Team GhostShell is back: the hacktivists undertake to expose lax security and cyber vulnerability at 100 of the world's major universities. Naval Surface Warfare Center Crane demonstrates an Android Trojan that masquerades as a camera app. (Fun fact: beside cyber security, Crane's mission is growing oak trees to repair USS Constitution's wooden hull.) A Twitter flaw lets ill-wishers hijack and replace users' handles. Anonymous attacks government sites in the Philippines to protest pending cyber crime legislation. Islamists deface Australian websites.
The DDoS toolkit used to attack US banks last week is identified as "itsoknoproblembro." Analysts' reactions to the Islamist campaign range from "it's the cyber Pearl Harbor we've been expecting" to "it barely stands out against ordinary background noise." Iran, meanwhile, claims it's in an ongoing cyberwar with the "imperialists" (US, UK, and Israel) and that it's succeeded in stealing sensitive data from its enemies. Iranian police arrest two engineers and charge them with treason for complicity in spreading Stuxnet. The Chinese attack on White House networks was a fairly routing spearphishing effort the White House says was easily thwarted.
Cyber Command's General Alexander sees a trend: hackers are becoming more destructive. The Department of Homeland Security may open the hitherto closed National Cybersecurity and Communications Integration Center to industry partners. Budget sequestration approaches, and Lockheed Martin and BAE pointedly say they won't issue layoff notices (yet). Two interesting pieces discuss the influence of mobile devices on interface design. Cyber security offices continue to put down roots in county governments.