When is a Phone Charger Not A Charger ?

You might want to be a little more careful the next time you pick up a cheap knock-off accessory for your device to save a few bucks because new hardware hacks could be the next big thing among cyber criminals.

Researchers say they’ve built a custom iPhone wall charger that can install malware in any iOS device using a custom made malicious chargers called Mactans, which are in turn controlled by a Raspberry-Pi like computer called a BeagleBoard.

Mactans, which is named after the black widow spider’s Latin taxonomy, will be demonstrated by Billy Lau, Yeongjin Jang, and Chengyu Song at the Black Hat 2013 conference in July and they said all users were vulnerable to attacks over the charger.

They add that they can also demonstrate that the malware infection resulting from their malicious charger is persistent and tough to spot. In order for the malicious software to remain installed and unseen, the trio will show how an attacker can hide their software in the same way Apple hides its own built-in applications.

Researchers wanted to show just how easy and cheap it can be to cause a lot of virtual destruction in an innocent package. The security researchers have disclosed the vulnerability to Apple, but presumably Apple hasn’t fixed the hole yet as the researchers are refusing to give out exact details until the conference.

It doesn’t even matter what version of Apple iOS an iPhone or iPad the user is running, the hack doesn’t discriminate again any Apple platform.

19 Ways to Stop Big Brother Spying on You

What is a virtual private network (VPN)

A virtual private network (VPN) is a network that uses a public telecommunication infrastructure, such as the Internet, to provide remote offices or individual users with secure access to their organization’s network.

That’s all well and good but what do you really want a VPN for; looking at Facebook from school, downloading torrents from a site that your ISP has blocked, to watch streaming sites from a foreign county or just to stop big brother from spying on you.
So having said that below is a list of the top 19 free VPN services (would have been 20 but one site was down)

 

 

1) Free VPN by WSC

The Free VPN service protects web surfing session on your home Internet network as well as on Public Internet networks (both wired and wireless). Free VPN enables you to access all web content freely and securely. Free VPN supports Windows 7/Vista/XP (both 32 bit and 64 bit)

Free VPN Features

• Access blocked websites from within a corporate environment
• Watch Hulu.com, Pandora.com, ABC.com, BBC.co.uk Abroad
• Use VoIP software like Skype if it’s blocked.
• Protect yourself from snoopers at Wi-Fi hotspots, hotels, airports, corporate offices and ISP hubs.
• Hide your IP address for your privacy online.

Download – thefreevpn to access blocked websites.

2) Hotspot Shield

Hotspot Shield is yet another free VPN service available that ensures your privacy and security online. If you want to install Hotspot Shield on your iPhone then visit here for more information on how to configure free VPN on iPhone. It works on both wireless and wired connections providing unlimited Bandwidth. Supports Windows 7/Vista/XP, Mac OS, Snow Leopard.

Features of Hotspot Shield

• Secure your web session, data, online shopping, and personal information online with HTTPS encryption.
• Protect yourself from identity theft online.
• Hide your IP address for your privacy online.
• Access all content privately without censorship; bypass firewalls.
• Protect yourself from snoopers at Wi-Fi hotspots, hotels, airports, corporate offices.

Download – Hotspot Shield to protect your identity online

3) AlwaysVPN

AlwaysVPN creates an encrypted link between your computer and AlwaysVPN servers and then forwards all of your internet traffic through this link.

AlwaysVPN Features

• Prevent local eavesdroppers from listening in on your web communication.
• Bypass restrictive firewalls.
• Allows you to Access US only web content like Hulu, ABC and other video networks that were blocked previously.
• Bypass Government firewalls or web content filtering.

4) Tor VPN

Tor is free software that protects your online privacy, business activities and relationships. Torbutton blocks browser plugins such as Java, Flash, ActiveX, RealPlayer, Quicktime, Adobe’s PDF plugin, and others that can be manipulated by hackers into revealing your IP address and thereby stealing confidential information. Using Tor might disable Youtube. If you want to view videos at Youtube, you can reconfigure Torbutton to allow it. Supports Windows Mac OS and Linux.

Download Tor to protect your online privacy

5) ItsHidden

Most free VPN service on the Internet like Tor provides limited bandwidth or usage restriction. ItsHidden.com is the ultimate FREE surfing privacy service on the Internet that provides you over 5 GB of dedicated bandwidth to its users. ItsHidden works on BitTorrent (BT) traffic (both upload and download transfer) making it useful for users whose torrent traffic been choked by their ISP, or users who need to hide themselves for anti-piracy organizations from sharing copyrighted content. There is no software required and ItsHidden.com works on all Platforms including Windows, Mac, Linux, IPhone etc

Features of ItsHidden

• ItsHidden.com is fast and reliable with over 5 gigabits of dedicated bandwidth.
• Instant access & no software is needed
• Total privacy, no records of your surfing are kept by us
• 128-bit secure connection to ensure privacy over all networks

Sign up for ItsHidden VPN service.

6) UltraSurf

UltraSurf is a popular tool to protect Internet privacy with anonymous surfing and browsing. The tool hides or mask the IP addresses and locations, clean browsing history, cookies & more to hide your identity online. With Ultrasurf you can also browse any website freely, that were blocked before. Support Windows only.

Download UltraSurf 9.8. Firefox users need to download the Firefox add-on besides the software

7) NotMyIP

NotMyIP is free online privacy protection software that hides your real online identity from cyber thieves by masking your IP address, which might reveal sensitive information. Not my IP lets you access blocked websites, allows you to vote and comment on forums you were banned before, and further more to prevent other people (organizations) to follow you online by providing you different proxies from all over the world.

Download Not My IP – Free Online Protection Tool.

8) Freenet

Freenet is free tool that allows you to share files, browse, publish, and chat on forums, without fear of censorship anonymously. Freenet when used in “darknet” mode, where users only connect to their friends, is very difficult to detect. Communications by Freenet nodes are encrypted and are routed through other nodes to make it extremely difficult to determine who is requesting the information and what its content is. Supports Windows, Mac OS, Linux

Download Freenet for Windows, Mac OS and Linux

9) Freegate

Freegate is an anti-censorship tool that enables internet users from mainland China, Iran, Syria, Tunisia, Turkey and United Arab Emirates, to view blocked websites and content by their governments. The tool uses multiple open proxies allowing users to penetrate firewalls used to block web sites. Freegate works by tapping into an anti-censorship backbone, DynaWeb, DIT’s P2P-like proxy network system and FirePhoenix used most widely to get around China’s Great Firewall. Supports Windows OS only.

Download – Freegate to penetrate China’s Great Firewall

10) GPass

GPass is a highly advanced software that encrypts online data, hide IP address, and sidestep content filtering and monitoring using a number of secure channels to connect to the Internet and break through the Internet blockade. It encrypts the data sent on the internet, keeping your content safe. The tool allows accessing blocked websites by penetrating into the firewalls and bypassing network censorship. GPass supports streaming audio/video, email, instant messaging, download managers, as well as web surfing. Supports Windows.

Download GPass for Windows

11) JonDo

The JonDo anonymous proxy software protects your Internet access against observation from ISPs, websites and even against the anonymous proxy servers and their operators. Blogger can use it for publishing their views anonymously in order to avoid punishment, disadvantages at work.Supports Windows, Mac OS, Linux

Download JonDo for Windows Mac & Linux

12) UltraVPN

UltraVPN is a client/server SSL VPN solution based on OpenVPN. It encrypts and anonymizes your network connection.

UltraVPN Features

• Watch streaming websites like hulu.com or favorite-tvshows.com
• Access blocked websites from within a corporate environment
• Connect or log in into MSN if it’s blocked
• Use VoIP software like Skype if it’s blocked
• Protect your email and browsing privacy

Download UltraVPN for Windows

13) GNUnet

GNUnet is a secure peer-to-peer networking tool that uses a service on top of the networking layer allowing anonymous file-sharing. The tool uses link-encrypted connections with stable bandwidth utilization to communicate between peers. GNUnet uses a simple, excess-based economic model to allocate resources.

Download GNUnet for Windows, Mac & Linux

14) Alonweb

VPN service offers to preserve anonymity on the web and encrypt the transferred data. VPN provides a secure connection, hides your real IP address and encrypts the transferred data (correspondence, passwords, sent files). Just register yourself for free anonymous web surfing. Free VPN service from Alonweb offers its users connection via two servers: Netherlands and Panama with some limitations (not for premium users) like – Only 1Gb of data traffic per month is available, maximum HTTP request size is 2Mb, heavy traffic consuming protocols and games are blocked.

Register yourself on Alonweb for free VPN

15) Your Freedom

Your Freedom VPN service that bypass restrictive firewalls, filter web proxies and hides network or IP address. Once installed you can easily penetrate into a firewall or a filtering web proxy and access blocked web pages. The tool allows you to stay anonymous, as your IP address is not logged with every access to someone’s web page. Nearly all applications work with Your Freedom, but make sure to have an Internet access entirely. It also allow you to play many online games like World of Warcraft, Second Life, Lineage 2, Final Fantasy XI, EVE Online and many more through web proxies. Supports Windows and Mac

Download Your Freedom to bypass firewalls & Filter web proxies

16) CyberGhost

CyberGhost conceals your IP address and completely protects your data transmissions from eavesdroppers. With 128-bit AES encryption, you can surf anonymously. Supports Windows OS only.

Download CyberGhost to surf anonymously

17) Loki Network Project

It is free VPN service and SSL based free VPN server to protect your private data like IP address, e-mail/FTP/HTTP passwords, web-sites visited, uploaded/downloaded files and etc. It also bypasses internet access limitations, if any. Public Loki VPN Service also protects data from being intercepted by various network sniffers in your LAN segment and safely bypass traffic interception and analyses on corporate, ISP or even country level firewall. Supports Windows only.

Download Loki Network Project to bypass any limitations in visiting web-sites or any other Internet services

18) Comdo EasyVPN

Free VPN software, Comodo EasyVPN uses 128 bit encryption providing you complete security right on top of Internet. EasyVPN allows you to create your own private ‘network-within-the-Internet’ that only the contacts you invite are able to view and use.

Features of Comodo EasyVPN

• Access your PC from anywhere – EasyVPN makes it simple to gain control of any machine in your network.
• Security by Comodo – EasyVPN allows you to create your own private ‘network-within-the-Internet’ that only the contacts you invite are able to view and use.
• Remote File and Printer Sharing – Creating an EasyVPN network allows you to exchange files and folders and even print to your local printer from any remote location.

Download Comodo EasyVPN 32 bit version | 64 bit version

19) Wippien

Wippien allows you to access your friends’ shares, printers, services, desktop, even ping them by providing an IP address. Wippien uses WeOnlyDo wodVPN component to establish P2P between peers, and then redirects all traffic from Virtual Network Adapter through wodVPN to remote side.

Download Wippien

Backtrack Kali Tutorial – Exploit MS08-067 Vulnerability using Metasploit

This tutorial is for demonstration purposes only – Please use this knowledge responsibly

This video will show you how to create a reverse SSH connection to a server/workstation

This exploit is taking advantage of vulnerability MS08-067 using Metasploit on Kali.
This is a Kali VM attacking a Microsoft 2008 server (this will also work on any machine without the patch)

The moral of this is to update your system

http://www.kali.org

http://support.microsoft.com/kb/958644

Caintech.co.uk – Here comes Kali

Affected Software

Operating System

Microsoft Windows 2000 Service Pack 4

Windows XP Service Pack 2

Windows XP Service Pack 3

Windows XP Professional x64 Edition

Windows XP Professional x64 Edition Service Pack 2

Windows Server 2003 Service Pack 1

Windows Server 2003 Service Pack 2

Windows Server 2003 x64 Edition

Windows Server 2003 x64 Edition Service Pack 2

Windows Server 2003 with SP1 for Itanium-based Systems

Windows Server 2003 with SP2 for Itanium-based Systems

Windows Vista and Windows Vista Service Pack 1

Windows Vista x64 Edition and Windows Vista x64 Edition Service Pack 1

Windows Server 2008 for 32-bit Systems

Windows Server 2008 for x64-based Systems

Windows Server 2008 for Itanium-based Systems

Nintendo Say ‘U Are A Failure’

Wii U is seriously struggling Nintendo’s own figures show; just 300,000 consoles sold in last three months

Nintendo sold just 300,000 Wii Us in the first three months of the year.

The company revealed the number as it posted its financials for the last three months of its 2012 financial year.

Sales for the year hit ¥635.42bn (£4.2bn). That was 5.2 per cent lower than the company forecast. Analysts had predicted that the company would miss its targets.

However, it completely missed its net income prediction by almost 50 per cent. It had forecast a net income of ¥14bn (£920bn) for the 12 months ending March 2013, but made ¥7.1bn (£420.8m)

Nintendo blamed “weaker than expected sales” of both the 3DS and Wii U. It also said the currency markets had had an impact.

As a result, Nintendo made a loss of ¥43.2bn (£284m). That was down however on last year’s loss of ¥60.86bn (£403m).

However, it is the low sales figures for the Wii U that are grabbing the headlines.

The console has sold just 3.45m units since it was launched at the end of November.

In contrast to the Wii U, the Wii sold 2.65m units during the same point after launch (Jan – Mar 07 vs Jan – Mar 13). At the time, Nintendo simply couldn’t keep up with demand and the console was often sold out, with large waiting lists at retailers.

That statistic is made even more damning when you realise the Wii – despite being six year older than the Wii U – still managed to outsell its successor during the same three months.

According to Nintendo’s own figures, the 3.98m Wiis were sold since its new console launched. That’s 53,000 more Wiis sold than Wii Us.

Nintendo has said that it believes that when major software titles begin shipping later this year, sales will pick up.

However, with such low sales, it is feasible retailers may start scaling back the number of shelves they dedicate to the Wii U. If that starts happening before those games arrive, then the console will be in real trouble.

AMD To Unleash The Centurion – FX at 5GHz

AMD’s focus for the start of this year has been on explaining the virtues of Accelerated Processing Units (APUs) and driving up gaming interest with the impressive Never Settle bundle, available for most mainstream and high-end Radeon cards.

With attention directed elsewhere, AMD’s beleaguered FX processors have, it seems, been consigned to the ash heap of history. These chips do without the baked-in graphics present on APUs and, while perfectly reasonable in their own right, are overshadowed by Intel’s third-generation Core ‘Ivy Bridge’ processors.

So how about this as a rumour for a Friday morning? Though AMD will never go on record and confirm this, we have it on good authority that the chip-maker will soon be releasing a super-FX chip. Based on the same ‘Vishera’ architecture powering the current FX-8350, which runs at up to 4.2GHz, this new FX, codenamed ‘Centurion’, is to be made available in very limited quantities.

This so-called Centurion is guaranteed to run at 5GHz, on air, though we don’t know exactly what voltage or supporting hardware will be required for this lofty speed.

Here’s the kicker; our sources indicate that this limited-edition chip is set to cost a whopping $795 – this is not a typo! Yup, back to the pricing of FX chips of old. Is there any way that you, the readers, can countenance such pricing for an architecture that’s been in the doldrums of late? Let us know your thoughts

Googles April Fool – Google Nose

Happy first of April ~ April Fools’ Day is celebrated in many countries on April 1 every year. Sometimes referred to as All Fools’ Day, April 1 is not a national holiday, but is widely recognized and celebrated as a day when people play practical jokes and hoaxes on each other.

While spending my Monday morning investigating the latest news and comical images on Reddit and Google, I came across this ingenious post for Google’s new scentsation in search:

The new scentsation in search

• Coming to your senses: go beyond type, talk, and touch for a new notation of sensation.
• Your internet sommelier: expertly curated Knowledge Panels pair images, descriptions, and aromas.
• Take a whiff: the Google Aromabase – 15M+ scentibytes.
• Don’t ask, don’t smell: For when you’re wary of your query – SafeSearch included.

Have a look at the full page in all it’s glory: Google Nose

IE10, Chrome & Firefox Java exploited

During March Patch Tuesday of 2013, Microsoft released seven new security bulletins, with four rated as critical, and others as Important. Most interesting one was MS13-027, which is rated as “important” because the attack requires physical access to the vulnerable machine.

This flaw allows anyone with a USB thumb drive loaded with the payload to bypass security controls and access a vulnerable system even if AutoRun is disabled, and the screen is locked. Flaw exposes your Windows PCs to major risk. If you remember Stuxnet, worm was injected to Iran’s nuclear program system using USB thumb drive.

Windows typically discovers USB devices when they are inserted or when they change power sources (if they switch from plugged-in power to being powered off of the USB connection itself).

To exploit the vulnerability an attacker could add a maliciously formatted USB device to the system. When the Windows USB device drivers enumerate the device, parsing a specially crafted descriptor, the attacker could cause the system to execute malicious code in the context of the Windows kernel.

Because the vulnerability is triggered during device enumeration, no user intervention is required. In fact, the vulnerability can be triggered when the workstation is locked or when no user is logged in, making this an unauthenticated elevation of privilege for an attacker with casual physical access to the machine.

Microsoft admits the flaw could “open additional avenues of exploitation that do not require direct physical access to the system,” once the USB based exploit is successful.

The vulnerabilities addressed by Microsoft do not include those exploited by security researchers at the recent Pwn2Own hacking competition at the CanSecWest Conference in Vancouver.

Here Comes Kali

The official update from BackTrack Central:

Seven years of developing BackTrack Linux has taught us a significant amount about what we, and the security community, think a penetration testing distribution should look like. We’ve taken all of this knowledge and experience and implemented it in our “next generation” penetration testing distribution.

After a year of silent development, we are incredibly proud to announce the release and public availability of “Kali Linux“, the most advanced, robust, and stable penetration testing distribution to date.

Kali is a more mature, secure, and enterprise-ready version of BackTrack Linux. Trying to list all the new features and possibilities that are now available in Kali would be an impossible task on this single page. We therefore invite you to visit our new Kali Linux Website and Kali Linux Documentation site to experience the goodness of Kali for yourself.

We are extremely excited about the future of the distribution and we can’t wait to see what the BackTrack community will do with Kali. Sign up in the new Kali Forums and join us in IRC in #kali-linux on irc.freenode.net and help us usher in this new era.

How To Watch BBC iPlayer From Countries Other Than The UK

How to watch BBC iPlayer from countries other than the UK

Although this tutorial seems easy to do (and it is) it is a little know upgrade to a product that I have used for years. As I reside in the UK I can freely view BBC iPlayer for free, however to view the contents on pages like Hulu.com (which you have to be in the US to view) and bypass my ISPs ban on thepiratebay.se I use an application called Hotspot Shield. Just follow the next few set steps to get full and away you go.

Go to www.hotspotshield.com and download the free version

After the install you will see a little red shield. Double click the shield and you will see a popup window as below, just click the country you would like your IP to become and off you go you can now watch all the goodies that are not broadcast in your own country

What Most Schools Don’t Teach