone hit the shelves, enterprise security was primarily focused on protecting an organization’s perimeter, since business processes and data resided primarily inside the corporate network. However, the mobile revolution completely changed the way employees interact with, access, and share information.

TOKYO - Japan and the United States will discuss strengthening defenses against cyber-attacks, reports said Monday, as Tokyo looks to play a more active role in global security. At talks in Japan later this week, the foreign and defence ministers from both countries will undertake their first review for 15 years of how their security alliance operates.

Britain Recruiting Cyber-warriors LONDON - Britain is to set up a dedicated military unit to counter cyber attacks, the defence secretary announced Sunday as he issued a call for tech-savvy new recruits.