Reports were quarantined by software designed to protect fraud bureau’s computer system, watchdog told

Thousands of reports of cybercrime were quarantined on a police database instead of being investigated because software designed to protect the computer system labelled them a security risk.

The backlog at one point stretched to about 9,000 reports of cybercrime and fraud, some of them dating back to October last year. The reports had been made to Action Fraud and handed to the National Fraud Intelligence Bureau (NFIB), run by the City of London police.

Related: Plan for massive facial recognition database sparks privacy concerns

Related: Counter-terror police running secret Prevent database

Continue reading…

from Data and computer security | The Guardian https://ift.tt/2W9sGct
via IFTTT

Without greater access to our online habits, politicians cannot frame laws for the digital age

The UK government’s porn block was a dead man walking for months, if not years. It is long overdue that this attempt to curb children’s access to online pornography is scrapped. Almost two years ago, a close colleague and I sat in a meeting with one of the policymakers who had recently been asked to implement the proposal. The pained look on his face when we queried his progress confirmed our suspicions that it was an impossible task. It was clear to many that the block could – and would – never come to pass.

The plan did not have just one achilles heel – it had many.

Scientists and other stakeholders cannot access information about what the population is actually doing online

Related: UK drops plans for online pornography age verification system

Continue reading…

from Data and computer security | The Guardian https://ift.tt/2oNyRHd
via IFTTT

Chinese use state-owned enterprises, local tech companies and foreign partnerships, ASPI report says

The Chinese government is sweeping up vast amounts of data from all around the world to bulwark the nation’s security, but most critically to secure the political future of the Communist party, a new report argues.

Engineering Global Consent, a policy brief by the Australian Strategic Policy Institute’s Dr Samantha Hoffman, argues that the Chinese party-state seeks to influence – and where possible control – global online and political environments so that public sentiment around the world is more favourable towards its interests. China has expanded its operations of influence into organisations such as universities in the UK, the US and Australia.

Related: Peter Dutton: China accuses home affairs minister of ‘shocking’ and ‘malicious’ slur

Sign up to receive the top stories from Guardian Australia every morning

Related: Australia’s relationship with China in a ‘terrible’ state after Morrison’s US visit, Labor says

Continue reading…

from Data and computer security | The Guardian https://ift.tt/2MED9IK
via IFTTT

Describing a documented database as ‘secret’ risks causing unjustified distrust in a multi-agency programme that seeks to protect those vulnerable to all forms of radicalisation and keep our communities safe, writes Chief Constable Simon Cole

Your front-page lead (7 October) talks of a “secret” police Prevent database. It is not a very well kept “secret”; a quick online search brings up numerous references to its existence in public documents – and it is where the published annual referral statistics are sourced from. The Prevent pages on the National Police Chiefs’ Council website also refer to the fact Prevent officers keep records.

We do this for exactly the same purpose we document other forms of supportive safeguarding activity such as for child sexual exploitation, domestic abuse or human trafficking. It means we can be – and are – subject to oversight and accountability.

Continue reading…

from Data and computer security | The Guardian https://ift.tt/35gJm6b
via IFTTT

Messages can only be seen under UV light and can be erased using a hairdryer

Forget lemon juice and hot irons, there is a new way to write and read invisible messages – and it can be used again and again.

The approach, developed by researchers in China, involves using water to print messages on paper coated with manganese-containing chemicals. The message, invisible to the naked eye, can be read by shining UV light on the paper.

Continue reading…

from Data and computer security | The Guardian https://ift.tt/2lwp1b7
via IFTTT

Fining YouTube for targeting adverts at children as if they were adults shows progress is being made on both sides of the Atlantic, writes Steve Wood of the Information Commissioner’s Office

The conclusion of the Federal Trade Commission investigation into YouTube’s gathering of young people’s personal information (‘Woeful’ YouTube fine for child data breach, 5 September) shows progress is being made on both sides of the Atlantic towards a more children-friendly internet. The company was accused of treating younger users’ data in the same way it treats adult users’ data.

YouTube’s journey sounds similar to many other online services: it began targeting adults, found more and more children were using its service, and so continued to take commercial advantage of that. But the allegation is it didn’t treat those young people differently, gathering their data and using it to target content and adverts at them as though they were adult users.

Continue reading…

from Data and computer security | The Guardian https://ift.tt/2LCgzBb
via IFTTT

Students using events app Get, previously known as Qnect, may have had their personal data exposed online

The personal details of an estimated 50,000 students involved in university clubs and societies around Australia may have been exposed online, in the second breach of its kind for the company holding the data.

Get, previously known as Qnect, is an app built for university societies and clubs to facilitate payments for events and merchandise. The app operates in four countries with 159,000 active student users, and 453 clubs using it.

Continue reading…

from Data and computer security | The Guardian https://ift.tt/2HXj5zw
via IFTTT

Our head of investigations explains how a new IT system, Giant, has the power to find needles in journalistic haystacks

There aren’t too many places to hide at the Guardian. The offices are open-plan and most of the meeting rooms have glass walls.

There is one room, however, that has a special status. In recent years, when we have been involved in big investigations, this is the place where reporters and editors have relocated for months on end.

Continue reading…

from Data and computer security | The Guardian https://ift.tt/2UvOqi6
via IFTTT

Users of Zao can now add themselves into the scenes of their favourite movies. But is our desire to insert ourselves into everything putting our privacy at risk?

‘You oughta be in pictures,” goes the 1934 Rudy Vallée song. And, as of last week, pretty much anyone can be. The entry requirements for being a star fell dramatically thanks to the launch, in China, of a face-swapping app that can decant users into film and TV clips.

Zao, which has quickly become China’s most downloaded free app, fuses the face in the original clip with your features. All that is required is a single selfie and the man or woman in the street is transformed into a star of the mobile screen, if not quite the silver one. In other words, anyone who yearns to be part of Titanic or Game of Thrones, The Big Bang Theory or the latest J-Pop sensation can now bypass the audition and go straight to the limelight without all that pesky hard work, talent and dedication. A whole new generation of synthetic movie idols could be unleashed upon the world: a Humphrey Bogus, a Phony Curtis, a Fake Dunaway.

Related: The rise of the deepfake and the threat to democracy

Continue reading…

from Data and computer security | The Guardian https://ift.tt/2LhOX45
via IFTTT

Android and Windows devices also targeted in campaign believed to be state-backed

Chinese Uighurs were the target of an iOS malware attack lasting more than two years that was revealed last week, according to multiple reports.

Android and Windows devices were also targeted in the campaign, which took the form of “watering hole attacks”: taking over commonly visited websites or redirecting their visitors to clones in order to indiscriminately attack each member of a community.

Related: China’s hi-tech war on its Muslim minority

Continue reading…

from Data and computer security | The Guardian https://ift.tt/2ZK6TZh
via IFTTT