Thank you for reading the LinuxSecurity.com weekly security newsletter. The purpose of this document is to provide our readers with a quick summary of each week's most relevant Linux security headlines.

LinuxSecurity.com Feature Extras:

Peter Smith Releases Linux Network Security Online - Thanks so much to Peter Smith for announcing on linuxsecurity.com the release of his Linux Network Security book available free online. "In 2005 I wrote a book on Linux security. 8 years later and the publisher has gone out of business. Now that I'm free from restrictions on reproducing material from the book, I have decided to make the entire book available online."

Securing a Linux Web Server - With the significant prevalence of Linux web servers globally, security is often touted as a strength of the platform for such a purpose. However, a Linux based web server is only as secure as its configuration and very often many are quite vulnerable to compromise. While specific configurations vary wildly due to environments or specific use, there are various general steps that can be taken to insure basic security considerations are in place.

  Thinking like a hacker reduces security breaches (Apr 1)
 

Automated testing has its place in detecting IT security weaknesses but it cannot replace manual testing.The most effective means to protect data is a combination of manual testing and automated scans.
  Forget Stealing Credit Cards, Now Hackers Just Straight-Up Blackmail You (Apr 1)
 

While hackers tried to get rich by stealing millions of credit cards from Target, other cybercriminals have quietly tried another method to make a quick buck: Asking companies to pay them to go away.
  Why Privacy Is Actually Thriving Online (Mar 31)
 

Privacy is dead--or so we're told, both by those who would mourn the loss and by those who would dance on its grave. And the murderers aren't just the NSA and snooping corporations. We too have played a part in privacy's demise, through our embrace of mass exhibitionism.
  (Mar 31)
 

Google said its free DNS (Domain Name System) service is being intercepted by most Turkish ISPs as the country battles users trying to circumvent censorship efforts by the government.
  Report: RSA endowed crypto product with second NSA-influenced code (Apr 3)
 

Security provider RSA endowed its BSAFE cryptography toolkit with a second NSA-influenced random number generator (RNG) that's so weak it makes it easier for eavesdroppers to decrypt protected communications, Reuters reported Monday.
  (Apr 1)
 

Recently I saw a movie on the life and death of Aaron Swartz, who is nowadays often called a martyr for the freedom of the Internet.People, nations and governments like martyrs. They love them, they need them. Martyrs are part of our bipolar, black and white society constructed from good and bad guys, who always do good and bad deeds.
  Hypervisors: The cloud's potential security Achilles heel (Apr 1)
 

A cloud is only as secure as the hypervisors that support its virtual machines and how secure are those? That's a darn good question and one we tend to avoid looking at.
  U.S. States Investigating Breach at Experian (Apr 4)
 

An exclusive KrebsOnSecurity investigation detailing how a unit of credit bureau Experian ended up selling consumer records to an identity theft service in the cybercrime underground has prompted a multi-state investigation by several attorneys general, according to wire reports.
  Creating Forensic Sketches from DNA (Mar 31)
 

It's already possible to make some inferences about the appearance of crime suspects from their DNA alone, including their racial ancestry and some shades of hair colour. And in 2012, a team led by Manfred Kayser of Erasmus University Medical Center in Rotterdam, the Netherlands, identified five genetic variants with detectable effects on facial shape.
  DNS-Based Amplification Attacks Key on Home Routers (Apr 3)
 

DNS providers Nominum have published new data on DNS-based DDoS amplification attacks that are using home and small office routers as a jumping off point.
  (Apr 3)
 

The bad guys are taking full advantage of the squishy parts of the Internet's DNA. The result: massive DDoS attacks are disrupting Internet commerce, and slowing down the speed of the web.
  (Apr 7)
 

Nobody loves downtime or reboots -- especially not Suse. But the Linux engineers at Suse didn't just sit there and grind their teeth over forced reboots after a kernel patch; they went out and did something about it.