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US Treasury's intelligence network was susceptible to cyberattacks
Yet another government agency was found to have substandard cybersecurity measures in place after an internal audit -- worse, it exposed the organization's intelligence network to attacks. According to a late 2014 audit report obtained by Reuters, around 29 percent of the devices that connect to the US Treasury's Foreign Intelligence Network don't meet federal cybersecurity standards. Some of those are Windows computers that weren't properly configured, preventing the IT division from updating them on time and making sure they were secure. The country's spy agencies tap into that network to add info they want to share with each other and assess and detect international threats to America's economy. They also use it to keep track of what their peers know about militant groups and the effect of sanctions against organizations and countries like Iran and Russia.
PayPal's failure to spot sanctioned accounts just cost it $7.7 millon
PayPal has has agreed to pay the US Department of the Treasury $7.7 million, after the financial giant processed transactions for a number of companies and individuals on the US sanctions list. A total of 486 violations of US regulations had apparently been committed by PayPal "for several years" after repeated failures in the firm's screening process, a reports explains. While the severity of each instance will vary, the Treasury highlighted a number that relate to Turkish national Kursud Zafer Cire -- an individual on the list after suspected involvement in the movement of weapons of mass destruction. The Treasury's report states that Risk Operations Agents at PayPal manually overrode at least four alerts flagging Cire as blacklisted -- resulting in transactions totalling over $7,000. Since 2013, PayPal has introduced a "long term solution" that checks for violations in real time. An investment we imagine that's a little more cost effective, than predicting future malware.
Verizon sends $25 million settlement to FCC, credits customers $52.8 million for wrongful data fees
Did we say Verizon would dole out $90 million in credits? It seems we spoke too soon, because the US Government is taking its cut of the carrier's apology after charging for data that customers didn't actually use. Verizon says it's settled with the FCC for $25 million and will cut a check to the US Treasury, and put the remaining $52.8 million towards the bills of 15 million affected customers in the form of $2 to $6 credits each. Verizon's not taking any blame in the matter, mind you, as it says the original data charges were "inadvertent" and caused by software pre-loaded on some phones. Yet another reason to ditch the bloatware, we suppose. PR after the break.
