A Veterans Day Salute to Radio Eavesdroppers & Code Breakers

At age 97, Marjorie Stetson has never told anyone her secret code number — until now.

That's the identity code — 225 — that she typed on every page of her highly classified work for the Canadian Armed Forces during the Second World War.

The retired sergeant's wartime work was so covert, she said, she had to sign 15 separate copies of Canada's Official Secrets Act...

"She was on the front line of the radio war," said military historian David O'Keefe, who studies Second World War code breaking and signals intelligence...

Stetson used a radio receiver to intercept Japanese army and air force communications. She used a special typewriter to transcribe the Japanese codes she heard. Those number-filled documents were sent to code breakers in the U.S. and sometimes England, said O'Keefe — giving the Allies an intelligence edge in the Pacific region. more

This Month in Spycam News

Australia - A woman who discovered she had been spied on for months by a cybersecurity expert, who was also her friend and housemate, by using a camera hidden in her room had one word that summed up how she felt: humiliated. more

FL - A registered sexual offender was arrested last week after he was accused of using his cellphone to record two students in a restroom at a Duval County high school, authorities said. more 

VT -  A federal judge has cleared at least part of the way for a plea deal involving a former emergency room doctor at the University of Vermont Medical Center, who ... hid a camera in a staff bathroom while working at the Burlington hospital, investigators said. He was later fired. more

Canada - A former New Glasgow doctor who was charged in 2016 for allegedly putting a hidden camera in a staff washroom at the Westside Medical Clinic, has left the profession. more

UT - A Utah man was arrested for voyeurism after an employee in the University Mall said he was recording people in dressing rooms at a clothing store. more 

FL - A University of Central Florida (UCF) student is speaking out, warning others after she said she discovered a spy camera was recording her through her bedroom window. more

CT - A city man with a history of voyeuristic criminal activity was recently arrested for allegedly trying to record a female shopper in a mall changing room earlier this year, according to an arrest warrant. more

WY - Trial Date Set for Sheridan County Man - Kobielusz was arrested in April  for allegedly placing video recording devices in a bedroom and bathroom of his home and using the devices to record three individuals, two minors and one adult, without their consent. more

UK - A man has been jailed for six months for voyeurism after he used a spy camera in his shoelaces and a phone to take video underneath skirts. more

Philippines - Policemen arrested a security guard for allegedly filming a woman while she was taking a shower Sunday evening in San Roque village, Tarlac City. more

WI - A Wisconsin teacher was sentenced to 12 years in federal prison after pleading guilty to one count of attempting to produce child pornography, reports NBC News. David Krutchen, 39, hid cameras in air fresheners on a field trip. more 

FL - A Frontier Airlines pilot has been charged over allegations he recorded a 19-year-old Florida college student with a hidden spy camera hidden in her apartment, university police said. more 

Japan - Kyoto Prefectural Police have launched an initiative to show a non-skippable video ad on YouTube warning that "secret filming is a crime," targeting users who have searched for terms seemingly related to voyeurism. more

MA - Amazon driver in blonde wig filmed naked girls in women's bathroom with pen camera, police say. more

CT - Detectives investigating a child pornography tip discovered photographs of young female students apparently taken without their knowledge by a Rockville High School teacher, arrest records show. more 

IN - Schneider remains on unpaid suspension from the New Albany Police Department. He was arrested in June on charges of voyeurism. Investigators said he used his smartphone to record video of women changing in a dressing room at his Memphis, Indiana, home. more 

Canada - A personal support worker charged with voyeurism at a long-term care home in Guelph/Eramosa is no longer an employee after being accused of taking intimate images of a vulnerable resident. more

Singapore - A South Korean man who had served as an interpreter for the Singapore Police Force (SPF) during the Trump-Kim Summit here in 2018, was caught in February this year using a pinhole camera to take videos of women using a toilet. more 

LA - Man admits to taking 19 upskirt videos in College Drive Walmart more

WA - A former Arlington Christian School teacher who admitted to shooting hundreds of videos of female staff members and students without their permission will not see any more time in jail. more

WY - Lander resident Dudley Irvine pled “not guilty” to a charge of attempted voyeurism at his September 28th arraignment hearing... The charge was originally filed after a gym member reported to the Lander Police Department that she had found a “covert recording device that was plugged into an electrical outlet facing the shower within the women’s locker room.” more 

India - Hinjewadi police have booked a voyeurism case against the chairperson, secretary and treasurer of a housing society in Hinjewadi-Wakad road on charges of voyeurism. The accused have been charged for installing CCTV camera near the bedroom window of the woman resident and recording her private life for almost one month. more

Hong Kong - (new law) People who take non-consensual photographs up a woman’s skirt face up to five years in jail in Hong Kong under a law passed Thursday aimed at tackling voyeurism. more 

Our spycam detection services are being requested more often. Due diligence makes sense to businesses like: hotels, gyms, swimming pools, country clubs, educational institutions, clothing retailers, and all businesses offering private areas to their employees and guests.

We can not guarantee you will never be on the wrong end of a voyeurism law suit. However, we are sure our services will pay for themselves many times over if damages are assessed. Showing due diligence can mitigate damages. 

Businesses must proactively protect the privacy of employees and the visiting public.

Learn more: FREE Security White Paper (No questions asked. Just click to view.)
"Surreptitious Workplace Recording ...and what you can do about it."

CO Supreme Court - Nonstop Hidden Camera Spying Violated Fourth Amendment

Using a hidden pole camera without a warrant to spy on and record a man’s home for more than three months violated the Fourth Amendment, the Colorado Supreme Court unanimously declared last month. “A camera monitoring all of a person’s backyard activities,” Chief Justice Brian Boatright wrote for the court, “provokes an immediate negative visceral reaction: indiscriminate video surveillance raises the spectre of the Orwellian state.”

With its decision, the Colorado Supreme Court widens a growing split on the constitutionality of long-term pole camera surveillance. The Fifth Circuit U.S. Court of Appeals, as well as the South Dakota Supreme Court, have both ruled against warrantless surveillance, while the Sixth and Seventh have ruled the opposite. more

Fluffer & Nutter - The Peanut Butter Sandwich Spies

A nuclear engineer for the U.S. Navy and his wife have been charged with trying to share some of the United States’ most closely held secrets on submarine technology with another country, according to court documents unsealed on Sunday.

The engineer, Jonathan Toebbe, was accused of trying to sell information on the nuclear propulsion system of Virginia-class attack submarines — the technology at the heart of a recent deal that the United States and Britain struck with Australia...

Over a series of exchanges, the F.B.I. persuaded the sender to leave information at a dead drop in return for cryptocurrency payments. The F.B.I. then observed Mr. Toebbe and his wife, Diana Toebbe, at the location of the drop, in West Virginia.

With Ms. Toebbe acting as a lookout, Mr. Toebbe left an SD card concealed inside half a peanut butter sandwich in a plastic bag, according to the court documents. After the undercover agent retrieved the sandwich, Mr. Toebbe was sent $20,000. more

Entry Level TSCM Tech Job Posting (UK)

Technical Surveillance Counter Measures (TSCM) Engineer
UK Ministry of Defence Tarrant Rawston, England, United Kingdom

About the job

This role is within the Technical Surveillance Counter Measures (TSCM) team, part of the Spectrum team within Operations, Defence Digital. We are looking for people who will be able to assist with conducting TSCM Assessments which are technical and physical counter surveillance assessments with highly sophisticated equipment for the detection of concealed devices and identification of security vulnerabilities within offices, building infrastructure, furniture and office equipment. This is to reduce the MOD’s exposure to eavesdropping and information exploitation.

Responsibilities

You will be part of a small team conducting TSCM activities to protect, detect and respond to the technical exploitation of the MOD’s facilities by a range of threats including adversaries and insider threats to prevent unwanted exposure to Defence sensitive information.

Key Responsibilities

• Assist in the scoping and planning tasks as appropriately to conduct the task effectively.
• As a team member, assist with conducting Technical Surveillance Counter Measures (TSCM) Assessments of areas as tasked.
• Assist with the completion of reports on tasks that identify the activities undertaken in a timely manner.
• Manage the equipment holdings of the section, ensuring all equipment is working correctly, calibrated, packed and ready to deploy on trial at short notice.
• Support the C2 Senior TSCM Engineer in the output of TSCM tasks as appropriate.
  

This job will involve significant travel away from home, at locations both in the UK and abroad but this is expected to be no more than 2 weeks at a time, and no more than 16 weeks per year.  more

 

PS - This is an unusual and interesting career. Rarely is an entry level position offered. 

PI & Security Director Alert - Camera Smartband for Apple Watch

A dream for professional investigators.
A nightmare for security directors.
The Apple watch band wristcam!

The scoop...
• Apple MFi-Certified Modular Camera Smartband for Apple Watch,
• 42mm-44mm, Black,
• TWO CAMERAS: 8MP + 2MP, 4K Photo, 1080p Video,
• 2 Microphones (underwater support for water adventures)
• 8GB Storage, WiFi, Bluetooth 5,
• IP68 Water Resistant

"Now you can go without your phone, and use your Apple Watch to capture 4K photo, 1080p video, and even video live chat with the Wristcam App." more

LANTENNA: Exfiltrating Data from Air-Gapped Networks via Ethernet Cables

via Cyber Security Labs @ Ben Gurion University

Air-gapped networks are wired with Ethernet cables since wireless connections are strictly prohibited. 

 LANTENNA - a new type of electromagnetic attack allowing adversaries to leak sensitive data from isolated, air-gapped networks. 

Malicious code in air-gapped computers gathers sensitive data and then encodes it over radio waves emanating from the Ethernet cables, using them as antennas. A nearby receiving device can intercept the signals wirelessly, decode the data, and send it to the attacker. 

We discuss the exfiltration techniques, examine the covert channel characteristics, and provide implementation details. Notably, the malicious code can run in an ordinary user-mode process and successfully operate from within a virtual machine. We evaluate the covert channel in different scenarios and present a set of countermeasures. 

Our experiments show that with the LANTENNA attack, data can be exfiltrated from air-gapped computers to a distance of several meters away. more & video

Eavesdropping on TSCM Expert Chris Browning

PODCAST - This week we are eavesdropping on TSCM expert Chris Browning. Mr. Browning is a highly skilled and experienced 8-year veteran instructor with the prestigious Research Electronics International (REI)...

Chris Browning is a graduate of the FBI National Academy and spent two decades in law enforcement... He studied TSCM at REI for 4 years and has been an instructor there for the last 8 years. 

Enjoy eavesdropping on TSCM expert Chris Browning and I as we discuss this specialized skill. This episode is sponsored in part by the Investigators Toolbox, the #1 online resource community for private investigators. more

Weird, Unusual & Interesting - Spy News Clickbait

Venice, Italy - The city’s leaders are acquiring the cellphone data of unwitting tourists and using hundreds of surveillance cameras to monitor visitors and prevent crowding. Next summer, they plan to install long-debated gates at key entry points; visitors coming only for the day will have to book ahead and pay a fee to enter. If too many people want to come, some will be turned away. more

Banksy's Spy Booth Brick + NFT Auction Crashes Servers with Overwhelmingly Heavy Web Traffic more

Australia - An ABC News drone took the brunt of the bite force when a saltwater crocodile leapt up and plucked it from mid-air while filming in Darwin. video

Top 9 Surveillance Videos of the Week video  

How Jamie Spears Spied on Britney Spears Through iCloud - A security firm spied on Britney Spears through her iCloud account. Here's how to figure out if someone is doing that to you, and how to stop it. more & more & more & bugsweep

ShadowDragon: Inside the Social Media Surveillance Software That Can Watch Your Every Move - The tool is the product of a growing industry whose work is usually kept from the public and utilized by police. more & more

Florida - New Law – Corporate Espionage (HB 1523): Sponsored by Republican Rep. Mike Beltran, the new law creates the crime of “trafficking in trade secrets” and enhances criminal penalties under certain circumstances. If the trafficking of trade secrets benefits a foreign government or company, the offense is now a first-degree felony. more

Florida - Surveillance Drone Assists in Search for Brian Laundrie more 

Security researchers think Amazon's Astro bot isn't safe. more

Security Director Alert: Check for Spyware When Execs Travel

Smartphone, laptop, etc. device check service for traveling users.  

Detect Pegasus and other 0-click and 1-click spywares. Check before and after executives enter high-risk countries to determine their exposure and perform remediation. Prevent introducing foreign threats to your network. Service is a ZecOps product. more

Reasons You Should Never Connect To Public Wifi

There Are Too Many Risks
Put simply, the risks you take when you connect to Wifi in public places such as libraries, stations, cafes, and shopping malls are often too great to make the benefits worthwhile...

• Misuse of personal data Distribution of malware
• Insecure connection
• Online attacks on business
• Eavesdropping
  

Hackers or anyone with a sound knowledge about internet software and applications can eavesdrop on your personal data if they are using the same public Wi-Fi connection as you are...

• Try not to share your personal data while you are using a personal Wi-Fi connection.
• Avoid logging in to websites that involve your personal or bank credentials.
• Try using a VPN (virtual Private Network) service that will help you to encrypt all the data you receive or send.
• Use 2-Factor authorizations that will make your connection secure and prevent the risk of data loss.” more
  

Grain of Sand Sky Spies

A new microchip roughly the size of a grain of sand that has the potential to glide across great distances is being touted as a breakthrough for aerial surveillance.

Key points: 

• The devices are about the size of a grain of sand and can transmit wirelessly
• Remote sensing technology was originally developed for warfare
• The researchers hope the technology can be used to help monitor disease spread

Collaborating scientists from institutions including Northwestern University in the United States and Soongsil University in Korea have created what they believe are the world's smallest ever "human-made flying structures", which can be fitted with microchips and sensors and have the capacity to transmit data remotely.

The microchips can be dropped from the sky and potentially used to monitor environmental impacts and the spread of disease.The researchers, who published their findings today in the journal Nature. more

NFL Spying Book in the Works

Spies on the Sidelines - The High Stakes World of NFL Espionage
A NON FICTION BOOK BY KEVIN BRYANT

After the NFL’s Spygate controversy, involving the New England Patriots illicitly recording the defensive signals of the New York Jets in 2007, NFL fans and pundits alike struggled to answer a lingering question: Were the Patriots the only team spying on their opponents or was espionage a commonplace activity in the NFL? 

Everyone had an opinion, but few could offer more than a gut feeling to back up their claims and for good reason...

Well, that was before. Spies on the Sidelines shines a light on the shadowy world of NFL espionage and exposes the full range of collection techniques teams use to spy on their opponents, as well as the defensive countermeasures that are used to defend against these threats. more

Have a Little James Bond in You? Have I Got a Car for You!

ASTON MARTIN DB5 JUNIOR

No Time To Die Edition

From Goldfinger to No Time To Die, Bond has never been far from his Aston Martin DB5. This car has arguably been part of his DNA for over 50 years. Now, an exclusive partnership between Aston Martin, EON Productions and The Little Car Company brings you the Aston Martin DB5 Junior No Time To Die Edition.

Limited production run of 125 vehicles.

Created at 66% scale of the original, with a fully electric powertrain, the DB5 has been reimagined for Bond fans worldwide. As an official Aston Martin model, the No Time To Die edition will pay homage to the rich history of the brand with Silver Birch paintwork, Smiths instruments, and individually numbered chassis plates. Complete with Aston Martin and 007 badging, this car is unmistakably Bond.

The DB5 Junior is designed to offer seating for an adult and child side by side, to allow all generations of Bond fans to share the love of driving. more

Pegasus: How The Spyware Invades Phones & What It Does

What is Pegasus?
Is Pegasus a hacking software or spyware? It is pipped as the best version of both worlds that was developed, marketed, and licensed to governments around the world by the Israeli company NSO Group. This is because of the intrusive nature it possesses where it can infect and silent surveillance on billions of phones running either iOS or Android operating systems. 

Pegasus was first discovered in 2016 in a group of mobile devices which were infected via a spear phishing campaign which tricked users into clicking on malicious links which would install the spying software. However, recent versions of the spyware are much more sophisticated and require zero interaction from the victim for delivery and execution.

How it works?
The spyware executes via a zero-click exploit. This means that a victim does not need to interact with the initial delivery vector of the spyware for the malicious code to be executed. The victim receives a message on SMS, WhatsApp, iMessage or any other messaging application. As soon as the message is received the spyware is executed and all traces of the message are deleted. This implies that the user’s device will be infected with the spyware, without the user being aware of even receiving any suspicious message. more