August 2025
US scrambles to recoup $1M+ nicked by NORKs
The alleged perpetrators remain at large The US Department of Justice is trying to recoup around $1 million that three IT specialists secretly working for the North Korean government allegedly stole from a New York company.…
Red teams are safe from robots for now, as AI makes better shield than spear
The bad news? The machines, and their operators, are coming on fast Black Hat/DEF CON At the opening of Black Hat, the largest security shindig in the Hacker Summer Camp week ahead of DEF CON and BSides, the opening keynote speaker suggested the current state of AI slightly…
Wikimedia Foundation loses first court battle to swerve Online Safety Act regulation
But it can contest if it lands up in 'Category 1,' and the move hurts operations, says judge Wikipedia today lost a legal battle against the UK's tech secretary to tighten the criteria around the Online Safety Act 2023 (OSA), as it seeks to exclude itself from the…
Intel chief Lip-Bu Tan to visit White House after Trump calls for him to step down
Amid hints by president he may announce 100% tariffs on imported chips, semiconductors Intel boss Lip-Bu Tan reportedly has an appointment at the White House today, just days after President Donald Trump called for his resignation. The move comes as Intel's former CEO Craig Barrett weighs in on…
Deepfake detectors are slowly coming of age, at a time of dire need
By video, picture, and voice – the fakers are coming for your money DEF CON While AI was on everyone's lips in Las Vegas this week at the trio of security conferences in Sin City – BSides, Black Hat, AND DEF CON – there were a lot of…
DEF CON hackers plug security holes in US water systems amid tsunami of threats
Five pilot deployments are just a drop in the bucket, so it's time to turbo scale def con A DEF CON hacker walks into a small-town water facility…no, this is not the setup for a joke or a (super-geeky) odd-couple rom-com. It's a true story that happened at…
The inside story of the Telemessage saga, and how you can view the data
It turns out no one was clean on OPSEC DEF CON On Saturday at DEF CON, security boffin Micah Lee explained just how he hacked into TeleMessage, the supposedly secure messaging app used by White House officials, which in turn led to a massive database dump of their…
Chinese biz using AI to hit US politicians, influencers with propaganda
In misinformation, Russia might be the top dog but the Chinese are coming warns former NSA boss DEF CON A cache of documents uncovered by Vanderbilt University has revealed disturbing details about how a Chinese company is building up a database of US politicians and influencers with whom…
Star leaky app of the week: StarDict
Fun feature found in Debian 13: send your selected text to China – in plaintext As Trixie gets ready to début, a little-known app is hogging the limelight: StarDict, which sends whatever text you select, unencrypted, to servers in China.…
Ex-White House cyber, counter-terrorism guru: Microsoft considers security an annoyance, not a necessity
Tells The Reg China's ability to p0wn Redmond's wares 'gives me a political aneurysm' Comment Roger Cressey served two US presidents as a senior cybersecurity and counter-terrorism advisor and currently worries he'll experience a "political aneurysm" due to Microsoft's many security messes.…