You’d think it would be difficult to find an app that can secretly track a person’s every move. But researchers have found them right in the open on Google’s Play Store. Antivirus company Avast said Wednesday that it’s found seven stalkerware apps available on Android’s market. In all, they had been installed more than 130,000 …

Millions of people in China who use loan apps to borrow money have ended up paying with their privacy. A security researcher discovered a public database left exposed online containing sensitive data on more than 4.6 million devices, including location history, debt logs, financial information and contacts. The database had over 899 gigabytes of data coming from more than 100 …

With this vulnerability, what you see on WhatsApp and Telegram might not be what was sent. Despite the secure messaging apps’ end-to-end encryption protecting people from government surveillance, researchers from Symantec disclosed flaws that could allow potential hackers to alter images and audio files.  While the sender might have sent, say, a photo of a map, malware could exploit this …

Permissions on Android apps are intended to be gatekeepers for how much data your device gives up. If you don’t want a flashlight app to be able to read through your call logs, you should be able to deny that access. But even when you say no, many apps find a way around: Researchers discovered more than 1,000 apps that …

Lake City isn’t the first local government to pay out hundreds of thousands of dollars to hackers over ransomware, and it’s not likely to be the last. The northern Florida city said Tuesday that it would be paying hackers up to $460,000 in bitcoin to recover its computer systems.  This comes days after Riviera Beach, a Florida city more than …

EA had to step up its game after researchers found an EA Origin vulnerability that could have exposed millions of people to account takeovers. The flaw exposed more than 300 million players on popular online games such as Battlefield, Madden NFL, NBA Live and FIFA, according to security researchers from Check Point and CyberInt. “EA’s Origin platform is hugely popular, …

Hackers have quietly infiltrated more than a dozen mobile carriers around the world, gaining complete control of networks behind the companies’ backs. The attackers have been using that access over the last seven years to steal sensitive data, but have so much control they could shut down communications at a moment’s notice, according to Cybereason, a security company based in …

For three weeks, Riviera Beach, a city of 35,000 people in Florida, had its computer systems held hostage. On Monday, the city council voted unanimously to pay $600,000 in bitcoin to the hackers who caused the problem. After a city employee clicked on a malicious link in an email, ransomware quickly spread throughout Riviera Beach’s computer network, locking it down …

Your car knows a lot more about you than you think. It gathers all sorts of information, from where you’ve been to whom you’ve talked to and what music you like, and police are able to get all of that information without a warrant. A Georgia Supreme Court case could change that. The American Civil Liberties Union argued Wednesday that …

If you’re worried about your privacy, there are precautions you can take like staying off social networks, using cash or watching out for certain apps. But when it comes to watching television, more and more you’re out of luck. Smart televisions collect a massive amount of data on viewers, through a technology called Automatic Content Recognition. It recognizes everything you’re …