On Wednesday, a Georgia man pleaded guilt y to hacking the Apple accounts of professional athletes and musicians. Beginning in at least March 2015, 27-year-old Kwamaine Jerell Ford made accounts meant to mimic Apple customer service. He sent emails targeting college and professional athletes — including NBA and NFL players — and rappers. Authorities have not released the names of those impacted. Ford took accounts over by attempting to reset the password, changing the contact email, and changing the security questions. Apple reported that they received “hundreds” of unauthorized logins from the victims’ accounts. On some accounts, Ford found credit card information, which he used to pay for “thousands of dollars in air travel, hotel stays, other travel expenses, furniture, and money transfers”. “The high profile victims in this case are an example that no matter who you are, hackers like Ford are trying to get your personal information,” FBI agent Chris Hacker said. “This case...
Microsoft announced it is increasing its cybersecurity for think tanks in the U.S. and abroad, ahead of the European Parliament elections. The company said that it has detected attacks against employees of the German Council on Foreign Relations, The Aspen Institutes in Europe, and The German Marshall Fund through its Threat Intelligence Center and Digital Crimes Unit. “We believe the work of organizations like The German Marshall Fund and its Alliance for Securing Democracy are an essential part of efforts to secure democracies against those who seek to undermine it,” Microsoft Customer Security & Trust Vice President Tom Burt said in a blog post . “Many organizations essential to democracy do not have the resources or expertise to defend themselves against cyberattacks.” The cyber attack targeted more than 100 accounts across Europe between September and December 2018. Microsoft said its ongoing investigation leads it to believe that Strontium, a Russian-linked hacker group,...
The internet is the gateway to so many opportunities, and for some people, it has become just as important to their daily lives as the food they eat. On the flip side, the internet makes us vulnerable to a lot of individuals or organizations with malicious intent. With information being so easy to access these days, all anyone needs to become a hacker is just a computer and internet access. This makes every single internet user a potential victim of hacking. Fortunately, there are actions you can take to protect yourself from hackers. Here are a few of them. Enter private information on secure websites only There are numerous websites claiming to be trustworthy all in the bid to rope you into divulging sensitive information like passwords or credit card details. You have to ensure that the website is authentic before you enter sensitive details into any field. A good way to check is to make sure the connection with the site is “ https:// ”, which means the site is encrypted and...