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Twin brothers in Virginia were indicted Thursday on computer hacking and other charges. Muneeb and Sohaib Akhter and co-conspirators allegedly hacked into the website of a cosmetics company and stole customer credit card data and personal information, according to a Thursday release. The 23-year-old brothers used the information obtained in the scheme to purchase goods and services such as flights and hotel reservations, and even to register to attend professional conferences, the release indicated. The duo and co-conspirators are also charged with hacking government systems. “In addition, the brothers and co-conspirators devised a scheme to hack into computer systems at the U.S. Department of State to access network traffic and to obtain passport information,” the release stated. The two men are charged with aggravated identity theft, conspiracy to commit wire fraud, conspiracy to access a protected computer without authorization, access of a protected computer without authorization, conspiracy to access a government computer without authorization, false statements, and obstruction of justice. If convicted on all counts, Muneeb Akhter faces a maximum 59 years in prison and Sohaib Akhter faces a maximum 39 years in prison. Source

Four U.S. citizens have been indicted by a federal grand jury in Pittsburgh for their alleged roles in an international Federal Reserve Notes (FRN) counterfeiting operation based out of Uganda, according to a Thursday release from the Department of Justice. Ryan Gustafson – who is currently incarcerated and facing charges in Uganda – is charged alongside Zackary Ruiz, Jeremy Miller, and Michael Lin with conspiracy and counterfeiting acts committed in and out of the U.S. Gustafson allegedly set up Community-X in December 2013, a website on the dark web that was “dedicated to the manufacturing, selling, buying, distribution and passing of counterfeit [FRNs], which [Gustafson] claimed to have manufactured,” the release stated, citing the indictment. The Community-X website evolved in September 2014 after Gustafson allegedly split it into two separate sites – one a Community-X HQ with controlled access, and another a Community-X Recruitment Center that was publicly accessible. Gustafson, Ruiz and Miller were allegedly active members of both sites, while Lin was only a member of the Recruitment Center, the Justice Department noted in the release. “Gustafson and others allegedly sold these [ugandan-made] counterfeit FRNs to purchasers in the U.S.,” the release said. “From December 2013 through February 2014, an associate of Gustafson sent DHL packages containing these counterfeit FRNs to individuals in the U.S. After February 2014, Gustafson had the counterfeit FRNs smuggled into the U.S. by hiding the counterfeit FRNs in glued together pages of fake charity pamphlets.” Ruiz, Miller and Lin allegedly had different roles in the operation, the Justice Department release indicated. Ruiz allegedly unpacked the counterfeit FRNs and – along with Miller – treated, prepared and mailed the counterfeit FRNs via the U.S. Postal Service to re-shippers and purchasers. Lin was allegedly a purchaser, and also helped in passing the phony notes in casinos. “The indictment alleges more than $1.4 million in counterfeit FRNs have been seized and passed worldwide, both overseas and in the U.S. as part of this scheme,” the release said. The maximum prison sentence for a conspiracy count is five years, the maximum prison sentence for a conspiracy to commit money laundering count is 20 years, and the maximum prison sentence for each passing and receiving counterfeit money count is also 20 years, the Justice Department noted. Source

Kali Linux 1.1.0 Released After almost two years of public development (and another year behind the scenes), we are proud to announce our first point release of Kali Linux – version 1.1.0. This release brings with it a mix of unprecedented hardware support as well as rock solid stability. For us, this is a real milestone as this release epitomizes the benefits of our move from BackTrack to Kali Linux over two years ago. As we look at a now mature Kali, we see a versatile, flexible Linux distribution, rich with useful security and penetration testing related features, running on all sorts of weird and wonderful ARM hardware. But enough talk, here are the goods: The new release runs a 3.18 kernel, patched for wireless injection attacks. Our ISO build systems are now running off live-build 4.x. Improved wireless driver support, due to both kernel and firmware upgrades. NVIDIA Optimus hardware support. Update virtualbox-tool, openvm-tools and vmware-tools packages and instructions. A whole bunch of fixes and updates from our bug-tracker changelog. And most importantly, we changed grub screens and wallpapers! Download or Upgrade Kali Linux 1.1.0 You can download the new version from our Kali Linux Download page, where you’ll also find mini-installer ISOS for both 32 and 64 bit CPU architectures. You can expect updated VMWare and multiple ARM image releases to be posted in the Offensive Security custom Kali Linux image download page in the next few days. As usual, if you’ve already got Kali Linux installed and running, there’s no need to re-download the image as you can simply update your existing operating system using simple apt commands: apt-get update apt-get dist-upgrade sursa