Another tale to do with advertising, it just goes to show it’s really not a good idea to run JavaScript from a 3rd party source on your site, especially if you don’t want your visitors redirected to a p*rn site!

This is just what happened to Perl.com a few days ago.

Visitors to Perl.com, the O’Reilly Media-owned resource, were redirected on 17th of January to a link farm pushing p*rn sites.

Geeks who hit the site were sent to grepblogs-dot-net, a site that offers links to live adult webcams, erotic blogs and adult erotic fiction, among other things. Closing the Internet Explorer browser window that contains the site caused another link farm of dubious links to open, from a site called cnomy-dot-com. It carries more p*rno links and banner ads claiming visitors have won a free iPod.

“I was aghast,” said Tom Christiansen, author of many of the most popular Perl reference books. “I need to understand the nature of the problem.”

Odd that the name of the p*rn site is pretty geeky too, grep blog? Doesn’t sound like your run of the mile adult webcam directory right?

I guess spammers and getting more clued in, targeting a Perl site..using a geeky blog name – pretty smart.

The episode is the latest example of the perils that come from running ads and javascript from a third-party website. In recent months, rogue ads hosted on DoubleClick, Real Media and others have infected websites. While such services often make life easier for administrators, they also create opportunities for miscreants to defraud users.

Since 2006, HTML code on the Perl.com website has pulled javascript off of the grepblogs site, said Dale Dougherty, general manager of the O’Reilly divisions that’s responsible for upkeep of Perl.com. Once the content on the grepblogs site changed, visitors to the site were soon redirected to other sites. O’Reilly admins fixed the problem at about 6:30 a.m. California time on Friday by nullifying the script.

As many of the members here have done, blocking JavaScript may be a good idea, blocking ads may help or just not surfing at all!

Of course not using Internet Exploder Explorer also goes a long way.

Source: The Register

Aha! Trojans strike again. Really, I still think it all comes down to education, it doesn’t seem to be a targeted attack though.

Just a random infection from your average porn site Trojan.

Electronic files containing personal data of up to 2,200 Oregon taxpayers may have been compromised by an ex-employee’s unauthorized use of a computer, the Oregon Department of Revenue said Tuesday.

Amy McLaughlin, an information technology security officer with the state, said the incident apparently occurred when an employee downloaded a contaminated file from a porn site.

There was no apparent pattern on the data taken.

Hardin said the released data likely involved names or addresses or Social Security numbers, or possibly in some cases all three.

It’s unclear if it was damaging but said some of the data may have gotten back to the porn site.

Ed O’Meara, head of the department’s information processing division, said about 1,600 files had been identified so far and that the total likely will not surpass 2,200.

He said 1,300 letters were sent out to the affected taxpayers as of Monday night and the rest are being contacted as they are identified.

Source: Katu News

It’s sad when a country has to resort to this to control it’s people, freedom to watch p*rn for Cambodians!

Heeding a request from his wife, Prime Minister Hun Sen on Friday banned the latest generation of mobile phone services in Cambodia to curb the dissemination of p*rnography.

Bun Rany, along with the wives of several other senior government officials, recently urged Hun Sen to prohibit the use of third-generation, or 3G, phones in the impoverished country because they can be used to spread obscene images.

Such phones – which few can afford in Cambodia – are capable of displaying high-quality video and images over wireless broadband connections.

I really don’t see what the big issue with p*rnography is, don’t Cambodians have sex? I mean there is a VERY high rate of mental health issues there, after the khmer rouge regime…but still? Isn’t this a little harsh?

On Friday, Hun Sen said he agrees with his wife and that while Cambodia is still unable to cope with p*rnography on the Internet, “how can we go for video phones?

“Hold it. Do not yet start the mobile phone services through which the callers can see each others’ images,” he said in a speech during a visit to a Buddhist pagoda in the capital, Phnom Penh.

“Maybe we can wait for another 10 years or so until we have done enough to strengthen the morality of our society,” he said.

Alcatel, a French telecommunications firm, announced in February that it would provide 3G mobile services to CamGSM, a Cambodian mobile phone network.

Strengthen the morality? Hello?

It seems like he somewhat looks down upon his populous.

The 3G mobile phone “is way too advanced for us. Hearing each other’s voices and exchanging text messages should be enough. If we go further than this, it could be more difficult for us to control” p*rnography, he said.

It was unclear if legislation is necessary for the ban to take effect. Hun Sen’s orders are often carried out without challenge by Cambodia’s government and lawmakers.

Cambodia is predominantly Buddhist and socially conservative. People normally do not talk openly about sex.

Source: Associated Press

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Haha, well serves them right, get out and get laid guys.

Online payment company iBill on Thursday said a massive cache of stolen consumer data uncovered by security experts did not come from its database.

“I’m the first person that would have taken this to the FBI and the first person to have gone on 60 Minutes to say ‘we screwed up,’ if that were the case,” said iBill President Gary Spaniak Jr.

Two caches of stolen data were discovered separately by two security companies while conducting routine research into malicious software online. Both had file names that purportedly linked them to iBill.

Losers..but well iBill seems to be off the hook anyway, could be part of a massive Phishing scam.

He says as long as iBill stays in business, it will try to repay those webmasters. “Over $20 million has been paid back, we have plans for paying back another $18 million.”

James says the actual source of the stolen data remains a mystery. An FBI spokeswoman says the bureau wouldn’t investigate the breach unless the source of the leak comes forward to make a complaint.

Source: Wired News