The Federal Trade Commission is taking action against education technology provider Chegg Inc. for its lax data security practices that exposed sensitive information about millions of its customers and employees, including Social Security numbers, email addresses and passwords. Chegg allegedly failed to fix problems with its data security despite experiencing four security breaches since 2017….
Category: Commentaries and Analyses
Serious breach of cellphone users’ data
The News (Pakistan) reports: The personal data of the subscribers of the telecom companies operating in Pakistan has once again been seriously compromised as various mobile applications and web portals are providing access to individual subscribers’ data on the internet. Recently, a video of a mobile application named ‘Asan Bash’ went viral on social media claiming…
Young Finnish man detained in absentia over data breach at Vastaamo
The Vastaamo psychotherapy clinic hack and extortion attempt in Finland, first disclosed in 2020, remains one of the most sensitive and disturbing breaches DataBreaches has ever covered. Past news items about it can be found here. Now there is an update. Aleksi Teivainen of Helsinki Times reports: The District Court of Helsinki on Friday detained…
Hacked Documents: How Iran Can Track and Control Protesters’ Phones
Sam Biddle and Murtaza Hussain report: As furious anti-government protests swept Iran, the authorities retaliated with both brute force and digital repression. Iranian mobile and internet users reported rolling network blackouts, mobile app restrictions, and other disruptions. Many expressed fears that the government can track their activities through their indispensable and ubiquitous smartphones. Iran’s tight…
Suffolk cyberattack: County consultant also lobbies for vendor hired to fortify system
Mark Harrington and Sandra Peddie report: A consulting firm hired to help manage Suffolk County’s response to a ransomware attack also has served as a lobbyist for the computer security company brought in more than three years ago to analyze and fortify Suffolk’s networks, according to a Newsday analysis of records. Computer security experts and…
Il: Security breach in Shas database could expose information of millions
Roman Meitav reports: A serious security breach in the Shas Party’s computerized election management system has left it vulnerable to easy exploitation, even by those with only basic knowledge of cybersecurity, according to tech experts. The breach in the system, which contains not just the data of Shas supporters and activists but rather the information of all Israeli…