This may be one of the
“other retailers” related to Target. Note: If we are already
seeing the card data in use, the breach is old enough for the
breachers to gather, organize, and sell the data.
Sources:
Card Breach at Michaels Stores
Multiple sources in the
banking industry say they are tracking a pattern of fraud on cards
that were all recently used at Michaels Stores Inc.,
an Irving, Texas-based arts-and-crafts retailer that maintains more
than 1,250 stores across the United States.
Update 1:34
p.m. ET: The U.S. Secret Service confirmed
that it is investigating a potential data breach at Michaels. Also,
Michaels has just issued a statement stating that it “recently
learned of possible fraudulent activity on some U.S. payment cards
that had been used at Michaels, suggesting that the Company may have
experienced a data security attack.”
… It really does
look like kind of the way we saw the Target breach spin up, because
the fraud here isn’t limited to one store or one area, it’s
been all over the place.”
A cautionary tale. Is
it in fact “User Error” when a technology changes without a clear
explanation of the new features? Does anyone conduct a scenario
review to see what new data might be exposed?
The Stream Team writes:
Google’s
latest operating system for Android, called the KitKat, has faced
criticism
from transgender users who say it fails to protect their privacy.
A
key feature of the software is Google+ integration with contacts, SMS
messages and texts. Attention was drawn to the potential problems
this update poses for trans users when a trans woman named Erika
Sorensen was inadvertently outed
to her coworker. The software update makes the Google Hangouts
instant messaging chat platform the default for all messages, so when
Sorensen texted a coworker, her name appeared as Erika rather than
her previous male name she was still using at work.
Read more on The
Stream Team and then read this very powerful piece on the issue
by Violet
Blue if you haven’t read it already. And when you look around
for examples of “privacy harm,” think of this situation.
Some functions should
never be outsourced. If 40% were “flushed,” were the remaining
60% perfect?
POGO
– DOJ Sues Firm That Screened Edward Snowden and Navy Yard Shooter
by Sabrina
I. Pacifici on January 25, 2014
“On Wednesday
[January 23, 2014], the Justice Department filed its long-awaited
complaint
in a False Claims Act lawsuit against background check contractor
U.S. Investigations Services (USIS). In October last year, Justice
announced it had intervened in the lawsuit, which was filed in
2011 by former USIS employee Blake Percival. Percival’s
complaint is posted here.
The government claims
that, from March 2008 through September 2012, USIS defrauded the
government by submitting at least 665,000 incomplete background
investigations of current or prospective federal and contractor
employees, which were used to determine eligibility for access to
classified information and suitability for sensitive jobs.
Specifically, the government accuses USIS of engaging in a practice
known inside the company as “dumping” or “flushing,” through
which it allegedly submitted investigations that it falsely claimed
were complete and had undergone quality review. The government paid
USIS between $95 and $2,500 for each of these 665,000
investigations (about 40 percent of USIS’s total workload
during that time period) and also paid USIS more than $11.7 million
in annual performance bonuses. USIS made
national news last year as the firm responsible for the
background investigations of Navy Yard shooter Aaron Alexis and NSA
surveillance program whistleblower Edward Snowden. It is not clear
from the government’s complaint whether USIS’s 2011 investigation
of Snowden is among the thousands USIS allegedly falsified. (USIS’s
investigation of Alexis, conducted in 2007, is presumably outside the
scope of the lawsuit.) It also does not state whether USIS’s
alleged fraud resulted in any serious security breaches or if any of
the allegedly tainted background investigations had to be reopened…”
Perspective
Microsoft
releases global survey on Internet users around the world
by Sabrina
I. Pacifici on January 25, 2014
“A new global survey
of Internet users conducted by Microsoft Corp. reveals distinct
regional findings and differing viewpoints between the developed and
developing world. However, overwhelmingly the more than 10,000
people surveyed from 10 nations said they embrace personal
technology, particularly in emerging markets, and see it as the
foundation of innovation and economic empowerment. Microsoft
unveiled the results of its new survey today at the World Economic
Forum in Davos, Switzerland, in the report titled, Views
from Around the Globe: How Personal Technology is Changing Our
Lives.”
[From
the article:
We invite you to read
the entirety of our survey, entitled “Views from Around the Globe:
How Personal Technology Is Changing Our Lives,” by clicking
here. The survey was taken between Dec. 26, 2013 and Jan. 3,
2014. The 10 countries surveyed include the U.S., France, Germany,
Brazil, Russia, China, India, Japan, Mexico and Turkey.
Global Cooling! Global
Cooling! Take that, Al Gore.
Solar
Lull Could Trigger Another 'Little Ice Age,' Sun Scientists Say
Every week, and it's
free!
… After penning a
letter to the campus protesting proposed budget cuts, CSU
sociology professor Tim McGettigan had his email
suspended by the university. McGettigan’s email compared the
budget cuts to the Ludlow massacres (the massacre in 1914 of striking
coal miners in the region). The university said the email was a
threat and compared
McGettigan to the shooters at Columbine and Virginia Tech. By
the end of the week – after a huge outcry about academic freedom
and the administration’s inability to grasp analogy, McGettigan’s
email was restored. More
via Inside Higher Ed.
… Last
week, two Yale students got in trouble for
creating a website to help other students plan their course schedule.
In response to the university shutting down that site, another
student Sean Haufler made an “unblockable
replacement.” The URL for his blog post is great:
“i-hope-i-dont-get-kicked-out-of-yale-for-this/” – and I
don’t think he will. Yale
later admitted that it had made a mistake in banning the website.
… Microsoft
Research has adopted an open
access policy for its researchers’ publications.
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