Content filters are supposed to protect you from bad stuff, but they can have unexpected side effects and block things you want to access.

As we approach Valentine's Day a new survey by UK broadband comparison site Broadband Genie has discovered that filters may be preventing Brits from finding love by blocking online dating sites.

Cryptowall 3.0 is the most successful ransomware of all time, a new report by security firm Imperva says. Ransomware is a type of malware which, once active on a device, encrypts all the data and demands payment from the victim, typically through Bitcoin.

In its report on the dangers of ransomware, and the impotent attitude of the FBI, which usually advises victims to pay the ransom, Imperva says Cryptowall 3.0 has caused $325 million (£225.7m) in damages so far.

To celebrate Safer Internet Day the other day, Google gave away an extra 2GB of cloud storage to anyone who completed a simple security audit of their account. At the same time the company also introduced a couple of important security enhancements to Gmail.

The first change sees the appearance of a simple indicator that makes it clear when an email is received through, or is about to be sent through, a service that doesn’t support TLS encryption.  A broken padlock icon indicates that TLS encryption is not available, serving as a warning that there is the potential for the email in question to be dangerous or for the message to be intercepted.

A security specialist has discovered a flaw in Sparkle, a third-party framework that Mac apps use to receive updates, which makes a man in the middle attack possible when unencrypted HTTP connections are used.

If the attacker has the ability to intercept the unencrypted data stream for example on a public Wi-Fi hotspot they could possibly inject malicious code.

Messaging and infrastructure security specialist Cloudmark has released its Annual Global Threat Report for 2015 which reveals the biggest current threats based on its crowd sourced security platform, which analyses user behavior from more than a billion subscribers.

Top of the list is the Swizzor malware which delivers unsolicited ads, modifying browser settings without user permission. This silent threat delivers booby-trapped emails to unsuspecting users with varying subject lines. Each email contains a zip file carrying the malware payload, this uses a simple domain generation algorithm for command and control synchronization to create a large number of domains that then clash with legitimate websites and make it difficult for them to be taken down.

Nearly three million Brits have decided to leave a service provider that got hacked, a new research by security firm Privitar reveals. The report shows that 23 per cent of Brits have been affected by a security breach at some point, and 24 per cent of these reacted by switching providers.

The company says consumers now pay attention to how well a company handles data, when making choices. Even though data handling has become one of the key selling points for many companies, 52 per cent of consumers say it’s difficult to find any information on how companies store and use their personal information.

It's coming up to Valentine's Day, so inevitably the IT industry turns its thoughts towards dating apps. Two new reports show that the apps may not be living up to expectations, and that users of them could be revealing more than they intend to.

New research from app quality researcher Applause shows that consumers are more dissatisfied with dating apps than any other type.

All is not well at Twitter. Rumors about a rejigged timeline last week led to #RIPTwitter trending on the site and reassurances from Jack Dorsey did little to calm users' fears. But Twitter is failing to attract new users -- as today's earning's report shows -- and it is desperate to be seen listening to people, and providing tools that are valuable.

This is precisely why the micro-blogging site puts out feel-good stories about how it is tackling terrorists, shouts about beating online trolls, and goes out of its way to try to appeal to, and be useful to, people who don’t have an account yet. The move is the latest attempted to try to rejuvenate interest in the site which is failing to grow at the rate expected. It's an attempt to balance freedom of speech with control of those seen to be abusing the service.

Hackers have leaked the contact information of 20,000 FBI employees, which follows the previous day's release of 10,000 Homeland Security employees' data.

The hackers communicating through Twitter, claimed "Well folks, it looks like @TheJusticeDept has finally realized their computer has been breached after one week".

Endpoint systems often represent the weakest element in the security of any corporate network. In order to guard against attacks, protection specialist Bromium is launching the latest version of its security product.

Bromium Advanced Endpoint Security integrates threat isolation and analysis, plus has newly introduced continuous host monitoring to enable organizations to protect, detect and respond to targeted attacks, zero-day threats and breaches in real time.

We all know that hacking is big business, 2015 proved to be a record year for cyber crime, and it's predicted that 2016 could be even worse. But aside from the worry of putting customer and employee information at risk, what are the financial penalties of being hacked?

Cyber security specialist Praesidio has put together an infographic looking at just how expensive a cyber attack can be.

Security teams face threats from outside the organization but also challenges within to put protection in place and satisfy executive and regulatory demands.

Managed security company Trustwave has published its latest Security Pressures Report, compiling the thoughts of more than 1,400 IT security professionals around the world, addressing which emerging technologies pose the greatest risks, the top fears of post-breach repercussions, which security responsibilities are top priorities, and more.

The latest State of the Cloud report from cloud management specialist RightScale reveals that a lack of resources and expertise is now the top cloud challenge -- cited by 32 percent of respondents.

This means it has overtaken security, mentioned by only 29 percent. Even the most security conscious respondents -- enterprise central IT teams and security pros -- no longer see security as their main challenge.

The growth of distributed enterprise networks and changes in traffic patterns as data moves to the cloud has presented companies with problems in ensuring that all of their information and endpoints are properly protected.

To address this, Israeli company Cato Networks is launching its new network security as a service (NSaaS) platform. Cato Cloud is aimed at making network security simple and cost-effective for the distributed, cloud-centric and mobile-first enterprise.

It's hard -- although admittedly not impossible -- to have too much cloud storage space. It's possible that you were hit by the loss of Google Drive bonus storage last year, but now you have a chance to claw back an extra 2GB of space free of charge.

To celebrate, or perhaps promote, Safer Internet Day (what's that? 9 February is devoid of such a reminder in your calendar?!) Google is inviting people to perform a Security Check-up. It takes just a matter of moments, but as a reward for your time, you can bag yourself some extra space.