News of the Cyber World

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NPD Hack Confirmed: Got Sued by Users

National Public Data admits hackers stole Social Security numbers in massive breach reportedly affecting nearly all Americans

The company that was named in a class-action lawsuit filed by internet users who claim that the Social Security number of every American was stolen from its servers has confirmed that it was hacked by cybercriminals who obtained the sensitive data.

Jerico Pictures Inc., the Coral Springs, Fla.-based entity that does business as National Public Data, released a statement last week in which it acknowledged that “the information that was suspected of being breached contained name, email address, phone number, social security number, and mailing address(es).”

NPD, which attributed the “data security incident” to an attempted hack by a “third-party bad actor,” released the statement on its website.
It said there was an attempted hack in December 2023 as well as “potential leaks of certain data in April 2024 and summer 2024.”

NPD, which conducts criminal background checks for employers and investigators “for some of the lowest fees in the industry,” did not specify how many people were affected.
The company said it had “cooperated with law enforcement and governmental investigators and conducted a review of the potentially affected records.”

NPD also said it undertook “additional security measures in efforts to prevent the reoccurrence of such a breach and to protect our systems.”

The company said it would be reaching out to all of the affected users “so that you can take action which will assist to minimize or eliminate potential harm.”
NPD recommended that online users “closely monitor your financial accounts and if you see any unauthorized activity, you should promptly contact your financial institution.”

Social Security number holders are also being encouraged to contact the three large credit reporting agencies — Equifax, Experian and TransUnion — in order to obtain a free credit report as well as to place a fraud alert on their file.

Fraud alerts, which are free of charge, lets creditors know that they should contact you in case someone tries to open any new accounts or change existing accounts that are under your name.

At least eight separate lawsuits have been filed against NPD since Aug. 1, when news of the breach came to light.

US Intel on Trump Campaign Hack

U.S. Intelligence Officials Say Iran Hacked the Trump Campaign

A joint statement that the FBI, the Office of the Director of National Intelligence (ODNI), and the Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency (CISA) released on Monday said hackers linked to the Iranian government were most likely responsible for the August cyberattack on former President Donald Trump’s presidential campaign.

“Iran perceives this year’s elections to be particularly consequential in terms of the impact they could have on its national security interests, increasing Tehran’s inclination to try to shape the outcome,” the statement said.

It continued:

We have observed increasingly aggressive Iranian activity during this election cycle, specifically involving influence operations targeting the American public and cyber operations targeting Presidential campaigns. This includes the recently reported activities to compromise former President Trump’s campaign, which [the U.S. intelligence community] attributes to Iran.

The three agencies added that they are “confident that the Iranians have, through social engineering and other efforts, sought access to individuals with direct access to the Presidential campaigns of both political parties.”

The Trump campaign said “foreign sources hostile to the United States” hacked it on August 10. The hackers provided stolen internal documents to the political news website Politico, including research the campaign conducted on Sen. JD Vance (R-OH) before Trump chose him as his running mate.

Trump campaign spokesman Steven Cheung said the hackers sought to “sow chaos throughout our democratic process,” an analysis that the intelligence community statement supported on Monday.

Microsoft security researchers released a report in early August warning that hackers linked to the Iranian government were attacking U.S. officials during the presidential campaign. Google published a similar report on August 13, specifically naming a hacker group tied to Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) as a major threat.

Vice President Kamala Harris’ presidential campaign said when the Google report was published that the FBI informed it of a threat from Iranian hackers in July. The Harris campaign said it was “not aware of any security breaches of our systems resulting from those efforts.”

The Iranian mission to the United Nations in New York dismissed the allegations in Monday’s intelligence community statement as “unsubstantiated and devoid of any standing.”

“As we have previously announced, the Islamic Republic of Iran harbors neither the intention nor the motive to interfere with the U.S. presidential election,” the Iranian mission said.

“Should the U.S. government genuinely believe in the validity of its claims, it should furnish us with the pertinent evidence -if any- to which we will respond accordingly,” the Iranians added.

British Tycoon Tech Missing

British Tech Tycoon Mike Lynch Among Those Missing After Sicily Superyacht Shipwreck

British tech magnate Mike Lynch and five other people were missing after their luxury superyacht sank during a freak storm off Sicily early Monday, Italy’s civil protection and authorities said. Lynch’s wife and 14 other people survived.

Lynch, who was acquitted in June in a big U.S. fraud trial, was among six people who remain unaccounted for after their chartered sailboat sank off Porticello, when a tornado over the water known as a waterspout struck the area overnight, said Salvo Cocina of Sicily’s civil protection agency.

One body had been recovered, and police divers were trying to reach the hull of the ship, which was resting at a depth of 50 meters (163 feet) off Porticello, near Palermo, where it had been anchored, rescue authorities said.

It had a crew of 10 people and 12 passengers, the Italian coast guard said. A sudden fierce storm had battered the area overnight, and struck the place precisely where the 56-meter (184-foot) British-flagged Bayesian had been moored.

“They were in the wrong place at the wrong time,” said Cocina, noting that another superyacht nearby wasn’t as badly damaged and helped rescue some of the 15 survivors, who included Lynch’s wife Angela Bacares.

The Bayesian was notable for its single 75-meter (246-feet) mast – one of the world’s tallest made of aluminum and which was lit up at night, just hours before it sank. Online charter sites listed it for rent for up to 195,000 euros (about $215,000) a week.

One of the survivors, identified as Charlotte Emsley, said she momentarily lost hold of her 1-year-old daughter Sofia in the water, but then managed to hold her up over the waves until a lifeboat inflated and they were both pulled to safety, Italian news agency ANSA reported, quoting the mother. The father, James Emsley, also survived, said Cocina.

Eight of the 15 people rescued and taken ashore at Porticello were hospitalized while the others were taken to a hotel. One body believed to be the cook was found near the wreck, but six others were unaccounted for and believed inside the hull, said Luca Cari, a spokesperson for the Italian fire rescue service.

Meta's Threads

‘Deathly Dull:’ Mark Zuckerberg’s Threads Is Failing to Live Up to the Anti-X Hype

Leftists around the world have been flocking to alternative social media platforms over the last year, fleeing Elon Musk’s X/Twitter. Although Mark Zuckerberg’s Threads has been touted as the ultimate X replacement, the reality is that many users find the platform “deathly dull.”

The Guardian reports that the social media world has been in flux since Elon Musk’s acquisition of Twitter, now rebranded as X, in 2022. Musk’s tenure has been controversial in the eyes of many leftists, who have been seeking out alternative platforms, with Meta’s Threads emerging as a frontrunner.

Threads, which launched just a year ago, has already amassed over 200 million active users, thanks in large part to its seamless integration with Instagram. This integration allows Instagram users to create a Threads account with just a few clicks, making it an attractive option for those looking to leave X. In contrast, other alternative platforms like Bluesky and Mastodon have struggled to gain the same level of traction.

For some users, like author and journalist Sathnam Sanghera, the decision to move away from X is driven by a desire to escape the “systematic abuse” and negative societal impact associated with the platform. However, Sanghera notes that while Threads has its merits, particularly its link to Instagram, it still lacks the engagement from the people he values most. He expresses hope for better regulation of social media platforms in the future.

Despite Threads’ rapid growth, not everyone is convinced of its long-term value. Emily Bell, director of the Tow Centre for Digital Journalism at Columbia University, describes Threads as “deathly dull” and lacking in innovation. She believes that Meta designed Threads to compete with Twitter by creating a platform that is the antithesis of everything Twitter represents.

New users have also reported mixed experiences when attempting to join Threads. Some have encountered technical difficulties and account restrictions, while others have found the platform to be a more pleasant environment compared to X, largely due to active moderation and the absence of conservatives.

Meta on Russia

Zuckerberg’s Meta Names Russia as Leading Source of ‘Coordinated Inauthentic Behavior’ Before Election

In a recent security report, Mark Zuckerberg’s Meta has identified Russia as the leading source of global coordinated inauthentic behavior (CIB) efforts, with at least 39 covert influence operations. Leading into the 2024 election, it appears that Facebook and Instagram are once again pushing the threat of Russian interference much like the Russiagate attacks against Donald Trump that started in 2016.

Business Insider reports that Meta’s newly released security report blames Russia for the extensive use of artificial intelligence to bolster its efforts in influencing international politics through social media. The report claims that Russia has been employing generative AI to create personas for fake journalists and publish distorted information from authentic articles on fictitious news sites.

According to Meta, Russia’s current “deceptive campaign” is primarily focused on garnering support for its ongoing war in Ukraine, marking a shift from its previous efforts that relied on exploiting divisive social and cultural issues within targeted countries to gain traction. The report suggests that between now and the upcoming US elections in November, Russia-based operations are expected to promote supportive commentary about candidates who oppose aid to Ukraine while criticizing those who advocate for aiding its defenses.

Meta anticipates that these efforts could manifest in various forms, such as blaming the US’s economic hardships on providing financial assistance to Ukraine, portraying Ukraine’s government as unreliable, or amplifying voices that express pro-Russia views on the war and its prospects.

The relationship between Russia and Meta has been strained since Russia’s invasion of Ukraine in 2022. In response to the invasion, Facebook took swift action by pulling all advertising in Russia and blocking Russian ads. Months later, Russia retaliated by categorizing Meta as an extremist and terrorist organization.

Despite Russia’s adoption of AI-powered tactics, Meta remains confident in its ability to detect and remove deceptive posts and accounts. The company targets and removes more deceptive content that heavily relies on AI or is run by contractors in for-hire deception campaigns. Meta characterizes these operations as “low-quality, high-volume” with lapses in operational security, making them less effective at avoiding detection.

The report emphasizes that “GenAI-powered tactics provide only incremental productivity and content-generation gains to the threat actors, and have not impeded our ability to disrupt their influence operations.” Meta further notes that real people continue to call out these networks as trolls, as they struggle to engage authentic audiences.

EU VS X: Round 3

Top EU Lawmaker Threatens to Ban Elon Musk’s X in Europe over ‘Hate Speech and Disinformation’

A leading EU parliamentarian has warned Elon Musk that X could be shut down entirely in the European Union if it fails to censor so-called “disinformation and hate speech”.

Sandro Gozi, an Italian Member of the European Parliament who serves as the Secretary-General for the European Democratic Party and in the leadership of French President Emmanuel Macron’s Renew Europe group in Strasbourg, issued another threat of censorship towards Elon Musk and X, warning of a potential outright ban of the platform if it does not abide by the speech directives in the EU’s Digital Services Act (DSA).

Speaking to the Italian paper La Repubblica on Monday, the MEP said: “The former Twitter must also comply with the DSA directive on disinformation and hate speech.”

“If Elon Musk does not comply with European rules on digital services, the EU Commission will ask continental operators to block X or, in the most extreme case, will impose a total dismantling of the platform in the territory of the Union,” Gozi added.

The warning from the leading EU parliamentarian came just a week after Thierry Breton, the European Commission’s censorship czar, wrote an open letter to Musk, demanding that the X boss censor his live interview with former President Donald Trump.
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Breton’s intervention drew pushback from other power players within Brussels as the EU faced accusations of “election interference” in the United States by demanding censorship of the Republican nominee for president. The following day, after Breton’s letter, a spokesman for the European Commission said that it was sent without the knowledge of EU chief Ursula von der Leyen. Other unnamed EU sources slammed Breton for being “attention-seeking” and for engaging in “electoral interference.”

With the intervention of Gozi on Monday, it appears that Breton is not without allies in the push to launch a censorship campaign against Elon Musk and X.

However, following his threat to ban X, Gozi travelled to Chicago to attend the Democratic National Convention (DNC) and to support the Kamala Harris campaign, perhaps demonstrating his partisan reasons for seeking to censor the free speech-oriented social media platform.

San Francisco Sues AI Websites

San Francisco Sues AI ‘Undressing’ Websites Used to Generate Deepfake Nudes

The San Francisco City Attorney’s office has launched a lawsuit against 16 of the most visited AI-powered “undressing” websites, alleging violations of state and federal laws prohibiting revenge porn, deepfake pornography, and child pornography.

The Verge reports that in a move to combat the rising tide of AI-generated non-consensual nude images, San Francisco City Attorney David Chiu has announced a groundbreaking lawsuit targeting 16 of the most frequently visited AI “undressing” websites. These sites, which use artificial intelligence to create fake nude images of real people without their consent, have collectively amassed over 200 million visits in just the first half of 2024.

The lawsuit, filed by the San Francisco City Attorney’s office, accuses the website operators of violating multiple state and federal laws, including those prohibiting revenge pornography, deepfake pornography, and child pornography. Additionally, the complaint alleges that these sites are in breach of California’s unfair competition law, arguing that the harm caused to consumers far outweighs any potential benefits associated with their practices.

The targeted websites employ sophisticated AI tools that allow users to upload images of fully clothed individuals, which are then digitally manipulated to simulate nudity. One unnamed website even boasted in its marketing material about circumventing the need for dating, suggesting users could simply generate nude images of their romantic interests instead.

This legal action comes at a time of increasing concern over the proliferation of deepfake technology and its potential for misuse. Recent incidents involving celebrities like Taylor Swift, who have fallen victim to sexually explicit deepfakes, have brought the issue into the public spotlight. Moreover, there have been alarming reports of schoolchildren facing expulsion or arrest for circulating AI-generated nude photos of their classmates.

The lawsuit seeks not only civil penalties but also aims to permanently shut down these websites and prevent their operators from engaging in the creation of deepfake pornography in the future. City Attorney Chiu expressed his horror at the exploitation enabled by these technologies, describing the investigation as leading to “the darkest corners of the internet.”

Kamala & Google

Kamala Harris’ Big Tech Ties Raise Concerns Over Potential Google Leniency

The cozy relationship between the Kamala Harris campaign and Big Tech giants including Google have sparked concerns about potential leniency in antitrust cases if she is elected president.

The New York Post reports that as the 2024 presidential election looms, the Kamala Harris campaign has come under scrutiny for its cozy ties with Big Tech, particularly Google. The Post has learned that these connections have raised worries that Google may be allowed to avoid a proposed breakup of its search empire if Harris secures the presidency.

Harris has close ties to Paul Weiss, the prominent law firm leading Google’s defense in a major antitrust case targeting its digital ad business. The firm’s top litigator, Karen Dunn, is assisting Harris with debate preparation, while the firm’s chairman, Brad Karp, is reportedly heading a “Lawyers Committee for Kamala Harris” to raise funds for her campaign.

Moreover, Harris is heavily relying on the guidance of Eric Holder, who vetted her potential running mates, and her brother-in-law Tony West, a Silicon Valley ally who took a leave from his position as chief legal officer at Uber to aid her campaign. Both Holder and West are reportedly on the shortlist for Cabinet positions in a potential Harris administration.

Jeff Hauser, executive director at the Revolving Door Project, commented on the optics of the situation, stating, “It’s going to be a fork-in-the-road moment for a Harris administration that may become clear even before she’s inaugurated if we see whether or not these figures get slotted for key White House or Justice Department jobs.”

Experts have expressed concern that tech-friendly advisers could lobby behind the scenes for leniency toward Google if Harris, who would have the power to appoint antitrust leaders in the DOJ and Federal Trade Commission, wins the election. A well-connected tech policy expert told the Post, “They could lean on [deputy attorney general] Lisa Monaco to settle. Say ‘OK, we proved our point, go get Google’s best offer, make sure it has 3 commas and let’s call it a day.’ And nothing changes.”