It’s Black Hat and DefCon conference time again[1], when the world’s top security researchers descend on the den of iniquity that is Las Vegas in August and try to scare the bejeezus out of people with new research into ominous hacks. Hooray!
WIRED’s been there for a few days already. Lily Hay Newman discovered that several mobile credit card readers are rife with bugs[2], potentially leaving you exposed. She also reports that researchers found a way to hack new Mac computers right out of the box[3], and the hubs that power smart cities are so vulnerable they’re a hacker’s dream[4]. Brian Barrett reports that online stock trading has some serious security holes[5], and millions of Android phones have insecurities built right in[6], thanks to bad firmware tweaks from carriers and manufacturers. Louise Matsakis explains how machine learning can ID anonymous coders[7] based on the quirks of their style, and why touchscreens in your hotel room[8] could be spying on you. Oh, and there’s a new way to hack Medtronic pacemakers[9] that could kill people. Yeesh.
WIRED will be in Vegas all weekend covering the conferences, so check back for more stories.
This week wasn’t all news from the Sin City, though. We also suggested seven ways to stay safe[10] on public Wi-Fi. We told you about an apparent assassination attempt[11] when a drone carrying explosives allegedly detonated near Venezuelan president Nicholas Maduro. And security researchers are totally freaked out[12] that West Virginia is going ahead with voting-by-app for some overseas service members in the midterms, even though online voting is known to be