Cyber-crime increasingly impacts both the online and offline world, and targeted attacks play a significant role in disrupting services in both. Targeted attacks are those that are aimed at a particular individual, group, or type of site or service. Unlike worms and viruses that usually attack indiscriminately, targeted attacks involve intelligence-gathering and planning to a degree that drastically changes its profile. Individuals, corporations, and even governments are facing new threats from targeted attacks. Targeted Cyber Attacks examines real-world examples of directed attacks and provides insight into what techniques and resources are used to stage these attacks so that you can counter them more effectively. - A well-structured introduction into the world of targeted cyber-attacks - Includes analysis of real-world attacks - Written by cyber-security researchers and experts

Two separate cat species collide in the cosmos to tackle one shared mission: survive deadly virus attacks while thwarting the tyrannical schemes of power-hungry leaders. Zahra and Orion have misled the felidors of exoplanet Kapteyn b, assuring them they can achieve immortality if they merge with a different species to counteract the virus. Felidors are more advanced than felines and have achieved intergalactic space travel along with language assimilation skills. Meanwhile, felines on planet Earth face a horrible virus themselves. Their future is just as dire as the felidors. Now, only one shelter houses cats that are still infection free, but time is running out. Inside this facility are two caged cats. Donovan from Kapteyn b and Khan from planet Earth. They become fast friends and allies. What will happen to them? Five extraordinary felidors are led by Artema in a fight to maintain goodness and equality on their home planet and beyond. Follow the action in this explosive novella series as Rhea, an almighty cat god of the universe, battles her evil sister Hecate’s takeover attempts!

Viral respiratory tract infections are important and common causes of morbidity and mortality worldwide. In the past two decades, several novel viral respiratory infections have emerged with epidemic potential that threaten global health security. This Monograph aims to provide an up-to-date and comprehensive overview of severe acute respiratory syndrome, Middle East respiratory syndrome and other viral respiratory infections, including seasonal influenza, avian influenza, respiratory syncytial virus and human rhinovirus, through six chapters written by authoritative experts from around the globe.

Public health officials and organizations around the world remain on high alert because of increasing concerns about the prospect of an influenza pandemic, which many experts believe to be inevitable. Moreover, recent problems with the availability and strain-specificity of vaccine for annual flu epidemics in some countries and the rise of pandemic strains of avian flu in disparate geographic regions have alarmed experts about the world's ability to prevent or contain a human pandemic. The workshop summary, The Threat of Pandemic Influenza: Are We Ready? addresses these urgent concerns. The report describes what steps the United States and other countries have taken thus far to prepare for the next outbreak of "killer flu." It also looks at gaps in readiness, including hospitals' inability to absorb a surge of patients and many nations' incapacity to monitor and detect flu outbreaks. The report points to the need for international agreements to share flu vaccine and antiviral stockpiles to ensure that the 88 percent of nations that cannot manufacture or stockpile these products have access to them. It chronicles the toll of the H5N1 strain of avian flu currently circulating among poultry in many parts of Asia, which now accounts for the culling of millions of birds and the death of at least 50 persons. And it compares the costs of preparations with the costs of illness and death that could arise during an outbreak.

Veteran journalist Gina Kolata's Flu: The Story of the Great Influenza Pandemic of 1918 and the Search for the Virus That Caused It presents a fascinating look at true story of the world's deadliest disease. In 1918, the Great Flu Epidemic felled the young and healthy virtually overnight. An estimated forty million people died as the epidemic raged. Children were left orphaned and families were devastated. As many American soldiers were killed by the 1918 flu as were killed in battle during World War I. And no area of the globe was safe. Eskimos living in remote outposts in the frozen tundra were sickened and killed by the flu in such numbers that entire villages were wiped out. Scientists have recently rediscovered shards of the flu virus frozen in Alaska and preserved in scraps of tissue in a government warehouse. Gina Kolata, an acclaimed reporter for The New York Times, unravels the mystery of this lethal virus with the high drama of a great adventure story. Delving into the history of the flu and previous epidemics, detailing the science and the latest understanding of this mortal disease, Kolata addresses the prospects for a great epidemic recurring, and, most important, what can be done to prevent it.

A top cybersecurity journalist tells the story behind the virus that sabotaged Iran’s nuclear efforts and shows how its existence has ushered in a new age of warfare—one in which a digital attack can have the same destructive capability as a megaton bomb. “Immensely enjoyable . . . Zetter turns a complicated and technical cyber story into an engrossing whodunit.”—The Washington Post The virus now known as Stuxnet was unlike any other piece of malware built before: Rather than simply hijacking targeted computers or stealing information from them, it proved that a piece of code could escape the digital realm and wreak actual, physical destruction—in this case, on an Iranian nuclear facility. In these pages, journalist Kim Zetter tells the whole story behind the world’s first cyberweapon, covering its genesis in the corridors of the White House and its effects in Iran—and telling the spectacular, unlikely tale of the security geeks who managed to unravel a top secret sabotage campaign years in the making. But Countdown to Zero Day also ranges beyond Stuxnet itself, exploring the history of cyberwarfare and its future, showing us what might happen should our infrastructure be targeted by a Stuxnet-style attack, and ultimately, providing a portrait of a world at the edge of a new kind of war.

In 2013, the FBI started posting a new most wanted list—not for kidnappers, murderers, or armed robbers, but for online crooks. These "Cyber's Most Wanted" criminals have committed serious offenses ranging from hijacking Internet traffic to spying on businesses and governments. They steal online passwords and financial information, break into online bank accounts, install malicious software on computers, and hack into computers via spam and phishing e-mails. Cyber crime is serious business. Internet security companies report that worldwide cyber crimes cost consumers about $113 billion per year. Cyber crimes cost businesses around the world even more, up to $500 billion each year. Technology experts continue to improve security software, but the attacks keep coming. Hackers are hitting electrical power grids, oil and gas pipelines, and other critical national infrastructures. Cyber criminals relentlessly strike corporate computers, trying to steal financial data, industrial blueprints, and business plans. They steal passwords from personal computers, which in turn can give them access to credit card, Social Security, and bank account numbers. Some cyber criminals steal military secrets. Others disrupt the workings of governments and political organizations. Many cyber crooks are lone individuals while others work in gangs. Many cyber criminals use botnets, or armies of robot computers, to inflict massive damage that could not be accomplished with individual computers alone. Who are these criminals and what motivates them? How can we stop them—and what might happen if we don't?