Computer #1: Hackers Sell IDs for $14, Symantec Says

Malicious documents help crack servers and steal data, according to security report.
Jeremy Kirk, IDG News Service
Monday, March 19, 2007 08:00 AM PDT
Source: http://www.pcworld.com/article/id,129951-c,hackers/article.html


Identity thieves are offering a person's credit-card number, date of birth and other sensitive information for as little as US$14 over the Internet, said a new report on online threats released Monday.

The data is sold on so-called "underground economy servers," used by criminal organizations to hawk information they've captured through hacking, Symantec Corp. said in its Internet Security Threat Report, which tracked online trends from June to December 2006. The information can then be used for identity scams such as opening a bank account in a false name.
"U.S.-based credit cards with a card verification number were available for between US$1 to $6, while an identity -- including a U.S. bank account, credit card, date of birth and government-issued identification number -- was available for between $14 to $18," the report said.
Some 51 percent of the servers hosting the information were in the U.S., in part because the growth in broadband Internet access in the U.S. has created new opportunities for criminals, Symantec said. About 86 percent of the credit and debit card numbers available on those servers were issued by U.S. banks, it said.

One way that criminals have gained access to computers is by exploiting zero-day vulnerabilities, or software flaws that are being exploited as soon as they are revealed and before a patch has been released.

Symantec documented 12 zero-day vulnerabilities in the period from June to December 2006. Only one was found in its two prior six-month reporting periods, the company said.
Hackers have exploited some of those vulnerabilities by creating malicious documents in Microsoft Office and other software, said Ollie Whitehouse, a security architect at Symantec.
A malicious Word or Excel document, when attached to a spam e-mail, has a greater chance of being opened by someone since it may appear legitimate and be targeted at an employee of a specific company.

While security software programs will often block executable programs attached to e-mail, common Office documents are allowed to go through, Whitehouse said. "A business isn't going to say 'We will no longer accept Office documents received via email,'" Whitehouse said. "I think productivity would go through the floor at that point. Unfortunately, this is where the security requirement and the business requirement do really clash." A video posted on Symantec's blog, shows a sophisticated attack where a malicious document is opened that puts a harmful executable onto the system and then opens a regular Word document. The attack is almost invisible to the user, apart from a flicker on the screen before the Word document opens.
"Office documents -- PowerPoint presentations, Excel spreadsheets -- and graphics like JPEGs aren't necessarily considered malicious file formats, so the user is more inclined to open them," Whitehouse said.

Medicine #1: New Russian drug may help fight bird flu

Source: http://www.sciencedaily.com/upi/index.php?feed=Science&article=UPI-1-20070319-16171900-bc-russia-birdflu-crn.xml


ST. PETERSBURG, Russia, March 19 (UPI) -- Russian scientists have created a new anti-virus drug that they allege can help neutralize the potentially deadly H5N1 bird flu virus.
The Russian news agency ITAR-Tass reported scientists from the Russian Academy of Medical Sciences and the Russian Academy of Sciences developed the new drug that is far superior to current treatments.

Called Triazoverin, the academy's newest creation must wait for official state approval.
Russian Academy of Medical Sciences official Oleg Kiselev said the drug represents "a major achievement of Russian science and a result of fruitful cooperation of the two leading institutes of the Russian Academy of Sciences and the Russian Academy of Medical Sciences."
He added the new drug is unique in its ability to act at any stage of an infection, no matter how severe.

ITAR-Tass said the development project won funding from the Science of the Russian Federation and the Russian Ministry of Education.

Copyright 2007 by United Press International. All Rights Reserved.

Science #1: NASA Studies How Airborne Particles Affect Climate Change

Source: NASA Ames Research Center
Date: March 18, 2007
http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2007/03/070317131918.htm

Science Daily — A recent NASA study links natural and human-made aerosol particles to how much Earth warms or cools. Earth's atmosphere acts as a protective shield that regulates how much solar energy the planet absorbs or deflects. The Intercontinental Chemical Transport Experiment studied how chemicals and pollution affect that protective shield by measuring air flowing from North America and across the Atlantic Ocean.

Aerosol particles (haze particles suspended in the atmosphere, generally smaller than cloud droplets) affect climate by changing the flow of radiant energy from the sun to the Earth's surfaces and within the atmosphere. They do this both directly, by scattering and absorbing solar radiation, and indirectly, by changing cloud properties, rain, snow, and atmospheric mixing. Aerosol particles are extremely varied, in part because they have very many sources, both manmade and natural (e.g., car exhaust, power plants, forest fires, evaporation from petroleum products, agriculture, natural living plants, dust storms, breaking ocean waves, volcanoes). (Credit: Image courtesy of International Consortium for Atmospheric Research on Transport and Transformation (ICARTT))

"The majority of aerosols form a layer of haze near the Earth's surface, which can cause either a cooling or warming effect, depending on aerosol type and location," said Jens Redemann, lead author of the science paper at NASA Ames Research Center, Moffett Field, Calif.

Different types of aerosol particles can influence visible light and other kinds of radiation, affecting climate and temperatures, the scientists reported. "Changing the flow of radiation – including light – above and within the atmosphere changes the energy available for driving Earth's climate," said Phil Russell, also a NASA Ames scientist.

"Our study measured how aerosols change the flow of solar energy," Russell said. This solar energy includes visible light and also radiation at shorter and longer wavelengths in the ultraviolet and infrared ranges.

To find out the extent to which tiny particles in the air could affect climate, NASA scientists flew in a low-flying aircraft over the dark waters of the Gulf of Maine. Two types of instruments on the aircraft measured radiation from the sun.

Radiometers – devices that measure the intensity of radiant energy – measured total solar energy coming from all directions. At the same time, a sun photometer – an instrument that measures the intensity of the sun’s light – measured sunlight coming directly, straight from the sun through the atmosphere. The quantity of aerosols in the atmosphere between the sun photometer and the sun is proportional to the difference between the light intensity measured by the sun photometer and the amount of light that would pass through an aerosol-free atmosphere.

Combining measurements of total solar light intensity from all directions, solar light intensity directly, straight from the sun, and the amount of aerosols in the atmospheric column, scientists can estimate how much of the sun’s energy is scattered (redirected) and absorbed (causes heating) by atmospheric aerosols. These measurements are useful to climate scientists as a reality check for computer climate models.

Note: This story has been adapted from a news release issued by NASA Ames Research Center.