OiNK Arrests


British authorities have reportedly begun arresting users of OiNK. Last week at least one person was arrested for seeding a single album on the now-defunct torrent index. The user was questioned by police and then released on bail.

Though it is not new for record companies to engage in civil action against users of filesharing networks, legal experts who have commented on the case are puzzled by what – if any – criminal charges can be filed against filesharing defendants. It is unknown if any further arrests have been made.

Best Of The Rest


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Violating Terms Of Service Equals Hacking


A new legal precedent may be set with the case of [Lori Drew], the St. Louis woman who posed as a teenage boy on MySpace and harassed 13-year-old [Megan Meier] until she committed suicide. Drew is being charged under the computer fraud and abuse act, on the grounds that she violated the terms of service agreement of MySpace. If she is convicted of these charges (she is also being charged with conspiracy), it may allow for the criminal prosecution of anyone who violates the terms of service agreement of a site under the same law.

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Erase An IPhone Properly


A fundamental problem with flash memory has just gone mainstream. A detective successfully recovered data from a refurbished iPhone purchased from Apple. Flash memory controllers write to blocks randomly so using standard secure erase techniques are no guarantee that all of the storage space will be written.

[Rich Mogull] has posted a method that should wipe out almost all remnants of your personal data. You start by restoring the iPhone in iTunes and turning off all the syncing options. Next you create 3 playlists large enough to consume all of the phone’s storage space. Sync each playlist in turn and your residual personal data should be obliterated. All that’s left to do is sit back and wonder when the first article about the MacBook Air SSD being impossible to securely erase will be published…

Phlashing Denial Of Service Attack, The New Hype


Imagine how surprised we were to discover that by accidentally bricking our router we were executing a brand new attack: Phlashing Denial Of Service (PDOS). This week at EUSecWest, researcher [Rich Smith] will present the theoretical PDOS attack. Instead of taking over control of an embedded system, the attacker turns it into a nonfunctioning brick by flashing it with a broken firmware. Anyone who has flashed a device knows the danger of interrupting the procedure.

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Flying RC Penis Violates Chessmaster’s Airspace


A speech by famed chess player Garry Kasparov was interrupted Saturday by a remote controlled flying penis. Since many of you are at work or school we’ll leave all the pictures, videos, and tasteless jokes after the break.

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