Cyber Crimes Unit

LONDON — (Marketwired) — 06/18/13 — Arxan Technologies, the industry-leading provider of software security solutions that protect the App Economy, today announced they will speak on a panel titled “Breaking Down the Security of a Mobile Wallet” at the Mobile Wallet and Retail Innovation Summit. The summit will address the mCommerce ecosystem’s critical business, partnership, technology and security questions, as both operators and OTT players begin implementing different approaches to securing ROI through their m-payment proposition.

Cyber criminals are increasingly developing pervasive exploits and the means to commit mobile transaction fraud is growing. Money transfers and merchandise purchases are driving up mobile payment transactions around the world, with the value of transactions this year expected to reach $235.4 billion according to the Gartner analyst firm. Mobile enterprises serving consumers and end users must understand the top mobile vulnerabilities and emerging threats that impact mobile financial transactions via the application.

“Innovations in mobile payment technology are at an extremely exciting stage,” said Winston Bond, European technical manager, Arxan UK. “However, the development of peer-to-peer banking transactions, remote wallet/credit card payments, mobile banking and mCommerce in general open up a wide array of cyberthreats that can lead to fraud, unauthorized access, data breaches and brand erosion without the proper application security measures in place.”

WHAT:
Breaking Down the Security of a Mobile Wallet – Panel Session

WHO:
Arxan Technologies’ Winston Bond joins Lorenzo Gaston, technical director, Smart Payment Association (SPA), France for a discussion moderated by Angel Dobarziev, practice leader, Emerging Markets, Ovum, UK.

Bond has over 20 years of experience developing software on a wide variety of embedded, desktop and mobile platforms. Since 2008, he has been focused on helping businesses, from large banks to emerging digital media companies, protect apps against tampering and reverse engineering for unauthorized use, piracy and theft of intellectual property.

WHEN:
Wednesday, June 19, 2013, 12:30 PM

WHERE:
Mobile Wallet and Retail Innovation Summit. Thistle Marble Arch, London, UK.

For more information or to schedule a meeting with Winston at the summit, please email: info@arxan.com or call 831-247-5394.

ABOUT ARXAN TECHNOLOGIES
Arxan protects the App Economy from attacks in distributed or untrusted environments with the world’s strongest and most deployed application integrity protection products. Among today’s diverse computing platforms, mobile and tablet apps and packaged or embedded software are all exposed to hacking attacks such as reverse-engineering, tampering, insertion of malware/exploits, repackaging, fraud, intellectual property theft, and piracy. Arxan’s unique patented Guarding technology enables sensitive or high-value applications to proactively guard their own integrity by defending, detecting, alerting, and reacting to hacking attacks through a risk-based, customized protection. Arxan’s self-defending and tamper-proof applications are deployed on more than 200 million devices by leading Fortune 500 organizations in high-tech, ISV, financial services, digital media, gaming, healthcare, and other industries. Arxan Technologies is headquartered in the United States with global offices in EMEA and APAC. Visit us at www.arxan.com.
Follow us @Arxan or http://www.linkedin.com/company/arxan-technologies

Arxan: Protecting the App Economy™. Share your thoughts on application protection using hashtag #protectyourapps

Media Contact:

Jodi Wadhwa
Arxan Technologies
1-301-968-4295
jwadhwa@arxan.com

Nathan Beers
Schwartz MSL
1-512-777-0770
nathan.beers@schwartzmsl.com

Article source: http://www.sys-con.com/node/2703640

Nashville, TN — (SBWIRE) — 06/18/2013 — DigiTrax Entertainment, creators of the Karaoke Cloud, will host its 2nd annual Karaoke Summit Thursday, June 20 in Nashville. Attending will be karaoke music label executives, music publishers, entertainment/intellectual properties attorneys and more. This summit will focus on solutions for the American karaoke industry in reference to licensing and piracy issues.

“We are honored to have legal representation from the NMPA, Piracy Recovery and Allen Jacobi Law. This is going to be one very informative summit,” stated Joe Vangieri CEO DigiTrax Entertainment.

Summit topics and speakers include:

The National Music Publishers Association (NMPA), Legal Fellow, Natalie Madaj on the topic of Reform Sync Licensing Now – How Labels and Publishers Can Make More Money and Reduce Overhead. Ms. Madaj will state the case for reform in karaoke and video sync licensing and how it would ultimately lead to more profit for publishers.

Sync Licensing In the Global Economy- Contrasting Rights in the US and Abroad, by Allen Jacobi, Allen Jacobi Law. Mr. Jacobi will illustrate how our competitive markets of the UK and EU have an advantage in compulsory licensing. UK and EU karaoke labels are flourishing while the American counterparts are laboring under difficult licensing practices. Allen Jacobi is a pioneering entertainment industry attorney who has successfully been able to combine music, motion picture and television into a single career.

Piracy Interdiction Efforts- Karaoke song theft in the karaoke bar industry. Roby Robinson Registered U.S. Patent Attorney, Luedeka Neely Group, P.C. representing Piracy Recovery. Mr. Robinson will update the Summit on current litigation for World-Wide Digital / Piracy Recovery in TN. He will also lay out Piracy Recovery’s National program.

“Honest working Karaoke Jockeys and karaoke recording labels are affected by piracy. Almost all of the major American karaoke brands like Sound Choice, Chartbuster and Priddis have been terminally effected by piracy,” stated David Harb President of Piracy Recovery. “Honest Karaoke Jockeys are making less money because of piracy, but that’s all about to change with our undercover national karaoke investigations.”

This year’s Karaoke Summit will be filled with a very thorough review of the industry’s problems, new and innovative approaches through technology and piracy litigation to help fix this crippled American industry.

About DigiTrax Entertainment
DigiTrax is a global company dedicated to bringing high-quality, interactive, music services to market. DigiTrax’s main offerings include Karaoke Cloud, a consumer subscription karaoke platform, and its professional version, Karaoke Cloud Pro, for karaoke show hosts.

Article source: http://www.sbwire.com/press-releases/karaoke/karaoke-summit/sbwire-267804.htm

Arxan Discusses Mobile App Integrity Protection at Mobile Wallet and Retail Innovation Summit

Panel Session Breaks Down Mobile Wallet Security Vulnerabilities

LONDON–(Marketwired – Jun 18, 2013) – Arxan Technologies, the industry-leading provider of software security solutions that protect the App Economy, today announced they will speak on a panel titled “Breaking Down the Security of a Mobile Wallet” at the Mobile Wallet and Retail Innovation Summit. The summit will address the mCommerce ecosystem’s critical business, partnership, technology and security questions, as both operators and OTT players begin implementing different approaches to securing ROI through their m-payment proposition.

Cyber criminals are …

Article source: http://online.wsj.com/article/PR-CO-20130618-901670.html?mod=googlenews_wsj

ACCORDING TO the government’s 2013 Information Security Breaches Survey, an unprecedented number of cyber attacks are experienced by UK businesses. A staggering 93% of large organisations (employing 250 or more), and 87% of small businesses (under 50 staff) have fallen victim to cyber crime over the past year. 

While the proportion of large organisations reporting security breaches remains consistent with 2012, 11% more small businesses appear to have suffered third-party hacking. The increasing number of businesses failing to protect their data is a concern, as is the spiralling number of breaches each will experience.

The survey advises 50% more breaches, on average, have occurred. For large businesses, the median figure is 113, for their smaller counterparts it’s 17; up from 71 and 11 a year ago. The associated costs are rising too – large companies can expect to pay between £450,000 – £850,000 for their security lapses; smaller companies face a £35,000 – £60,000 bill.

So what’s behind one of the biggest emerging threats to UK businesses? Whereas once it was attributed to criminals, hacktivists and competitors, the survey suggests in-house technology, processes and people are increasingly likely to inadvertently wreak havoc, particularly in small businesses.

Around a third of the worst security breaches of the year for all organisations were caused by human error, with a higher proportion of small businesses (57%) attributing security shortfalls to staff. Nearly one in five (17%) were aware staff broke data protection regulations.

Most respondents, 81%, confirm they’ll continue to prioritise security with promises of extra expenditure, however Survey commentators concede ‘many businesses can’t translate this expenditure into effective security defences’. It highlights how ‘ineffective leadership and communication about security risks often leaves staff unable to take the right actions’ and ‘weaknesses in risk assessment and skills shortages also often prevent effective targeting of security expenditure’.

The survey concludes ‘companies are struggling to keep up to date with security threats and so find it hard to take the right actions’. A fair assumption given technology within businesses constantly evolves (how can you hit a moving target?).

Social networking, smartphones, tablets, cloud computing and portable media bypassing defences are all identified as cyber attack tools so it’s vital firms understand where and how their breaches can occur, implement the necessary security systems and training to reduce the likelihood of an incident and if it does occur, have mechanisms in place for damage limitation and business recovery.

Only 30% of large organisations refer to the government’s ten step guidelines on how to protect a business from a cyber security threat and for small businesses, the survey says the implementation of basic practices is ‘patchy’.

Our own survey underlines this lack of understanding. Small business leaders were asked if they knew what cyber theft was? Only 39% identified it as the stealing of intellectual property or confidential data, the remainder had no idea. Any firm that relies on the internet or undertakes financial transactions electronically is exposed to cyber theft, yet only 6% of respondents felt their business was at risk.

It’s not surprising to find 78% of respondents had no insurance cover for this type of threat and the remainder weren’t sure. Despite insurers being crucial players in the battle against cyber attacks, few it appears are keen to use insurance for damage limitation and that all-important business recovery.

A typical cyber policy in general, will;
• Enable a firm to detect and restore damaged information/communication systems
• Reimburse lost profits following damaged systems or lost data
• Provide access to experts in crisis management, public relations, forensics and security
• Set up a temporary storage facility
• Meet investigation costs and any Government or regulatory-imposed fines
• Pay costs incurred in notifying data protection authorities and clients (in line with new European Data Laws) following a data loss
• Pay for credit monitoring and setting up of a call centre to deal with customer enquiries
• Manage and meet the costs involved with cyber extortion

In its recent ‘Cost of Cyber Crime‘ report, the government estimated cyber crime costs the UK economy around £27bn a year. Businesses paid around £21bn, the Government £2.2bn and citizens £3.1bn. Whatever the business size, we all have a responsibility to reduce the costs associated with cyber crime.

Annie Plaskett is a senior manager at small business insurance specialist, YOUR Insurance

Article source: http://www.financialdirector.co.uk/financial-director/feature/2275282/cyber-crime-is-it-on-your-radar

Cyber-attacks are eroding world economic growth, and the G-20 needs to set aside emotion-charged discussions to focus on the damage, a former White House official said.

“We have made cybersecurity one topic when it is many, and countries can’t see eye-to-eye on what is most important and what needs to be done first,” said Melissa Hathaway, who left President Barack Obama’s administration in 2009 and now heads a private consulting firm.

“We need to start to talk about this as gross domestic product loss, and the instability of the financial institutions we are all dependent on as a global economy,” she said.

Hathaway, who advised both Obama and President George W. Bush, estimated in a May report that the Group of Twenty economies have lost 2.5 million jobs to counterfeiting and piracy while governments and consumers lose $125 billion annually to cyber-attacks, including losses in tax revenue.

While governments aren’t going to give up espionage, steps can be taken to stop the disruption of services at financial institutions and the theft of intellectual property, she said.

“If you couch the conversation on the economy and not in espionage and warfare, we can all agree. The economy is common and safe ground,” she said in an interview in Tel Aviv.

Hathaway said that the G-20 projects that information and communications technology, along with increasing broadband communications, will lead to a minimum 4 percent increase in gross domestic product in developed economies, with developing countries seeing a boost of as much as 10 percent.

Full Losses

The numbers are misleading because countries aren’t measuring full losses from cyber-attacks, she said. In the May article, Hathaway said the U.K. has estimated losing 27 billion sterling ($42.4 billion) a year to online criminals. In the Netherlands, cybercrime costs at least 10 billion euros ($13.3 billion) annually, she said, citing TNO, a Dutch research organization.

U.K. officials have said the country is losing a minimum of 3 percent of its GDP to security issues, and the Netherlands is net-neutral, Hathaway said in the interview.

“Until this is on the agenda of the G-20, we aren’t going to make progress,” said Hathaway, who was in Tel Aviv to speak at a conference sponsored by Tel Aviv University’s Yuval Ne’eman Workshop for Science, Technology and Security. “It is the most effective in talking about economic stability and overall growth, health and wellbeing of the world.”

South Korea

In March, criminals launched a computer virus that penetrated financial institutions in South Korea. The malware code was distributed through targeted organizations’ servers, destroying their computers’ ability to boot.

In December 2012, Saudi Arabia blamed unidentified people based outside the kingdom for a cyber-attack on state-owned Saudi Arabian Oil Co. that was aimed at disrupting production from the world’s largest exporter of crude.

U.S. officials have accused the Chinese government of being behind a campaign to steal trade secrets and potentially disable computers that operate banks, power grids and telecommunication systems. China has rejected the charges.

“There are more and more cyber sabotage attacks, and we need to have our muscles ready to fight off the next attacks,” said Eugene Kaspersky, chief executive officer of Kaspersky Lab, a Moscow-based company that monitors cyber-attacks and develops defense against them. He said he advocates a military-free cyberspace.

Symantec’s Report

Symantec Corp (SYMC)., the largest maker of security software, reported in April a 42 percent surge in targeted attacks in 2012 compared to the year earlier. Ilias Chantzos, the firm’s senior director for Europe, the Middle East and Africa and the Asia-Pacific and Japan region, said European governments are growing increasingly aware of the risks.

“There has been an attempt to push the legislation forward that requires the disclosure of breaches and states to cooperate,” said Chantzos, who’s based in Brussels. “The move itself is a very clear political signal of the recognition of the need to go down this path.”

The G-20 is scheduled to meet next in September in St. Petersburg, Russia.

To contact the reporter on this story: Gwen Ackerman in Jerusalem at gackerman@bloomberg.net

To contact the editor responsible for this story: John Walcott at jwalcott9@bloomberg.net

Article source: http://www.businessweek.com/news/2013-06-13/g-20-urged-to-treat-cyber-attacks-as-threat-to-global-economy