Data broker giant LexisNexis says breach exposed personal information of over 364,000 people

LexisNexis Risk Solutions, a data broker that collects and uses consumers’ personal data to help its paying corporate customers detect possible risk and fraud, has disclosed a data breach affecting more than 364,000 people.  The company said in a filing with Maine’s attorney gener

Apple CEO reportedly urged Texas’ governor to ditch online child safety bill

Apple CEO Tim Cook reportedly called Texas Gov. Greg Abbott to make changes to or veto a newly passed law in the state that would require the company to verify the ages of device owners, according to The Wall Street Journal. Abbott has yet to sign the bill. But Apple, alongside Google, has been wo

Mysterious hacking group Careto was run by the Spanish government, sources say

More than a decade ago, researchers at antivirus company Kaspersky identified suspicious internet traffic of what they thought was a known government-backed group, based on similar targeting and its phishing techniques. Soon, the researchers realized they had found a much more advanced hacking oper

Signal’s new Windows update prevents the system from capturing screenshots of chats

Signal said today that it is updating its Windows app to prevent the system from capturing screenshots, thereby protecting the content that is on display. The company said that this new “screen security” setting is enabled by default on Windows 11. Signal said that this new feature is

Wyden: AT&T, T-Mobile, and Verizon weren’t notifying senators of surveillance requests

Sen. Ron Wyden sent a letter to fellow senators on Wednesday, revealing that three major U.S. cellphone carriers did not have provisions to notify lawmakers about government surveillance requests, despite a contractual requirement to do so.  In the letter, Wyden, a Democrat and longstanding membe

US student agrees to plead guilty to hack affecting tens of millions of students

A Massachusetts student has agreed to plead guilty to federal charges relating to hacking and extorting one of the largest U.S. education tech companies, prosecutors confirmed Tuesday.  Matthew D. Lane, 19, is accused of using stolen login credentials to access the network of an unnamed softw

Cocospy stalkerware apps go offline after data breach

A trio of phone surveillance apps, which was caught spying on millions of people’s phones earlier this year, has gone offline. Cocospy, Spyic, and Spyzie were three near-identical but differently branded stalkerware apps that allowed the person planting one of the apps on a target’s ph

Pharma giant Regeneron to buy 23andMe and its customers’ data for $256M

Pharmaceutical maker Regeneron announced Monday it will buy genetic testing company 23andMe for $256 million following a bankruptcy auction.  Regeneron said it will acquire 23andMe’s genomics service and its bank of 15 million customers’ personal and genetic data as part of the de

Coinbase says customers’ personal information stolen in data breach

Crypto giant Coinbase has confirmed its systems have been breached and customer data, including government-issued identity documents, were stolen. In a legally required filing with U.S. regulators, Coinbase said a hacker this week told the company that they had obtained information about customer

White House scraps plan to block data brokers from selling Americans’ sensitive data

A senior Trump administration official has scrapped a plan that would have blocked data brokers from selling Americans’ personal and financial information, including Social Security numbers.  The Consumer Financial Protection Bureau (CFPB) said in December 2024 it planned to close a loo

xAI’s promised safety report is MIA

Elon Musk’s AI company, xAI, has missed a self-imposed deadline to publish a finalized AI safety framework, as noted by watchdog group The Midas Project. xAI isn’t exactly known for its strong commitments to AI safety as it’s commonly understood. A recent report found that t

Google announces new security features for Android for protection against scam and theft

At the Android Show on Tuesday, ahead of Google I/O, Google announced new security and privacy features for Android. These new features include new protections for calls, screen sharing, messages, device access, and system-level permissions. With these features, Google aims to protect users from fa

GovDelivery, an email alert system used by governments, abused to send scam messages

An email notification system used by U.S. federal and state government departments to alert residents to important information has been used to send scam emails, technewss has learned. The U.S. state of Indiana said Tuesday that it is “aware of fraudulent messages purportedly sent by state

Marks & Spencer confirms customers’ personal data was stolen in hack

U.K. retail giant Marks & Spencer has confirmed hackers stole its customers’ personal information during a cyberattack last month. In a brief statement with London’s stock exchange on Tuesday, the retailer said an unspecified amount of customer information was taken in the data bre