Opening Soon - Lebanese Phone Bugging Center

A new phone monitoring station is nearing completion in Lebanon and will be capable of recording up to 72,000 calls every day. (more)

Apple Keyboard Secret Keystroke Logger

Translation...
Keystroke logging software may be inserted directly into some keyboards. A physical inspection won't find it. Reloading your system software won't destroy it.

"The security posture of a computer can be adversely affected by poorly-designed devices on its USB bus. Many modern embedded devices permit firmware to be upgraded in the field and the use of low-cost microcontrollers in these devices can make it difficult to perform the mathematical operations needed to verify a cryptographic signature. The security of many of these upgrade mechanisms is very much in question. For a concrete example, we describe how to tamper with a firmware upgrade to the Apple Aluminum Keyboard. We describe how an attacker can subvert an off-the-shelf keyboard by embedding into the firmware malicious code which allows a rootkit to survive a clean re-installation of the host operating system." K. Chen - Georgia Institute of Technology (more)

How to Be a Corporate Mole

Some co-workers may have mole-like personal habits, but a true corporate mole is a dangerous animal. They burrow in, keep a low profile and eat profits buy selling intellectual property.

Why do they do it?
Primarily money. They are on two payroll at the same time, and one of them may be very remunerative. A sense of power, adventure or righteousness are also motivating factors.

How does one learn how to be a corporate mole?
There are many books, but one can also learn for free at ehow.com where you can learn "How to do just about everything."

Part of the How to Be a Corporate Mole training (listed under Resources) is to Review counterespionage practices. Guess who that links to. I am flattered. ~Kevin

P.S. You may also want to read their How to Spot a Corporate Mole tutorial which is missing...
Step 8: Conduct electronic eavesdropping detection audits regularly. Moles are in the best position, and have the highest motivation, to plant electronic eavesdropping devices.

Trial by Fire... or, You're a Pane

Testing Bulletproof Glass - 1952
...how far would your significant other go for you?

"Shoot the little spy satellite, win a prize!"

The U.S. Navy is preparing to shoot a faltering U.S. spy satellite out of the sky in the next two weeks using a tactical missile that was manufactured as a defensive weapon to head off enemy aircraft, the Pentagon announced.

While it's not uncommon for space junk to fall out of the sky, military officials said they are particularly concerned in this case because much of the 1,000 pounds of the frozen rocket fuel called hydrazine on the spacecraft could survive the descent and pose health risks, such as damage to skin and lung tissue, if it lands in a populated area. (more)

SpyCam Story #545 - All in the Family

GA - A Chatsworth man has been arrested on eavesdropping charges that officials said include installing a video camera in his daughter’s bathroom.

Douglas Harrison Keith, 59, of 1253 Stafford Road in Chatsworth, was charged by the Murray County Sheriff’s Office with unlawful eavesdropping/surveillance with audio equipment and unlawful eavesdropping/surveillance with hidden video cameras (four counts).

“The eavesdropping warrant by audio regards a telephone conversation being recorded without the people on the phone being aware of it,” said District Attorney Kermit McManus. “According to Georgia law, at least one person must be aware (the conversation is being recorded).”

McManus said another eavesdropping charge came when a video camera was discovered in a bathroom used “solely” by his daughter, with the images being fed into an office where Keith had sole access. A spokesman with the sheriff’s office said the daughter discovered the camera in the bathroom. (more)

Wiretap Scandal Heats Up in Spain

Spain - A scandal over alleged corruption and wiretaps in Spain heated up Tuesday as the opposition leader accused Prime Minister Jose Luis Rodriguez Zapatero of "persecuting" his party. (more)

Spy Numbers Become Art

The Palais de Tokyo's ongoing exhibition, Spy Numbers, takes as its starting point the mysterious and vaguely distressing Numbers Stations. These shortwave radio stations have been broadcasting for several decades, yet their precise function and origin are an enigma. Artificially generated voices are reading streams of numbers, words, letters, tunes or Morse code...

On the short waves of our radios, voices read out uninterrupted series of numbers. 2… 11… 58… 35… 23… Whether they are encrypted instructions intended for sleeping agents, messages exchanged between traffickers, or simple telephone settings, the “Spy Numbers Stations” have been broadcasting for several decades without their precise function becoming known.

New Bugging & Eavesdropping Movie Coming

HONG KONG -- Now that financial crime thriller “Overheard” has become the top Chinese-language film in China so far this summer, writer-director Alan Mak and Felix Chong are planning a follow-up that revolves around eavesdropping...

“It wouldn’t be a prequel that involves the same characters, as their lives before what happened in ‘Overheard’ wouldn’t be dramatic enough for a story,” Mak told the Hollywood Reporter. “But we think there’s a lot to be explored about bugging and eavesdropping, and are developing a script around this theme.” (more)

Synopsis for "Overheard"
A major stock exchange in the world, Hong Kong attracts not only money but anyone who tries to manipulate the market. At the Hong Kong Police Force Commercial Crime Bureau, an operation is underway to infiltrate a trading company where a man nicknamed Boss is the chief suspect. The team, led by Inspector Leung (Lau Ching Wan) together with Yeung (Louis Koo) and Lam (Daniel Wu) installs bugs to monitor the communications. When crucial information on a surging share is intercepted, a moment of greed now puts them in a crossfire between the Bureau and the boss.

Security Director Alert - 911Headcount

True security innovations don't show up every day. Locks are still locks. Alarms are still alarms. Models, designs and features change, but functions remain the same. You get the idea.

Here is truly innovative and useful idea... a system that can quickly account for employees during emergency situations (an OSHA requirement).

The system - 911HEADCOUNT - is a clever combination of technologies. The brains behind 911Headcount is Bo Mitchell, the Former Police Commissioner of Wilton, CT and a respected consultant in the private security industry.

from their Web site...
"911 Headcount is the first and only automatic two-way, triple redundancy Mass Emergency Notification System that you can launch and manipulate on the run to account for employees, visitors and contractors in any emergency."
• Background.
• How it works.

The Un-Welcome Mat

Coming this Fall (in Japan)...
The Un-Welcome Mat
or, as we call it around here, Kevin's Home Alone Safety Zone Burglar Atone and Drop Zone Rat Mat. It is a giant sticky mat! Strategically place them at your portals when you leave. Stuck like a bug in a rug, your burglar will be playing Ultimate Twister instead of carting off your goodies. Just don't forget it's there when you come home. Look for it to be sold here.

Video over IP. Convenient, but not secure.

Video about video being hacked, hijacked and insert-attacked...
• A security assessment of an IP Video Camera; think Ocean’s Eleven.

Man-in-the-middle attacks tamper with video surveillance feeds, eavesdrop on IP video phone conversations

In one attack, researchers from Viper Lab showed how a criminal could tamper with an IP video surveillance system to cover up a crime by replacing the video with another benign clip. In another demo, they eavesdropped on a private IP video call. (more)

Disaster Recovery Plan time...

Hey, how's your disaster recovery plan looking?
Dusty?
Faded?
Incomplete?
Incompetent?
MIA?
Just missing?
Don't have one yet?
I see a lot of raised hands.

Every business, large and small, needs a "what if... what do we do?" plan.

Creating one need not be hard, nor expensive.
There is a lot of expert help out there.
• How to Create a Disaster Recovery Plan. (free basic outline)
• Disaster Recovery Journal (free magazine)
• D-I-Y Template ($)

A smarter way is to enlist the aid of a professional consultant.
• International Association of Professional Security Consultants
• BAM - "BAM has a crackerjack team of ex-military strategists, FBI trainers, intelligence and security professionals, mathematicians, and 3D creative agents who use the latest technology, including mobile devices and social media networks, to arm their clients with the most appropriate tools for dealing with disaster, as it happens." Kevin Burton is their CEO.

or, you could use the Dilbert Disaster Recovery Plan.

SpyCam Story #544 - Monkey Business

TX - Surveillance video at a Dallas-area store caught the theft of several dozen plants, flowers and small statues on tape. But the culprit turned out to be a very unusual thief, a monkey with serious sticky fingers. (video) (sing-a-long)

Business Espioange - Goldman Sachs

via The Wall Street Journal...
A Goldman Sachs Group Inc. computer programmer who quit last month was arrested and charged with stealing codes related to a high-speed trading program that he helped develop.

The programmer, Sergey Aleynikov, 39 years old, was arrested Friday by Federal Bureau of Investigation agents as he got off a plane at Newark Liberty International Airport. According to a complaint filed Saturday, Mr. Aleynikov downloaded 32 megabytes of data from Goldman's computer system with "the intent to convert that trade secret to the economic benefit of someone other than the owner."...

According to the FBI, Mr. Aleynikov got a job offer earlier this year at an unnamed Chicago firm that planned to triple the $400,000-a-year salary he was paid at Goldman. The unnamed company is "new" and "intended to engage in high-volume automated trading," the FBI said in the court filing. (more)