According to a report in the New York Daily News, the New York Jets were aware of New England Patriots head coach Bill Belichick's videotaping shenanigans as far back as 2004.
Sources told the Daily News that Herm Edwards, then the Jets head coach, and his defensive coordinator Donnie Henderson not only noticed a camera aimed at them from the opposite sideline during a game between the Jets and Patriots, but they waved at it. (Does this constitute consent?)
The News' report also said the videotape was apparently one of six tapes Belichick turned over to the league that were subsequently destroyed by the order of NFL commissioner Roger Goodell. (more)
But spying has always existed in football and other professional sports. A marvelous book, "The Echoing Green
," documents how the 1951 New York Giants utilized a telescope to steal opposing catchers' signs — and relay them to the batters.
Papa Bear George Halas, it has been claimed, paid young men to listen to and film other teams' practices. The old Kansas City Chiefs were accused of being the worst spying offenders — by Al Davis, who was accused of bugging AFL teams' locker rooms. The Broncos purportedly had two spies a long time ago at a San Diego workout, writing plays on the inside of paper cups.
A former NFL coach told me at the recent Super Bowl in Arizona that his team cheated regularly. "We did everything you can imagine to get information on
the teams we were playing. The more technology, the easier you can get stuff. It's common in the league," he said.
Belichick was caught.
Now, Congress is involved. (more)
"The weed of crime bears bitter fruit..."
by Mike Elgan...
The online catalogs have names like Spy World, Spy Source and even Spy Zilla. The wonderful and disturbing new world of spy gadgets offers obscure, often expensive devices -- available in most cases to anyone with a credit card.Most spy gadgets should be and could be used for legal and ethical purposes -- but you know they probably won't be.Hidden cameras, secret microphones, GPS tracking devices, telephone voice changers, camera and microphone detectors, computer and cell phone snooping devices, cell phone and Wi-Fi "jammers" -- spy gadgets are sold vaguely and euphemistically as "security" or "surveillance" products. But you can bet they're popular with perverts, snooping bosses, suspicious spouses, cheaters, blackmailers, criminals and terrorists.Nobody monitors who buys this stuff or what they use it for... (much more)
Smart businesses regularly conduct eavesdropping detection inspections. If you're not looking, you're not finding. Call us.
from switched.com...
The Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA) will award contracts to design and build an unmanned spy plane they've dreamed up that will stay aloft for for an amazing five years. The pseudo satellite will circle the globe for years at between 60,000 and 90,000 feet, gathering photos, communications, and generally watching everything you do. (more)
from the seller's website...
New for 2008! eBlaster 6.0eBlaster has been the standard in remote monitoring software for parents and employers for almost a decade. It's time for a real innovative change, and we have some very exciting news.
Blaster 6.0 is now available, and we have added features we believe you're really going to like. Now, you have the ability to change options and settings remotely without having to return to the computer on which eBlaster is installed.
What Else is New in eBlaster 6.0?
NEW! Block Web Sites
-- Block inappropriate web sites by name immediately...
NEW! Block Chat/IM Contacts
-- Block all chat and instant messaging with specific people...
NEW! Online Searches
-- records searches made on Google, AOL, MSN, and Yahoo...
NEW! Screen Snapshots with Keyword Alerts
-- Now you can actually see EXACTLY what they saw...
NEW! MySpace Activity
-- All activity on the popular but potentially dangerous MySpace site...
When was the last time you checked your computer for spyware?
eBlaster detection.
The agency that the Pentagon set up to turn outlandish sci-fi concepts into reality has come closer to creating an army -- or air force -- of cybugs: cyber-moths and beetles that can spy on the enemy.
Inspired by Thomas Easton's 1990 novel, Sparrowhawk, in which animals enlarged by genetic engineering were fitted with implanted control systems, the Defence Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA) set out to insert microsystems into living insects as they undergo metamorphosis.
The plan is that their organs will grow around the chips and wires that make up the remote-control devices. (more)
UK - Police in Nuneaton yesterday unveiled their latest technological weapon - a remote-controlled helicopter, the size of a dustbin lid.
The microdrone can film from more than 350ft away and beams back live video footage to operators on the ground.
If needed, the little helicopter can even swoop down and squirt offenders with a security marking solution called SmartWater which can be identified by police. (more)
Eavesdropping on Michael Jackson and his lawyer Mark Geragos will cause the former owner of charter jet company XtraJet a total of $10 million, according to TMZ.com.
Geragos filed a lawsuit suit against XtraJet claiming the company violated Jackson's right to privacy by videotaping their Nov. 2003 flight from Las Vegas to Santa Barbara, where the King of Pop was to surrender to child molestation charges. XtraJet's former owner Jeffrey Borer tried to sell those tapes to the media. The judge awarded Geragos and an associate lawyer $2 million in compensatory damages and $8 million in punitive damages, according to TMZ. Geragos called the taping "one of the most outrageous acts I've seen in my 20 years of practicing criminal law." (more)
Anthony Pellicano masterminded a lucrative criminal enterprise aimed at discrediting and destroying the enemies of his Hollywood clients, a federal prosecutor charged Thursday in opening arguments in a long-awaited wiretapping trial.But he bragged about it so much — and recorded himself doing so — that Mr. Pellicano “was the biggest government informant in this case,” the prosecutor, Kevin Lally, said Thursday.Mr. Pellicano, 63, who is defending himself against wiretapping and racketeering charges, denied nothing in his opening remarks, saying that his business was “problem solving,” and that customers in the entertainment industry paid him well because they knew he would “perform” for them. He stressed only that he never intended their secrets to become public. (more)
Ace sound engineer, Mike Stewart, spins advice about how to turn old 78rpm records into MP3 or CD recordings.
Sounds like it should be easy, but consider, "modern" record players won't play at 78rpm.
Now you know why Mike is the Ace.(video tutorial)
“People tap phones lines for one of three reasons—money, power, sex,” says Kevin Murray, of Murray Associates, which secures corporations against eavesdropping. Dr. Gordon Mitchell, president of the counterintelligence consultancy company, Future Focus agrees. “Oddly enough, in the private sector it isn’t usually a situation where the big powerful competitor is trying to get information, but some sort of soap opera is going on inside,” he says. “And usually you can preface the person you suspect with an ex. Ex-boyfriend, ex-husband ex-partner.” If you suspect that there is wiretap on one of your phone lines, you first want to establish a connection between the information loss and whoever you suspect is leaking it. If you can’t show a cause and effect relationship between the criminal and the crime, you can’t prosecute a case against an eavesdropper...
...big corporations are still conscious about securing the workplace against foreign ears. “Whenever you’re in competition it means someone isn’t going to play the game fairly,” says Murray. “Businesses are very proactive about detecting these types of devices.” Most corporations do inspections on a quarterly basis, “and it’s something you rarely hear about,” says Murray. After hours, a counterintelligence security team will come in and investigate the most sensitive areas of the company. According to Murray, it costs between $5,000 and $10,000 to inspect eight to ten executive offices and a boardroom. (more)
Meet the pistol that fits in your pocket - and packs a hell of a punch.
The SwissMiniGun is the size of a key fob but fires tiny 270mph bullets powerful enough to kill at close range.Officially the world's smallest working revolver, the gun is being marketed as a collector's item and measures just 2.16 inches long (5.5cm). It can fire real 4.53 bullets up to a range of 367ft (112m). (more)
Filming people secretly and without permission will be subject to big fines and prison sentences under new laws being introduced in the South Australian Parliament.
The Attorney-General, Michael Atkinson, wants to crack down on modern-day peeping toms using mobile phones to capture images of people without permission.
"We're also concerned with indecent filming, filming people going to the lavatory, filming people engaged in private acts, namely sexual acts, that occur only in private," he said.
"The Rann Government is keen to protect peoples' privacy from modern-day peeping toms, the raincoat brigade and some of the more extreme elements of the paparazzi. (more)
CA - Anthony Pellicano, the former investigator known as Hollywood's private eye to the stars, goes on trial Thursday in a case of wiretapping and skulduggery that is expected to reveal the dark side of the glitzy world of the movie industry.Actors Sylvester Stallone, Keith Carradine and Farrah Fawcett, along with movie studio executives Brad Grey and Ron Meyer and former powerhouse talent agent Michael Ovitz, are among the 120 prosecution witnesses called to testify in a case that has kept Hollywood on tenterhooks for almost six years.
Pellicano, 63, is accused of illegally wiretapping the telephones of opponents of his powerful clients and of bribing police officers and telephone company workers to run illegal background checks on the targets of his investigation.
Pellicano is representing himself at his trial and has pleaded not guilty, along with his four co-defendants, to the 111 federal charges they face together. The trial in Los Angeles federal court is expected to last up to 10 weeks. (more)
Mind-reading with a brain scan
Scientists have developed a way of ‘decoding’ someone’s brain activity to determine what they are looking at.“The problem is analogous to the classic ‘pick a card, any card’ magic trick,” says Jack Gallant, a neuroscientist at the University of California in Berkeley, who led the study. But while a magician uses a ploy to pretend to ‘read the mind’ of the subject staring at a card, now researchers can do it for real using brain-scanning instruments. “When the deck of cards, or photographs, has about 120 images, we can do better than 90% correct,” says Gallant. (more)
the teams we were playing. The more technology, the easier you can get stuff. It's common in the league," he said.
