Congress Approves Big Changes to 401(k) and IRA Accounts: Everything You Need to Know - CNET

The omnibus spending bill for 2023 now includes many changes to the rules on retirement accounts.

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'Nepo Babies' Explained: What They Are, and Why Everyone's Talking About Them - CNET

A new generation is discovering an old truth: Kids of celebrities have an easier path to fame than nobodies.

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Three-Legged Deer Tangled in Christmas Lights Gets Help From Humans - CNET

This is a timely reminder to secure your holiday decorations to protect wildlife.

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Latest Tech News

As we enter the festive season, its peak trading time for online scammers - but luckily the FBI has waded in, recommending the use of ad blockers to keep safe. 

In recent public service announcement, the agency warned that fake ads can be put at the top of search results, indistinguishable from the results themselves, and can be very convincing when impersonating legitimate brands. 

The FBI mentioned that ads could be pretending to be from cryptocurrency exchanges, and clicking on them can result in malware being installed on your system, stealing sensitive data and ultimately your money. 

Staying safe

Other recommendations from the agency include checking the URL before clicking on a link to make sure it is legitimate by looking out for spelling errors, and typing the web address directly into your browser of the business you are looking for rather than searching for it.

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In its advice to business, the FBI recommended using domain protection services to be notified when similar domain names are registered and to inform customers of any imposter websites. 

Ad blockers do what they say - they prevent adverts from appearing on your browser. There chief benefit is to stop intrusive and long-loading ads such as videos getting in your way and slowing you down.

However, they also prevent these ads from tracking you, stopping big data harvesters such as Google and Facebook from discovering your browsing habits while online, either on desktop or on mobile devices.

For this reason, the agency's announcement is unlikely to please big tech, who seem to walking a tightrope between trying to nullify their use without upsetting the large user base of such extensions.

Recently, popular ad blocker uBlock Origin complained about the upcoming API changes in Chrome, which look set to prevent it and other ad blocking extensions in chromium browsers from working. Browsers built on chromium include Microsoft Edge and Opera.

Google also confirmed in the summer that VPN apps on Android devices that block advertisements will no longer be available on the Play store. 

• Our pick of the best antivirus software around

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Save Up to 72% on Body Massagers and Get Relief From Sore Muscles - CNET

Renpho massage guns, leg massagers, foot massagers and more have major discounts right now at Amazon.

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Latest Tech News

Someone found a way to bypass the two-factor authentication (2FA) security measure at Comcast Xfinity and compromise countless accounts, reports have claimed. 

Following the bypass, the attackers are able to use the compromised accounts to try and take over cryptocurrency exchange accounts and cloud storage services.

On December 19 Xfinity email users started getting notified of changes to their account information, but their passwords were already changed so they couldn’t enter. Those that managed to get back into the account found that a secondary email address was added to the account, from a disposable domain yopmail.com.

Bypassing 2FA

The secondary email address is a security measure used by some email providers that help with password resets, account notifications, and similar. 

Many of the victims took to Twitter, Reddit, and Xfinity forums to discuss what had happened, and said that they had 2FA enabled. So, whoever was behind the attack, managed to guess the password with credential stuffing, and then managed to bypass the two-factor authentication security measure. BleepingComputer’s report states the attackers used a “privately circulated OTP (one-time password) bypass” which allowed them to generate working 2FA verification codes.

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That gave them access to the account, and adding the secondary, disposable email account, allowed them to perform the password reset process.

After gaining complete control over the compromised email accounts, the threat actors then proceeded to breach further online services, assuming people's identities to request email resets. Dropbox, Evernote, Coinbase, and Gemini, are just some of the services that the threat actors tried to breach.

Xfinity is keeping silent on the matter for the time being, but a customer said on Reddit that the firm is aware of the incident and is currently investigating. The same source also said that according to a customer support employee they spoke to, the issue seems to be quite widespread.

• Here's our rundown of the best endpoint protection services right now

Via: BleepingComputer

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Latest Tech News

If your fancy new Corsair keyboard has started typing full sentences you first typed in days or even weeks ago, seemingly at random, don't worry - it isn't possessed. 

It is also not infected with any form of malware, keyloggers, or infostealers. Instead, it’s just an ugly bug that Corsair wasn’t even aware of, and is currently investigating the matter further.

The news, which first broke on Ars Technica, came from Corsair’s users, with multiple reports posted to the company’s forum about how their K100 keyboard suddenly started typing in full sentences that they had typed in the past. The keyboard was repeating the user’s keystrokes verbatim - if the user made a typo and backtracked - the keyboard did the same thing.

No foul play

Obviously, this left users fearing that an infostealer might be at play. After all, the keyboard was capable of typing out passwords or repeating sensitive text messages that were sent to other people in confidentiality. 

However, after analyzing the keyboard’s behavior in safe mode, it was determined that it didn’t have malware installed - it was just buggy.

As it turns out, the K100 has a macro recording function that sometimes turns itself on and begins recording keystrokes and mouse activity. The macros get saved and replayed at random, at a later date. 

A company’s spokesperson told Ars Technica, “Corsair keyboards unequivocally do not log user input in any way and do not have the ability to log individual keystrokes”.  

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While the company managed to determine how the bug happens, the why is still a mystery.

Corsair is currently investigating the matter and the first thing it determined is that factory resetting the device won’t help much. Still, those that wish to stop the keyboard while typing out their passwords during a company presentation, need to unplug it and hold down the ESC button for five seconds, while plugging the peripheral back in. 

• Here's our list of the best endpoint protection services around

Via: Ars Technica

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Wear This 'Snack Scarf' to Smuggle Food Out of Holiday Parties - CNET

The scarves from Hefty come with hidden slider storage bags. Sounds like Homer Simpson's dream scarf.

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Latest Gadgets News

NASA has formally retired its Mars InSight lander, the first robotic probe specially designed to study the deep interior of a distant world, four years after it arrived on the surface of the red planet, the US space agency announced on Wednesday. Mission controllers at NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory (JPL) near Los Angeles determined the mission was over when two co...

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Ursids Boost the Holiday Meteor Count This Week: How to See the Forgotten Meteor Shower - CNET

Some gifts are best left unwrapped, because they're going to be lit on fire when they crash into our atmosphere.

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Latest Tech News

Zerobot, a botnet that infects various Internet of Things (IoT) devices and uses them for distributed denial of service (DDoS) attacks, has been updated with new features and new infection mechanisms. 

A report from Microsoft's security team claims that the malware used to integrate IoT devices into the botnet has reached version 1.1.

With this upgrade, Zerobot can now leverage flaws found in Apache and Apache Spark to compromise various endpoints and later use them in the attacks. The flaws used to deploy Zerobot are tracked as CVE-2021-42013 and CVE-2022-33891. 

Abusing Apache flaws

CVE-2021-42013 is actually an upgrade for the previous fix, designed to patch CVE-2021-41773 in Apache HTTP Server 2.4.50. 

As the latter was insufficient, it allowed threat actors to use a path traversal attack to map URLs to files outside the directories configured by Alias-like directives, the cve.mitre.org site explains. “If files outside of these directories are not protected by the usual default configuration "require all denied", these requests can succeed. If CGI scripts are also enabled for these aliased pathes, this could allow for remote code execution. This issue only affects Apache 2.4.49 and Apache 2.4.50 and not earlier versions.”

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CVE-2022-33891, on the other hand, affects the Apache Spark UI, and allows attackers to perform impersonation attacks by providing an arbitrary username, and ultimately, allows the attackers to run arbitrary shell commands. This affects Apache Spark versions 3.0.3 and earlier, versions 3.1.1 to 3.1.2, and versions 3.2.0 to 3.2.1, cve.mitre.org explained.

The new version of Zerobot also comes with new DDoS attack capabilities, Microsoft explained. These capabilities allow threat actors to target different resources and render them inaccessible. In almost every attack, the report states, the destination port is customizable, allowing threat actors who purchase the malware to modify the attack as they see fit.

• These are the best firewalls at the moment

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New Retirement Savings Rule Changes: Here's What's Coming for Your 401(k) and IRA - CNET

The omnibus spending bill expected to pass Congress this week includes major changes to the rules for retirement accounts.

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Latest Tech News

Google has announced that it is set to drop TrustCor Systems as a root certificate authority (CA) for its web browser.

The tech giant cited a “loss of confidence in its ability to uphold these fundamental principles and to protect and safeguard Chrome's users” in a group discussion.

Joel Reardon, a professor and mobile space privacy researcher at the University of Calgary, said that his team had “uncovered and disclosed a spyware SDK embedded in apps that were invasively tracking users”.

TrustCor root certificate authority

In a joint effort with Wall Street Journal investigative journalists, it was found that TrustCor was registered just a month apart from the company behind the SKD, known as Measurement Systems, both in Panama. 

Reardon points out in his notice:  “To be clear, I have found no evidence of TrustCor issuing a bad certificate or otherwise abusing the authority they have in code signing, SMIME, and domain validation… Perhaps the identical ownership of TrustCor and Measurement Systems is a coincidence.”

Beyond this, there are a number of unfortunate, related coincidences that have led companies like Microsoft and Mozilla to drop TrustCor as a root CA, too.

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The change is set to take effect with the rollout of Chrome 111, which is set to land on March 7, 2023, following a beta release around one month before. Previous versions of Chrome capable of receiving component updates will also be included in the change.

Just how long we’ll have to wait for the change to make its way to Android devices is uncertain. Unlike Chrome for desktop, which can be tweaked by itself, Android’s root certificate is updated as part of the entire operating system, which is likely to cause a delay.

While some apps, like Firefox for Android, can configure their own set of CAs on top of the operating system’s root store, this isn’t the case with Chrome.

While tech giant Apple is yet to announce any decision that it will make, TrustCor has published a public statement on its website.

•  These are the best privacy tools and anonymous browsers around

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Multiple cybersecurity firms have confirmed the existence of Godfather, an Android banking malware that has been found targeting victim's bank and cryptocurrency accounts. 

Experts at Group-IB, ThreatFabric, and Cyble have all recently reported on Godfather, its targets, and methodologies, which sees the malware attempt to steal login data by overlaying legitimate banking and cryptocurrency apps (exchanges, wallets, and similar). 

The group found that Godfather has targeted more than 400 different entities, with most of them being in the US (49), Turkey (31), Spain (30), Canada (22), France (20), Germany (19), and the UK (17). 

Multiple infection vectors

What’s more, the malware analyzes the endpoint it infected, and if it determines that the device language is either Russian, Azerbaijani, Armenian, Belarusian, Kazakh, Kyrgyz, Moldovan, Uzbek, or Tajik, it shuts the whole operation down - leading some of the researchers to believe that the threat actors are of Russian origin.

The exact number of infected devices is impossible to determine, as Play Store is not the only infection vector. In fact, the malware has had a relatively limited distribution through Google’s app repository, and the main distribution channels are yet to be discovered. What we do know, courtesy of Cyble’s research, is that one of the malicious apps has more than 10 million downloads under its belt. 

But when a victim downloads the malware, they first need to give it permissions, which is why in some instances, it imitates “Google Protect” and demands access to the Accessibility Service. If the victim provides, the malware takes over SMS texts and notifications, starts recording the screen, exfiltrates contacts and call lists, and more. 

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By turning on Accessibility Service, the malware gets even harder to eliminate, too, and allows threat actors to exfiltrate Google Authentication one-time passwords, as well. 

The researchers also said that the malware has additional modules that can be added, giving it extra features such as to launch a VNC server, enable silent mode, establish a WebSocket connection, or dim the screen.

• Here's our list of the best firewalls out there

Via: BleepingComputer

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Content creators eyeing up the new AMD Radeon RX 7900 XTX could be in for a disappointment. 

Benchmarking the GPU across popular content creation apps, Puget Systems found AMD’s latest offering lagged below the standards set by rival Nvidia.

The results chime with our own tests, where the graphic card remains a great option for gaming PCs, but creative workload performance could best be described as “just ok”. 

AMD Radeon RX 7900 XTX: Benchmarking  

The team over at Puget put the GPU through its paces, running a range of video editing software, VFX software, and 3D modeling software on Team Red’s most powerful graphics card. 

DaVinci Resolve was first up. The free video editing software is well-equipped to take advantage of high-end GPUs, and it’s here where the graphics card shone. 

According to Puget  the 7900 XTX showed more than a 30% overall performance boost compared to the older Radeon 6900 XT. It even edged out the Nvidia GeForce RTX 4090 to hit the top spot. 

It also achieved high marks in the H.264/HEVC and RAW debayering tests, outperforming the 6900 XT and about on par with the RTX 4090. 

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Next, the custom PC builder tried out Adobe Premiere Pro, which doesn’t make much use of GPUs as a whole. Overall, it increased performance by 22% over past AMD GPUs. However, it failed to beat the RTX 4090 or 4080, with Puget noting it was “more in line with the RTX 3080 and 3090 models.” 

In Adobe After Effects, the 7900 XTX was found to be a mid-table performer. As in other tests, performance was overall superior to the 6900 XT, but couldn’t keep up with the GeForce 4080, 3090, or 4090. 

Nor did the card perform well in Unreal Engine with mixed results when used alongside the top game development tool. The team found “in rasterized workloads, the 7900 XTX performs quite well, in one test nearly matching the slightly more expensive RTX 4080. But in the other rasterized test, the 7900 XTX had the lowest score of all cards tested.” 

Finally, the 7900 XTX was used for 3D rendering software Blender. And it makes grim reading, with the GPU “unable to match the rendering power of the NVIDIA GeForce RTX series.” While GPU rendering showed a 70% performance increase compared to AMD’s RX 6900 XT, Nvidia’s RTX 4080 proved to be almost three times faster. 

In the final analysis, Puget Systems suggested that while certain content creation workloads would benefit from the AMD Radeon RX 7900 XTX, Nvidia’s line-up remained its top choice for creators. 

• Find out where to buy the AMD Radeon RX 7900 XTX 

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