Replies

Experian Glitch Exposing Credit Files Lasted 47 Days

January 25, 2023

“On Dec. 23, 2022, KrebsOnSecurity alerted big-three consumer credit reporting bureau Experian that identity thieves had worked out how to bypass its security and access any consumer’s full credit report — armed with nothing more than a person’s name, address, date of birth, and Social Security number. Experian fixed the glitch, but remained silent about the incident for a month. This week, however, Experian acknowledged that the security failure persisted for nearly seven weeks, between Nov. 9, 2022 and Dec. 26, 2022.”

https://krebsonsecurity.com/

+++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++

47 days? Oooh, aaaargh, ow, ow, ow! Mooo!

I can’t believe this! Can we have something like a “March on ‘K’  street” to give these lobbyists the boot? The credit bureaus need to be reined in or abolished in favor of something better.

Unacceptable, Irredeemable, flagrant disregard of the Public Good, …I ran out of words.

(I know, take a picture… 😐 )

Win7 Pro SP1 64-bit, Dell Latitude E6330, Intel CORE i5 "Ivy Bridge", 12GB RAM, Group "0Patch", Multiple Air-Gapped backup drives in different locations. Linux Mint Greenhorn
--
"...all the people, all the time..."Peter Ustinov ad-lib in "Logan's Run"

4 users thanked author for this post.

SueW, wavy, alejr, Alex5723

Alex5723 wrote:

You don’t have any reason to believe any cloud service is secure. It isn’t.

“The Cloud”: Your stuff on someone else’s computer.

(Who said that?)

Win7 Pro SP1 64-bit, Dell Latitude E6330, Intel CORE i5 "Ivy Bridge", 12GB RAM, Group "0Patch", Multiple Air-Gapped backup drives in different locations. Linux Mint Greenhorn
--
"...all the people, all the time..."Peter Ustinov ad-lib in "Logan's Run"

1 user thanked author for this post.

Alex5723

mledman wrote:

Even though all account passwords were salted and hashed

From what I understand this is practically impossible to crack. Am I wrong?

Win7 Pro SP1 64-bit, Dell Latitude E6330, Intel CORE i5 "Ivy Bridge", 12GB RAM, Group "0Patch", Multiple Air-Gapped backup drives in different locations. Linux Mint Greenhorn
--
"...all the people, all the time..."Peter Ustinov ad-lib in "Logan's Run"

dg1261 wrote:

That explains why any individual user is highly unlikely to get a notice. Nothing here worth getting worked up about.

I thank you for the perspective. It appears that the Gods of Panic and Fear (Phobos and Deimos?) have been appeased and put down. .008%. Hmm.

This is one of the happier times when the howling in the Security Media came to less than The Initial Awful Dread. I find that certain sources in The Security Media, besides being very useful, can sometimes go off the deep end in initial reportage. Not always, not even mostly. But sometimes. And that, sometimes, seems too often.

IMHO.

Win7 Pro SP1 64-bit, Dell Latitude E6330, Intel CORE i5 "Ivy Bridge", 12GB RAM, Group "0Patch", Multiple Air-Gapped backup drives in different locations. Linux Mint Greenhorn
--
"...all the people, all the time..."Peter Ustinov ad-lib in "Logan's Run"

Ascaris wrote:

These are motherboards sold as components, so their target audience is enthusiasts who build PCs, not average computer users.

Ah, for the days of rolling your own!

I built my 2nd, 3rd, and 4th PC because I found out 1) I COULD do it (with help) and 2) I could have an overall superior product by selecting the individual components myself, and come out with money saved! However:

Time and tide took their toll, and I just was physically not up to it for #5, which was to be a graphics workstation. So I went to a local custom shop, and THEY built to my specs and threw in a 1 year guarantee for less than MY build price! (Which was great, as I only had to take it back _twice_ to get it running right!) Today, alas, custom shops are very few…

…and it looks like MSI is making clinkers now…disappointing, they used to be very good! Have they gone down the drain, or is this an anomaly?

(Moderator: remove to hardware if not appropriate.)

Win7 Pro SP1 64-bit, Dell Latitude E6330, Intel CORE i5 "Ivy Bridge", 12GB RAM, Group "0Patch", Multiple Air-Gapped backup drives in different locations. Linux Mint Greenhorn
--
"...all the people, all the time..."Peter Ustinov ad-lib in "Logan's Run"

Alex5723 wrote:

Don’t buy Samsung as they are HP now.

Ouch! Yeah, they bought their printer biz. Everybody’s buying up all the smaller fish -see what MVNO’s Verizon bought in the past 24. Off-topic, but had to throw it in.

Win7 Pro SP1 64-bit, Dell Latitude E6330, Intel CORE i5 "Ivy Bridge", 12GB RAM, Group "0Patch", Multiple Air-Gapped backup drives in different locations. Linux Mint Greenhorn
--
"...all the people, all the time..."Peter Ustinov ad-lib in "Logan's Run"

Alex5723 wrote:

Don’t forget that HP blocks installation of replacement ink cartridges.

I know this sort of flummery has been going on for some time, but I have always been able to use after-market carts (to a worse or better result depending on the re-manufacturer). Maybe that’s because the printer is so old; made in a time when QC was not so bad and the printer companies weren’t as money-mad as they are today.

I know…this business of having a WiFi printer is a mixed blessing if it’s phoning home all the time.

After re-educating myself a bit on inkjet carts, I did find out you have to pretty much print a couple of pages a month to keep the carts from drying out. I never had this issue before, as lived in a very humid environment –by the ocean for decades. I’m currently much farther inland, where it gets hotter and dryer a LOT more, so I think the carts just dried up from environmental factors -dry air as we have HVAC and it’s a VERY dry climate. Disuse was another factor. Very little was printed in 2022.

Oh, and the alkie soak failed…so I just broke down and located a vendor of re-manufactured carts for the HP, $30 for all three plus shipping and they have a 10-day money back guarantee if you’re unhappy, so we shall see what we shall see.

If these fail, or something goes totally wrong with the 5550, well, it looks like a laser for me. Looked at the Brother RetiredGeek recommended and it seems to have a lot of good reviews. (But jeez…21 years? They built THAT one right back then.)

Always gotta keep learning. Everything changes fast in Tech.

“You live and learn, or you don’t live long.” –Robert Heinlein

Win7 Pro SP1 64-bit, Dell Latitude E6330, Intel CORE i5 "Ivy Bridge", 12GB RAM, Group "0Patch", Multiple Air-Gapped backup drives in different locations. Linux Mint Greenhorn
--
"...all the people, all the time..."Peter Ustinov ad-lib in "Logan's Run"

1 user thanked author for this post.

Alex5723

RetiredGeek wrote:

I use the Brother HL-L-2350DW (Amazon $149) and love it.

Was looking at the Linkyo carts…and notice they have replacement “Drums”.

https://www.linkyo.com/catalogsearch/result/?q=brother+730

Never owned a laser printer…how often do you have to change the drum?

Win7 Pro SP1 64-bit, Dell Latitude E6330, Intel CORE i5 "Ivy Bridge", 12GB RAM, Group "0Patch", Multiple Air-Gapped backup drives in different locations. Linux Mint Greenhorn
--
"...all the people, all the time..."Peter Ustinov ad-lib in "Logan's Run"

…and to think all this started because I just wanted to print a 2X3 pic to go in a wallet…then the carts proved dried out! After a lot of common “unplugging tricks” on the carts failed, we are currently soaking the heads in a 50/50 mix of Isopropyl alcohol and distilled water, hoping.

Wow. There sure is a lot here to unpack! One cannot complain of a paucity of responses on this forum!

In an effort to mitigate my usual “Writer’s Curse” (10 words where five are needed) I didn’t add the reason for the color printing requirement: We bought this printer at a time when my wife was going full guns as a Graphics and Fine Artist, and we sold a lot of originals cut to odd sizes (the framers loved us, $$$) on very nice paper right out of the 5550 printer. (Also, it was just nice having the ability there in case we needed it.)

This is no longer the case, but as we are still planning to get the old graphics workstation up and running this year in our new home (3 years of health and COVID issues, and now the cost of housing, delaying everything) and things have changed. It may well do for us to go laser and just hand the whole pro color affair over to the digital print/graphics shop. We were using one anyway for the big stuff, especially the digital Giclee’s and regular canvas.

(Unfortunately, the outfits that do this well are getting few and far between…but that’s another story.)

And, as still I do a lot of general landscape and portrait photography (was a pro in a past life) we DID used to just drop it all off at the digital printer’s with the usual 4X6’s, so…the Laser route may be the way to go. Also, there’s inflation; $120 in Jan. 2002 is like, $200.00 in Nov. 2022. (BLS data)

And the printer failure rates today? Good old cheap foreign labor, I guess; they can have a fail rate of 25% and STILL make a profit.

Like I said, there’s a lot here to unpack from all of you!

I’ll let you all know how well the “overnight alkie soak” went. I know, I’m pretty sure those carts have gone to join The Great Printout in the sky. 🙂 in the meantime, heartfelt thanks!

Win7 Pro SP1 64-bit, Dell Latitude E6330, Intel CORE i5 "Ivy Bridge", 12GB RAM, Group "0Patch", Multiple Air-Gapped backup drives in different locations. Linux Mint Greenhorn
--
"...all the people, all the time..."Peter Ustinov ad-lib in "Logan's Run"

Alex5723 wrote:

We threw out a Canon TS3450 printer that died after 5 months. Before that 2 HP Deskjet 2630 died after 6 months.

You could be right, but I need some more input.

BTW, these printers you mention are supposed to have a one-year warranty. I’m surprised you heaved them instead of invoking that. (I hope you recycled them as e-waste.)

It certainly does not speak well for HP or Canon’s line, or those models at least, in any case.

Well, “More shall be revealed.”

Win7 Pro SP1 64-bit, Dell Latitude E6330, Intel CORE i5 "Ivy Bridge", 12GB RAM, Group "0Patch", Multiple Air-Gapped backup drives in different locations. Linux Mint Greenhorn
--
"...all the people, all the time..."Peter Ustinov ad-lib in "Logan's Run"

Thanks, but per my post:

1. It’s an all-In-One

2. At $325.00 it’s out of my league

Win7 Pro SP1 64-bit, Dell Latitude E6330, Intel CORE i5 "Ivy Bridge", 12GB RAM, Group "0Patch", Multiple Air-Gapped backup drives in different locations. Linux Mint Greenhorn
--
"...all the people, all the time..."Peter Ustinov ad-lib in "Logan's Run"

Rick Corbett wrote:

I wonder if Elon Musk is yet regretting his decision to waste spend $44B on a hobby purchase?

If he is, he’d never admit it.

Win7 Pro SP1 64-bit, Dell Latitude E6330, Intel CORE i5 "Ivy Bridge", 12GB RAM, Group "0Patch", Multiple Air-Gapped backup drives in different locations. Linux Mint Greenhorn
--
"...all the people, all the time..."Peter Ustinov ad-lib in "Logan's Run"

Alex5723 wrote:

* I don’t the big victory. Settlement should have been in $Bs After the lawyers take their cut each user may receive ~$5.

Yep. Meta made 29 billion (net) last financial year.

https://www.macrotrends.net/stocks/charts/META/meta-platforms/net-income

2.5%…That’s a mosquito bite on a Hippopotamus! Alex, I can’t stand it, I tell you…argh!

Win7 Pro SP1 64-bit, Dell Latitude E6330, Intel CORE i5 "Ivy Bridge", 12GB RAM, Group "0Patch", Multiple Air-Gapped backup drives in different locations. Linux Mint Greenhorn
--
"...all the people, all the time..."Peter Ustinov ad-lib in "Logan's Run"

1 user thanked author for this post.

Sky

Fred wrote:

is this all about chit-chat?, or is there some editorial comment, if you please?

Just my conversational tone of writing while explaining my approach to security in a security forum, when there’s a security issue regarding password security being discussed.

I was an English/Lit major, and I tend to write like it. Some publishers have actually thought well of it. 🙂

Happy Holidays!

Win7 Pro SP1 64-bit, Dell Latitude E6330, Intel CORE i5 "Ivy Bridge", 12GB RAM, Group "0Patch", Multiple Air-Gapped backup drives in different locations. Linux Mint Greenhorn
--
"...all the people, all the time..."Peter Ustinov ad-lib in "Logan's Run"

For every lock, there’s some sneaky foot-scraping cracker that can make a key for it. Eventually.

I just don’t know, folks…maybe I’m like that old fisherman in Maine who didn’t “believe in all them fancy frills and gimm-ocks…!”, but for me, a unusual word or term, translated into an incredibly obscure language, salted with symbols and squirrel noises, then written down in a small book hidden away in some location known to only one other person you’ve known for 40 years seems to do fine by me.

(If I’m feeling particularly fine that day, I might write that down in Southern Akson Thai or some other Abugida-like tongue/script to drive anyone who DOES find it insane trying to decode it.)

YMMV.

Win7 Pro SP1 64-bit, Dell Latitude E6330, Intel CORE i5 "Ivy Bridge", 12GB RAM, Group "0Patch", Multiple Air-Gapped backup drives in different locations. Linux Mint Greenhorn
--
"...all the people, all the time..."Peter Ustinov ad-lib in "Logan's Run"

1 user thanked author for this post.

Alex5723