Security (Link) Clearance - August 2012

Another small selection of interesting stories from recent security blogs.


Why passwords have never been weaker - and crackers have never been stronger.

Over at Ars Technica, Dan Goodin explains why, thanks to real-world data, the keys to your digital kingdom are under assault:

http://arstechnica.com/security/2012/08/passwords-under-assault/


The iPhone Has Passed a Key Security Threshold

So thinks Technology Review contributing editor Simson L. Garfinkel:

Does society really want extremely private mobile devices if they make life easier for criminals? Apple's newly toughened standards sharpen the focus on that question.

http://www.technologyreview.com/news/428477/the-iphone-has-passed-a-key-security-threshold/


Is iPhone Security Really this Good?

Meanwhile, Bruce Schneier has his own perspective on that assertion:

Yes, I believe that full-disk encryption -- whether Apple's FileVault or Microsoft's BitLocker (I don't know what the iOS system is called) -- is good; but its security is only as good as the user is at choosing a good password.

http://www.schneier.com/blog/archives/2012/08/is_iphone_secur.html


Triple DDoS vs. KrebsOnSecurity

With the best security blog of them all, it's unsurprising that Brian Krebs continues to attract the ire and DDoS arrows of the spambot kings:

According to Prolexic, the one used against KrebsOnSecurity.com was Attack Type 4, a.k.a “Max Flood”; this method carries a fairly unique signature of issuing POST requests against a server that are over a million bytes in length.

http://krebsonsecurity.com/2012/08/triple-ddos-vs-krebsonsecurity/


There ya go.