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News

• Security conference dives into SAP coding problems

  The Black Hat Europe conference in Barcelona next week will feature a keynote on cyberwar from Bruce Schneier, and presentations on security flaws in Apple's Mac OS X and SAP's business software.

• UK banks report lower online banking and card payment losses

  U.K. banks reported sharply lower levels of online banking fraud and counterfeit cards in 2010, a sign the industry may be getting better at deflecting attacks from cybercriminals.

• Hackers targeted French gov't computers for G20 secrets

  IT staff spent the weekend in a massive clean-up operation to remove traces of a "spectacular" attack on computers at Bercy, the headquarters of the French Ministry of Economy, Finances and Industry, a government minister said Monday.

• Alleged 'scareware' vendors to pay $8.2 million to FTC

  The operator of an alleged "scareware" scheme, using deceptive advertising to trick Internet users into buying software to fix their supposedly infected computers, will pay the U.S. Federal Trade Commission US$8.2 million to settle a complaint brought by the agency, the FTC said.

• UK cyber challenge aims to fill IT talent shortage

  Paul Laverack of London is an actor, but he's considering a possible career change -- to computer security.

• Govt websites could face WikiLeaks revenge attack

  The UK's national security advisor has warned that government websites used to upload tax returns or claims benefits are at risk of attack from hackers who support <a href="http://wikileaks.org">WikiLeaks</a>.

• LimeWire to close online music store on December 31

  LimeWire will close for good on New Years Eve as it will shut its legitimate online music store permanently.

• Trend Micro releases free Stuxnet detection tool

  Trend Micro has released a tool that administrators can use to scan dozens of computers at a time for Stuxnet, the malicious software program that has raised widespread concern for its targeting of industrial systems made by Siemens.

• Google adds phishing URL alerts into network tool

  Google has added notification for phishing URLs to its service that lets administrators know if their networks have been compromised.

• Microsoft will look to courts for botnet takedowns

  Microsoft has seen a dramatic drop in the number of computers infected with Waledac, a piece of malicious software affiliated with a botnet that was once responsible for a massive amount of spam.

• Security program automatically tracks down missing patches

  Secunia has updated its Personal Software Inspector (PSI) with the ability to silently download and apply patches from multiple vendors soon after their release. PSI 2.0 is now available in an open beta test,

• Germany to launch antibotnet program for consumers

  Germany will soon launch a service to help consumers remove malicious software from their computers in an attempt to stem the spread of spam-sending botnets.

• Rustock botnet responsible for 40 percent of spam

  More than 40 percent of the world's spam is coming from a single network of computers that computer security experts continue to battle, according to new statistics from Symantec's MessageLabs' division.