Apple Puts Kibosh on Two Sessions at Black Hat

Legal and corporate officials at Apple Computer reportedly have put the brakes on two presentations scheduled for this week's Black Hat conference that would have given attendees more insight into the company's security posture.

According to a report in The Washington Post, Charles Edge, a researcher from Georgia, had been slated to discuss his research on a vulnerability that could be used to defeat FileVault encryption on the Mac. But sometime last week, Black Hat organizers pulled his name and presentation listing from its schedule of talks.

Edge told The Post that he had signed confidentiality agreements with Apple, preventing him from speaking on the topic and from discussing the matter further.

Meanwhile, members of Apple's security team canceled a presentation in which they had planned to discuss how the team handles security threats and vulnerabilities in Mac OSX and other Apple software, according to reports. They were expected to discuss how the company builds on the OSX Unix base to keep customers secure.

Apple pulled its session virtually at the last minute, Black Hat director Jeff Moss said Friday.

"Marketing got wind of it, and nobody at Apple is ever allowed to speak publicly about anything without marketing approval," Moss said.

— Tim Wilson, Site Editor, Dark Reading