This case, which happened last night, is a good example of this detection tip paying off...
MA - A custodian at Northampton High School is facing charges after police say he "modified" a girls' bathroom at the school, creating holes in the ceiling so he could take pictures of students.
Michael Kremensky, 22, of Florence, is facing four charges of photographing an unsuspecting nude person, said Police Chief Jody Kasper, in a statement.
Police were called to the school Thursday for a report of suspicious activity involving holes in the ceiling of a girls' bathroom on the first floor.
No other bathrooms or rooms were affected, Kasper said. The activity was "localized to the one bathroom," she said. more Learn more about spycam detection.
Testing the long-held belief that Facebook listens to your conversations to advertise stuff...
For years, people have speculated that Facebook and Facebook Messenger use your phone’s microphone to listen to your conversations and send you targeted adverts based on your IRL chats...
To put the rumor to rest, we at the New Statesman engaged in a very scientific test. Each employee had a scripted conversation in front of their phone with Facebook or Messenger open (after changing their settings to ensure that Facebook and Facebook Messenger had access to their microphones)...
A conspiracy theory has spread among Facebook and Instagram users: The company is tapping our microphones to target ads...
“Facebook does not use your phone’s microphone to inform ads or to change what you see in News Feed,” says Facebook.
Yeah, sure, and the government swears it isn’t keeping any pet aliens at Area 51. So I contacted former Facebook employees and various advertising technology experts, who all cited technical and legal reasons audio snooping isn’t possible... more
Brief Profile
Dà-Ji?ng Innovations Science and Technology Co., Ltd, marketed and popularly known as DJI, was established in 2006 by Frank Wang. It has its specialization in aerial photography and videography equipment (unmanned aerial vehicles), gimbals, cameras, and propulsion systems among others. They are one of the market leaders in their segment and continue to gain popularity, especially since the 2010s. In 2015, the Economist named them as being at the forefront of civilian-drone industry. more
Brief Profile
SZMID was established in 2006 by intelligence, security and telecom professionals with extensive backgrounds in the security sector providing a wide range of high quality security devices & solutions to customers around the world. Our business is mainly focus on detection and jamming areas. more
via Boing Boing... As if the Elf on a Shelf wasn't creepy enough, now they've put Peeps in the faux-surveillance game.
A new book and plush Peep sold together as Peep on a Perch is encouraging parents to start a new "Easter family tradition":
The soft plush Easter Peep included in the set can be perched anywhere
throughout the home. Children will be proud to have the Easter Peep
watch them being good all day as they get ready for bed without making a
fuss, help out around the house, and use good manners. And the more
kindness the Easter Peep sees, the happier the Easter Peep gets! PEEPS®
fans of all ages will love to make this a new Easter family tradition.
One Amazon reviewer (who gave the product five stars) writes, "The book
encourages children to help, share and be kind as the Peep reports
directly to the Easter Bunny." No, just no. more
Monitoring in real time what happens in and around our bodies can be
invaluable in the context of health care or clinical studies, but not so
easy to do. That could soon change thanks to new, miniaturized sensors
developed by researchers at the Tufts University School of Engineering
that, when mounted directly on a tooth and communicating wirelessly with
a mobile device, can transmit information on glucose, salt and alcohol
intake...
Tufts engineers sought a more adoptable technology and developed a
sensor with a mere 2mm x 2mm footprint that can flexibly conform and
bond to the irregular surface of a tooth. In a similar fashion to the
way a toll is collected on a highway, the sensors transmit their data
wirelessly in response to an incoming radio-frequency signal. more Just in case you were disappointed that this was not a story about a mysterious tooth implant...
The American Phoenix Foundation — a now-defunct conservative activist group known for attempting undercover stings of lawmakers and lobbyists — planted an intern in a Texas state lawmaker’s office during the 2013 legislative session in an effort to expose misdeeds, testimony in federal court revealed Thursday.
Shaughn Adeleye, testifying in Houston in the federal fraud case against former U.S. Rep. Steve Stockman, said in court Thursday that he was planted in the office of state Rep. James White to obtain footage of the Hillister Republican engaged in “fraud and abuse” and also in more mundane activities like cursing or failing to tidy his messy car... more
FL - A Largo man has been accused of using video cameras to record multiple women and two men while using the women’s restrooms in an office building, the Pinellas Park Police Department said.
John Phillip Gibbs, 49, of Largo, was charged with 14 counts of video voyeurism, a felony. The investigation is ongoing as police officers continue to identify others who were video recorded. Additional charges are expected, officers said.
The investigation began March 2 when Pinellas Park Police were called to an office building at 12360 66th St. N to investigate a suspicious incident in one of the women’s restrooms inside the building. During the initial investigation officers said they found two separate video recording devices above the ceiling tiles inside two different women’s restrooms...
Detectives said they were able to identify Gibbs from images on the video as being a maintenance worker for the office building.
The building management has notified the 60 different small businesses inside the building where the common restrooms are located. more
Don't become a lawsuit defendant, or a spy camera victim. Learn how to protect your guests, customers, employees and yourself.
Mary Lou Jepsen believes her technology will be 99.9% cheaper than MRIs (that’s an actual estimate, not a euphemism); radically smaller (the size of a ski cap, not a bedroom); and that its resolution will exceed that of MRIs by a factor of a billion. Yes, that’s an actual “b,” not a typo. And the really cool thing? Her creation might also enable telepathy.
If your mind rebels at the scale of these claims, reread Mary Lou’s credentials, then give an interview with her a listen. You can hear it by searching “After On” in your favorite podcast app...
Here’s where telepathy comes in...
Neurons range from 4 to 100 microns in diameter. This makes them invisible to MRIs, CAT scans, PET scans – pretty much anything other than a scalpel and a microscope. But Mary Lou’s technology could monitor them, if it delivers on its maximum promise. Add some clever machine learning, and the system could closely infer what those neurons are contemplating.
Might all this raise an ethical issue or two? To quote a one-time would-be VP, yooooou betcha! more
MA - A former Framingham supermarket employee installed a spy camera in an employee ladies room last year, recording unsuspecting co-workers as they used the toilet, authorities said.
John E. Lola Jr., 47, of Holliston, pleaded not guilty to the charges at his Framingham District Court arraignment on Tuesday.
Lola was a longtime employee at the Stop and Shop on Temple Street. On Nov. 18 of last year, a female employee discovered the camera in a unisex employees-only restroom...
The camera was disguised as an electrical outlet. According to the report, the female employee was suspicious when she saw a new outlet in a stall. When she touched it, the outlet fell to the floor and revealed the camera, which was aimed at the level of someone sitting on a toilet, police wrote.
The small video camera had a disc attached to it. Police got a warrant to view the contents of the disc, which contained 34 videos, mostly about one-minute long each.
"Most were of females using the bathroom, primarily of the private parts are visible," police wrote in the report.
The videos did not show any of the people's faces. However, the video did catch a closeup of the person installing the camera. It appeared the camera was turned on as the man attached the camera to the stall's wall, police wrote in the video. moreThe Clink
A research team from Israel’s Ben-Gurion University of the Negev's cybersecurity research center has discovered a new way of data extraction from air-gapped computers via using passive devices like earbuds, earphones, headphones, and speakers.
Now, the same research center has claimed to be able to use computer speakers and headphones to act as microphones and receive data. The devices can be used to send back the signals and make the otherwise safe practice of air-gapping less secure.
As per the new technique [PDF], data is extracted in the form of inaudible ultrasonic sound waves and transmission occurs between two computers installed in the same room while data is shared without using microphones. more
Off-the-shelf devices that include baby monitors, home security cameras, doorbells, and thermostats were easily co-opted by cyber researchers at Ben-Gurion University of the Negev (BGU). As part of their ongoing research into detecting vulnerabilities of devices and networks expanding in the smart home and Internet of Things (IoT), the researchers disassembled and reverse engineered many common devices and quickly uncovered serious security issues.
"It is truly frightening how easily a criminal, voyeur or pedophile can take over these devices," says Dr. Yossi Oren, a senior lecturer in BGU's Department of Software and Information Systems Engineering and head of the Implementation Security and Side-Channel Attacks Lab at Cyber@BGU. "Using these devices in our lab, we were able to play loud music through a baby monitor, turn off a thermostat and turn on a camera remotely, much to the concern of our researchers who themselves use these products."
"It only took 30 minutes to find passwords for most of the devices and some of them were found only through a Google search of the brand," says Omer Shwartz, a Ph.D. student and member of Dr. Oren's lab. "Once hackers can access an IoT device, like a camera, they can create an entire network of these camera models controlled remotely." more
by Adam Brown In the modern age of relatively cheap and ever-evolving technology, corporate espionage is a real threat that could be perpetrated by any employee or other insider at any time.
The term “corporate espionage” covers many different types of behavior, ordinarily taking the form of a malicious company insider secretly stealing confidential company information, usually for use in a competing business. The insider may be planning on joining an existing competitor, or may be planning on founding a new competing business of their own.
In essence, however, the term refers to any act of spying that is carried out for commercial purposes. Regardless of the form it takes, the wrongdoer will be looking to exploit the time, money, and hard work you have put in to make your business successful for their own malicious purposes.
Corporate espionage comes in many forms, some more sophisticated than others. While there is no foolproof way to spot all transgressions before it is too late, here are some general warning signs to watch for:
The employee begins working from home or out of the office more often;
You see an increase in after-hours work or unusual office or remote computer access;
The employee begins meeting with customers without recording meetings in company systems;
The employee knows about business matters they are not directly involved in;*
The employee becomes disgruntled or has a sudden change in attitude;
Files or other materials are missing from the office with no explanation;
The employee unexpectedly resigns without advance notice; and
The employee refuses an exit interview or does not want to discuss post-resignation employment plans. While not necessarily indicative of any improper actions, any of these behaviors should be considered “red flags” that merit further investigation or research. more
Australia - The anti-corruption watchdog sought special exemption from the
Anti-Discrimination Board of NSW to advertise for the $127,627 ($100,440.71 USD) job which
requires women to be sent into the field in “covert” spying operations.
“The exemption is required to ensure operational effectiveness and flexibility,”... more ($)
