Tag Archive for: Kiwis

How NZ’s top 3 telcos are protecting Kiwis from cyber threats

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Ahead of Cyber Smart Week and following the cyber attack on Australian telecommunications company Optus, 1News checked in with three major players in the New Zealand market to see how Kiwis are being protected from cyber crime.

The computer hacker who stole the personal data of almost 10 million customers of a telecommunications company in one of Australia’s worst privacy breaches used techniques to conceal their identity, actions and whereabouts, police said on Friday.

But Optus maintains it was the target of a sophisticated cyber attack that penetrated several layers of security.

1News spoke to telecommunications companies, Spark, Vodafone and 2degrees about their security measures and how they help keep their customers’ data safe.

Vodafone/One NZ

Sam Sinnott, spokesperson from Vodafone, said it’s aware of the cyber attack on Optus, “and like all large companies, we take our responsibilities around cyber security extremely seriously”.

“Due to the sensitive nature of this topic, we can’t share more detail with you, however we regularly test and review our cyber security defences, including the technology, processes, and training that we have in place to keep our customers, systems, and employees secure.

“We can also share that DEFEND is an award-winning company themselves and their expertise is invaluable to New Zealand businesses. DEFEND offers a range of threat protection services as well as incident response and security management and has won multiple awards including Microsoft’s New Zealand partner of the year for 2022,” Sinnott said.

At an announcement about the company’s rebrand to One NZ last week, chief executive Jason Paris said Vodafone has a 24/7 manned cyber defence centre.

He said every business customer will have the opportunity to upgrade to Microsoft’s premium security offering as Vodafone becomes One NZ.

“Given what’s happening recently in Australia – the security breaches and the constant attacks that New Zealander’s don’t see but we defend every single day – it’s a great thing for New Zealand businesses,” Paris said.

Paris said the company has a range of world-leading technology solutions that makes sure “we are sensing in real-time all of…

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Hacking threat: Kiwis urged to upgrade Apple devices

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News Highlights: Hacking threat: Kiwis urged to upgrade Apple devices.

Apple’s iOS 14.4 update is now live – and in addition to fixing a vulnerability, it will help scan Covid-19 posters.

Late yesterday, Crown agency CERT NZ (the Computer Emergency Response Team) issued an advisory report on a security issue with iOS that Apple says is being actively exploited by hackers.

The problem affects iOS (the software that iPhones run on), iPadOs, and tvOS (the software that Apple TVs run on).

Update your Apple iOS, iPadOS and tvOS devices to version 14.4 immediately where the update is available. For most users, a popup should warn you that an update is available – select ‘Update now’, ”CERT NZ advises.

If you don’t receive a popup message, follow these steps: Go to Settings> System> Software Update. Select “Update Software” there.

At the time, iOS 14 was not available. It should now show up as an option to most users (Apple usually makes iOS updates available continuously). The update took the Herald about 10 minutes to update and install.

Details about the vulnerability are sparse at this stage, but an Apple reporting page about the problem says, “A malicious program can increase permissions,” if it exploits the vulnerability, indicating that a hacker may be in control of a device.

“Apple is aware of a report that this problem may have been actively exploited,” said the iPhone maker says on its security notification page.

The company says it will not provide details on security issues until after they have been patched.

iOS 14.4 also adds support for cutting smaller QR codes – a useful addition as we are all encouraged to step up our Covid poster scanning.

CERT NZ recommends that users enable an automatic software update feature on each device.

The announcement took some of the shine away from the Data Privacy Day, which saw Facebook boss Mark Zuckerberg annoyed by an action by Apple to let advertisers know when they want to track your activity.

Zuckerberg called the move anticompetive. Apple said it was responding to users’ demands for greater privacy and transparency, and released a “Day in the Life of Your Data” presentation to defend its case.

Via:…

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