The Case of the Spying Apps

Cellphone users say they want more privacy, and app makers are listening.

No, they're not listening to user requests. They're literally listening to the sounds in your office, kitchen, living room and bedroom.

A new class of smartphone app has emerged that uses the microphone built into your phone as a covert listening device -- a "bug," in common parlance.

But according to app makers, it's not a bug. It's a feature!

The apps use ambient sounds to figure out what you're paying attention to. It's the next best thing to reading your mind. (more) (the solution)

SpyCam Spied at Berkeley's Cafe Med

CA - In a "revoltin development" the Med’s 50 year ban on tourist photography and ESPECIALLY an alphabet soup of spying agencies like F.B.I., C.I.A., C.B.S., N.B.C., O.N.I.--has sputtered... Call it big brother; call it the eyeball on high, call it Orwell.

Installers of the eye, Craig Becker, 59, the Med's owner and two university students with a hot business model put up the petite eyeball more than two weeks ago.

The students plan to install the geeky eyeballs in other Berkeley cafes and businesses so that students can spy on their friends.

But--FLASH: Big Brother is now blooie, victim of either chronic neck droop, a staff intervention, or customer sabotage.

Sabotaged, Blooie, blotto, or just plain broke. It now spends its once active filming life mis-aimed at the ceiling with what Berkeley's Poet Laureate, Julia Vinograd calls a "celestial stare." (more)

"So does this mean you won't marry me again, Brian?"

NASCAR chairman Brian France has sued his former wife, accusing her of tape recording telephone conversations to extort money from him.

In a lawsuit filed Friday, Brian France claims his ex-wife, Megan France, has recorded multiple telephone conversations with him without his consent. He is asking a federal judge to issue an injunction barring Megan France from engaging in additional “intercepts of wire communications” between the two and distributing the contents of the recordings.

Brian and Megan France have been married and divorced twice, Brian France noted in his lawsuit. Their second divorce was finalized on April 29, 2008. (more)

Eavesdropper Stung by Victim... who happens to be Hugh Grant

Hugh Grant is trending after he turned the tables on an eavesdropping tabloid. Grant, a victim of voice-mail hacking by Rupert Murdoch's News of the World, secretly taped journalist Paul McMullan coming clean about the electronic snooping and then sent the recording to the New Statesman.

According to the transcript, McMullan admits tabloid reporters have listened in on stars, prominent politicians, even Prince Charles.

The News of the World has printed a public apology, but the paper is facing a number of civil claims from celebrity victims, including actress Sienna Miller. (more)

This Week in World Spy News

Iran has expelled three Kuwaiti diplomats in retaliation for the expulsion of three Iranian diplomats accused of spying in the emirate. (more)

Industrial spying cases are on the increase in Korea. Stolen technologies sometimes end up with foreign firms according to police. (more)

ND - Former employees of a Fargo-based engineering company who left to form their own firm reject allegations of corporate espionage. The group of 21 former Ulteig Engineers employees has filed a countersuit seeking tens of thousands of dollars in unpaid fees. (more)

The Algerian authorities sentenced on Thursday to ten years in prison two former soldiers and a computer scientist for spying for France. (more)

Lebanon has filed a complaint with the United Nations Security Council over Israel's planting of a spy system camouflaged as rocks in its southern territory. (more)

UK - Government sources have confirmed that MI5 are set to outsource their spying activities to the world’s most popular internet search engine. ‘Google have shown that they are world leaders in this arena and can provide a far greater range of spying operations than the British security services for a fraction of the price,’ said an MI5 spokesman known only as ‘Z’... (more:) 

A former CIA agent from Cuba has been cleared of all 11 counts of lying and obstruction during immigration hearings. A jury in El Paso, Texas, took just three hours to reach a verdict... Luis Posada Carriles, 83, described as Public Enemy No 1 in Cuba and a nemesis of former President Fidel Castro, said outside the court afterwards that he just wanted some peace and quiet. (more)

Ecuador's leftist President Rafael Correa on Friday accused the U.S. embassy of spying on the country's police and military, adding the espionage was a factor in his expulsion this week of the U.S. ambassador. (more)

German prosecutors said Friday that they have indicted a 64-year-old German man for allegedly spying on the country's Uighur community and passing information to Chinese intelligence. (more)

Rupert Murdoch's powerful British news operation reversed course on Friday and admitted responsibility in a phone hacking scandal that had already cost the prime minister's spokesman his job. (more)

Come on. Just staple an RFID tag to my ear and get it over with.

Copenhagen International Airport one recent day was much like that at any airport around the world...

But unlike other airports, the movement of the passengers was being observed in an office here in Geneva, 860 miles away. Stephane Cheikh, innovation manager for the aviation communications and technology company SITA, was using his laptop to demonstrate a new program that tracked travelers’ movements based on the Wi-Fi-emitting devices they carried.

When Copenhagen Airport starts using the program in the next few weeks, airport officials will get a real-time picture of where travelers go and what they do. The officials can use this information to improve the design of the airport, direct the flow of passengers or shift employees to improve the efficiency of security or immigration checkpoints. (more)

...or to pump coupons to your phone to buy stuff you don't need as you approach yet another "Bookstones"?

"16,001 and you could have a case here barrister."

UK - The Crown Prosecution Service (CPS) has dropped a request bring charges against BT and Phorm - the firm that supplied the monitoring system. (Which snooped on the web browsing habits of its customers.)

The Webwise software used cookies to track people online and then tailored adverts to the sites they visited.

The CPS explained its decision saying that there was insufficient evidence to proceed with a prosecution. The web tracking trials were carried out in 2006 and involved more than 16,000 BT customers. (more)

In a surprise move...

Click to enlarge.

Russia's domestic security service called for access to encrypted communication providers like Gmail, Hotmail and Skype on Friday, saying the uncontrolled use of such services could threaten national security. (more) (sting-a-long)

In other news...

Seen any good movies lately?

Cops Sue Over HQ "Bug" Find

OH - A lawsuit involving two dozen plaintiffs and 18 defendants has been filed over alleged illegal wiretapping at the Newton Falls Police Department.

The lawsuit claims oral communications were illicitly recorded by hidden microphones placed in public and private areas of the police department... The new chief, John Kuivila, has said he found the devices in May of 2009. (more)

Hurdle: They will need to prove the CCTV camera microphones actually transmitted audio.

"When correctly viewed, everything is, Dude."

Russia - Got a dictaphone? A cell phone with voice recording function — say, an iPhone? Or maybe a laptop that can record your Internet phone conversations? It’s up to three years in jail for you, or a fine of 200,000 rubles ($7,000), unless you obtained permission for your gadget from the Federal Security Service. 

This, at least, can be inferred from the Thursday ruling of the Constitutional Court that upheld the law making “spying devices” the exclusive domain of the special services.

The problem is, the list of such devices takes a single page and is vague enough to allow law enforcement agencies to interpret it in wildly varying ways — a privilege officials do not fail to use...

The list of “spy devices” was compiled by the government, which does not specify models or even types of gadgets. Instead, it speaks only of things like “technical devices for covert collection and registration of acoustic information,” a description that most voice recorders fit squarely. (more) (sing-a-long)

...thus making future TSCM sweeps totally unnecessary, mate.

Australia - A simmering conflict between The Australian newspaper and the Greens (a political party) has become open warfare, with Greens leader Bob Brown accusing the national broadsheet of a vendetta against his party and telling it to "grow up".

He also demanded a guarantee from the newspaper that they do not use eavesdropping equipment to secure stories.

Two journalists from the paper's British News Limited stablemate, News of the World, have been arrested over an eavesdropping scandal, where they allegedly hacked into politicians' voicemail. (more)

Android on Security Steroids

PCTEL said Monday that the company had established a supply agreement for the development of a secure Android phone that it will market to government agencies whose employees have "Top Secret" clearance.

The phone will be branded by PCTEL Secure, the partnership between PCTEL and Eclipse Design Technologies, the companies said. The phone, which will be supplied by an unnamed ODM, will contain PCTEL's ProsettaCore solution for thwarting various threats to cell phone security, the company said.

Security will be maintained by a combination of hardware and software, most likely the combination of a plugin SD card and "extensive" software, said Tony Kobrinetz, the vice president of technology and operations for PCTEL. (more)

"Are you a tra- trader if you want to burn money?" - Max Headroom

NJ - Federal prosecutors accused a corporate lawyer and a trader of stealing confidential information about pending mergers and other deals from three prominent law firms in a decades-long scheme that resulted in (they were not just making a little pin money on the side) more than $32 million of profits.

The defendants allegedly used pay phones and prepaid phones paid with cash in order to avoid detection by law enforcement authorities and suspended the alleged scheme for a six-year period out of fear that their alleged criminal activity might be detected, according to a federal criminal complaint filed Wednesday in Newark, New Jersey... 

Mr. Bauer then promised to financial support the co-conspirator if he was charged, saying: "I am sitting with over $20 million in the bank," according to the criminal complaint. He also told him to burn $175,000 from a recent deal, prosecutors said.

"You know what, if you feel better burn the money and I'll give it back to you," Mr. Bauer said, according to the complaint. 

"Burn it?" the co-conspirator said.

"I would burn it...if there is any chance of us getting caught on that," Mr. Bauer said.

(more) (sing-a-long)

SpyCam Story #606 - Another Covert Skype'r

Australia - The Defence Force has confirmed it has called in police to investigate sex allegations made by a first-year female cadet at the Australian Defence Force Academy in Canberra.

The 18-year-old, identified as 'Kate', says she had consensual sex with another first-year cadet but it was transmitted by Skype to six cadets in another room without her knowledge. (more)

...thus leaving us all to wonder which one will get their clock cleaned in court.

NY - A major New York watch dealer has been forced out of his home and arrested after his estranged wife accused him of criminally accessing her email account.
 

Evan Zimmermann was arrested late last month in his Manhattan apartment on charges of computer trespass, eavesdropping and unauthorized use of a computer.

According to the New York Post, his wife Jennifer Zimmermann took out the charges in order to gain advantage in their pending divorce and as 'retaliation' for his refusal to move out of their Westchester home.

His lawyer Robert Wolf said: 'The charges are all fabricated, she gave him her password to prove she was not cheating on him.' (more)