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ARS Technica: Verizon contacted me on Twitter and asked for my billing password

Thu, 06 Nov 2014 15:20:20 -0600

Aurich Lawson

On Verizon Wireless’ website, the company advises customers to “[n]ever give your passwords to anyone over the phone, include them in e-mail messages, [or] give them to anyone.” This is good security advice that experts would agree with. Yet Verizon itself is seeking out customers on Twitter and asking for their billing passwords over the social network’s direct messages platform.

This, obviously, isn’t the best security practice. Security experts who spoke to Ars disagreed on just how dangerous it is but agreed that Verizon should find a better way to verify the identities of customers.

ARS Technica: Sony: Developers can block Share Play features on PS4 games

Thu, 06 Nov 2014 14:10:22 -0600

Game Informer

After reports that the new Share Play feature would work with all PS4 games, Sony has clarified that game developers can restrict the feature, as Activision has done in Call of Duty: Advanced Warfare.

"Share Play is a system level feature enabled by System Software Update 2.00, making it available for all PS4 titles," a Sony representative said in a statement provided to Ars. "However the option is available to developers to disable the feature according to what they feel will best benefit the consumer experience."

ARS Technica: Active “WireLurker” iPhone infection ushers in new era for iOS users

Thu, 06 Nov 2014 14:07:43 -0600

Carrrrrlos

Ushering in a new threat landscape for iPhone users, security researchers have uncovered an active malware operation that compromised the OS X and iOS devices of hundreds of thousands of people.

ARS Technica: Custom evolution boosts an enzyme for power plant carbon capture

Thu, 06 Nov 2014 13:32:55 -0600

Robert S. Donovan

We can’t just shutter the world’s fossil fuel power plants tomorrow, but in a perfect world, we could eliminate the greenhouse-enhancing CO₂ coming out of the stacks. While it’s not a perfect world just yet, techniques to capture that Co₂are being developed—especially for coal plants, which emit the most CO₂ per Watt of power generated. Two major obstacles stand between here and there: the infrastructure to store the captured CO₂ deep underground (or in other ways) and the cost of capturing the CO₂.

For traditional coal plants, this involves some way to separate CO₂ out of the mix of gases coming through the exhaust stream. A common technique uses amine solutions, which latch on to the CO₂ chemically, releasing it later when the solution is heated. That means that some of the heat produced by the burning coal has to be used for the CO₂-capture process, rather than producing electricity.

BBC World: VIDEO: Paid mourners banned in Kenya

Thu, 06 Nov 2014 13:14:19 -0600

Every Thursday and Friday, Kenya's third largest city, Kisumu, grinds to a halt as hundreds of motorcyclists block the roads.

BBC Tech: VIDEO: Bird poisoning 'a shocking case'

Thu, 06 Nov 2014 13:06:52 -0600

Norfolk gamekeeper Allen Lambert has been sentenced for what wildlife groups are calling the worst case of bird of prey poisoning recorded in England.

ARS Technica: Prosecutor: Silk Road 2.0 suspect “did admit to everything”

Thu, 06 Nov 2014 12:53:00 -0600

SAN FRANCISCO—In his first court appearance since being arrested, Silk Road 2.0 suspect Blake Benthall appeared before a federal judge on Thursday. He was not in handcuffs or shackles; the accused wore street clothes, including a gray hoodie that read "INTERNET BETTER" across the back.

During the brief hearing, Benthall did not speak other than to say that he is the named suspect and to confirm his age as 26. He looked at a few women and a couple of men seated in court and appeared to be holding back tears, but those people declined to speak to Ars before or after the hearing.

His attorney, Daniel Blank, a federal public defender, said that he only met his client for the first time in court on Thursday. "You could fill a large volume with what I don't know," Blank told reporters after the hearing.

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ARS Technica: Laser strikes force US Coast Guard helicopter missions to abort

Thu, 06 Nov 2014 12:41:57 -0600

US Coastguard HH-65C Dolphin Helicopter

UK Ministry of Defefnce

The US Coast Guard scrubbed two helicopter training missions in Michigan after the pilot and crew were hit with green laser beams, the agency said Wednesday. While no arrests have been made, flight rules require missions to be aborted if a crew member's vision is compromised, the Coast Guard said.

ARS Technica: US Attorney’s office: Whoops, Silk Road 2.0 hired a fed [Updated]

Thu, 06 Nov 2014 12:17:04 -0600

When the first Silk Road and its alleged operator, Ross William Ulbricht, were taken down by the US government just over a year ago, it took some technical mojo to track down the server and its operator. That apparently wasn’t the case with Ulbricht’s successor. According to the US Attorney’s office for the Southern District of New York, Silk Road 2.0 was the victim of some old-fashioned social engineering of the most damaging kind. An undercover federal agent was able to join the site's administration team and gather the intelligence that led to the arrest of Blake Benthall—the alleged operator of the Silk Road successor site who went by the name “Defcon.”

ARS Technica: FBI arrests Blake “Defcon” Benthall, alleged operator of Silk Road 2.0 [Updated]

Thu, 06 Nov 2014 12:16:19 -0600

The FBI announced that yesterday it arrested Blake Benthall, aka "Defcon," the alleged owner and operator of Silk Road 2.0. Benthall was apprehended in San Francisco and will be presented today in a federal court in the city before Magistrate Judge Jaqueline Scott Corley. Accordingly, Silk Road 2.0 has been seized as of this post.

“As alleged, Blake Benthall attempted to resurrect Silk Road, a secret website that law enforcement seized last year, by running Silk Road 2.0, a nearly identical criminal enterprise," Manhattan US Attorney Preet Bharara said in a statement. "Let’s be clear—this Silk Road, in whatever form, is the road to prison. Those looking to follow in the footsteps of alleged cybercriminals should understand that we will return as many times as necessary to shut down noxious online criminal bazaars. We don’t get tired.”