WhatsApp bug ‘could have let hackers secretly install spyware on YOUR phone’

HACKERS could have secretly installed spyware on phones through WhatsApp, it has been revealed.

Last month the messaging app resolved a critical design flaw which could have allowed attackers to remotely target devices and steal messages and files.

According to The Hacker News, the vulnerability tracked as CVE-2019-11931 is a stack-based buffer overflow issue.

To remotely exploit the bug, all the attacker needs is the phone number of the targeted users.

The hackers then send a crafted MP4 file over WhatsApp, which can eventually be programmed to install a spyware app on the devices.

WhatsApp's owner, Facebook published a list of the affected app versions: Android versions before 2.19.274, iOS versions before 2.19.100, Enterprise Client versions before 2.25.3, Windows Phone versions before and including 2.18.368, Business for Android versions before 2.19.104 and Business for iOS versions before 2.19.100.

A spokesperson for Whatsapp told The Hacker News: "WhatsApp is constantly working to improve the security of our service. We make public reports on potential issues we have fixed consistent with industry best practices.

"In this instance, there is no reason to believe that users were impacted."

The Sun have approached WhatsApp for comment.

5 family members, including 3 children, dead in reported shooting at San Diego home

San Diego police investigate a shooting that killed five members of a family and wounded one more in Paradise Hills on Saturday, Nov. 16, 2019 in San Diego, California. (Photo: ayne Palmour/The San Diego Union-Tribune via AP)

SAN DIEGO — Five family members died and a child was hospitalized Saturday morning after an apparent shooting in the Paradise Hills neighborhood of San Diego. 

The suspect is believed to be among the dead, the San Diego Union-Tribune reports, citing homicide Lt. Matt Dobbs.

Dobbs said investigators found a gun in the house and that officers responded to the scene after a report of arguing and what sounded like a nail gun being fired inside a house.

Three boys died in the incident, ages 3, 5 and 9 years old, Dobbs said. Also among those found dead in the house: a 29-year-old woman and a 31-year-old man.

An 11-year-old boy was taken to the hospital for surgery.

The 5-year-old and 9-year-old were also taken to a hospital, where they were pronounced dead.

Contributing: The Associated Press

Santa Clarita shooting: ‘Funny, loyal, light of our lives’: Community mourns victims of Saugus school shooting

Trump goes to Walter Reed National Medical Center for ‘portions’ of annual physical exam

WASHINGTON – President Donald Trump traveled to Walter Reed National Medical Center in Maryland on Saturday for “portions” of his annual physical exam, the White House announced. 

“Anticipating a very busy 2020, the President is taking advantage of a free weekend here in Washington, D.C., to begin portions of his routine annual physical exam at Walter Reed,” said White House press secretary Stephanie Grisham. 

His last physical exam in February 2019 yielded a clean bill of health for the president. 

“I am happy to announce the president of the United States is in very good health and I anticipate he will remain so for the duration of his presidency, and beyond,” Dr. Sean Conley, the president’s physician, wrote in a memo released by the White House at the time.

Trump’s health has been subject to some degree of speculation as he doesn’t exercise regularly, beyond golf, and has acknowledged he takes a statin drug designed to lower his cholesterol. 

His 2018 physical showed that Trump, at 6-foot 3-inches tall, had a body mass index of 29.9 last year, which places him in the overweight category on the verge of obesity, which is defined as a BMI of 30 or greater.

Contributing: John Fritze and Michael Collins, USA TODAY 

Read the transcript for NSC official Timothy Morrison’s testimony in the Trump impeachment inquiry

Congressional impeachment investigators released the transcript of National Security Council official Timothy Morrison’s testimony in the impeachment inquiry of President Donald Trump.

Morrison told congressional members and staff on Oct. 31 that he asked National Security Council lawyers to review Trump’s July 25 call with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky because he thought it “would be damaging” if it “leaked.”

Trump is accused of withholding nearly $400 million of military assistance to Ukraine as well as a White House meeting with Zelensky unless the Ukrainian government opened investigations into Trump’s political adversaries, including former Vice President Joe Biden and his son Hunter. 

Read Morrison’s full transcript below:

Trump Gets Early Start on Annual Checkup With Saturday Tests

President Donald Trump got a head start on his physical exam on Saturday, just nine months since his last annual checkup.

Trump traveled to Walter Reed National Military Medical Center in Maryland for the initial tests, White House press secretary Stephanie Grisham said.

“Anticipating a very busy 2020, the president is taking advantage of a free weekend here in Washington, D.C., to begin portions of his routine annual physical exam at Walter Reed,” Grisham said in an emailed statement.

Trump’s most recent physical exam concluded in February with an assertion the 6-foot, 3-inch president is in “very good health.”

Doctors last year recommended Trump lose weight, though White House spokesman Hogan Gidley conceded in February the president had not “religiously” followed that guidance.

Trump was reported to weigh 243 pounds, putting his body mass index at 30.4, making him clinically obese. His dose of rosuvastatin, a medication for treating high cholesterol, was increased, according to the statement from physician to the president, Sean P. Conley at the time.

— With assistance by Justin Sink