Politico's Son Complains About Being Tapped... While Being Tapped

NY - A powerful New York State legislative leader was allegedly recorded complaining about his calls being recorded — while his conversation was being recorded.

Majority Leader Dean Skelos (R) and his son, Adam Skelos, were arrested Monday on federal corruption charges. US Attorney Preet Bharara accused them of a orchestrating a scheme that led to Adam Skelos getting a job in exchange for government sewer contracts and other favors...

According to the complaint, Adam Skelos was caught in an "intercepted call" telling his father it was unfortunate he couldn't get any "real advice" because "you can't talk normally because it's like f---ing Preet Bharara is listening to every f---ing phone call. It's just f---ing frustrating." more sing-a-long

Current King of the Voyeur Jungle - Pleads Not Guilty - Judge Says Stop, Lyon

CA - Disgraced Sacramento real estate mogul Michael Lyon was back in court Monday... after being released from jail last month...

His hearing was postponed to May 18 in Sacramento Superior Court on 16 felony counts of electronic eavesdropping that expose him to potentially more time behind bars.

When he was released April 1, Lyon, 59, the former chief executive officer of Lyon Real Estate, had served six months for violating the terms of a plea agreement his lawyer worked out with the District Attorney’s Office in 2011. During that arrest last year, prosecutors allege, investigators discovered methamphetamine and other drugs in his home and seized electronic equipment that they analyzed in preparing the latest eavesdropping charges.

The new case follows a similar set of charges brought against Lyon in 2010, in which he was accused of secretly videotaping his interactions with prostitutes and making surreptitious recordings of friends and employees in bathrooms and elsewhere. He pleaded guilty...

Prosecutors now allege that he continued the illicit recordings, despite repeated warnings from the court that he stop. The new complaint alleges that the 16 counts took place on 14 separate dates with eight different unnamed victims between Jan. 15, 2014, and Sept. 27, 2014.

Lyon has pleaded not guilty.

When he was released last month, Sacramento Superior Court Judge Ben Davidian told him he could have “no cameras of any kind” in his possession, including a cellphone camera. more

Kolon Blows $360 Million Down the Crapper - DuPont Still Bullet-Proof

Kolon Industries Inc. admitted conspiring to steal DuPont Co.’s Kevlar trade secrets 

as a U.S. judge signed off on its plea agreement and $360 million penalty...

“There’s no doubt this case involves brazen and blatant conduct,” U.S. District Judge Anthony Trenga said before accepting the company’s guilty plea. Trenga said he was particularly troubled by Kolon employees destroying documents after DuPont sued in 2009.

The charges were initially filed against Gyeonggi, South Korea-based Kolon Industries Inc., which split into two public companies in 2010, Kolon Industries and Kolon Corp. The theft of secrets occurred before the split.

Kolon’s guilty plea also covered attempts to steal trade secrets from a second company, Tokyo-based Teijin Ltd. more

Airbus'ed by Spies

Airbus on Thursday said it would file a criminal complaint against unknown parties after German media reports of the company having been the target of industrial espionage by the U.S. ...

German newspaper Bild reported earlier this week that the National Security Agency spied or sought to spy on Airbus and other companies and that the German government had known about it for several years. more

Edinburgh Spy Week

Edinburgh Spy Week: Fictions of Espionage will run again in May 2015 with a whole new range of talks, films and events that explore the world of espionage in literature and film.

Highlights include:

• May 19th - An Evening with Graham Greene at the National Library of Scotland.
• May 22nd - James Robertson, ‘The Blanket of the Dark: Secrets, Truth and Lies in Real and Imagined Scotland’.
• May 22nd - Publish your own spy fiction! A workshop with Tim Stevens.
• May 23rd - ‘Secrecy and the Modern World’: a day of talks and discussions at the University of Edinburgh. Speakers include Kieron O’ Hara and Charles Cumming.
• Throughout the week: A series of Greene adaptations at the Edinburgh Filmhouse.

For more information on the week, including a full programme of events and details on how to book a place, visit the website at: www.spyweek.llc.ed.ac.uk

Who's Behind Those Ray Bans

ACLU - The map below tracks what we know, based on press reports and publicly available documents, about the use of stingray tracking devices by state and local police departments. 

Following the map is a list of the federal law enforcement agencies known to use the technology throughout the United States. The ACLU has identified 51 agencies in 21 states and the District of Columbia that own stingrays, but because many agencies continue to shroud their purchase and use of stingrays in secrecy, this map dramatically under represents the actual use of stingrays by law enforcement agencies nationwide.

Stingrays, also known as "cell site simulators" or "IMSI catchers," are invasive cell phone surveillance devices that mimic cell phone towers and send out signals to trick cell phones in the area into transmitting their locations and identifying information. When used to track a suspect's cell phone, they also gather information about the phones of countless bystanders who happen to be nearby. Click here for more info on stingrays.

It's Just Not Cricket

India

Former Board of Control for Cricket in India (BCCI) chief N Srinivasan allegedly hired the services of a London firm to spy on BCCI officials, The Times of India reports...

According to reports, Srinivasan paid Rs 14 crore of BCCI's money to spy on his fellow board members and asked them to tap their phones and track their e-mails. It is expected that BCCI will investigate this matter further lead by new secretary Anurag Thakur. more "It's just not cricket"

Bugging Concerns Prompt City Hall TSCM Sweep

UK - Council chiefs were forced to pay a specialist security firm to “sweep” for electronic recording devices after an ex-councillor hinted the council house had been bugged...

It is understood the un-named company carried out a sweep of the council house at some stage in the past month, but no such electronic items were found.

A spokesman for Plymouth City Council said: “We received a communication that suggested recording devices may have been installed in the council house.

“Given the highly confidential nature of some of the meetings held in the building, which include those about the safeguarding of vulnerable children, we had a duty to look into it and had the building checked.  more

Student Uses Keystroke Logger to Change Grades - Fail & Jail

UK - Student uses a keyboard spying device to hack the computer of Birmingham University to up his own grades and has been sentenced for 4 months of jail.

A final year student was found guilty of hacking the university computers to change his marks and to increase his overall final year grades has been sentenced by the court for a 4 months of jail.

Imran Uddin, a 25 year old student of Bio Science, at the University of Birmingham hacked the university computers by using “keyboard spying device”. This device resembles a USB stick and can be purchased from the internet sites for as low as £49. Mr. Uddin had bought these equipments from online website ebay and implanted them on a number of computers in the university where he was studying. more cue the cat

The Rayney Wiretap Trial Continues

Lloyd Rayney phone-tapping trial: Fingerprints on roof manhole match alleged installer of bugging equipment.

Australia - Two fingerprints on a manhole cover* from the home of Lloyd Rayney matched those of the man he is alleged to have paid to install phone-bugging equipment, a police officer has told the District Court in Perth.

Senior Constable Damian Sheridan was testifying at the trial of Mr Rayney on two charges of aiding, abetting or procuring the interception of the landline telephone at his family's home over two periods in 2007, before the death of his wife Corryn. more *The cover plate for an in-wall wiring junction box.

Beauty Queen Sues In-Laws For Bugging Bedroom

A former Turkish beauty queen has sued her former in-laws for bugging her bedroom with the help of her ex-husband, according to a local media report.

Sinem Sülün, who was crowned Miss Model Turkey in 2005 and was runner-up at Miss Turkey-Universe in 2007, divorced her husband Mustafa Yüksel last month. She was awarded 200,000 Turkish Liras in compensation and 2,500 liras as a monthly alimony after the divorce.

Daily Milliyet reported on April 1 that the divorce case led to a fierce argument between the two sides, after Sülün claimed that her husband and his parents had illegally wiretapped their private conversations by bugging a power socket in their bedroom.

The 5th Criminal Court of Peace recently ruled for the trial of businessman Yüksel and his parents on charges of illegally recording a private conversation, the report said. more

The Wire - Censored to Protect You

HBO's The Wire was lauded for its gritty, realistic portrayal of the drug war in Baltimore, but it seems law enforcement thought the show could be a bit too authentic at times. In a story about cellphone tracking technology, showrunner David Simon tells The Baltimore Sun that "At points, we were asked by law enforcement not to reveal certain vulnerabilities in our plotlines."

Simon, who was once a reporter for the very same paper, explains that the writers once intended to show that criminals using the walkie-talkie-eque, "push-to-talk" feature of Nextel phones could avoid surveillance and wiretaps. According to Simon, the technology "was actually impervious to any interception by law enforcement during a critical window of time." more

Encyclopedia Spytanica

Trying to get a handle on hundreds of sensitive, closely held surveillance programs, a Senate committee is compiling a secret encyclopedia of American intelligence collection. It's part of an effort to improve congressional oversight of the government's sprawling global spying effort.

Sen. Dianne Feinstein launched the review in October 2013, after a leak by former National Security Agency systems administrator Edward Snowden disclosed that the NSA had been eavesdropping on German Chancellor Angela Merkel's cellphone. Four months earlier, Snowden had revealed the existence of other programs that vacuumed up Americans' and foreigners' phone call records and electronic communications.

"We're trying right now to look at every intelligence program," Feinstein told The Associated Press. "There are hundreds of programs we have found ... sprinkled all over. Many people in the departments don't even know (they) are going on." more

Ex Rigs Live Streaming Bedroom Spycam

WA - A 41-year-old Cheney, Washington, is accused of entering his ex-girlfriend's home and secretly installing a wireless camera in her bedroom to spy on her...

Court records shows the ex-girlfriend called Liberty Lake police in late March when she arrived home and found several items he had given her burned in a backyard fire pit. A few days later, she reported finding a camera hidden in a light fixture above her bed.

Liberty Lake police Chief Brian Asmus says the camera was connected to a wireless device hidden in the attic and was streaming live video.  more

The World Wrestles with the Spycam Epidemic

India - After Human Resources Development Smriti Irani claims to have detected a CCTV camera facing towards a FabIndia trial* room in Goa, many shops are now being inspected to ensure that no such cameras are found inside changing rooms...

A spy camera can be fitted in the smoke detector, electrical switch and almost in any item usually found in a trial room. 

Spy camera retailer Parminder Singh said, "Spy cameras can be fitted even in the fire extinguisher."

But the sophistication of these cameras and the huge variety in which they come in have reached makes it becomes difficult for a common man to detect a hidden camera with a naked eye.

While spy cam detectors are available in the market, their effectiveness is unreliable. more

* In India, a "trial room" is a changing room in a clothing store.