‘Land Lordz’ Service Powers Airbnb Scams

Credit to Author: BrianKrebs| Date: Sun, 14 Apr 2019 18:40:33 +0000

Scammers who make a living swindling Airbnb.com customers have a powerful new tool at their disposal: A software-as-a-service offering called “Land Lordz,” which helps automate the creation and management of fake Airbnb Web sites and the sending of messages to advertise the fraudulent listings.

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773M Password ‘Megabreach’ is Years Old

Credit to Author: BrianKrebs| Date: Thu, 17 Jan 2019 20:11:08 +0000

My inbox and Twitter messages positively lit up today with people forwarding stories from Wired and other publications about a supposedly new trove of nearly 773 million unique email addresses and 21 million unique passwords that were posted to a hacking forum. A story in The Guardian breathlessly dubbed it “the largest collection ever of breached data found.” But in an interview with the apparent seller, KrebsOnSecurity learned that it is not even close to the largest gathering of stolen data, and that it is at least two to three years old.

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In a Few Days, Credit Freezes Will Be Fee-Free

Credit to Author: BrianKrebs| Date: Tue, 11 Sep 2018 02:26:06 +0000

Later this month, all of the three major consumer credit bureaus will be required to offer free credit freezes to all Americans and their dependents. Maybe you’ve been holding off freezing your credit file because your home state currently charges a fee for placing or thawing a credit freeze, or because you believe it’s just not worth the hassle. If that accurately describes your views on the matter, this post may well change your mind.

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When Identity Thieves Hack Your Accountant

Credit to Author: BrianKrebs| Date: Wed, 11 Apr 2018 18:11:26 +0000

The Internal Revenue Service has been urging tax preparation firms to step up their cybersecurity efforts this year, warning that identity thieves and hackers increasingly are targeting certified public accountants (CPAs) in a bid to siphon oodles of sensitive personal and financial data on taxpayers. This is the story of a CPA in New Jersey whose compromise by malware led to identity theft and phony tax refund requests filed on behalf of his clients.

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Look-Alike Domains and Visual Confusion

Credit to Author: BrianKrebs| Date: Thu, 08 Mar 2018 16:55:13 +0000

How good are you at telling the difference between domain names you know and trust and imposter or look-alike domains? The answer may depend on how familiar you are with the nuances of internationalized domain names (IDNs), as well as which browser or Web application you’re using. For example, how does your browser interpret the following domain? I’ll give you a hint: Despite appearances, it is most certainly not the actual domain for software firm CA Technologies (formerly Computer Associates Intl Inc.), which owns the original ca.com domain name: https://www.са.com/ Go ahead and click on the link above or cut-and-paste it into a browser address bar. If you’re using Google Chrome, Apple’s Safari, or some recent version of Microsoft’s Internet Explorer or Edge browsers, you should notice that the address converts to “xn--80a7a.com.” This is called “punycode,” and it allows browsers to render domains with non-Latin alphabets like Cyrillic and Ukrainian. Below is what it looks like in Edge on Windows 10; Google Chrome renders it much the same way. Notice what’s in the address bar (ignore the “fake site” and “Welcome to…” text, which was added as a courtesy by the person who registered this domain):

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Anti-Skimmer Detector for Skimmer Scammers

Credit to Author: BrianKrebs| Date: Tue, 05 Dec 2017 20:37:22 +0000

Crooks who make and deploy ATM skimmers are constantly engaged in a cat-and-mouse game with financial institutions, which deploy a variety of technological measures designed to defeat skimming devices. The latest innovation aimed at tipping the scales in favor of skimmer thieves is a small, battery powered device that provides crooks a digital readout indicating whether an ATM likely includes digital anti-skimming technology.

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2nd Breach at Verticalscope Impacts Millions

Credit to Author: BrianKrebs| Date: Fri, 03 Nov 2017 22:00:26 +0000

For the second time in as many years, hackers have compromised Verticalscope.com, a Canadian company that manages hundreds of popular Web discussion forums totaling more than 45 million user accounts. Evidence of the breach was discovered just before someone began using that illicit access as a commercial for a new paid search service that indexes consumer information exposed in corporate data breaches.

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Ayuda! (Help!) Equifax Has My Data!

Credit to Author: BrianKrebs| Date: Tue, 12 Sep 2017 22:02:49 +0000

Equifax last week disclosed a historic breach involving Social Security numbers and other sensitive data on as many as 143 million Americans. The company said the breach also impacted an undisclosed number of people in Canada and the United Kingdom. But the official list of victim countries may not yet be complete: According to information […]

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