Illegal Corporate Wiretapping Brings Disruption

Remember Bexar Metropolitan Water District General Manager, Gilbert Olivares? (background) His indictment last August included 12 counts of Illegally Intercepting Oral Communications. He was accused of wiretapping his employees. The organization was knocked off its pins... and still hasn't recovered.

Texas - The Bexar Metropolitan Water District's board asked Gov. Rick Perry to appoint a lone conservator to guide and advise the agency as it tries to emerge from years of troubled management. (more)

Security Director's Budget Booster
Bexar is an excellent example of illegal bug and wiretap fallout.
Aside from the immediate damage, colateral damage often includes:
• defending wrongful termination suits,
• hiring replacement employee costs,
• crippled employee morale,
• PR nightmares,
• stockholder suits,
• and general public embarrassment.

Budget for Eavesdropping Detection Audits with all this in mind. Proactive audits are an essential element of a complete security program.

Water Manager's Wiretap Leaked

TX - Bexar County District Attorney Susan Reed announced Friday that Gilbert Olivares, General Manager of Bexar Metropolitan Water District, has been indicted for wiretapping, misapplication of funds, and sexual harassment.

The indictment includes 12 counts of Illegally Intercepting Oral Communications, 1 count of Misapplication of Fiduciary Property, 1 count Abuse of Official Capacity, and two counts of Official Oppression.

...the indictment alleges Olivares ordered the monitoring and recording of phone conversations of four Bexar Met employees' who were viewed as critics of his leadership. The recordings allegedly took place over a 8-month period and without the knowledge or consent of any of the parties to the conversations. (more) (video)

How spying was done at BexarMet

TX - Secretly recorded phone conversations, snapshots of computer screens and a program that tracked computer keystrokes all were part of a strategy by former General Manager Gilbert Olivares to spy on top managers at Bexar Metropolitan Water District, according to a court document obtained by the San Antonio Express-News...

“This confirms how pervasive this was over there,” said Elliott Cappuccio, an attorney for two employees who have sued BexarMet over the wiretaps...

When the recordings began, Hopkins said he also launched programs on the computers of Morin, Garza and Oranday. The programs captured every computer keystroke and took screen snapshots about every 30 seconds. (more)

Electronic Surveillance Detection Audits

Not having an Electronic Surveillance Detection Audit program can cripple your company.

Just ask...
• Société Générale, who last January, revealed that unauthorised dealing by Jérôme Kerviel, a futures trader in Paris, resulted in losses of €4.9 billion ($6.6 billion) for the French bank. This is the biggest rogue trading scandal in history. (more)

Tool of choice: A tiny cell phone, using text messaging!

Preventable? Yes.

How? We would have pointed out this vulnerability during a regular Electronic Surveillance Detection Audit (TSCM sweep). The solution... a special 24/7 radio-monitoring system. The system would have nailed the very first unauthorized text message from the trading floor. Via computerized triangulation mapping, a big red dot would have popped up, right over Mr. Kerviel's desk – indicating he was the culprit!

Total Solution Cost? Less than .000016 % of this loss (or about $100,000.00).
Status: Until a solution is put into place, this type of loss can happen again! Smart money protects... before the problem occurs. They use Electronic Surveillance Detection Audits to uncover hidden vulnerabilities.

Other cases, this year, where Electronic Surveillance Detection Audits could have prevented the loss...
• Jim Damman thought somebody was looking over his shoulder for months. Little did he know that his office was routinely broken into and more than 150-million dollars worth of trade secrets were stolen without a visible trace according to a federal lawsuit. The President of Exel Transportation Services says his suspicion grew so strong that he took the unusual step of sweeping the company's Addison offices for electronic bugs. (Had the "step" not been "unusual" the problem would not have turned into a 150-million dollar loss.)
Preventable? Yes.

• The BexarMet Board of Directors voted Thursday evening to terminate the contract of its embattled general manager, Gil Olivares. Olivares was suspended in August days after a Bexar County jury indicted him on charges of official oppression and illegal wiretapping, among other charges. (The cost: of attorney's fees, lost productivity and employee moral easily makes periodic inspections a no-brainer.)
Preventable? Yes.

• A federal judge denied a motion by a group of ex-securities brokers and former A.B. Watley Inc. executives to dismiss a criminal case against them in an alleged scheme to misuse brokerage firm "squawk" boxes. Prosecutors have alleged that three ex-brokers placed open telephone lines next to the internal speaker systems at their companies so that Watley day traders could secretly eavesdrop on block orders by institutional clients. (The costs here include: stockholder suits, public relations, company attorney fees, lost productivity and employee.)
Preventable? Yes.

• A state lawmaker said Thursday night he attached a digital recorder under an aide’s desk as “just a prank,”... (he) recalled setting the device up on Tuesday, said he forgot about putting the recorder there until Thursday. (Just having an Electronic Surveillance Detection Audit program would have been a deterrent in this case.)
Preventable? Yes.

• Bechtel National has taken disciplinary action against four managers at the Hanford vitrification plant for reportedly eavesdropping on a meeting between safety representatives and the Department of Energy.Preventable? Yes.

• 15 new GSM bugs - eavesdropping devices which can be listened to from anywhere in the world by simply dialing their cell phone number - are featured here, and on ebay here.
(Letting you know about new problems like this is the job of your Electronic Surveillance Detection Audit consultant. This person should also have solutions, too.)
Preventable? Yes.

The list goes on, but the point remains the same.Electronic Surveillance Detection Audits are cheap insurance, only better!
Insurance can't prevent the disaster.

Business Espionage - The Boss Wiretapped

TX - The former general manager for the Bexar Metropolitan Water District pleaded guilty Friday to two counts of wiretapping — admissions that could send him to prison for up to 20 years and force him to testify against the utility's previous public relations consultant.

As a condition of the plea agreements, prosecutors aren't challenging Gil Olivares' request for probation. (more)

...taps, you lose.

TX - The BexarMet Board of Directors voted Thursday evening to terminate the contract of its embattled general manager, Gil Olivares.

Olivares was suspended in August days after a Bexar County jury indicted him on charges of official oppression and illegal wiretapping, among other charges. (more)