Tag: citizens | SpinSafe

CERT-In to offer citizens eScan bot cleaning tool

February 7, 2024/in Internet Security

Indian Computer Emergency Response Team (CERT-In) is celebrating “Cyber Swachhta Pakhwada” from February 1 to 15. To secure the nation’s digital landscape, “Cyber Swachhta Kendra” (CSK) under CERT-In aims to create a secure cyberspace by detecting botnet infections in India and to notify, enable cleaning and securing systems of end users so as to prevent further infections.

As part of this national campaign, eScan, a cybersecurity solutions vendor, is contributing to the cause by providing eScan botnet scanning and cleaning Toolkit for botnet detections on laptops, desktops, and smartphones. This tool will empower citizens to scan and clean their devices of any potential botnet infections, thereby fortifying their digital defences.

eScan botnet cleaning toolkit: Key detailsCERT-In and eScan invite citizens across the country to actively participate in this cybersecurity endeavour. The free Botnet scanning and cleaning toolkit can be easily downloaded from the website of “Cyber Swachhta Kendra” (CSK) and MicroWorld’s official website, equipping users with a robust solution to enhance the security posture of their computers and smartphones.

MicroWorld develops information security solutions that offer protection against current and evolving cyber threats. The organisation houses the brands eScan, MailScan and Nemasis under its banner.

Its product portfolio encompasses anti-virus, anti-malware, anti-spyware, content security, anti-spam, network and host intrusion prevention solutions, app control, data leak and data theft prevention, host and network-based vulnerability assessment, backup, and patch management solutions.

These are available for on-premise deployment or cloud SaaS. Its research team is currently developing new methodologies for security inference using innovative AI models. As an MII OEM headquartered in India, MicroWorld has offices in four countries and is represented by partners across the globe.

By collaborating with eScan and other stakeholders, CERT-In aims to build a resilient and secure digital ecosystem. The Cyber Cleanliness Drive stands as a testament to the collective efforts toward fostering a safer, more secure cyberspace for all citizens.

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Is government’s anti-disinformation unit protecting or persecuting citizens? – PublicTechnology

October 9, 2023/in Internet Security

Government claims the Counter Disinformation Unit – accused of effectively spying on its own citizens – has played a key role in tackling Kremlin narratives, and will be important in election preparations

“The CDU uses publicly available data, including material shared on social media platforms, to develop an understanding of disinformation narratives and trends. It does not, and has never, monitored individuals and all data is anonymised wherever possible.”

This is how the government summarises the work and methods of its Counter Disinformation Unit (CDU). The unit is based in the Department for Science, Innovation and Technology and, in its current form, was “stood up” in the early weeks of the coronavirus crisis in spring 2020, with a remit to tackle false information about the pandemic circulating online.

Others have a different, and darker take on how the CDU goes about its business. Some of the fiercest recent criticism of the unit has come from close to the heart of government itself.

“To the best of our knowledge, the CDU undertakes its work in the absence of effective transparency, oversight, accountability mechanisms or due process,” said a letter sent last month to DSIT secretary Michelle Donelan by David Davis – the MP who formerly served as Brexit secretary and Conservative party chair.

As reported by the Telegraph, the missive, co-signed by Labour MP Bell-Ribeiro Addy and the Green party’s Caroline Lucas, added: “We call on you to suspend the CDU immediately and commission an independent review of its work, in order to ensure that the rights to freedom of expression and privacy are sufficiently protected.”

According to a report published earlier this year by the Daily Mail and campaign group Big Brother Watch, the MPs are just three among many citizens whose online posts have been flagged by government and military disinformation units – despite the posts, in some cases, containing no factual inaccuracies, but merely being critical of government policy.

The MPs’ concerns about the CDU’s lack of transparency, at least, seem difficult to refute. Government has repeatedly failed to provide basic operational…

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Mumbai Police Issues Advisory On Email Bombing For Citizens To Stay Safe From Online Threat

July 1, 2023/in Internet Security

The Mumbai police on Friday issued an advisory for citizens on a lurking email bomb cyber attack. An email bomb is a form of net abuse that sends large volumes of email to an address, making the mailbox overflow and overwhelm the server. This smoke screen distracts the attention from important email messages, indicating a security breach.

Methods Of Email Bomb Attack

There are three ways of carrying out an email bomb attack, including mass mailing, linking lists, and zip bombing, according to the advisory.

‘‘Mass mailing consists of sending numerous duplicate emails to the same email address. These types of mail bombs are simple to design but their extreme simplicity means they can be easily detected by spam filters. Email-bombing using mass mailing is also commonly performed as a Distributed Denial-of-Service attack by employing the use of botnets, hierarchical networks of computers compromised by malware and under the attacker’s control,” the advisory states.

The advisory further reads, “As in spamming, the attacker instructs the botnet to send out millions of emails, but unlike normal botnet spamming, the emails are all addressed to only one or a few addresses the attacker wishes to flood,” it said.

“This type of attack is more difficult to defend against than a simple mass-mailing bomb because of the multiple source addresses and the possibility of each infected computer sending a different message or employing stealth techniques to defeat spam filters,” it said, adding that “a zip bomb is a variant of mail-bombing”.

Details On Email Cluster Bomb Attack

“List linking, also known as ‘email cluster bomb’, means signing a particular email address up to several email list subscriptions. The victim then has to unsubscribe from these unwanted services manually. The attack can be carried out automatically with simple scripts,” said the advisory.

“This is easy, almost impossible to trace back to the perpetrator, and potentially very destructive. To prevent this type of bombing, most email subscription services send a confirmation email to a person’s inbox,” it said.

“It is generally advisable not to click…

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