An anonymous reader quotes a report from CBC News: The murder trial of a tech consultant in the stabbing death of Cash App founder Bob Lee begins Monday, a year and a half after the widely admired entrepreneur was found staggering on a deserted downtown San Francisco street seeking help. Lee's death at age 43 stunned the tech community, and fellow executives and engineers penned tributes to his generosity and brilliance. Lee was chief product officer of cryptocurrency platform MobileCoin when he died. He was a father to two children.

Prosecutors say Nima Momeni, 40, planned the April 4 attack after a dispute over his younger sister, Khazar, with whom Lee was friends. They say Momeni took a knife from his sister's condo, drove Lee to a secluded area and stabbed him three times, then fled. Defence lawyers disagree, and they say that Lee, high on drugs, attacked Momeni. "Our theory is that Bob had the knife, and that Nima acted in self defence," attorney Saam Zangeneh said.

He said his client is eager to tell his side of the story, but they haven't decided whether Momeni will testify in his defence. Momeni, who lives in nearby Emeryville, Calif., has been in custody since his arrest days after Lee died at a San Francisco hospital. Momeni's mother has been a steadfast presence at court hearings, and he is close to his sister. [...] Momeni, who has pleaded not guilty, faces 26 years to life if convicted. San Francisco Superior Court Judge Alexandra Gordon has told jurors the trial could last until mid-December.

9to5Mac's Filipe Esposito reports: Passkeys were introduced two years ago, and they replace traditional passwords with more secure authentication using a security key or biometrics. To make the technology even better, the FIDO Alliance published on Monday new specifications for passkeys, which ensure a way to let users import and export them. Currently, there's no secure way to move passkeys between different password managers. For example, if you've stored a specific passkey in Apple's Passwords app, you can't simply move it to 1Password, or vice versa. But that will change soon.

As just announced by the FIDO Alliance, the new specifications aim to promote user choice by offering a way to import and export passkeys. The draft of the new specifications establishes the Credential Exchange Protocol (CXP) and Credential Exchange Format (CXF) formats for transferring not only passkeys, but other types of credentials will also be supported. The new formats are encrypted, which ensures that credentials remain secure during the process. For comparison, most password managers currently rely on CSV files to import and export credentials, which is much less secure.

"Some prominent privacy advocates are encouraging customers to pull their data" from 23andMe, reports SFGate.

But can you actually do that? 23andMe makes it easy to feel like you've protected your genetic footprint. In their account settings, customers can download versions of their data to a computer and choose to delete the data attached to their 23andMe profile. An email then arrives with a big pink button: "Permanently Delete All Records." Doing so, it promises, will "terminate your relationship with 23andMe and irreversibly delete your account and Personal Information."

But there's another clause in the email that conflicts with that "terminate" promise. It says 23andMe and whichever contracted genotyping laboratory worked on a customer's samples will still hold on to the customer's sex, date of birth and genetic information, even after they're "deleted." The reason? The company cites "legal obligations," including federal laboratory regulations and California lab rules. The federal program, which sets quality standards for laboratories, requires that labs hold on to patient test records for at least two years; the California rule, part of the state's Business and Professions Code, requires three. When SFGATE asked 23andMe vice president of communications Katie Watson about the retention mandates, she said 23andMe does delete the genetic data after the three-year period, where applicable...

Before it's finally deleted, the data remains 23andMe property and is held under the same rules as the company's privacy policy, Watson added. If that policy changes, customers are supposed to be informed and asked for their consent. In the meantime, a hack is unfortunately always possible. Another 23andMe spokesperson, Andy Kill, told SFGATE that [CEO Anne] Wojcicki is "committed to customers' privacy and pledges to retain the current privacy policy in force for the foreseeable future, including after the acquisition she is currently pursuing."
An Electronic Frontier Foundation privacy lawyer tells SFGate there's no information more personal than your DNA. "It is like a Social Security number, it can't be changed. But it's not just a piece of paper, it's kind of you."

He urged 23andMe to leave customers' data out of any acquisition deals, and promise customers they'd avoid takeover attempts from companies with bad security — or with ties to law enforcement.

America's electric vehicle subsidies brought a 2-to-1 return on investment, according to a paper by the National Bureau of Economic Research. "That includes environmental benefits, but mostly reflects a shift of profits to the United States," reports the New York Times. "Before the climate law, tax credits were mainly used to buy foreign-made cars." "What the [subsidy legislation] did was swing the pendulum the other way, and heavily subsidized American carmakers," said Felix Tintelnot, an associate professor of economics at Duke University who was a co-author of the paper. Those benefits were undermined, however, by a loophole allowing dealers to apply the subsidy to leases of foreign-made electric vehicles. The provision sends profits to non-American companies, and since those foreign-made vehicles are on average heavier and less efficient, they impose more environmental and road-safety costs. Also, the researchers estimated that for every additional electric vehicle the new tax credits put on the road, about three other electric vehicle buyers would have made the purchases even without a $7,500 credit. That dilutes the effectiveness of the subsidies, which are forecast to cost as much as $390 billion through 2031.
The chief economist at Cox Automotive (which provided some of the data) tells the Times that "we could do better", but adds that the subsidies were "worth the money invested". But of course, that depends partly on how benefits were calculated: [U]ing the Environmental Protection Agency's "social cost of carbon" metric, they calculated the dollar cost of each model's lifetime carbon emissions from both manufacturing and driving. On average, emissions by gas-powered vehicles impose 57% greater costs than electric vehicles. The study then calculated harms from air pollution other than greenhouse gases — smog, for example. That's where electric vehicles start to perform relatively poorly, since generating the electricity for them still creates pollution. Those harms will probably fade as more wind and solar energy comes online, but they are significant. Finally, the authors added the road deaths associated with heavier cars. Batteries are heavy, so electric vehicles — especially the largest — are likelier to kill people in crashes.

Totaling these costs and then subtracting fiscal benefits through gas taxes and electricity bills, electric vehicles impose $16,003 in net harms, the authors said, while gas vehicles impose $19,239. But the range is wide, with the largest electric vehicles far outpacing many internal combustion cars.
By this methodology, a large electric pickup like the Rivian imposes three times the harms of a Prius, according to one of the study's co-authors (a Stanford professor of global environmental). And yet "we are subsidizing the Rivian and not the Prius..."

The Wall Street Journal delves into the origin story of that teenaged Grand Theft Auto VI leaker. Arion Kurtaj, now 19 years old, is the most notorious name that has emerged from a sprawling set of online communities called the Com... Their youthful inventiveness and tenacity, as well as their status as minors that make prosecution more complicated, have made the Com especially dangerous, according to law-enforcement officials and cybersecurity investigators. Some kids, they say, are recruited from popular online spaces like Minecraft or Roblox.... [William McKeen, a supervisory special agent with the FBI's Cyber Division] said the average age of anyone arrested for a crime in the U.S. is 37, while the average age of someone arrested for cybercrime is 19. Cybersecurity investigators have found posts they say suggest Kurtaj has been involved in online attacks since he was 11.
"He had limited social skills and trouble developing relationships, records say — and ultimately looked for approval in the booming world of cybercrime..." [When Kurtaj was 14] he landed in a residential school serving children with severe emotional and behavioral needs. Kurtaj was physically assaulted by a staff member at his school who was later convicted as a result, according to a person familiar with the case. In early 2021, his mother brought him home and removed him from government care, court records say. He never returned to school. He was 16.

A month after his mother pulled him out of school, investigators say that Kurtaj was part of a hacking group called Recursion Team that broke into the videogame firm Electronic Arts and stole 780 gigabytes of data. When Electronic Arts refused to engage, they dumped the stolen data online. Within a week of that hack, investigators had identified Kurtaj and provided his name to the FBI. Later in that summer of 2021, according to court records, Kurtaj partnered with another teenager, known as ASyntax, and several Brazilian hackers, and started calling themselves Lapsus$. The group hacked into the British telecommunications giant BT in an effort to steal money using a technique called SIM swapping... The hacks weren't always for money. In late 2021, Lapsus$ hacked into a website operated by Brazil's Ministry of Health and deleted the country's database of Covid vaccinations, according to law enforcement...

If the Com has a social center, it's a website called Doxbin, where users publish personal details, such as home addresses and phone numbers, of their online rivals in an attempt to intimidate each other. Kurtaj bought Doxbin in November 2021 for $75,000, according to Chainalysis. But after a few months, the previous owners accused Kurtaj of mismanaging the site and pressured him to sell it back. He relented. Then in January 2022, cybersecurity investigators say, he doxxed the entire site, publishing a database that included usernames, passwords and email addresses that he'd downloaded when he was the owner. For cybersecurity experts, it was a gold mine. "It helped investigators piece together which crimes were done by who," said Allison Nixon, chief research officer at Unit 221B, an online investigations firm.

Doxbin's owners responded with a dox of Kurtaj and his family, including his home address and photos of him, investigators say — setting up the chain of events that would put Kurtaj in the Travelodge.
After two weeks of "protective custody" there — during which time he was supposed to be computer-free — Kurtaj "was arrested a third time and charged with hacking, fraud and blackmail. Authorities said that while at the Travelodge, he broke into Uber and taunted the company by posting a link to a photo of an erect penis on the company's internal Slack messaging system, then stole software and videos from Rockstar Games. Stolen clips had popped up in a Grand Theft Auto discussion forum from a user named teapotuberhacker and stirred a frenzy.

"As officers collected evidence, the teen stood by, emotionless, police say...."

"Kurtaj's lawyers and some experts on autism have said a potential lifetime of incarceration isn't appropriate for a teenager like Kurtaj..."

Thanks to long-time Slashdot reader SpzToid for sharing the article.

In mid-2021 Ameria's National Security Advisor set up a new directorate focused on "advanced chips, quantum computing, and other cutting-edge tech," reports Wired. And the next year as Congress was working on boosting America's semiconductor sector, he was "closing in on a plan to cripple China's... In October 2022, the Commerce Department forged ahead with its new export controls."

So what happened next? In a phone call with President Biden this past spring, Xi Jinping warned that if the US continued trying to stall China's technological development, he would not "sit back and watch." And he hasn't. Already, China has answered the US export controls — and its corresponding deals with other countries — by imposing its own restrictions on critical minerals used to make semiconductors and by hoovering up older chips and manufacturing equipment it is still allowed to buy. For the past several quarters, in fact, China was the top customer for ASML and a number of Japanese chip companies. A robust black market for banned chips has also emerged in China. According to a recent New York Times investigation, some of the Chinese companies that have been barred from accessing American chips through US export controls have set up new corporations to evade those bans. (These companies have claimed no connection to the ones who've been banned.) This has reportedly enabled Chinese entities with ties to the military to obtain small amounts of Nvidia's high-powered chips.

Nvidia, meanwhile, has responded to the US actions by developing new China-specific chips that don't run afoul of the US controls but don't exactly thrill the Biden administration either. For the White House and Commerce Department, keeping pace with all of these workarounds has been a constant game of cat and mouse. In 2023, the US introduced the first round of updates to its export controls. This September, it released another — an announcement that was quickly followed by a similar expansion of controls by the Dutch. Some observers have speculated that the Biden administration's actions have only made China more determined to invest in its advanced tech sector.

And there's clearly some truth to that. But it's also true that China has been trying to become self-sufficient since long before Biden entered office. Since 2014, it has plowed nearly $100 billion into its domestic chip sector. "That was the world we walked into," [NSA Advisor Jake] Sullivan said. "Not the world we created through our export controls." The United States' actions, he argues, have only made accomplishing that mission that much tougher and costlier for Beijing. Intel CEO Pat Gelsinger estimated earlier this year that there's a "10-year gap" between the most powerful chips being made by Chinese chipmakers like SMIC and the ones Intel and Nvidia are working on, thanks in part to the export controls.

If the measure of Sullivan's success is how effectively the United States has constrained China's advancement, it's hard to argue with the evidence. "It's probably one of the biggest achievements of the entire Biden administration," said Martijn Rasser, managing director of Datenna, a leading intelligence firm focused on China. Rasser said the impact of the US export controls alone "will endure for decades." But if you're judging Sullivan's success by his more idealistic promises regarding the future of technology — the idea that the US can usher in an era of progress dominated by democratic values — well, that's a far tougher test. In many ways, the world, and the way advanced technologies are poised to shape it, feels more unsettled than ever.

Four years was always going to be too short for Sullivan to deliver on that promise. The question is whether whoever's sitting in Sullivan's seat next will pick up where he left off.

Formed in 2021 by cybersecurity professionals (and backed by high-powered VCs including Dell Technologies Capital), Halcyon sells an enterprise-grade anti-ransomware platform.

And this month they announced they're offering protection against ransomware attacks targeting Linux systems, according to Linux magazine: According to Cynet, Linux ransomware attacks increased by 75 percent in 2023 and are expected to continue to climb as more bad actors target Linux deployments... "While Windows is the favorite for desktops, Linux dominates the market for supercomputers and servers."
Here's how Halcyon's announcement made their pitch: "When it comes to ransomware protection, organizations typically prioritize securing Windows environments because that's where the ransomware operators were focusing most of their attacks. However, Linux-based systems are at the core of most any organization's infrastructure, and protecting these systems is often an afterthought," said Jon Miller, CEO & Co-founder, Halcyon. "The fact that Linux systems usually are always on and available means they provide the perfect beachhead for establishing persistence and moving laterally in a targeted network, and they can be leveraged for data theft where the exfiltration is easily masked by normal network traffic. As more ransomware operators are developing the capability to target Linux systems alongside Windows, it is imperative that organizations have the ability to keep pace with the expanded threat."

Halcyon Linux, powered through the Halcyon Anti-Ransomware Platform, uniquely secures Linux-based systems offering comprehensive protection and rapid response capabilities... Halcyon Linux monitors and detects ransomware-specific behaviors such as unauthorized access, lateral movement, or modification of critical files in real-time, providing instant alerts with critical context... When ransomware is suspected or detected, the Halcyon Ransomware Response Engine allows for rapid response and action.... Halcyon Data Exfiltration Protection (DXP) identifies and blocks unauthorized data transfers to protect sensitive information, safeguarding the sensitive data stored in Linux-based systems and endpoints...

Halcyon Linux runs with minimal resource impact, ensuring critical environments such as database servers or virtualized workloads, maintain the same performance.
And in addition, Halcyon offers "an around the clock Threat Response team, reviewing and responding to alerts," so your own corporate security teams "can attend to other pressing priorities..."

The Fifth Circuit Court of Appeals has affirmed a copyright infringement verdict against Internet provider Grande, which failed to take action against allegedly pirating subscribers. The jury's $47 million damages award in favor of the major music label plaintiffs is vacated. According to the Court (PDF), individual tracks that are part of an album, should not be counted as separate works. TorrentFreak reports: After hearing both sides, the Fifth Circuit Court of Appeals affirmed the jury verdict yesterday. Grande's arguments, suggesting that the district court mistakenly upheld the verdict earlier, were rejected. "The district court did not err in upholding the jury's unanimous liability verdict because Plaintiffs satisfied each element legally and factually," the decision reads. "The court correctly interpreted the law and instructed the jury on the relevant legal standards in light of the factual issues disputed by the parties, and Plaintiffs introduced ample evidence from which a reasonable jury could find in Plaintiffs' favor." [...]

In addition to the material contribution challenge, Grande and its supporters also pointed out that terminating Internet access isn't a "simple measure," as the jury concluded. Instead, it is drastic and overbroad, which could also impact innocent subscribers. The Court of Appeals rejects this reasoning. Instead, it states that the jury could and did conclude that terminations are a simple measure. There is no evidence to reach a different conclusion. All in all, the Court sees no reason to reverse the jury's verdict that Grande is liable for contributory infringement. This means that the jury verdict is affirmed.

Casio confirmed it suffered a ransomware attack earlier this month, resulting in the theft of personal and confidential data from employees, job candidates, business partners, and some customers. Although customer payment data was not compromised, Casio warns the impact may broaden as the investigation continues. BleepingComputer reports: The attack was disclosed Monday when Casio warned that it was facing system disruption and service outages due to unauthorized access to its networks during the weekend. Yesterday, the Underground ransomware group claimed responsibility for the attack, leaking various documents allegedly stolen from the Japanese tech giant's systems. Today, after the data was leaked, Casio published a new statement that admits that sensitive data was stolen during the attack on its network.

As to the current results of its ongoing investigation, Casio says the following information has been confirmed as likely compromised:

- Personal data of both permanent and temporary/contract employees of Casio and its affiliated companies.
- Personal details related to business partners of Casio and certain affiliates.
- Personal information of individuals who have interviewed for employment with Casio in the past.
- Personal information related to customers using services provided by Casio and its affiliated companies.
- Details related to contracts with current and past business partners.
- Financial data regarding invoices and sales transactions.
- Documents that include legal, financial, human resources planning, audit, sales, and technical information from within Casio and its affiliates.

An anonymous reader quotes a report from NPR : For the first time, internal TikTok communications have been made public that show a company unconcerned with the harms the app poses for American teenagers. This is despite its own research validating many child safety concerns. The confidential material was part of a more than two-year investigation into TikTok by 14 attorneys general that led to state officials suing the company on Tuesday. The lawsuit alleges that TikTok was designed with the express intention of addicting young people to the app. The states argue the multi-billion-dollar company deceived the public about the risks. In each of the separate lawsuits state regulators filed, dozens of internal communications, documents and research data were redacted -- blacked-out from public view -- since authorities entered into confidentiality agreements with TikTok.

But in one of the lawsuits, filed by the Kentucky Attorney General's Office, the redactions were faulty. This was revealed when Kentucky Public Radio copied-and-pasted excerpts of the redacted material, bringing to light some 30 pages of documents that had been kept secret. A group of more than a dozen states sued TikTok on Tuesday, alleging the app was intentionally designed to addict teens, something authorities say is a violation of state consumer protection laws. After Kentucky Public Radio published excerpts of the redacted material, a state judge sealed the entire complaint following a request from the attorney general's office "to ensure that any settlement documents and related information, confidential commercial and trade secret information, and other protected information was not improperly disseminated," according to an emergency motion to seal the complaint filed on Wednesday by Kentucky officials.

NPR reviewed all the portions of the suit that were redacted, which highlight TikTok executives speaking candidly about a host of dangers for children on the wildly popular video app. The material, mostly summaries of internal studies and communications, show some remedial measures -- like time-management tools -- would have a negligible reduction in screen time. The company went ahead and decided to release and tout the features. Separately, under a new law, TikTok has until January to divest from its Chinese parent company, ByteDance, or face a nationwide ban. TikTok is fighting the looming crackdown. Meanwhile, the new lawsuits from state authorities have cast scrutiny on the app and its ability to counter content that harms minors.

TechCrunch's Carly Page reports: Fidelity Investments, one of the world's largest asset managers, has confirmed that over 77,000 customers had personal information compromised during an August data breach, including Social Security numbers and driver's licenses. The Boston, Massachusetts-based investment firm said in a filing with Maine's attorney general on Wednesday that an unnamed third party accessed information from its systems between August 17 and August 19 "using two customer accounts that they had recently established."

"We detected this activity on August 19 and immediately took steps to terminate the access," Fidelity said in a letter sent to those affected, adding that the incident did not involve any access to customers' Fidelity accounts. Fidelity confirmed that a total of 77,099 customers were affected by the breach, and its completed review of the compromised data determined that customers' personal information was affected. When reached by TechCrunch, Fidelity did not say how the creation of two Fidelity customer accounts allowed access to the data of thousands of other customers.

In another data breach notice filed with New Hampshire's attorney general, Fidelity revealed that the third party "accessed and retrieved certain documents related to Fidelity customers and other individuals by submitting fraudulent requests to an internal database that housed images of documents pertaining to Fidelity customers." Fidelity said the data breach included customers' Social Security numbers and driver's licenses, according to a separate data breach notice filed by Fidelity with the Massachusetts' attorney general. No information about the breach was found on Fidelity's website at the time of writing.

The FBI created a cryptocurrency as part of an investigation into price manipulation in crypto markets, the government revealed on Wednesday. From a report: The FBI's Ethereum-based token, NexFundAI, was created with the help of "cooperating witnesses." As a result of the investigation, the Securities and Exchange Commission charged three "market makers" and nine people for allegedly engaging in schemes to boost the prices of certain crypto assets. The Department of Justice charged 18 people and entities for "widespread fraud and manipulation" in crypto markets.

The defendants allegedly made false claims about their tokens and executed so-called "wash trades" to create the impression of an active trading market, prosecutors claim. The three market makers -- ZMQuant, CLS Global, and MyTrade -- allegedly wash traded or conspired to wash trade on behalf of NexFundAI, an Ethereum-based token they didn't realize was created by the FBI.

"What the FBI uncovered in this case is essentially a new twist to old-school financial crime," Jodi Cohen, the special agent in charge of the FBI's Boston division, said in a statement. "What we uncovered has resulted in charges against the leadership of four cryptocurrency companies, and four crypto 'market makers' and their employees who are accused of spearheading a sophisticated trading scheme that allegedly bilked honest investors out of millions of dollars."

A new study suggests game piracy costs publishers 19% of revenue on average when digital rights management (DRM) protections are cracked. Research associate William Volckmann at UNC analyzed 86 games using Denuvo DRM on Steam between 2014-2022.

The study, published in Entertainment Computing, found cracks appearing in the first week after release led to 20% revenue loss, dropping to 5% for cracks after six weeks. Volckmann used Steam user reviews and player counts as proxies for sales data.

The European Union has delayed the introduction of a new biometric entry-check system for non-EU citizens, which was due to be introduced on Nov. 10, after Germany, France and the Netherlands said border computer systems were not yet ready. From a report: "Nov. 10 is no longer on the table," EU Home Affairs Commissioner Ylva Johansson told reporters. She said there was no new timetable, but that the possibility of a phased introduction was being looked at. The Entry/Exit System (EES) is supposed to create a digital record linking a travel document to biometric readings confirming a person's identity, removing the need to manually stamp passports at the EU's external border. It would require non-EU citizens arriving in the Schengen free-travel area to register their fingerprints, provide a facial scan and answer questions about their stay.

Porch pirates across the country for months have been snatching FedEx packages that contain AT&T iPhones -- within minutes or even seconds of delivery. From a report: The key to these swift crimes, investigators say: The thieves are armed with tracking numbers. Another factor that makes packages from AT&T particularly vulnerable is that AT&T typically doesn't require signature on delivery. Doorbell camera videos show the thefts in New York, Pennsylvania, Delaware, Virginia, Michigan, Georgia, Florida and Texas. The details are similar: A FedEx driver drops off a box with an iPhone from AT&T. Then a person walks up -- sometimes wearing an Amazon delivery vest -- and plucks the package off the front step. The heist can be so quick that in some videos, the FedEx driver and thief cross paths.

"They know what's getting delivered and the location," said Detective Lt. Matt Arsenault from the Gardner Police Department in Massachusetts, which is investigating several recent thefts. "They meet the delivery driver at the front door and take it." Since the pandemic, parcel carriers have reported a rise in porch thefts as workers have returned to offices and fewer people are home during the day to receive packages. Now, a spate of thefts that began a few months ago is targeting FedEx deliveries for AT&T. The two companies said they were working with law enforcement to investigate, and declined to disclose how many such packages have been stolen.