Internet Explorer 8 hacked within 24 hours

If you’re going to announce that your new browser is the safest on the market, you’d best be damned sure you’re right. It seems Microsoft releasing Internet Explorer 8 out of open beta yesterday was a red flag to a bull (or a challenge to a hacker), because within 24 hours a new exploit has been found in the browser.

The feat occurred at the annual CanSecWest security conference, which hosted its PWN2OWN hacking contest, where the exploit was found. A German hacker going by the name of Nils found it and claims a prize of $5000 in cash and a Sony Vaio laptop as a prize.

It’s only fair to mention that the same hacker managed to claim an additional $10,000 for successfully hacking Safari and Firefox. There’s still two days left for more browsers to succumb to the hacker’s codey wiles – perhaps Chrome and Opera will let their guard slip as well.

Quick! Encrypt your hard drives now: Euro police could be hacking your PC

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It’s very easy to become alarmed by some of the scaremongering stories which appear in certain sections of the UK press when it comes to technology and privacy, but this one – if abused – could be pretty serious indeed.

According to The Times, The Home Office has developed plans to give the UK police force the power to remotely hack into the personal computer of anyone it suspects might be involved with something dodgy — you know, terrorism, paedophilia, drug trafficking, that kind of thing — without a warrant, with the additional joyous notion that police forces from across the European Union can request information on any British Citizen.

Yes, it does all sound a bit Daily Mail, but unsurprisingly it’s raised the hackles of the human rights group Liberty, which has said that it will mount a legal challenge.