Fifty years of the internet

Leonard Kleinrock Contributor Share on Twitter Leonard Kleinrock is the Distinguished Professor Emeritus of Computer Science at the UCLA Samueli School of Engineering. When my team of graduate students and I sent the first message over the internet on a warm Los Angeles evening in October, 1969, little did we suspect that we were at […]

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Passbase is building a full stack identity engine with privacy baked in

Digital identity startup Passbase has bagged $600k in pre-seed funding led by a group of business angel investors from Alphabet, Stanford, Kleiner Perkins, EY; as well as seed fund investment from Chicago-based Upheaval Investments and Seedcamp. The 2018-founded Silicon Valley-based startup — whose co-founder we chatted to briefly on camera at Disrupt Berlin — is […]

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How to protect your cell phone number and why you should care

Assuming you have your strong passwords in place and your two-factor authentication set up, you think your accounts are now safe? Think again. There’s much more to be done. You might think your Social Security or bank account numbers are the most sensitive digits in your life. Nowadays, hackers can do far more damage with […]

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Instagram’s app-based 2FA is live now, here’s how to turn it on

If you’d like to be sure you’re the only one posting elaborately staged yet casual selfies to your Instagram feed, there’s now a powerful new option to help you keep your account safe. In late September, Instagram announced that it would be adding non SMS-based two-factor authentication to the app. Instagram confirmed to TechCrunch that […]

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Watchdog says face scanning at US airports is plagued with technical problems

A watchdog report has warned that Homeland Security’s face scanning program, designed to track all departing travelers from the US, is facing “technical and operational challenges” that may not see the system fully working by the time of its estimated completion in 2021. The report by Homeland Security’s inspector general said that although Customs and […]

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Delta to start scanning faces at airport check-in

Delta will later this year roll out facial recognition at its terminal at Atlanta International Airport for anyone traveling on an international flight. The airline said the biometric facial scanning is optional — a move that will shave off a few minutes off each flight — but will help border and pre-flight security authorities before […]

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Google announces its first foray into the security key market

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Google is having a busy week at its Cloud Next ’18 conference, but it’s primarily been all software announcements. That changed on Wednesday with the Titan Security Key.

The Titan is a physical security key that adds a layer of authentication to an account — one that a digital authenticator can’t match. It will first launch for Google Cloud customers before rolling out to all consumers via the Google Store in the months that follow.

Titan will come in two models: a USB-A one and a Bluetooth one, both with the same core functionality. It will utilize the same standard and protocols as other keys but has an extra layer of firmware that Google says will verify its integrity. This will likely increase the safety of this key, and will make it even more difficult for a phishing attack to authenticate with it.   Read more…

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Okta introduces ‘Sign in with Okta’ service

Consider that there are millions of Okta users out there using the service to sign into their company applications with a single set of credentials. Yet getting customers to work together using Okta authentication was an enormous task for developers. Okta wanted to simplify it, so they created a service they are calling it ‘Sign […]

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Auth0 snags $55M Series D, seeks international expansion

Auth0, a startup based in Seattle, has been helping developers with a set of APIs to build authentication into their applications for the last five years. It’s raised a fair bit of money along the way to help extend that mission, and today the company announced a $55 million Series D. This round was led […]

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Relx acquires ThreatMetrix for $817M to ramp up in risk-based authentication

 Another startup in the area of cyber security has been snapped up as platform businesses serving enterprises look for more ways of securing their own networks and working with customers to secure theirs. Today, the RELX Group (formerly known as Reed Elsevier) announced that it would acquire ThreatMetrix for £580 million (about $817 million) in cash. This is a big exit for ThreatMetrix, which… Read More

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Cloudflare Access aims to replace corporate VPNs

 If you’re part of a big company, chances are that there are resources that are only available via the internal network, or whatever your company calls it. The usual way to access these from outside company property is a VPN, but VPNs are a clumsy solution — one companies like Google and Amazon are leaving behind. Now Cloudflare wants you to do the same and use its new Access… Read More

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