~TECH-BYTES~

About a month ago we reported that certain Nokia 1100 handsets, one of the company’s most basic handsets that was seemingly designed for emerging markets, was hacked by criminals to steal bank account passwords and other such valuable data. The reason authorities picked up on the system was because of the sudden rise in cost of the handset among the criminal underworld. We had also mentioned that investigations were on going at the time to try and figure out how this was being done.

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Due to incidents such as the hacking of Sara Palin’s email last year and others like it, Yahoo is refining their password recovery process.  The incident last year is a perfect example of how security is compromised in the simplest of ways usually.  One doesn’t need to have access to encryption/decryption tools or proxies to intercept https packets.  To hack into Yahoo mail, at least until recently, one only needs Wikipedia and Google.  Check out the explanation from the culprit himself as to how he hacked into Sara Palin’s email using the password recovery wizard of Yahoo.  One detail left out from this explanation was the fact that he did this using a public proxy, in this case ctunnel.com, in order to hide his IP address. Continue reading »

One of THE most basic handsets to have come out of Nokia was their 1100 mobile handset that you may recall had a single promising feature that was an LED flashlight. However this simplistic low-end handset has been going for obscene prices in part of Europe (€5,000 – Rs. 3, 26, 800). If you think that’s unbelievable, there’s actually a really good reason for this, but first, to make things a little clearer, the only guys buying THIS handset at THAT price are those interested in using it for purposes other than making calls.

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The Dev-Team just launched its long-awaited iPhone 3G unlock, dubbed “yellowsn0w,” and while they’re still working out a few kinks (terming this release a 0.9 beta release), reports are already pouring in of successful unlocks. It’s also been confirmed that this release will work with the iPhone’s latest v2.2 firmware, and in fact requires that the phone be updated to v2.2 to run at all — much to the chagrin of folks who’ve held off on that update at the Dev-Team’s behest, we’re sure, but hopefully all will soon be forgotten in the new year… Continue reading »

Well this has been a long time coming. It seems that the iPhone Dev-Team has finally done the impossible — they’ve gone and unlocked the iPhone 3G. The hack isn’t out yet (the team says they’re shooting for a December 31st release), and it requires that you’ve got a baseband of 2.11.07 or earlier, but when it drops, the crew seems fairly confident it will result in freedom from carrier oppression. The team is packaging the app — formerly codenamed “yellowsn0w” — into a user-friendly app a la PwnageTool and QuickPwn. Of course, you know how this cat and mouse game goes by now, so don’t be surprised when Jobs and company come calling with an update that adds toast making to the official menu, but breaks your breaks all over again.

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A pakistani hacking group “pakistan cyber army {PCA} hacked ONGC website and a few other indian sites and as per the message on the hacked pages this is in response to defacement of pakistan’s OGRA’s website by an indian group called “HMG”. The message left by the hackers reads: Continue reading »

A website owner’s biggest nightmare is getting hacked… well last night was no less than a nightmare, it was around 2AM when i thought about checking out one of my blog that i don’t use much and i was busy surfing on other tabs there was this loud unknown language song that got started it took me a min to figure out which tab it is,i switched to that tab and there was this word “hacked” written on it, i immediately closed that tab thinking that some damm website i opened got hacked but then i thought lets check it out and when i checked the recently closed tabs i was surprised to see that it was my movies blog only.It took me a min to digest this fact but then it was my movies blog which i was planning to shut down so i was a bit ok but it didn’t took me much time to find out that it was not just one blog but my entire domain that got hacked…

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They always knew it could be done; that a hacker with enough time and processing power could watch your WPA-protected wireless network and, eventually, decrypt your precious datas. In under 15 minutes, though? “Inconceivable!” those hypothetical security experts would say — but they’re about to get a lesson from WiFi wizard Erik Tews. He’ll be giving a presentation next week at the PacSec Conference in Tokyo, describing the “mathematical breakthrough” that, he says, enables him to crack WPA-TKIP in 12 to 15 minutes. There are some limitations, as the data sent from a connected device to the compromised router is apparently still safe, but anything headed t’other way is wide open, and could even be supplanted by bogus bits sent from a Cheetos-munching hacker slouching in a rusty Ford Taurus in the parking lot. Don’t believe us? Tews was the guy able to crack WEP in under a minute last year, ironically advising people to switch to WPA ASAP at the time. We can only assume WPA2 is next.

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After a week full of Red Bulls, Fruit by the Foot and dreams of In-N-Out, the mighty Sony VAIO loaded with Linux stood as the only machine unhacked by the end of the PWN 2 OWN hacking contest at CanSecWest.

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