Cyber Criminal Traced to a McDonald’s in Smyrna, Georgia

In a major break in the war against cyber crime, Jason Cornish, 37, was arrested after being traced back to his headquarters at a McDonald’s in Smyrna, Georgia. Wait, we need to do a reboot on this one. People still eat inside at McDonald’s? Isn’t that something like getting People Magazine delivered to your home? We all know it’s okay to use the McDonald’s drive-through and read People Magazine … Read More »

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Cowboys, Black Hats and Web Security

If you spend even a little bit of time in the company of web security professionals, you’re likely to hear the term “black hat.” While the term has become almost synonymous with “hacking” and often refers to hacking for malicious purposes, the term has been around even longer than computers. According to Wikipedia, “a black hat is the villain or bad guy, especially in a western movie, in which … Read More »

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When Network Security Is Not Enough

I assume there are a few technology arenas more confusing that security (though, probably not many). Even when I have lunch with my small business counterparts and we talk security, I find a lot of misconceptions about what web security is all about. Most people will focus on perimeter security and think that they have it all covered. Many people view the hardware side of their data center as … Read More »

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Social Engineering – Bugs in the Human Hardware

Though putting security measures in place on your website is important, by all accounts, the largest threat to computer systems is people. A fun fact to back up this surprising statement: Oak Ridge National Labs (one of the US national energy labs) was a target for a spear phishing attack where 57 of a targeted 530 employees opened up an email that installed malware on their personal computers. Oak … Read More »

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Brick to Purse in 10 Seconds

As I was leaving the gym this morning (that was meant to impress you), I looked over at the car next to mine and noticed a woman’s purse on the front seat with her wallet hanging out. To be fair, the car was locked, but I couldn’t help but think how inconsiderate of her. Now some poor kid is going to have to go get a brick, smash the … Read More »

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SSL – the Magic that Protects Your Data

The next time you warm up the old browser and hop onto Facebook to check on your kid’s latest obsession, think about who might be checking on you. To get to Facebook you had to log in with your own name and password. You’re thinking about witty words as you type, uploading the pictures from your last Vegas trip and quietly checking on friends and family. To the best … Read More »

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Malware: the New Email Virus

Remember the email Virus craze of many years ago? Notably the ILOVEYOU virus and Melissa virus that brought down large portions of the Internet. These viruses were spread via emails that were opened by naive users who really did believe they were getting a personal love letter or message from a girl named Melissa. Email viruses caused turmoil in the 1990’s and early 2000’s, but are relatively rare these … Read More »

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What’s Behind a 403 Web Security Vulnerability Review

As you may have already heard, 403 Web Security now offers a free website security vulnerability review to any company that submits a request on our landing page. It’s easy to do, just fill in a few fields and submit. We’ll exchange a few emails with you about backup and the best time of day to do the review, but the request will be painless. The returned website evaluation  … Read More »

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The Kids are Busy Checking you Out

Think that the only people monitoring your Internet activity are high-ranking government agencies and talented hackers? Think again. In her New Your Times article, New Hacking Tools Pose Bigger Threats to Wi-Fi Users, author Kate Murphy speaks about a new generation of hackers called “cyberpunks.” These guys are not the basement-living geeks that we are all fond of, but rather technology-adequate malcontents who hang out in coffee houses with … Read More »

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WDDinc Launches New Company, 403 Web Security: New Company helps businesses examine, repair and develop secure websites

(INDIANAPOLIS, Ind. – April 26, 2011) - WDDinc, a leader in custom software development, today announced the launch of 403 Web Security, a secure web application development company. The launch of 403 is in response to demand from organizations that are in need of comprehensive website security. Any website, regardless of size, is vulnerable to attacks such as a Cross-Site Scripting (XSS) to infect smaller sites or a SQL … Read More »