Windows bug fixed by Microsoft

In its latest monthly patch release, Microsoft has patched a Windows bug that was deemed "critical" and has possibly been being exploited by cyber criminals.

The MS07-061 patch fixes an important flaw in Windows' Uniform Resource Identifier, which is involved in Windows' process for passing information between applications. Ben Greenbaum, a senior research manager at Symantec, told the Associated Press that the security flaw is "concerning". By taking advantage of the security flaw, cyber criminals could take over a victim's computer and steal crucial information such as passwords and financial information. Once infected, the victim's computer could also be used to disseminate spam.

This month unusually saw only two patches released, the other of which was deemed "important", the second-highest level of security rating for a patch. The second patch is for those with computers running the Windows 2000 Server and the Windows Server 2003.

Companies 'not ready for disasters'

Many companies are not ready should the worst happen, the security software company Symantec has reported.

Though 91 percent of IT companies do carry out tests of their disaster-recovery abilities, more than half of those tests fail, a recent in-depth study found. Many IT professionals fear that a disaster could hurt their company's reputation, affect the loyalty of customers and result in company information being compromised, the research discovered.

Sean Derrington, director, storage management product marketing at Symantec, said: "IT executives are taking a fresh, hard look at their disaster recovery and business continuity strategies. "To protect against downtime, organizations must implement high availability and disaster recovery across their enterprise environments."

Companies also need to have procedures in place that allow for them to test their recovery abilities, Mr Derrington added. Meanwhile, Microsoft has found that phishing scams are successful approximately 0.4 percent of the time. For more information visit www.broadbandnational.com

Spam Surge Originates In China

There has been a significant rise in the amount of spam emails from the .cn domain according to the security software company Symantec.

The .cn domain is China's top level domain. However, there has been a drop in the levels of spam originating from Hong Kong, traditionally one of the most popular places to disseminate junk emails from, Symantec noted. Hong Kong has recently instituted wide-ranging new anti-spam laws.

Charles Mok Lai-kwong, the chairman of the Hong Kong Internet Society, told Hong Kong's South China Morning Post that spam has gone down by at least one-third. He said: "We have observed from local internet providers that the volume of spam has been decreasing over the past year by about 30 percent." There has also been a significant drop in the amount of image spam being disseminated. In July ten percent of spam messages were image spam, in contrast to 50 percent earlier in 2007.

Google Includes Security Software In Pack

Google Includes Security Software In Pack

Now the search engine giant Google has included the Norton Security Scan in its free pack of useful software, called Google Pack.

The Norton Security Scan is a user-friendly security tool that allows users to scan their PCs for viruses and spyware. In addition, the security software is able to remove all the viruses, trojans and malware, which it detects on a PC.

Rowan Trollope, vice president of the engineering consumer business unit at Symantec, said: "Offering Norton Security Scan through the Google Pack is the perfect way to reach the everyday Internet home user. "Our goal is to provide Internet users everywhere with a powerful and easy-to-use tool to help them evaluate, and understand threats that may reside on their PCs."

Meanwhile, weblogs on Google's Blogger.com page are being used in phishing attacks and to spread malware, according to a recent report. The site may have been chosen by cyber-criminals due to its popularity in search-engines, the research from Internet security firm Fortinet stated.

"Security continues to be at the forefront of Internet users concerns," states Mark Weibel, EVP of Marketing for Broadband National Inc. who operates the Internets leading comparative shopping website for digital products. "Norton has long been one of the leaders in security and is a terrific compliment to Googles suite of offerings."

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