Fuji photo print kiosks infecting some USB drives

Apparently it is not standard practice to (a) install anti-virus software on these Windows kiosks, and (b) treat the customer's USB stick as read-only. As a result, some people are ending up with trojans on their sticks and an autorun.inf file to initiate it and remove their computer's anti-virus software.

Specifically mentioned stores are Woolworth's and Big W, but I would imagine most photo print kiosks at most any store could be vulnerable and should be treated as potentially hostile.

So be careful using these things! Your safest bet would be to copy the photos to be printed to a CD-R/W or CD-ROM and reformat or destroy the disk after using it. Using Linux or a Mac is also pretty safe, though if you use a non-Windows platform and get your stick infected, while your computer may be safe, you could infect a Windows machine later by using that stick on it.

http://risky.biz/big-wirus

http://security.morganstorey.com/2010/07/big-wirus.html

http://it.slashdot.org/story/10/07/06/0019234/Photo-Kiosks-Infecting-Customers-USB-Devices?art_pos=3

British bank sends out debit and credit cards -- pre-activated!

One of the writers stumbled upon HSBC sending out new and replacement cards that did not require activation. One guy took a card from a brand-new account and went around for over a week making purchases before dialing the number and activating the card. The people with the bank said 'we're very concerned about our customer's security' without saying they were going to fix the problem.

The telling bit is that this was first reported in 2004.

http://www.knowzy.com/Personal_Finance/Credit/Credit_Cards/HSBC_Sends_Activated_Debit_Cards_In_Mail.htm

http://news.slashdot.org/story/10/07/05/2235205/HSBC-Bank-Sends-Activated-Debit-Cards-Through-Mail