The Security box, podcast 39 for April 14, 2021

The technology blog and podcast and TSB

Welcome to podcast 39 of the Security Box. Looks like we've got commentary from the replay of broadcast 38's airing. We'll answer any questions from those comments if any, as well as talk about yet another story I read afterword in regards to Facebook and why it might be a good idea to remove your telephone number or use something like Google or Text Now as your number instead of your primary one. We'll have news, notes, commentary and more. We hope you enjoy the program as much as I have bringing it to you. Thanks for listening! Topic: More on Facebook, why Brian Krebs deleted his Facebook account In an article that I read on April 7th, Brian goes in to detail on why he eventually deleted his Facebook account sometime in 2020. According to the article, a paragraph says:

The phone number associated with my late Facebook account (which I deleted in Jan. 2020) was not in HaveIBeenPwned, but then again Facebook claims to have more than 2.7 billion active monthly users.

We know that Facebook has never been trustworthy after any type of incident, and I honestly don't believe that Mr. Krebs couldn't be part of the 533 million people affected by the breach. Checking with the site, yours truly isn't effected either, but I honestly wouldn't believe it now-a-day especially since news of this is two years old. The supposed database has been kicking around the Internet Cybercrime community since Last Summer, according to the article. I've never seen any of these databases, and with the massive amounts of databases out there and what they contain, who could confirm every piece of data in it? I like what Have I been Poned and what it is trying to offer, so don't get me wrong when it says that I'm not in there when I put my mobile number in the site to check. We now learn that the database was put up since June 2020 and include names, mobile number, gender, occupation, city, country and marital status. It includes data for 100 different countries and there is a link to a January 2021 twitter post within the article. KrebsOnSecurity goes on to talk about what might happen if someone with malicious intent gets ahold of your mobile number. One of the things that could happen is your phone number changing hands, otherwise known as a Sim-swapping attack. This happens because an employee at the store you got service is tricked in to changing the information to the attacker and you don't find out until you use your phone. Brian talks about how it is probably time to remove your number from services like Facebook once verification of the account is complete. I'm almost tempted on doing this myself. There is a very interesting paragraph in which I got interested in. It says:

Why did KrebsOnSecurity delete its Facebook account early last year? Sure, it might have had something to do with the incessant stream of breaches, leaks and privacy betrayals by Facebook over the years. But what really bothered me were the number of people who felt comfortable sharing extraordinarily sensitive information with me on things like Facebook Messenger, all the while expecting that I can vouch for the privacy and security of that message just by virtue of my presence on the platform.

We can't vouch for a presence of a sensitive message just because we're on the platform. I've never used Facebook or its messenger client for anything secure anyway, but that paragraph is very important. Are You One of the 533M People Who Got Facebooked? is the question and article title we're talking about in this segment, do read the article. News notes on the blog. Enjoy!