Hacking into a Gmail account proves to be an easy thing. Robert Graham (Ceo of Errata Security) gave a demo of it at Black Hat 2007 yesterday using an unprotected Wifi hotspot. The tools he used — nothing but 2 coded scripts called Ferret and Hamster.

Basically, he used Ferret to capture the Wifi signal Session IDs and Cookies from the victim’s Web browser session and used Hamster to clone the Session IDs/Cookies. The cloned web identity was then used to gain full read/ write access of the Gmail account. The scary part of it all is that one doesn’t need to be a super programmer to hack into an email system i.e. just knowing how to use the scripts would be enough. The term script kiddies comes to mind.

Just shows how much you should be aware of potential exploits within email. George Ou from Znet, posted a good article on security steps to safeguard yourself when using email. You should know however, that there is never a case where it is 100% hacker proof — to think it is would be foolish.

As you may (or may not) have known, Apple released their iPhone software update 1.01 security patch yesterday.

Here are some useful links around the blogosphere:

iPhone software update 1.0.1 released (updated) by Znet
Installation and update process (visual pictures included) by Znet
Tuaw’s analysis of the iPhone update
Information about the security content of iPhone v1.0.1 Update (Official Apple article)
Apple’s Security Download Page

Press Release

Bellevue, WA – March 7, 2007 – BSQUARE (Nasdaq: BSQR) has developed the first SecureMMC Client Software Suite for Windows Mobile 5.0 devices. The new product supports the new Secure MultiMediaCard specification, SecureMMC version 2.0. SecureMMC memory cards now enable secure downloading of songs and video to Windows Mobile devices, secure wireless financial transactions between Windows Mobile devices and point-of-sale terminals and secure data transfer between mobile professionals’ Smart phones and corporate enterprise networks over virtual private networks (VPN) lines.

“The new SecureMMC v2.0 standard, together with BSQUARE’s SecureMMC client software, allows both MMCA members and other mobile infrastructure ecosystem players to extend their business models since digital rights management and privacy of consumer and business data are now assured,” said Brian Crowley, president and CEO of BSQUARE.

MultiMediaCards offer features similar to Secure Digital cards. The two types of cards are based on separate but related industry standards. MMC and SecureMMC storage cards can be used in any device that supports Secure Digital (SD) storage cards as long as the software on the device supports them.

The market for mobile phones with removable memory cards like Secure Digital cards and MultiMediaCards reached over 277 million in 2006, compared to 115 million in 2005 (Source: Strategy Analytics Web site). Approximately 65% of mobile phone OEMs design their phones to use Secure Digital cards. MultiMediaCards can be used in these same phones with the appropriate client software support.

MMCA members can license the SecureMMC Client Software Suite from BSQUARE free of charge. Members pay a per device fee for implementation of the SecureMMC Client Software Suite when their devices ship. Email sales@bsquare.com or call 1-425-519-5900 for more information.

About BSQUARE

BSQUARE is a software solution provider to the global embedded device community. Committed to delivering quality, lowering project risk and time to market, our teams collaborate with smart device makers at any stage in their device development.

For those of you having Apple’s QuickTime media player on your computer, you may want to upgrade to the latest Quicktime version 7.1.5 that fixes 8 security flaws affecting Windows 2000, Windows XP, Windows Vista and Mac OS X users.

The vulnerabilities are considered highly critical due to the security risk level in code attacks. One of the flaws allows an attacker to gain control of a computer through the QuickTime player. Apple confirmed it with a product advisory which explains the flaws.

Latest product download [Quicktime 7.1.5]

If you are want a faster browsing experience on the Internet, OpenDNS may be an option for you.

Giving you a simplistic version of DNS (or Domain Naming System) - it is a system that translates domain names of websites and servers (like Yahoo.com, Google.com) to numerical IP addresses. Each IP address acts as a unique identification of where it is located on the internet and to which company or business it belongs to. Think of it like a street or house address. So when you type in a domain name on your browser, visit a web page or send an email, your ISP’s DNS Server automatically and transparently does the IP to Domain translation.

There are 2 factors that may influence and enhance your internet browsing experience:

Once you are sure that the first factor is out of the way, you can start concentrating on the later - making sure you have a good DNS. However, that may be a futile effort as most local ISPs would not give you access to their servers or mess with their DNS settings. That is where OpenDNS may be advantageous.

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