Google launches new anti-phishing attack feature

Google on Tuesday launched a new anti-phishing attack for the Gmail. The new feature will automatically display the address of the senders which previously have not yet made a contact with the user's email.

The launching of a new feature is a part of Google's effort to provide more security measure for the users of Gmail. Last month, Google was able to stop some spear phishing attack which have penetrated Gmail accounts of several high ranking U.S. officials as well as South Korean officials, Chinese political activists, journalists and military members.

If the sender of a message is not yet in the contact list of the user, or if the address of the sender has never been sent a message to, the user will see the address of that user on the message header. Third party sender such as email marketing bulk mailers sending messages for retailers will also be displayed automatically.

The feature actually has been present in Gmail and the user can set it manually. In the email services' interface, the user must click "show details" to see the sender's address. With the feature turned on automatically, Google hopes to help users avoid being trapped by suspicious messages that will try to compromise the user's Gmail information.

Once the user has built a communication with a new address, either by adding the address into the contact list or by replying the message, the full address will not be shown.

Al-Qaida network is unsafe

While the organization itself is a danger for most countries, it does not have trusted channel to spread its propaganda and media. Evan Kohlman of Flashpoint Partners yesterday said that the terror group’s latest forum, Shumukh, has been offline since at least three days ago.

There are still many other jihadi forums online but Al-Qaida does not trust them. Some of these jihadi forums also has been mysteriously knocked offline, including the Ansar al-Mujahideen Network, a forum in Arabic. Some mirrors still available for Al-Qaida’s material like aljahad.com/vb.

However, Al-Qaida will need an entirely new route to have a direct relation with any new forum, or the broken forum Shumukh has to be totally restructured, said Mr. Kohlmann. He also suggested that the group must also have the backup copies of the knocked down forum.

Last year, Al-Qaida’s forum Al-Faloja was down but the group immediately replaced the forum with the currently broken Shumukh. Kohlman assured that the group will form another forum once they have found the safer channel. He also listed several suspect, from the Jester to government-sponsored in the U.S. and U.K.

The Jester did not confirm to hack Shumukh.

Hackend: LulzSec disbands

After 50 days of uproar, hacktivists LulzSec on their Twitter account announced yesterday that they disband. The group released a full line of torrents containing around 750,000 users data stolen from several target, one of which is AT&T. The exact reason behind this disband is not clear yet but the group insisted that they knew that they would end after 50 days.

But they hope that their AntiSec campaign, a war against government and other high end establishments, shoulkd continue without them. The announcement said:

The support we’ve gathered for it in such a short space of time is truly overwhelming, and not to mention humbling. Please don’t stop. Together, united, we can stomp down our common oppressors and imbue ourselves with the power and freedom we deserve.

Zack Witthaker in ZDNet suggested four theories on the disband. The group may believe that fifty days is a set milestone. Topiary, the person ran the group's Twitter feed, is likely a British, judged by his/her writing of style and time zone. A politic-aware person must remembered George Orwell whose death was happened to be of this date. But Whittaker ruled out this possibility because the announcement was posted after midnight.

LulzSec is not immune from hacker attack which means that their identities have been compromised. A confrontation has developed with The Jester appeared to be able to take down LulzSec's main website on Friday albeit for a short while. They may be get bored too since press and media coverage for them have been below their target. Or, the movement has found its natural end. AntiSec campaign wants general population to revolt against their respective government. Considering how the majority of the public has voted for their current government, majority votes are unlikely in the hacktivists' favor.