Google added a new feature to Gmail which will detect suspicious activity in your account and notify you when an intruder has attempted to login to your account.

If Google detects a possible intrusion, it will display the following warning in your inbox that your account was accessed from a specific location.

By clicking on the “Details” link next to the [warning] message, you’ll see the last account activity window that you’re used to, along with the most recent access points.

If you think your account has been compromised, you can change your password from the same window. Or, if you know it was legitimate access (e.g. you were traveling, your husband/wife who accesses the account was also traveling, etc.), you can click “Dismiss” to remove the message.

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More information about OnlineFamily.Norton

“A rootkit infection may be the cause of a Windows Blue Screen of Death issue experienced by Windows XP users who applied the latest round of Microsoft patches. It appears that the affected Windows PCs had the rootkit infection prior to deploying the Microsoft patches. Researcher Patrick W. Barnes, investigating the issue, has isolated the infection to the Windows atapi.sys file, a driver used by Windows to connect hard drives and other components. Barnes identified the infection as the Tdss-rootkit, which surfaced last November and has been spreading quickly, creating zombie machines for botnet activity.”

Patrick’s Article
(Patrick’s site is currently being “slashdot-alanched” and is unavailable.)

Tdss-rootkit information

If this is true and you experience this crash after updating you will need to take steps to clean this infection off your computer. This post will be updated as information develops.

Kids’ Top 100 Searches of 2009

• YouTube, Google, and Facebook top the list
• Sex and Porn round out the top 5
• Kids spend most of their time searching for music related topics (30%), then TV/movie related topics (12%).
• The most popular celebrity kids searched for was Michael Jackson. Taylor Swift came in second.
• Team Jacob won over Team Edward, with Taylor Lautner coming in at #80 and Robert Pattinson being nonexistent in the top 100.
• Other top celebs on kids’ list of searches include Miley Cyrus, Lady Gaga, Justin Bieber, Selena Gomez, Lil Wayne, Megan Fox, Eminem, Beyonce, Britney Spears, Demi Lovato, Black Eyed Peas, Jonas Brothers, Rihanna, and Chris Brown.
• Kids are searching for shopping sites like eBay, Walmart, Target, and Best Buy.

Top Searches of 2009 – Boys vs. Girls

• YouTube, Google, and Facebook show up in the top three of both boys’ and girls’ search terms.
• Boys’ #4 search term was Sex while girls’ #4 search term was Taylor Swift. Girls were still interested in Sex, though, with the term coming it at #5.
• Boys’ most popular celebrity search term was Michael Jackson.
• Boys’ top 25 search terms were mainly comprised of social networking sites, various websites, shopping sites, inappropriate terms, and games.
• Girls’ top 25 search terms were main comprised of social networking sites, as well as music and entertainment/celebrity terms.
• Both boys’ and girls’ most popular search terms were related to music, though it was higher in terms of percentages for girls at 42% compared to boys at 22%.
• Boys search more adult topics compared to girls (13% vs. 2%).

Top Searches of 2009 – By Age Group

• Youtube, Facebook, and Google comprise the top 3 search terms for kids.
• Sex comes in at #4 for teens and tweens while porn comes in #4 for kids 7 and under.
• Taylor Swift was the top searched for term among teens. For tweens and kids 7 and under, it was Michael Jackson.
• Teens and tweens spend most of their search time online on music related subjects (34% and 27%).
• Kids under the age of seven spend most of their search time online on games (23%).
• Kids under the age of seven are conducting searches for P2P sites like Limewire and Mininova.

…

OnlineFamily.Norton surveyed a whole lot of parents and put a great deal of thought into the core features needed to provide a robust communication-based tool that aims to bring you and your family closer together as you work to manage your online lifestyles.

Key features of OnlineFamily.Norton include:

Personal Profiles

Your child is unique. You can manage, update, and adjust each profile based on their individual ages, tastes, and interests. This way OnlineFamily.Norton can grow with your children.

Web Monitoring

With OnlineFamily.Norton, you can view the sites that your children visit. This lets you know if they’ve been exposed to inappropriate or potentially harmful material. You can also block sites or types of sites that you think are inappropriate.

Chat Monitoring

With chat monitoring, you can ensure that your child’s friends online are people you know and trust.

Social Network Monitoring

You can learn how your child represents him or herself online, view the social networking sites that they belong to, and see which sites they visit most.

Time Limits

Tailor your child’s time allowance for computer use. You can set the total time limits for specific hours, or days of the week. So you can set curfews for school days vs. weekends.

Custom Alerts

Which alerts do you want? You decide which activities are most important to you, and which you don’t need to know about right away. So your alerts are tailored to your priorities.

Get Started With OnlineFamily.Norton

Below is an excellent article from Fox News about cyberscams during the holiday season.

Getting a bargain on Cyber Monday seems compelling. But with online shopping comes the risk of cyberscams.

According to Consumer Reports, cybercriminals have bilked $8 billion from consumers in the past two years. And as Americans open their wallets and their browsers for deals this week, scams and cheats are sure to increase.

To keep you safe as you shop, security company McAfee has broken down the 12 scams of Christmas, warning of the most common swindles crooks will use to try to sneak your wallet, your identity or access to your bank account. “These thieves follow seasonal trends and create holiday-related Web sites, scams and other convincing e-mails that can trick even the most cautious users,” warns Jeff Green, senior vice president of McAfee Labs.

Don’t let them get away with it! Never click links in e-mails, which can easily redirect you to false or misleading Websites. If you create a new account to buy, say, a new sweater from J Crew, use a unique password with letters and symbols, rather than using the same password for all of your log-ins.

And of course, be sure to use security software from a respected company. PCMag.com recently rounded up the 2010 versions of software suites from the big names in security: McAfee, Norton, Kaspersky, AVG, and more. Most packages run $50 to $80—a small price to pay for peace of mind as you shop.

Scam I: Charity Phishing

During the holiday season, hackers take advantage of citizens’ generosity by sending e-mails that appear to be from legitimate charitable organizations. In reality, they are fake Web sites designed to steal donations, credit card information and the identities of donors.

Scam II: Fake Invoices from Delivery Services

During the holidays, cybercriminals often send fake invoices and delivery notifications appearing to be from Federal Express, UPS or the U.S. Customs Service. They e-mail consumers asking for credit card details or require users to open an online invoice to receive a package. Once completed, the person’s information is stolen or malware is automatically installed on their computer.

Scam III: Social Networking Friend Requests

Cybercriminals take advantage of this time of the year by sending authentic-looking “friend request” e-mails from social networking sites. Clicking on links in these e-mails can automatically install malware on your computer or steal your personal information.

Scam IV: Holiday E-Cards

Cyber thieves cash in on consumers who send holiday e-cards in an effort to be environmentally conscious. Last holiday season saw phony Hallmark e-cards and McDonald’s and Coca-Cola holiday promotions. Holiday-themed PowerPoint attachments are also popular among cybercriminals.

Scam V: Holiday Jewelry

McAfee Labs recently uncovered a new holiday campaign that leads shoppers to malware-ridden sites claiming to offer discounted luxury gifts from Cartier, Gucci, and Tag Heuer. Cybercriminals even use fraudulent Better Business Bureau logos to trick shoppers into buying products they never receive.

Scam VI: Online Identity Theft

As bargain hunters surf for deals using free wireless networks at the local cafe, hackers can spy on their activity and steal their personal information.

Scam VII: Phony Websites

During the holidays, hackers create Websites for people searching for holiday-related wallpaper, Christmas carol lyrics or festive screensavers. Downloading holiday-themed files from these sites may infect one’s computer with spyware, adware or other malware.

Scam VIII: Job-Related E-mail Rip-offs

Scammers are preying on desperate job-seekers, with the promise of high-paying jobs and work-from-home moneymaking opportunities. Once interested persons submit their information and pay a set-up fee, hackers steal their money instead of following through on the promised employment opportunity.

Scam IX: Auction Site Fraud

Scammers often lurk on auction sites during the holiday season. Buyers should beware of auction deals that appear too good to be true, because often these purchases never reach their new owner.

Scam X: Password Robbery

Password theft is rampant during the holidays. Thieves use low-cost tools to uncover a person’s password and send out malware to record keystrokes, called keyloggers. Once criminals have access to one or more passwords, they gain vast access to consumers’ bank and credit card details and clean out accounts within minutes. They also commonly send out spam from a user’s account to their contacts.

Scam XI: E-Mail Banking

Cybercriminals more actively trick consumers into divulging their bank details during the holidays, by sending official-looking e-mails from financial institutions. They ask users to confirm their account information, including a user name and password, with a warning that their account will become invalid if they do not comply. They often sell this information through underground online black markets.

Scam XII: Ransomware Boondoggles

Hackers gain control of people’s computers through these holiday scams. They then act as virtual kidnappers to hijack computer files and encrypt them, making them unreadable and inaccessible. The scammer holds the user’s files ransom by demanding payment in exchange for getting them back.

Shopping on Cyber Monday? Beware the 12 Scams of Xmas

There is a new Facebook worm which will direct you to a link containing pornography. The following are the details of the worm:

The hook to the new Facebook worm appears in a friend’s profile as the racy image at left.

Click the image, and you are brought to a Web page with the same image.

Analysis by famous malware analyst Nick Fitzgerald calls this a CSRF
(Cross-Site Request Forgery) attack, a cousin to cross-site scripting:

A sequence of iframes on the exploit page call a sequence of other pages and scripts, eventually resulting in a form submission to Facebook “as if” the victim had submitted a URL for a wall post and clicked on the “Share” button to confirm the post.

Afterward, you are redirected to a porn site.

AVG’s Roger Thompson writes about the same issue to note that its LinkScanner protection blocks this attack and that another hook to the same malicious site is operating as “the popular farmville app” (I’ve never heard of it). All of the authors say that this is something that needs to be fixed by Facebook, and they expect it to be fixed very soon.

Source:
PC Magazine Security Watch

Scareware is a type of malware designed to trick victims into purchasing and downloading useless and potentially dangerous software.

Scareware, which generates pop-ups that resemble Windows system messages, usually purports to be antivirus or antispyware software, a firewall application or a registry cleaner. The messages typically say that a large number of problems — such as infected files — have been found on the computer and the user is prompted to purchase software to fix the problems. In reality, no problems were detected and the suggested software purchase may actually contain real malware. If the user falls for the scam, he will lose the money he paid for the useless software and he may also make his computer unusable. Frequently, the message window has a clickjacking feature that takes the user to the attacker’s Web site or initiates a malware download if the user clicks “Cancel” or the “X” to close the window.

Source:
What is scareware?

You should always have an Internet Security Suite, installed on each of your family’s computers.