Stewart Nozette, 52, developed an experiment that fueled the discovery of water on the south pole of the moon, and held a special security clearance at the United States Department of Energy on atomic materials.He has been charged with “attempted espionage for knowingly and willfully attempting to communicate, deliver and transmit classified information relating to the national defence of the US to an individual that Nozette believed to be an Israeli intelligence officer,” the US Department of Justice said.But the person Mr Nozette believed to be an Israeli intelligence officer was in fact an undercover FBI agent in a sting operation, the department said...During a meeting in a bugged Washington hotel room, Mr Nozette is alleged to have said he wanted to receive cash amounts “under $10,000” to keep him from reporting it to the authorities. (more)
CA - The word espionage conjures up images of James Bond or Alger Hiss, not usually techies in Silicon Valley. But as the San Jose Mercury News reports, two engineers are about to face economic espionage charges in San Jose for allegedly stealing superfast computer chip plans. It’s only the second such trial of its kind in the nation. “For Silicon Valley, where companies have worried for years about their prized secrets being leaked to China and other countries, such a trial is a window into the complexities of protecting product information in a place with ties to every corner of the global economy,” reports the Mercury News. (more)Moral: Don't count on the law to protect you. Have a good counterespionage strategy in place.
Yet another "record your life" tool...
uCorder by iResSpy cameras have been with us for over 100 years; mostly used offensively to spy, sometimes used to inoffensively document life without intrusion-disruption.Times are changing. Today, everyone has a chance at instant global immortality. YouTube and Flickr are our memory mausoleums; CNN's iReport, our chance to be part of the world. The price of admission to this ego-lottery... microelectronics.Microelectronic spycam offerings have dramatically picked up pace during the past 12 months.
Take a stroll in the Security Scrapbook memory mausoleum. You will be amazed at what you see ...and what can see you. (more) (more) (more) (more) (more) (more) (more) (more) (more) (more) (more) (more) (more) (more) (more) (more) (more) (more) (more) (more) (more) (more) (more) (more) (more) (more) (more) (more) (more) (more) (more)
...never, never say it with ink."New documents shed light on a widely disseminated comment by Bank of America Corp. director Charles Gifford, who wrote in a January email that a U.S.-required dividend cut meant "unfortunately it's screw the shareholders." (more) (more)Effective Counterespionage Strategy Rule #1:
Develop a culture which practices being discreet.
South Korean embassies and other diplomatic missions abroad are vulnerable to electronic eavesdropping due to the shortage of preventive devices, according to the foreign ministry.In a recent report to Rep. Rhee Beum-kwan for the ongoing parliamentary audit of government agencies, the ministry said only 34 of the country's 167 diplomatic offices across the world are equipped with devices for blocking electronic eavesdropping...
An anti-bugging device costs about 8 million won (US$6,600), and only one billion won would be needed to install them in the remaining 133 diplomatic missions, he pointed out. (more)
If there was an effective "anti-bugging device," it would sell for a whole lot more than $6,600.
There is a common misconception (even in government circles) that bugging is accomplished by only one technology - radio frequency transmission. "Install our handy-dandy 'anti-bugging receiver system' and you will be bug-free, 24/7/365... forever!" Even Fortune 1000 companies have almost fallen for this mental band-aid.
A while back, the South African government found one of these "anti-bugging devices" and thought it was a bug! (more) Interestingly, that system was from Korea.
Moral: Avoid gadgets. Get a Strategy.
Researchers at the University of Utah have found a way to see through walls to detect movement inside a building.The surveillance technique is called variance-based radio tomographic imaging and works by visualizing variations in radio waves as they travel to nodes in a wireless network. A person moving inside a building will cause the waves to vary in that location, the researchers found, allowing an observer to map their position...Of course there are privacy and security concerns associated with the technology. A burglar could use it to detect if anyone is home or to scout the location of security guards. (more)
This technology is a cousin to our Digital Surveillance Location Analysis™. We use it to detect and pinpoint the locations of rogue computers, unauthorized Wi-Fi hot spots and digital GSM wireless bugs. (more)
Researchers (University of Tokyo) say they have created a special kind of paint which can block out wireless signals. It means security-conscious wireless users could block their neighbours from being able to access their home network - without having to set up encryption.The paint contains an aluminium-iron oxide which resonates at the same frequency as wi-fi - or other radio waves - meaning the airborne data is absorbed and blocked.By coating an entire room, signals can't get in and, crucially, can't get out...Some security experts remain unconvinced by the paint. "The use of electromagnetic shielding techniques are nothing new," said Mark Jackson, security engineer at Cisco UK. (more)Mark is correct. This is nothing new. Furthermore, the "blocking" claims are bogus. Radio waves may be attenuated, but they are not blocked. Windows and cracks around doors allow radio waves to pass freely. We've reported on this before. (more)
Wales - A woman has told a jury how her former partner set up a secret camera system to spy on holidaymakers staying at their rental cottage.
Teresa Crick said David Sturgess, 53, hid four cameras in fake smoke alarms to film guests undressing, showering and having sex.At Swansea Crown Court he denies 12 charges of voyeurism and three of taking indecent images of children. The jury heard some of those filmed at Llandysul, Ceredigion, were under 18.
Ms Crick 51, told the court that Mr Sturgess, originally from Abingdon, Oxfordshire, would watch a TV monitor showing their naked guests. She reported him to the police after they split up. (more)
UPDATE
David Sturgess, 54, was found guilty of 12 charges of voyeurism and three of taking indecent images of children at a trial last month.
Swansea Crown Court heard Sturgess hid four cameras in fake smoke alarms to film guests undressing, showering and having sex at Llandysul, Ceredigion.
Sturgess was also disqualified from working with children.
Jailing him for 30 months, Judge Keith Thomas said the offences were a gross intrusion into people's privacy and they were rightly devastated. (more with video)
Hilton Worldwide, the American hotel behemoth, could face criminal charges of corporate spying, on top of a civil case brought by its rival Starwood Hotels & Resorts.It emerged that a federal grand jury is investigating the company and several of its former executives over claims that they engaged in the “wholesale looting” of confidential documents in order to help it to launch a rival brand to Starwood’s W Hotels. (more)"What's your counterespionage strategy?"Find one here.
Maj. Gen. Yang Hui, China's most senior military intelligence official, a veteran of spy operations in Europe and cyberspace, recently made a secret visit to the United States and complained to the Pentagon about the press leak on the Chinese submarine that secretly shadowed the USS Kitty Hawk aircraft carrier in 2006. (more)
Remember... Watch CCTV. Report Crime. Win a Prize!No prize, but just as weird...Everyday Texts,
where you eavesdrop on people's text messages.
Ireland - Charles Haughey used Royal Ulster Constabulary surveillance technology in political spying operations at the end of the 1970s, a new book on the undercover anti-terror war claims.Haughey went on to boast that the use of the bugging equipment, which was meant for anti-terrorist operations in Northern Ireland, "changed the course of Irish political history". According to the book, Border Crossing, by George Clarke, a retired Special Branch officer, the future taoiseach even refused a request to hand back the two pieces of spying equipment.
Clarke says he lent the bugs – one in the shape of a pen, the other disguised as a 13-amp plug adapter, both of which he had bought in a specialist spy shop in London for £90 – to one of his counterparts in the Garda. (more)
CO - When it was discovered that a man had installed a hidden camera in a Denver Tech Center hotel room to watch the people staying next door, the only legal option for prosecutors was an audio surveillance law.Because Colorado law has not kept up with technology, video surveillance cases are being prosecuted as eavesdropping, a law intended to outlaw wiretaps and surreptitiously overhead conversations. Prosecutors eventually abandoned the felony eavesdropping charge and instead allowed the suspect to plead to a misdemeanor and avoid jail time. (more)
UK - The Ministry of Defence was left embarrassed after its internal guide to preventing leaks appeared on the internet. The Defence Manual of Security sets out tactics for preventing Chinese and Russian intelligence services from using blackmail or hi-tech gadgets to obtain sensitive information... A MoD spokeswoman said: 'The document is marked Restricted as current MoD policy is to keep our security policies and procedures private but the publication of an old version of this document does not raise significant security concerns.' (more) (manual)
FutureWatch (Coming Nov. 2009)
Watch this trend expand.
Next stop, prison cameras?
UK - Internet Eyes is an online instant event notification system. Viewers (in the EU for now) are able to monitor live video feed from our Customers and notify them; the instant an event is observed.
Typical event notifications include:
Shop lifting
Anti social behaviour
Burglary
Vandalism
Would you like the opportunity to help detect these crimes?
How does a reward of £1000 a month sound?
Internet Eyes is now offering you that chance.
Viewers are anonymously monitoring random video feeds streamed from privately owned establishments. At no time can Viewers designate or control the video feeds they receive and the locations of the feeds are not disclosed.
The instant a Viewer monitors an event, an alert can be sent directly to the owner of that live camera feed. The alert is sent along with a screen grab, identifying the image you have observed. Only the first alert received by the camera owner is accepted. Then... (more)
Stewart Nozette, 52, developed an experiment that fueled the discovery of water on the south pole of the moon, and held a special security clearance at the United States Department of Energy on atomic materials.
