Business Espionage: Hooters v. Twin Peeks - Battle of the...

(stop snickering)

The AP is reporting the Hooters of America restaurant chain filed a federal lawsuit in Atlanta this week claiming that a former executive swiped mounds of documents to help an upstart competitor that plans to expand the Twin Peaks franchise.

The lawsuit filed in U.S. District Court in Atlanta on Wednesday said former Hooters vice president Joseph Hummel downloaded reams of “sensitive and highly confidential business information” to help La Cima Restaurants, an Atlanta-based firm that plans to help build 35 Twin Peaks stores across the Southeast.

Both chains are known for scantily clad women serving casual food... “The casual dining industry operates on extremely thin profit margins,” it said. “As a result, every operational advantage … is a jealously guarded business secret.”

...Even after his last day, Hummel was still able to download documents from company servers and transmit them through his personal email account because the company forgot to block his access, it said.

All told, the lawsuit said, Hummel took “well over 500 pages of highly sensitive business information and trade secrets” from Hooters. (more)

Is that runny nose a cold, or just a new message coming in?

via our West Coast ghost... 
Espionage just got a little more sophisticated and scientific. Invisible ink? Decoder rings? Lemon juice? Puh-lease -- that's mere child's play compared to what double agents scientists at Tufts University just created.

Now secret messages can be hidden in genetically engineered bacteria, thanks to a new method called steganography by printed arrays of microbes, or SPAM. Developed by chemistry professor David Walt and his cloak-and-dagger team of researchers, this new method uses an assortment of E. coli strains modified with fluorescent proteins that glow in seven colors.

Multiply that number by the two colors each message character is encoded with, and spies like us have more than 49 possible code combinations. That's enough for the alphabet, plus digits 0 to 9, with room left over for a few extra symbols...

It is also possible to develop bacteria that lose their fluorescent properties over time, creating a message that self-destructs in the style of Mission Impossible. (more)

Business Espionage: Bus Staff Bus'ted

Australia - Two senior staff members admitted downloading sensitive company information from Torrens Transit before taking management roles at new bus operator Transfield, their former employer claims.

The two men were accused of downloading confidential documents including suppliers' names, contact details, rosters and costings, resulting in the men being banned from Torrens Transit sites for life.

There have been claims that the life bans on the men exacerbated the chaos that ensued for passengers after this week's handover of services to Transfield. (more)

SpyCam Story #624 - A Bad Aim

CO - A jury on Thursday convicted a Durango man of felony stalking for secretly videotaping his housesitter and her boyfriend.

Mark “Steve” Brown, 57, showed no emotion as the guilty verdicts were announced. Wearing a suit and tie, he dabbed his eyes with a tissue shortly after the courtroom emptied. He remains free on $5,000 bail.

Brown, also known by his nickname Downtown Steve Brown, was found guilty on two counts of felony stalking, two counts of unlawful sexual conduct and two counts of invasion of privacy...

Brown set up covert cameras to record his housesitter while he worked as a civilian military contractor in South Korea... The cameras, which resembled motion detectors, recorded the housesitter and her boyfriend in various states of undress, including having sexual intercourse... Brown argued the cameras were for security...

Deputy District Attorney Justin Fay said Brown knowingly videotaped his housesitter for personal gratification without her consent. He asked jurors to consider the camera angles, especially the one in the bedroom that was pointed directly at the bed. (more)

Man Admitted Installing Spying Program

PA - A Pottstown man accused of illegally intercepting his father’s emails prior to his 2008 murder told investigators he had installed a program on two family computers that relayed keystrokes and other information on a daily basis, according to testimony given Thursday.

Pennsylvania State Police Trooper Robert Levan said Parth Ingle, 25, had told him in 2008 that he had installed a keystroke-logging program called eBlaster on the family computer in 2004 and on a subsequent family computer sometime in 2007.

According to Levan, Parth Ingle said his mother, Bhavnaben Ingle, told him in 2003 or 2004 that her husband had been unfaithful, but did not say his mother had directed him to install the software.

Parth and his sister, Avnee Ingle, 28, also of Pottstown, are accused of intercepting 15 emails between their father and women with whom he was believed to be having affairs.

No one has ever been charged with killing Arunkumar Ingle, whose beating and stabbing death at his Middletown home in January 2008 remains unsolved. (more)

Russia Accuses China of Spying (we're shocked)

Russia’s spy service has announced that it had arrested a Chinese citizen for allegedly attempting to steal secrets about the country’s missile system.  

The Russian statement came after a top American lawmaker accused China of exercising "an intolerable level" of espionage against the US, ABC News reports.

The Federal Security Service (FSB) said a Chinese citizen, Tong Shenyun, who pretended to be an official delegations’ translator, was working under the Chinese Government to buy "technical and repair documentation” about Russia''s S-300 missile system. 

China has so far not given response to the report, but officials have repeatedly condemned the hacking accusations against their country as "groundless."  (more)

Thus Clinching the Less Exciting than Watching Grass Grow Prize

Click to enlarge

Research scientists focused on the impact of climate change on the Himalaya have installed a new webcam to keep an eye on Mt. Everest. 

The high-definition camera is part of a larger initiative called SHARE, or "Stations at High Altitude for Research on the Environment," which hopes to track the retreating glaciers on the world's tallest peak – something that is already having a profound effect on the region. (more) (spycam)

EU restricts export of eavesdropping technology

The European Parliament has revised EU rules on the export of so-called dual-use technologies with an aim of restricting those that can be used to violate human rights.

Until now the export of products that had both civilian and military applications was not subjected to any EU authorization system, leaving the decision on the export of potentially dangerous technologies up to the member states.

The legislative resolution by Jrg Leichtfried, Austrian member of parliament for the Socialists and Democrats (S&D) party, prohibits a general EU approval for the export of telecommunications technologies that can be used to violate human rights, democratic principles or freedom of speech. The revision was made for "interception technologies and digital data transfer devices for monitoring mobile phones and text messages and targeted surveillance of internet use," the European Parliament (EP) said in a press release. (more)

5 Google Privacy Settings You Should Check

via Techlicious...

In our recent story on the privacy risks of using technology, we called out some of Google's products as potential privacy leaks. But Google also has some excellent tools you might not be familiar with that help preserve your privacy. Here are five tools you should be using... (more)

Too Much Hacking - Based on Too Few Discoveries

The chairman of the House intelligence committee on Tuesday launched a broadside against the Chinese government and its efforts to steal commercial data and other intellectual property online, saying that Beijing's cyber-espionage campaign has “reached an intolerable level” and that the United States and its allies have an “obligation to confront Beijing and demand that they put a stop to this piracy.” Rep. Mike Rogers (R-Mich.) noted that it might seem odd that a lawmaker charged with overseeing the U.S. intelligence community should lament spying by another government. But he said that China's espionage activities now extend beyond the U.S. government and military to include scores of private American companies. (more) 

Unfortunately, it's never this obvious.

Out of the last 50 forensic investigations that information security company Mandiant has conducted, 48 of the businesses involved didn't know they'd been breached until informed by law enforcement agencies, Mandiant CEO Kevin Mandia told the House Intelligence Committee on Tuesday. (more)

We'll miss you Steve

Steve Jobs, the visionary in the black turtleneck who co-founded Apple in a Silicon Valley garage, built it into the world's leading tech company and led a mobile-computing revolution with wildly popular devices such as the iPhone, died Wednesday. He was 56. (more)

"Steve Jobs has been called the Edison of our time." – Derek Thompson, Senior Editor - The Atlantic (August 25, 2011)

Autumn in New York city, when the spies bloom...

Even before President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad finished his incendiary rant (last year), U.S. diplomats marched out of the cavernous U.N. hall in protest and were ready with a written statement condemning his comments.

It was as if the U.S. knew exactly what Ahmadinejad intended to say.

The walkout hinted at one of the well-known but seldom spoken truths about the United Nations: The international organization, which was founded in the name of peace and security, is also a hotbed of spying and clandestine operations, where someone might very well be listening to your conversations and monitoring your emails — or perhaps reading your speeches in advance.

The start of the General Assembly each year is the Super Bowl of the U.N. spy games. (more)

Confessions of a domestic spy victim...

"Throughout my 9 year marriage my husband has spied on me using various techniques i.e. putting spyware on my iphone, hiding audio recording devices in my car, putting software on my computers to find out my passwords so that he could read my email. I need to say that I have never cheated on him, never. Every time I find out that he's spied on me we get in a huge fight which results in him promising that he'll never violate my privacy again. But what he does each time is only tell me part of the truth i.e. he says he figured out my iphone password which let him see my texts but in actuality he jailbroke my phone and purchased a spyware package to be able to track my gps, read all my texts, etc. I recently found out, yet again, about more lies and spying. He promises, yet again, to never do this again. What should/can I do? I love him and can definitely understand some of his insecurities (we both suffer from insecurity-I just don't get into his stuff) but I can't handle being lied to and violated. Plus-this type of behavior makes me think that HE'S cheating...you know (and I did also just find out that he has been secretly looking at internet porn and paying for it)? Any advice would be greatly appreciated. I posted this thread here because I DO think that he has a type of "spying addiction". Thanks." (more)

It is easy to believe that spying is an exciting and glamorous business. It is not. For every spy there is a victim, be it a business that loses money and marketplace, or a real person who is crushed by having their privacy and trust abused.

Playground Wiretapping Showdown - No Contest

PA - A Bucks County man who was facing wiretapping charges has made a plea. Nick Scott of Richland Township has pleaded no contest to intercepting communication, and was sentenced to a year of probation. He also can't have any contact with Joe Murgia, the man he was accused of recording a conversation with. Murgia is the Quakertown Public Works Manager. Scott complained to him about conditions at Panther Playground. (more)

Security Director Briefing: Inspecting Aircraft to Detect Electronic Eavesdropping Devices

More and more of our clients are asking me to inspect their corporate aircraft for eavesdropping devices. Trips to closed countries top the list of concerns for many of them.

There has also been a rise in general questions coming from other organizations. They are just beginning to realize the seriousness of this privacy vulnerability.

Their questions range from:

• "How is an inspection performed?"

• "Is scheduling and doing an inspection a difficult process?"

• "I am preparing a presentation for management and need a few more specific reasons to inspect. What do you suggest?"

to

• "We sometimes park in a semi-public hanger [or an untrusted foreign airport]. Do you have any suggestions?"

Sometimes I am out traveling and unavailable to answer questions. This prompted me to create a general briefing sheet for security directors who call me. It provides some instant answers my staff can send via email. 

If you have corporate jets or helicopters to protect, please feel free to help yourself to a copy of my briefing. No sign-in required. Just download the pdf file. When you decide to conduct your inspections, please give me a call (908-832-7900). ~Kevin