A dramatic story making the rounds claims that if "you don't have your computer malware free by July 9th the FBI will shut your computer down." As Techland points out, the story has roots in a small bit of reality but reporting on it has been a little bit overblown. The story originates all the way back to 2007, when malware called DNSChanger managed to infect millions of computers around the world.

A new message posted on Pastebin and attributed to the hacking group Anonymous promises to shut down the entire internet on March 31. The group says that it will target the 13 root DNS servers that make up the bulk of the servers that give URL names to most of the Internet.

As to why they would want to do this, they say the following:

Sony has taken two PSP games off the PlayStation Store, after it was revealed that the games might contain an exploit that allowed hackers access to the handheld's core functionality. In other words, it gave them the ability to run any kind of software they wanted to on the Vita. The two PSP games taken offline are Everybody's Tennis and MotorStorm Arctic Edge. The latter may have been taken off the store for other reasons and the timing of its removal could simply be coincidental.

According to this C&VG report, Capcom is aware of hacks being used to play unreleased Street Fighter x Tekken DLC content on Xbox Live, and will do something about it.

George Hotz may be best known as the guy that was sued by Sony for jailbreaking the PS3 and for jailbreaking the iPhone, but last week he was charged with a felony for something that didn't involve Electronic devices and hacking.

Jason Helton pens an F-U letter to the guy who hijacked his Xbox Live account (and credit card) and decided to buy a bunch of crap on Xbox Live. The lover letter can be found over at Joystick Division, and might be funny until you consider what this poor guy had to do stop this interloper. For one, he probably had to cancel his credit card and try to dispute any purchases the guy made, and then he decided to simply wipe his Xbox Live account to avoid any further agitation.

A Twitter account that serves as the "news source" of the hacking group Anonymous vows revenge against the FBI for six arrests it made of LulzSec and Anonymous members announced yesterday and offers tips on how to strike back. @YourAnonNews also encouraged members in the group, telling them not to be discouraged that top members had turned FBI informants.

Update: The FBI has issued a press release with more details on the arrests made so far. They name names and list all of the charges.

The hacktivist group Anonymous continues to assault government websites in protest of the Anti-Counterfeiting Trade Agreement (ACTA). The group has reportedly hacked several U.S. government web sites including business.ftc.gov, consumer.gov, and the National Consumer Protection Week official site (ncpw.gov). According to VentureBeat the group compromised the websites and then posted anti-ACTA statements and a PSA video.

Below is the statement they posted on the sites:

It was about two weeks ago that Halo 4 developer 343 Industries warned gamers that any Halo 4 sites offering access to a beta were fake. One such site, Halo4beta.net, is now feeling the wrath of Microsoft's legal team, according to Fusible.

DICE is looking for an anti-cheat security expert, according to a new job listing on its official site. The Battlefield series developer is looking for someone willing to take up residence in its home office (Stockholm, Sweden) where they will be charged with "secure the online experience for all DICE titles." Whoever dons the mantle of "Anti-Cheat Administrator" will have their work cut out from them, given all the hacking and cheating going on with its latest title Battlefield 3.

Hackers under auspices of the AntiSec group claimed responsibility for hacking OnGuardOnline.gov, the U.S. federal government's online security website, in protest of various internet-related legislation including ACTA, SOPA and PIPA. OnGuardOnline.gov is managed by the U.S. Federal Trade Commission (FTC) in cooperation with 14 other agencies.

Officials from the Polish government say that they are steadfast in their support of ACTA, despite the threats from Anonymous. The hacktivist group attacked various Polish government sites over the weekend in hopes of deterring the country from supporting the international agreement on counterfeiting and IP protection. Polish government minister Michal Boni, defended the Anti-Counterfeiting Trade Agreement, saying that signing the international treaty would not hamper Internet usage. He added that Poland still plans to sign it on Thursday, as planned.

An attack on multiple government web sites in Poland by hacktivist group Anonymous has made the Polish government rethink its position on the Anti-Counterfeiting Trade Agreement (ACTA), the negotiated-in-secret anti-piracy framework. (ACTA) is a treaty that would institute international standards regarding intellectual property protection enforcement. In October of last year the U.S., Japan, Australia, Canada, Morocco, New Zealand, Singapore, and South Korea agreed to move forward with the proposal during a meeting in Tokyo.

While it isn't indicated on its official site, the CoveritLive service has apparently been hacked and some personal user data may have been compromised, according to an email sent to subscribers this evening. The Live blogging technology is used by plenty of journalists, bloggers, and web sites as an easy way to blog live events. From the letter they mailed out to users this evening:

Those who use jailbroken iPhones and enjoy pirating software are in for a rude awakening as Apple uses the DMCA to take out a frequently used service - Apptrackr. According to Apptrackr developer "Dissident," Apple has sent what he calls "huge takedown notices" to cut off access to pirated apps found through the software. Apptrackr has decided to move the physical location of its servers outside the United States to get around Apple's legal maneuvers and is also employing a form of redirection to avoid "direct" links to infringing content.

A new video supposedly from the hacking group Anonymous warns Sony that they are soon to be targeted for their support of the Stop Online Piracy Act (SOPA).

Hacker Brandon Wilson decided to tinker with Activision's Skylanders action figures to see how they work. In case you don't know, Skylanders uses action figures that are placed on a portal peripheral that makes them appear in the game by reading the bottom of the figure.

Trion Worlds, makers of the MMO Rift Online, has been hacked according to an email it sent out to subscribers last night. The company said in the letter that unknown intruders gained access to a Trio Worlds account database that contained personal user information and credit card data.

According to a new report from F-Secure, over $10 million will be stolen online by cyber criminals this holiday season, because consumers are increasingly turning away from traditional retail to shop at online retailers. Online shopping has increased 10 percent since the same period a year ago, to right around $30.9 billion dollars - so far - according to comScore. For example, Cyber Monday raked in $1.25 billion, and Free Shipping Day saw around $1.72 billion in revenue.

Square Enix has revealed details on the extent of the hack that we reported on earlier this week. Square Enix confirmed that up to 1.8 million customers in Japan and the U.S. could be affected by the attack on its member service that took place earlier this week. While personal information may have been compromised, the Final Fantasy maker says that no financial information was stolen because the servers contained no credit card or billing information. They also noted that servers in Europe were not comprised.

Here we go again.

Square Enix put out a press release this afternoon stating that it had “reason to believe that unknown parties may have gained unauthorized access” to a server related to its Square Enix Members service offered in North America and Japan.  In response, the company temporarily suspended operation of the free service as of last night.

Account information from more than 13 million MapleStory players was compromised in a recent hacking incident, according to a report in the Korean Herald. According to that report, the attack took place last Thursday on Thanksgiving, and affected three-quarters of the game's player-base - right around 13.2 million people. The data that may have been stolen included player names, user IDs, passwords, and registration numbers (Korea's version of the US's social security number).

The Steam forums are offline, with a message to visitors declaring that they are undergoing maintenance, but some users are telling Eurogamer that the forums may have suffered a security breach. Currently the forums are displaying the following message:

"The Steam Forums are temporarily offline for maintenance," a message on Steampowered reads. "Your patience is appreciated."

Cracking and hacking group Razor1911 has found a way to allow owners of the PC version of Battlefield 3 to play online without using EA's Origin service. Battlefield 3 owners are required to have an Origin account to run even retail versions of the PC edition of the game. In the documentation to the crack (you can read the document here) the group laid out its reasoning for hacking EA's executables (besides doings it for the lulz):

Turbine Entertainment sent out an alert this morning informing subscribers of its various MMO titles that a third-party "may have attempted to access" forum accounts. While the company says that there is no indication that any accounts were modified or compromised, it is urging subscribers to change their passwords for the sake of safety and security. One of the curious things about the email is that it seems to indicate that this happened sometime before October 11. Why Turbine waited this long we do not know. From the email sent out this morning:

EA studio DICE is warning players that they should avoid playing the beta of the upcoming modern-day shooter Battlefield 3 on unofficial servers, noting that doing so could compromise their accounts. Last week, Battlefield 3's server files were leaked onto the internet, opening up players to a large amount of unofficial servers for the game's ongoing beta test on PC. Using these leaked files lets those who want to run a server to adjust player counts from 32 to 100, among other things.

Sony did not break Australia’s Privacy Act during the PlayStation Network cyber attack, ruled Australia's Privacy Commissioner Timothy Pilgrim. Pilgrim’s report, released today, said that the Commission found "no evidence that Sony intentionally disclosed any personal information to a third party." Pilgrim said that he was satisfied that Sony Australia took reasonable steps to protect its customers’ personal information, including encrypting credit card information and ensuring appropriate security measures were in place.

Infinity Ward's creative strategist Robert Bowling says that the studio has learned some hard lessons about online cheating from previous Call of Duty games, and is taking extraordinary measures to make sure that there is little (or at least less) of it in Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 3. To that end, Bowling says that MW3 will have dedicated teams monitoring online activity and dealing with anyone foolhardy enough to cheat.

A series of takedowns by law enforcement around the world may be taking its toll on the hacking group LulzSec. DailyTech claims that a number of recent police raids have seen the heart of the organization torn out. The first major arrest was LulzSec's chief ‘Topiary’ in the Shetland Islands, who is currently in jail awaiting trial. Recently five UK residents were detained, including supposed LulzSec leader ‘Kayla’.