CircleID

Average level of spam in the second quarter of 2009 has risen by 53 percent, as compared to the first quarter of this year, according to latest report from Google's email security and archiving services group, Postini. The report foresees unpredictable pattern of drops and spikes for the rest of the year... ›››

China is to delay a controversial plan requiring all new computers sold in the country to be equipped with an internet filtering software, state media says. The filter, called Green Dam Youth Escort, was to have been required from Wednesday, but the industry ministry said computer makers needed more time. ›››

Computerworld – The head of the U.S. Secret Service on Tuesday signed a memorandum of understanding with the head of the Italian police and the chief executive officer of the Italian Postal Service to set up an international task force to combat cyber crime. The European Electronic Crime Task Force -- not to be confused with the private study group of the same name that began operating in 2003 -- will tackle identity theft, hacking and other computer-based crime from a headquarters in Rome, Italian officials said... ›››

The Anti-Phishing Working Group (APWG) recently reported that the number of sites infecting PCs with password-stealing crimeware reached an all time high of 31,173 in December 2008 - an 827 percent increase from January. And according to a report just released by Trend Micro's Focus Report, 93 percent of data-stealing malware have been identified as Trojans in the first quarter of 2009. ›››

Domain Name Wire – Andrew Allemann reporting on Domain Name Wire: "Companies are filing with the United States Patent and Trademark Office for service marks related to new TLDs. For example, Top Level Domain Holdings, Ltd (AIM: TLDH) has filed trademarks for .movie, .kids, .books, .buy, .baby, .poker, .golf, and .casino. (Top Level Domain Holdings is an investor in new TLD consulting firm Mind + Machines and dotNYC, LLC.) Other examples include .eco, a trademark filed by Colored Planet of Connecticut that appears close to being approved..." ›››

Recent study indicates that US continues to widen its lead as the number one country when it comes to hosting phishing sites. According to the latest Brandjacking Index just released by MarkMonitor, US-hosted phishing sites grew by ten percent from last quarter -- up from 36 percent to 46 percent. Canada is now at second position with 4.7 percent of all phishing attacks, followed by the Russian Federation (4.5 percent), France (4 percent), and Denmark (4 percent). ›››

In a blog post last week, Gary Warner, director of research in computer forensics at the University of Alabama's (UAB) computer and information sciences department, wrote that it is well past time for someone to declare a "Spam Crisis in China". The warning comes along with UAB's reports that most of the spam they receive has ties to China. "It is very normal that more than one-third of the domain names we see each day in spam messages come from China," Warner wrote. "When one also considers the many '.com' and '.ru' domain names which are also hosted in China, the problem is much worse. More than half of all spam either uses domain names registered in China, is sent from computers in China, or uses computer in China to host their web pages." ›››

Computerworld – Darren Pauli of IDG News Service reports: "The new Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers (ICANN) chief has poured cold water on claims the organization is resisting a break from alleged US oversight. Incoming CEO Rod Beckstrom said at the Sydney ICANN meeting that he does not have a 'fixed form opinion' but is confident that an 'optimistic' resolution will be passed. The comments follow a call last month by European Union society commissioner Viviane Reding for US President Barack Obama to break the country's ties with ICANN..." ›››

In follow up to the last ICANN meetings in Mexico City, CircleID in collaboration with the team from Dynamic Network Services, will be bringing you video blogs and updates from the 35th ICANN meetings in Sydney (21-26 Jun 2009). Stay tuned as we keep this page updated through out the meetings. Comments and questions? Please post them below in the comment section of the page. ›››

Maggie Shiels reporting from BBC: "The internet suffered a number of slowdowns as people the world over rushed to verify accounts of Michael Jackson's death. Search giant Google confirmed to the BBC that when the news first broke it feared it was under attack. Millions of people who searched for the star's name on Google News were greeted with an error page. It warned users 'your query looks similar to automated requests from a computer virus or spyware application'." ›››

During its board meeting today in Sydney, the Internet Corporation of Assigned Names and Numbers (ICANN) announced Rod Beckstrom, the former U.S. cybersecurity chief, as the new President and CEO. Beckstrom will be replacing Dr. Paul Twomey who had been serving this position since March 2003 and announced his resignation earlier this year. Dr Twomey has lately been reported as the primary candidate for heading Australian Government's proposed A$43 billion investment in a new National Broadband Network. ››› Updated: Jun 26, 7:13 AM

Reuters – The U.S. Senate on Thursday approved the Obama administration's nomination of Julius Genachowski, a telecommunications industry executive, to head the Federal Communications Commission. Genachowski is set to chair the five-member panel that will be dominated by Democrats seeking to bring more power to consumers and extend high-speed Internet access to rural parts of the United States. ›››

Voice of America reporting: "U.S. lawmakers say they plan legislation that would fund efforts to help Iranians receive and send information despite government restrictions. Independent Senator Joe Lieberman said Thursday that the bill intends to help the Iranian people stay 'one step ahead of the Iranian regime.'" Also a related report by AFP. ›››

Reuters – China's Foreign Ministry on Thursday accused Google's English language search engine of spreading vulgar content that violated the nation's law. Chinese Foreign Ministry spokesman Qin Gang did not directly answer a question about whether government action was responsible for recent disruptions in access to Google sites from within China. ›››

Democracy Now has a video discussion on the recent reports about telecoms in Europe aiding the Iranian government develop highly sophisticated Internet censorship mechanisms or deep packet inspection. The WSJ recently reported that the Iranian monitoring capabilities where "at least in part [provided] by a joint venture of Siemens AG, the German conglomerate, and Nokia Corp., the Finish cellphone compnay, in second half of 2008." (also see previous report: Iran's Internet Censorship Most Sophisticated in the World) ›››

AFP – Top US trade officials said Wednesday they have written to the Chinese government urging it to drop a new rule requiring all computers to be fitted with Internet filtering software [related]. Commerce Secretary Gary Locke and US Trade Representative Ron Kirk said China may be violating its World Trade Organization obligations by requiring all computers sold in the country from July 1 to carry the "Green Dam" program... ›››

Computerworld – Maxwell Cooter of the IDG News Service reports: "The world's regional Internet registries (RIRs) have added their weight to call for Internet governance to be privatised. The RIRs have followed the European Union's demand, proposed by European Commissioner Viviane Reding last month, for the ending of the collaboration agreement between ICANN and the US Department of Commerce..." ›››

The Independent – Following the recent creation of a similar post by US President, UK government has also announced the formation of a cyber security chief. Reported by the Independent: "Britain is to appoint its first national cyber security chief to protect the country from terrorist computer hackers and electronic espionage, Gordon Brown will announce tomorrow. The Prime Minister's move comes amid fears that the computer systems of government and business are vulnerable to online attack from hostile countries and terrorist organisations..." ››› Updated: Jun 24, 11:43 AM

Dark Reading – It has been more than 15 years in the making, but DNSSEC is finally gaining some traction: The .gov and .org top-level domains have begun to adopt the Domain Name Service (DNS) security protocol, and during the past few days, some commercial activity was associated with it. HP last week announced it will resell Secure64's DNS software, while registrar and managed DNS provider Dynamic Network Services Inc. (Dyn Inc.), announced it has gone live with DNSSEC. DNS product vendor NeuStar, meanwhile, rolled out its own DNS security appliance to protect DNS servers from getting hit with the DNS cache poisoning flaw... ›››

CNET News – A joint venture of Siemens AG and Nokia Corp., two large European technology firms, is denying reports that Iran uses its Web-monitoring technology to censor and spy on its citizens' online activities. Nokia Siemens Networks said Monday that it has sold telecommunications systems to the Iranian government but that any built-in monitoring technology was for voice communications and not the Internet. ›››