I wish that I could use a stronger password for this site. 8 characters are NOT enough.
Response (Gaurav Sharma) 02/06/2010 05:53 AM
Thank you for your email regarding your online password.
I would like to inform you that our website has a 128 bit encryption. With this base, passwords that comprise only of letters and alphabets create an algorithm that is difficult to crack. We discourage the use of special characters because hacking softwares can recognize them very easily.
The length of the password is limited to 8 characters to reduce keyboard contact. Some softwares can decipher a password based on the information of “most common keys pressed”.
Therefore, lesser keys punched in a given frame of time lessen the possibility of the password being cracked.
Moreover, American Express is committed to protecting the privacy and security of all of our Cardmembers, both on-line and off-line. We believe that our current security measures, which include our sophisticated monitoring systems to detect unusual or fraudulent card activity, provide strong, ongoing protections for our Cardmembers.
Rest assured, I have forwarded your comments to our webmaster for review. During this review, we may contact you if additional information is required.
We value your membership and wish goodness and health to you and your family.Sincerely,
Gaurav Sharma
Email Servicing Team
American Express Interactive Services
O_o
Secretary of State Hillary Clinton’s announcement of a new U.S. policy on global Internet Freedom included a bold new statement about the responsibilities of American technology companies:
“…We are urging U.S. media companies to take a proactive role in challenging foreign governments’ demands for censorship and surveillance. The private sector has a shared responsibility to help safeguard free expression. And when their business dealings threaten to undermine this freedom, they need to consider what’s right, not simply what’s a quick profit.”
We couldn’t agree more. While Clinton focuses on media companies — meaning Internet media companies like Google, Yahoo! and Microsoft — there are plenty of other companies deserving scrutiny. Specfically, many U.S. (and multinational) technology companies may be knowingly selling Chinese authorities the surveillance equipment used to commit or facilitate human rights abuses. We think it’s high time to pay attention to them as well.
Full Article (EFF - eff.org)
If you’re a registered broker or work for firm that sells any sort of investment products, you’ll want to think twice before blurting out anything that could be construed as investment advice on Facebook, Twitter, or any other social networking site. The Financial Industry Regulatory Authority (FINRA) has updated its guidelines for interpreting the rules that govern how brokers present advice to the public to cover online social networks; and, in some cases, the guidelines rely on social network monitoring and archiving technology that doesn’t even exist yet.
Full Article (Ars Technica - arstechnica.com)
Easily the most-viewed post at krebsonsecurity.com so far has been the entry on a cleverly disguised ATM skimmer found attached to a Citibank ATM in California in late December. Last week, I had a chance to chat with Rick Doten, chief scientist at Lockheed Martin’s Center for Cyber Security Innovation. Doten has built an impressive slide deck on ATM fraud attacks, and pictured below are some of the more interesting images he uses in his presentations.
Full Article (Krebs on Security - krebsonsecurity.com)
A major hurdle to producing fusion energy using lasers has been swept aside, results in a new report show. The controlled fusion of atoms - creating conditions like those in our Sun - has long been touted as a possible revolutionary energy source. However, there have been doubts about the use of powerful lasers for fusion energy because the “plasma” they create could interrupt the fusion. An article in Science showed the plasma is far less of a problem than expected. The report is based on the first experiments from the National Ignition Facility (Nif) in the US that used all 192 of its laser beams. Along the way, the experiments smashed the record for the highest energy from a laser - by a factor of 20.
Full Article (BBC - bbc.co.uk)
As the practice of high-frequency trading continues to become more widespread, concerns are growing that erroneous trades carried out by “algos gone wild”—a sort of digitally amplified version of the “fat finger” phenomenon—could cause a market crash at Internet speed, a meltdown that no one could stop. Two recent market glitches could provide a preview of what’s to come.
Full Article (Ars Technica - arstechnica.com)
Time to get your science fiction hats on, but leave the fiction visor off this time. The BBC has gotten all hot and bothered today about a newly published research report indicating a significant advancement in the field of plasma-based disinfection of both healthy and wounded human skin.
BlueBeat.com made waves this week in the music world by selling remastered Beatles tracks for a quarter a piece. Now, hit with a federal copyright lawsuit, the company behind the site has responded… and it says that BlueBeat actually owns the copyright on the works it sells. EMI is not amused.
Social networking sites like Facebook and LinkedIn raise “serious new challenges” for financial regulators, the head of the largest U.S. independent securities regulator said on Tuesday.
When you are in security long enough, people in your daily life seem to seek you out when they have a problem that may be security related. This morning was one of those times, when a friend showed me her most recent ATM receipt in a panic. She had gone to the bank to confirm that $1,000 transfer she had expected had hit the account. Her savings balance: -$887,180.48.
With much fanfare and even a few parties, Windows 7 has arrived. In this extensive review, Peter Bright dives deep into Microsoft’s new OS offering to see what’s new, what’s still the same, and whether it’s worth upgrading.
Google has angered the Android enthusiast community by sending a cease and desist notice to a third-party developer who is building a popular custom version of the open source platform. Google doesn’t want its proprietary bits included in cooked ROMs.
Julius Genachowski, chairman of the Federal Communications Commission, plans to propose a new so-called net neutrality rule Monday that could prevent telecommunications, cable and wireless companies from blocking Internet applications, according to sources at the agency.
So here’s the deal with Wave: If you deal in technology, and you get this one wrong, you’ll miss the boat. And it’s a big boat. If, on the other hand, you get this one right, you have the potential to do some incredible innovation. In a nutshell, this is the next revolutionary leap in Internet application architecture. Maybe the first truly revolutionary leap since HTTP itself. I’ve been wanting to write this post for a while, but first I wanted to read fully thru and digest the specs and available code. I haven’t done any posts about XMPP for quite a while, but you’re going to start hearing a whole lot about it, and not just from me.
As the Kindle takes off in popularity, losses and thefts will as well. After hearing one reader’s tale of woe after losing his Kindle, we discovered that there are not that many options for recovery, though there could be if Amazon really wanted to offer them.
