How Oracle Sells Repression in China

In its bid for TikTok, Oracle was supposed to prevent data from being passed to Chinese police. Instead, it’s been marketing its own software for their surveillance work. From a report: Police in China’s Liaoning province were sitting on mounds of data collected through invasive means: financial records, travel information, vehicle registrations, social media, and surveillance camera footage. To make sense…

A Chinese Hacking Group Is Stealing Airline Passenger Details

An anonymous reader quotes a report from ZDNet: A suspected Chinese hacking group has been attacking the airline industry for the past few years with the goal of obtaining passenger data in order to track the movement of persons of interest. The intrusions have been linked to a threat actor that the cyber-security has been tracking under the name of Chimera….

Epic Games Buys a Huge Mall

Epic Games is buying an old shopping mall — with nearly one million square feet of space — and plans to convert it into its new global headquarters by 2024. From a report: The deal gives Epic the 980,000 square foot Cary Towne Center for $95 million. Cary Towne Center is about 2 miles from Epic’s current HQ. Epic Games has…

Nintendo Conducted Invasive Surveillance Operation Against Homebrew Hacker

Leaked Nintendo documents have revealed a frightening surveillance operation carried out against a hacker who was researching exploits for the 3DS handheld. TorrentFreak reports: During the past 24 hours, various Twitter accounts (1,2) have been posting snippets from documents that were recently leaked from Nintendo. While there are numerous items of interest, the most shocking revelations involve Neimod, a hacker who…

Credit Card Numbers For Millions of Hotel Guests Exposed By Misconfigured Cloud Database

“A widely used hotel reservation platform has exposed 10 million files related to guests at various hotels around the world, thanks to a misconfigured Amazon Web Services S3 bucket,” reports Threatpost. “The records include sensitive data, including credit-card details.” Prestige Software’s “Cloud Hospitality” is used by hotels to integrate their reservation systems with online booking websites like Expedia and Booking.com. The…

Your Computer Isn’t Yours

Security researcher Jeffrey Paul, writes in a blog post: On modern versions of macOS, you simply can’t power on your computer, launch a text editor or eBook reader, and write or read, without a log of your activity being transmitted and stored. It turns out that in the current version of the macOS, the OS sends to Apple a hash (unique…

To Avoid Prison For Leaving Bad Hotel Reviews Online, An American in Thailand Must Apologize

The New York Times reports:
He’s very, very sorry. But the hotel in Thailand that threatened an American guest with prison for his bad reviews may end up with bigger regrets. Wesley Barnes, the American guest, publicly apologized on Friday for his blunt online reviews of the Sea View Koh Chang resort in Thailand. In exchange, the hotel promised it would drop…

America’s FBI Warns of Security Risks in Using Hotel Wi-Fi

“Most users don’t seem to realize the severity of the risks they’re subjecting themselves to while using hotel Wi-Fi networks,” writes Windows Report, noting that America’s FBI “issued a Public Service Announcement concerning the risks of using hotel Wi-Fi networks while teleworking.” Apparently, more and more U.S. hotels started advertising room reservations during the daytime for those who seek a distraction-free…

Biogen Conference Likely Led To 20,000 COVID-19 Cases In Boston Area

schwit1 shares a report from The Boston Globe: A new study estimates the Biogen conference held at Boston’s Marriott Long Wharf hotel in February played a far greater role in spreading the coronavirus than previously thought. The research team analyzed the genetic sequences of the virus that caused COVID-19 in the 772 patients, almost all from Essex, Middlesex, Norfolk, and Suffolk…