SpyCams Gone Wild

OH - A 24-year veteran of the Mayfield Heights Fire Department could face dozens of charges after police accused him of placing hidden cameras in a Geauga County YMCA and his home in Chardon, where he secretly taped at least two teenage boys, investigators said.

Daniel J. Serge, 51, was charged Monday morning with pandering sexually oriented matter involving a minor...

Geauga County Sheriff Dan McClelland said he expects more charges to come after his deputies and state investigators finish combing through 60 videotapes, which average eight hours, and analyzing Serge's computer...

The investigation into Serge began last Tuesday when a worker at the Munson YMCA found an air freshener with a blinking light in a men's bathroom stall. The worker discovered the freshener contained a camera. Investigators think it had been there less than a day...

They found pinhole cameras, about an ⅛-inch in diameter, hidden in three of the four walls in Serge's bathroom. Wires hidden in the walls connected the cameras to recording equipment in a closet, McClelland said...

Serge worked for about three years with the nonprofit Hunt of a Lifetime Foundation, which organizes hunting trips for children and teenagers who have life-threatening illnesses. (more)

Eavesdropping Gone Wild

MA - The Middlesex District Attorney's office has announced that Shirley Town Administrator Kyle Keady was arrested yesterday in connection with an illegal wire tapping and videotaping scheme.

Keady was charged with illegal recording, illegal possession of a recording device, and video recording a person in a state of nudity...

 

State police went to town hall yesterday and talked to 46-year-old Keady where he allegedly admitted to using a baby monitor to record conversations of town employees.

Keady told police he did it because he didn't trust anyone and first started recording his secretary using a recorder he put in a plant on her desk without her knowledge.

During their interview with Keady, police asked him to empty the contents of his pockets where he had 9 zip drives with recordings and two camera pens wrapped in tape. (Yes, it gets worse.)

Update - Police Chief Bugging Case

MN - The former Gaylord police chief will serve one year probation after he was sentenced in Sibley County yesterday. 61 year old Dale Roiger was found guilty back in April of misconduct of a public officer - a gross misdemeanor - after having a "bug" planted in the Gaylord Chamber of Commerce office. (more)

Secret Agent Jobs - Full-time / Summer-time

The Clandestine Life  
Operations Officers and Collection Management Officers spend a significant portion of their time abroad. Typically, Operations Officers will serve 60% to 70% of their careers overseas, while Collection Management Officers will be overseas for 30% to 40% of their careers. Staff Operations Officers, although based in the Washington, D.C. area, travel overseas on a temporary basis. Language Officers also are primarily based in Washington, though short-term and some long-term foreign travel opportunities are available.

Officers in each of these careers are under cover. By the very nature of this clandestine business, officers can expect limited external recognition for themselves and their families. Instead, the Agency has its own internal promotions, awards and medals, and makes every effort to recognize the accomplishments of its personnel.

In addition to competitive pay, Officers are provided housing and receive overseas allowances and schooling benefits for their children when serving abroad. There are also other benefits, such as language pay incentives, that Officers can receive depending on their skills set and position duties. Collectively, the benefits enable Officers to make significant contributions that impact our national security, and experience a high level of job satisfaction and camaraderie throughout their career. (more) (full-time job openings) (summer jobs)

Smart Phones Smart

...via The Wall Street Journal 

In 2009, security experts identified 30 security flaws in the software and operating systems of smartphones made by companies like Apple, Nokia Corp. and BlackBerry maker Research In Motion Ltd., up from 16 the previous year, according to a review of records in the National Vulnerability Database, a repository created in 2005 by an agency of the U.S. Department of Commerce. Submissions are vetted and rated according to their severity... 

None of the companies contacted would discuss specific vulnerabilities, but all said they take security seriously. (more)

Muffin Maker Miffed as Secrets Walk

Chris Botticella knows the secret to those "nooks and crannies" in Thomas' English Muffins — the way they cradle butter and jam, and after a good toasting, produce just the right crunch.

It's a secret that the muffins' makers have gone to great lengths to protect over 75 years, allowing it to rack up $500 million in sales annually of the toaster treats.

The company says only seven executives know all three parts of its winning formula for making the muffins — including how much dough to use, the right amount of moisture and the proper way to bake them.

So it became alarmed and sued in January when Botticella, one of the trusted seven, decided to bolt and join rival Hostess, maker of Wonder Bread and Twinkies.

...lawyers say Botticella hid his new employment deal for months while attending high-level Bimbo meetings and debating strategies for competing with Hostess. They also accuse him of copying a dozen files onto a USB thumb drive in his final days, a charge he denies. (more)

CIA Report Helps You Spot Espionage Before it Happens

Project Slammer, now partially declassified, was based on extensive prison interviews with some 30 former military and intelligence personnel who had been convicted of spying for Russia, China and other hostile powers during the Cold War, from the lowest enlisted men to senior CIA officers like Aldrich Ames. It sought to answer why they had violated the trust their agencies had bestowed on them.

Two of the most important factors in a mole’s decision to steal secrets... emotional distress, and lax security...

...the authors of the highly classified Project Slammer report, delivered to CIA management on April 12, 1990, emphasized that behavioral changes were often associated with acts of espionage. 

“Heavy drinking, drug dependence, signs of depression or stress, extramarital affairs and divorce could be warning signs of a security problem...” (more)

What type of person is pre-disposed to becoming a spy? 

Here's one profile.

Mobile Phone Spyware Crackdown

Romanian authorities arrested 50 individuals for using a special mobile-phone program to spy on their spouses, business partners or the competition. The spyware was able to steal call logs, e-mails, SMS messages or GPS data from smartphones and allowed attackers to eavesdrop on active phone calls and private discussions held in the vicinity of the device...

Police also arrested Dan Nicolae Oproiu, 30, of Deva, Hunedoara, an IT specialist who sold the surveillance program through a variety of websites. ...the spyware application was available for Symbian, Windows Mobile, iPhone OS and BlackBerry OS and came in three versions - Light, Pro and ProXRecorder, which differed in features.

Most of Oproiu's clients who were arrested two days ago did not have a criminal background and many were members of the so-called upper class. The list includes several businessmen, doctors, engineers, as well as a government official, a former member of the Parliament, a police officer, a prosecutor and even a judge. There are also strong indications that the software was also unlawfully used by several detective agencies and private investigators. (more)

Phone Eavesdropping in Vogue Again

The huge rise in physical data security measures has inadvertently triggered a new line of attack for criminals: phone correspondence.  

With traditional identity theft channels now closing, fraudsters are increasingly targeting unprotected voice conversations to obtain confidential insider information, passwords and PIN codes without detection. Voice correspondence is almost always uncharted territory for business security armour under the false assumption that phone hacking is a highly sophisticated and expensive means of attack.

The days of phone fraud involving thousands of pounds of equipment and an extensive army of technology experts are long gone. Only in December it was revealed that a computer engineer had broken the algorithm used to encrypt the majority of the world’s digital mobile phone calls online, and published his method...

...when assessing the threat posed by phone fraudsters and criminals, we need look no further than the regular examples of celebrity phone eavesdropping that is becoming commonplace. Even high profile national newspapers like the News of the World have become embroiled in the scandal, resulting in one of their reporters being jailed for listening in on calls between members of the royal family. Liberal Democrat Lembit Opik recently went public saying he was concerned his phone calls were being intercepted and PR guru Max Clifford settled a hacking dispute out of court for a six-figure sum. And who can forget the case of Tiger Woods, who found himself in hot water after several voicemail and text messages fell in the lap of numerous national newspapers and celebrity magazines.

These celebrity incidents are serious enough, but business leaders and public sector chiefs now need to readdress their approach to voice and message security, to protect themselves against this growing threat. 

Increasingly, phone fraudsters are being hired or trained by rival businesses, getting insider information and critical data without ever being suspected. (more)

Information about Cell Phone Privacy is available with a google search. Businesses, however, require additional assistance with making sure their phones (analog, digital and VoIP digital) remain untapped. Quarterly inspections by a TSCM security specialist are the norm. For additional information about these services click here, or contact the company who provided this link to Kevin's Security Scrapbook.

Twenty Minutes into the Future

Australia - Companies who provide customers with a connection to the internet may soon have to retain subscriber's private web browsing history for law enforcement to examine when requested, a move which has been widely criticised by industry insiders.

Currently, companies that provide customers with a connection to the internet don't retain or log subscriber's private web browsing history unless they are given an interception warrant by law enforcement, usually approved by a judge. It is only then that companies can legally begin tapping a customer's internet connection. (more)

FutureWatch - Ask Blank Reg over at Max Headroom. Watch out for Murray, he's clueless. Bilp-def... "Blanks, a counter-culture group of people who lived without any official numbers or documentation for the sake of privacy."

Hackers plant viruses in Windows smartphone games

3D Anti-Terrorist and PDA Poker Art -- are available on sites that provide legitimate software for mobile devices, according to John Hering, CEO of San Francisco-based security firm Lookout.

Those games are bundled with malicious software that automatically dials premium-rate telephone services in Somalia, Italy and other countries, sometimes ringing up hundreds of dollars in charges in a single month.

Victims generally do not realize they have been infected until they get their phone bill and see hundreds of dollars of unexpected charges for those premium-rate services, he said. (more) 

FutureWatch - Expect this trend to continue. Un-vetted software apps (unlike Apple apps) are currently the easiest targets.

Nineteen Minutes into the Future

Italy - Italian Prime Minister Silvio Berlusconi advanced a draft law through the senate that restricts the use of wiretaps by prosecutors and introduces fines and prison sentences for journalists who issue reports on tapped conversations.

The draft law's passage on Thursday by the senate prompted a torrent of criticism from Italian prosecutors, newspapers and opposition lawmakers. Mr. Berlusconi, a media magnate, says the bill aims to protect the privacy of Italians. Critics say the draft legislation, which still faces a vote in the lower house of Parliament, is an attempt by Mr. Berlusconi to weaken the judiciary branch's investigative powers and muzzle criticism of the prime minister in Italian media.

"The massacre of freedom has begun," said Anna Finocchiaro, a senator in the center-left Democratic Party. (more)

No pun intended?

Headline: "Italy's daily runs blank page"
Italy's left-leaning La Repubblica daily on Friday ran an all-white front page to protest a bill curbing police wiretaps and setting hefty fines on media for publishing transcripts of them. 'The muzzling law denies citizens the right to be informed,' reads a message, styled as a yellow Post-It note, on the otherwise blank space under the La Repubblica banner. (more)

Eighteen Minutes into the Future - Teleportation and the end of wiretapping?

A group of Chinese scientists has successfully achieved teleportation up to 9.9 miles, using quantum entanglement of photons...

"This is the longest reported distance over which photonic teleportation has been achieved to date, more than 20 times longer than the previous implementation," Discovery News quoted Cheng-Zhi Peng, one of the co-authors of the study and a scientist at University of Science and Technology of China and Tsinghua University in Beijing, as saying.

In science fiction, teleportation usually describes the transfer of matter from one point to another, more or less instantaneously - a spooky aspect of quantum mechanics.

According to the theory, bits of light and matter can become entangled with one another and anything that happens to one particle will happen to the other, regardless of the distance or intervening matter...

A teleported telephone call, although no faster than a regular one, would however, be impenetrable and eavesdropping on a teleported telephone call would be impossible. (more)

The research is published in the current issue of the journal Nature Photonics.

FutureWatch: Teleportation's integration with communications. Then, teleportation as it relates to synchronicity... and a possible explanation to "it's a small world" and other coincidences.

Why do we eavesdrop?

Did you know, "that five and six centuries ago, English citizens had, in impressive numbers, been arrested for eavesdropping."

 

Want to know more? 

Eavesdropping: An Intimate History, by John Locke, is going to be released June 25th. (ISBN 13: 9780199236138)

The author writes...

"I wondered what, in the medieval mind, would have caused this behavior to be criminalized, and what the “criminals” themselves were doing, or thought they were doing, when they went out at night and listened to their neighbors’ conversations...

...until I began to study eavesdropping... I had never, in many years of research, encountered a behavior whose actual significance was so greatly at variance with its recognized importance. Look for books on social behavior with the word “eavesdropping” in the index section and you are likely to be severely disappointed. Enter the same word in computerized literature searches and your screen will display a list of books on wiretapping and other forms of electronic surveillance. But the word was coined centuries before telephones and recording equipment were invented, and the practice of eavesdropping documented nearly a thousand years earlier, when people were happy to entrust to unaided senses the question of who was doing what to whom." (more) (review)

Fascinating.

Now they really have something to kick about...

During this FIFA world cup, England’s football coach, Fabio Capello, plans to spy on his players using hi-tech TVs installed in their hotel rooms in order to keep out their wives and girlfriends (called as WAGs) and ensuring that the players are getting proper rest. Apparently, he believes that a sex ban will ensure that the players are bursting with energy right through the world cup. (more)

Bad Day for Spies Worldwide

France - A former senior spy accused of revealing French state secrets and the identities of fellow operatives in his recently-released memoir was being questioned by French police today. Defence Minister Herve Morin filed a complaint against Pierre Siramy, whose real name is Maurice Dufresne, author of "25 Years in the Secret Services," released in April. (more)

S. Korea - South Korea's military on Wednesday sought an arrest warrant for a two-star army general accused of leaking the country's war plan and other secrets to North Korea, a news report said. The Defence Security Command asked military prosecutors to arrest the major-general identified only as Kim for leaking classified information, Yonhap news agency said. (more)

India - The army has started probing the charges of espionage against an army officer posted in Andaman and Nicobar. He is being suspected of spying for Pakistan. About a month ago, when reports emerged that a major in Port Blair was caught spying for Pakistan, the army had dismissed it saying that his computer had been hacked by an external agency. But the government is now expecting to unearth a much larger spy network embedded in the military. (more)

Afghanistan - Suspected Taliban militants executed a seven-year-old boy in southern Afghanistan after accusing him of spying for the government, a provincial official said Wednesday. The child was captured by the militants in Sangin district of southern province of Helmand Tuesday, Daoud Ahmadi, a spokesman for the provincial governor, said. "The militants killed the seven-year-old boy in Heratiyan village of the district, on charges of espionage for Afghan government," Ahmadi said, citing information provided to police by relatives. (more)

Beware the Attack of the Killer Apps

Security researchers and government officials are growing increasingly concerned about the security of smartphone applications. Those concerns have been prompted by the discovery of a number of potentially dangerous apps in the app stores run by smartphone makers...

The Federal Bureau of Investigation's Cyber Division, meanwhile, is investigating a number of malicious programs that have appeared in app stores, including apps designed to compromise mobile banking services and programs designed to be used by foreign countries to conduct espionage. (more)

"Just don't let the birds see them." ~Hitchcock

The way light hits a tropical butterfly's wings could make your bank card safer, according to a new U.K. study.

That's because scientists are now able to mimic the cell structure of butterfly scales to encrypt information on banknotes and other secure cards, researchers at Britain's Cambridge University say.

"We have unlocked one of nature's secrets and combined this knowledge with state-of-the-art nanofabrication to mimic the intricate optical designs found in nature," said lead researcher Mathias Kolle on the university's website. (more)

Run a shadow OS on your computer for super secrecy...

via lifehacker.com

...if you're really serious about protecting your data, you can actually hide your entire operating system. Here's how to do it.

To accomplish this task, we'll be using TrueCrypt, our favorite free and open-source disk encryption software that runs on all platforms, supports hidden volumes, and can even encrypt your entire hard drive.


Once we've completed the setup, you'll have two Windows installations and two passwords. One password will activate a hidden Windows installation as your real operating system, and the other, a decoy install to throw intruders off the trail. (more)

Mobile Smart Phone Spying... There are apps for that!

 As smartphones and the applications that run on them take off, businesses and consumers are beginning to confront a budding dark side of the wireless Web....

"Mobile phones are a huge source of vulnerability," said Gordon Snow, assistant director of the Federal Bureau of Investigation's Cyber Division. "We are definitely seeing an increase in criminal activity."

The FBI's Cyber Division recently began working on a number of cases based on tips about malicious programs in app stores, Mr. Snow said. The cases involve apps designed to compromise banking on cellphones, as well as mobile "malware" used for espionage by foreign nations, said a person familiar with the matter. To protect its own operations, the FBI bars its employees from downloading apps on FBI-issued smartphones. (more)

Buy, buy anonymous pre-paid cell phones...

A bipartisan pair of Senate leaders have introduced a first-of-its-kind bill aimed at stopping terrorist suspects such as the would-be Times Square bomber from hiding their identities by using prepaid cellphones to plot their attacks.

The legislation sponsored by Sen. Charles E. Schumer (D-N.Y.) and Sen. John Cornyn (R-Tex.) would require buyers to present identification when purchasing a prepaid cellphone and require phone companies to keep the information on file, as they do with users of landline phones and subscription-based cellphones. The proposal would require the carriers to retain the data for 18 months after the phone's deactivation. (more) 
...while you can.

"Y" ??? Because I liked you.

A former assistant to a top Disney executive was arrested for allegedly trying to sell the company's quarterly earnings to buyers who wanted to trade on inside information.
    

Prosecutors say Bonnie Hoxie, 33, who has worked as a secretary for Disney's PR chief since 2007, passed along inside information such as quarterly earnings statements to her boyfriend, Yonnie Sebbag aka Jonathan Cyrus, who was also arrested for his alleged role in the crime.
    

Sebbag, 29, then tried to sell the inside information to investors by sending anonymous letters to hedge funds and investment companies, according to the complaint in Federal Court. (more)

iPhone PIN Prick

Basically, plugging an up-to-date, non jail-broken, PIN-protected iPhone (powered off) into a computer running Ubuntu Lucid Lynx will allow the people to see practically all of the user's data--including music, photos, videos, podcasts, voice recordings, Google safe browsing databases, and game contents. The "hacker" has read/write access to the iPhone, and the hack leaves no trace. (more)

Poll: Is '21st Century Living' worth the privacy tradeoffs?

Kevin's Security Scrapbook Poll Results

"Is '21st Century Living' worth the privacy tradeoffs?"
56.25%  No, not at all!
31.25%  Yes, definitely!
12.5%  The tradeoffs balance it all out.

A Data Loss Statistics Repository

DataLossDB is a research project aimed at documenting known and reported data loss incidents world-wide. The effort is now a community one.  

Help keep this Museum of Bitten Bytes going.
Open Security Foundation is the non-profit organization which runs the project. Their Web site, DataLossDB.org, asks for contributions of new incidents and new data for existing incidents. You can also contribute money.

Here is how some of their information is used...
The world's coolest data breach map!
Guaranteed to scare the dollars out of any tight-fisted CFO.

3 Graphic Arts Spy Techniques

If you use Photoshop or Illustrator you can send secret messages...
"You’re mission, if you choose to accept, is to learn how to smuggle secret information out of a building using Illustrator, encrypt a simple message using Photoshop and send a yes/no type of answer to a network of spies using a picture without any direct interaction. Enjoy!" (more)

Another Formula One Spy Scandal?

Formula One seems to thrive on scandal. Hardly a year goes by without some kind of dispute putting the sport on the front pages rather than the sports pages.

In recent years we have had Tyregate, Spygate, Liegate, Crashgate and even Spankgate. What next?

Well, according to a report in the Express by Pitpass' business editor Chris Sylt, it looks like a Spygate sequel is on the horizon.

Records at the UK's High Court show that Force India has launched a damages claim against the companies which run Lotus Racing alleging that they copied the windtunnel model which its car is based on.

The claim has echoes of the row which erupted in 2007 when the FIA fined McLaren $100m for possessing blueprints from Ferrari. (more)

"Place of the gods" gets CCTV

Hotels in the Tibetan capital, Lhasa, are being forced to install electronic surveillance equipment amid an ongoing security clampdown in the city, industry sources said... The hotel security measures come hard on the heels of tighter curbs on the cultural lives of Tibetans, including the use of print shops to replicate Tibetan-language material. (more)

Guess who runs CCTV.com.

Client Alert - FM Wireless Microphones - Illegal

FM Wireless Microphones capable of operations in the 700 MHz frequency range become illegal to use, in the United States, in just less than two weeks. 

For years, I have been advising clients to stop using FM wireless microphones in their Boardrooms and at off-site meetings. Eavesdropping on their transmissions is just too easy. 

A new generation of digital and encrypted wireless microphones are available to replace them. "Now" is an excellent time to justify the switch.

The FCC says... "To see if your wireless microphone operates on the 700 MHz band, simply click on the name of the manufacturer and see if your model is listed. (chart)

• If your model is listed on the table, it is a 700 MHz wireless microphone and can not be used after June 12, 2010. 
  
  
• If you can find your manufacturer’s name and your equipment is not listed, then you may continue using your wireless microphone because it does not operate in the 700 MHz Band. (Due to the eavesdropping risk, Murray Associates does not recommend this option.)

If your manufacturer is not listed, please contact the FCC for additional assistance to determine if your wireless microphone operates on the 700 MHz Band."

Need a source for digital wireless microphones?  

• Revolabs

• Audio-Technica - SpectraPulse™ Ultra Wideband (UWB) (white paper)

• Lectrosonics (...and an Encryption White Paper)

• Zaxcom 

• Mipro ACT-82 

• Telex SAFE-1000

The Geek Chorus on USB Sticks

Background... The Unsolicited "Gift" USB Stick

The latest proof...

Australia - IBM has been left with egg on its face after it distributed virus-laden USB keys to attendees at Australia's biggest computer security conference.

Delegates of the AusCERT conference, held over the past week at the Royal Pines Resort on the Gold Coast, were told about the malware problem in a warning email this afternoon by IBM Australia chief technologist Glenn Wightwick.

The incident is ironic because conference attendees include the who's who of the computer security world and IBM was there to show off its security credentials. (more)

Business Survival™ Weblog

Sure, dealing with business spies is important. That's probably why you're here. But what about all the other business risks you face? Where can you go for help and advice?

One place you should visit each day is Rothstein Associates Inc. Business Survival™ Weblog.

Here is a tip I recently picked up while visiting...

Many of us have had to deal with mentally unstable people at different times and at different levels of the corporate world, including those at executive levels tasked with making significant decisions for their organizations.

Like pornography, a lack of mental stability in people, especially in the workplace, is something most of us recognize when we see it. The effects of mental illness often cause serious negative impacts on the departments and the people the sick individuals interact with. But, because mental illness is still a taboo subject in corporate America, these people remain in their high level posts “undiscovered” for years.

See Dealing with Mentally Unstable Managers, by Joel Font, CISA, CBCP.

Philip J. Rothstein's Business Survival™ Weblog is loaded with tips like this one. It even has a special feeds called Global Disaster Alert (that'll cheer you up in the morning) and Business Survival™ News.

Breaking into Your Garage

If you have an automatic garage door opener, you may want to move your valuables somewhere else. This video shows how a burglar can open a closed (and supposedly locked) garage door, quietly, in less than six seconds! 

Security Scrapbook Tip #203: Secure the interior mechanical pull with a bent wire (a section of old coat hanger will do). Objective... pulling on the lever or cord will do no good until the wire is removed.

False Friends

Australia - It is alleged one of the bank's Melbourne-based debt collectors set up a fake account on the social networking site to covertly gather debtors' addresses, phone numbers and emails.

More than 80 people added "Max Bourke" as a contact before the fake profile was removed from the website yesterday.

ANZ spokesman Stephen Ries says several staff members are under investigation for their role in the online spying. (more)

App The Untappable

via Forbes...

Worried about the NSA, the FBI, criminals or cyberspies electronically eavedropping on your private phone calls? There may be an untappable app for that. 

On Tuesday, an independent hacker and security researcher who goes by the handle Moxie Marlinspike and his Pittsburgh-based startup Whisper Systems launched free public betas for two new privacy-focused programs on Google's Android mobile platform: RedPhone, a voice over Internet protocol (VoIP) program that encrypts phone calls, and TextSecure, an app for sending and receiving encrypted text messages and scrambling the messages stored in their inbox. (more)

ISS LEO BUG TAP CONFAB

Intelligence Support Systems for Lawful Interception, Criminal Investigations and Intelligence Gathering

ISS World Europe, hosted in Prague (June 2-4), is the world's largest gathering of European law enforcement, intelligence, defense, homeland security analysts and telecom operators responsible for lawful interception, electronic investigations and network intelligence gathering.

Track 1: ISS for Telecom Operator Lawful Interception
Track 2: ISS for Criminal Investigation
Track 3: ISS for Data Retention and Regulatory Compliance
Track 4: ISS for Mobile Location, Surveillance and Intercept 
Track 5: DPI for Lawful Interception, Network Security and Traffic Management
Track 6: ISS for Intelligence Gathering and Analysis
Track 7: LEA and Intelligence Analyst Training and Product Demonstrations 

Certificate of LEA/Intell Communication Monitoring and Surveillance Training Completion available upon request. (more)

TSCM Tools of the Trade

Many (but not all) tools of the TSCM trade are featured in the June issue of WIRED Magazine.

Russians and Chinese agents "spying on German firms wholesale"

Germany is full of Russian and Chinese spies working to get information about top business and technology developments, according to the country’s domestic intelligence service. 

Studies show that the German economy loses around €50 billion a year as a consequence, Burkhard Even, head of the counterintelligence section of the Federal Office for the Protection of the Constitution, told the audience at a recent security forum in Bonn...

He also described more underhand methods which he said were often employed by agents posing as visiting business delegations or even trainees who might use mini cameras to take pictures in factories, or secretly copy data. (more)

RoboBug

An innovator, Robert Wood who is an assistant professor at Harvard University is developing robotic flies. New kind of fabrication process is used in that tiny robot. The functionality of bending folding and stretching will be made possible by the help of polymer and nano carbon fibers. Using these techniques Wood made the world's tiniest robot capable of flying freely and taking pictures. This nano technology can used to make crawling, swimming and jumping bugs. (more)

The IT Girls

A study of British middle-aged couples found that 14% of wives spy on their husband’s emails, 13% read their mobile phone text messages and 10% check web browser logs. This is roughly twice the level of spousal spying that is found among men. Women are also far better at it than men, the researchers found. It appears that some women develop their IT skills simply to improve their surveillance techniques. (more)

Sex tape scandal spurs wiretapping phobia among deputies

Turkey - With the recent posting online of footage showing former Republican People’s Party (CHP) leader Deniz Baykal with a deputy from his party in an intimate setting, more and more politicians are taking measures against surveillance devices in their offices.

Many deputies are now using the 10-day break in Parliament to clean up their chambers in order to see if there are any bugs or other monitoring devices inside the room. Some have installed jammers or other preventive devices.

More than 75 deputies have employed “hunter” systems to detect hidden cameras and microphones. Fifty deputies have ordered jammers from the Tayama Security Company alone, according to executives at the company, which earlier briefed deputies in Parliament on installing such systems. They also said many deputies took these devices wherever they went. The company sells this system for $700. Parliament officials say other deputies have turned to other companies. (...for professional TSCM sweep services. These are the smart deputies. Save a spot on YouTube for the ones who bought the gadgets.) (more)

The Last 24

Time has run out for the paranoid spy TV series 24.

FutureWatch...

GSM Bug Prices Continue to Drop!

A few months ago, we found GSM bugs being sold on ebay in the $19-$60 range. Today, direct-from-the-manufacturer samples are advertised for $13.05. (Quantity pricing is even lower.)

Finding these normally dormant eavesdropping bugs is problematic. Digital Surveillance Location Analysis™ (DSLA™) is one very effective detection technique.

Business executives – You can no longer skate on the chance that one of these won't end up in your Boardroom. 

Quarterly eavesdropping detection audits are more important than ever. Be sure your TSCM provider is aware of this new threat, and can effectively deal with it. (Click graphic to enlarge it.)

(Update) One of our sharper colleagues noted the logo on this thing and mused... "Wonder what they think about the use of their logo?"

Hummmm... I seem to recall (this) (and this). But, nah. That would be too much of a stretch :)

An Old Score Settled

Italy - Italian magistrates and media are up in arms over a government attempt to restrict wiretaps and slap fines and jail sentences on newspapers that publish transcripts, saying it will help criminals and muzzle the press.

While the centre-right coalition of Prime Minister Silvio Berlusconi says it wants to protect privacy, the opposition says the government is just scrambling to cover up widespread corruption in its ranks with yet another tailor-made law...

The bill languished in parliament for months. But the government quickly dusted it off after newspapers published leaked transcripts from a high-profile graft probe into public work contracts that has tainted Berlusconi's cabinet. (more) (background)

Quote of the Week - The BugNets are Coming

"Remote surveillance is a significantly invasive threat, arguably even more so than identity theft. As it stands now, most vulnerable devices (mobile devices and computers) do not have the protection necessary to distinctly address microphone or camera hijacks. As a growing number of mobile devices with exploitable operation systems gain more reliable Internet access, this long standing problem is reaching a critical potential." 

from Roving Bugnet: Distributed Surveillance Threat and Mitigation
by Ryan Farley and Xinyuan Wang

Mobile Phone Eavesdropping - The Next Level

Imagine sitting in a café and discussing the details of a business proposal with a potential client. Neither you nor the client has a laptop; you're just two people having a conversation. But unbeknownst to you, someone half a world away is listening to every word you say. Later, as you leave, you receive a text message referring to the proposal and demanding money in exchange for silence.

Recent research from two universities suggests that such a remote-eavesdropping scenario may soon be possible.

According to George Mason University researchers Ryan Farley and Xinyuan Wang, cell phones make excellent surveillance devices for remote snoops. In a paper, Farley and Wang discuss a "modernized mic hijacker" [PDF] that an attacker could control over what they call a "roving bugnet." The eavesdropper would use a piece of malware called a "bugbot" to listen in on in-person interactions via a nearby smartphone or laptop. Such attacks would be more likely to target specific people (a wayward spouse, say) than to play a role in widespread attacks on the general public. (more)

Commercial Quantum Cryptography System Hacked

It is supposed to be absolutely secure – a means to transmit secret information between two parties with no possibility of someone eavesdropping. 

Yet quantum cryptography, according to some engineers, is not without its faults. In a preprint submitted late last week to arXiv, Hoi-Kwong Lo and colleagues at the University of Toronto, Canada, claim to have hacked into a commercial quantum cryptography system by exploiting a certain practical “loophole”.  

So does this mean high-profile users of quantum cryptography – banks and governments, for example – are in danger of being eavesdropped after all? (more)

Don't even think of saying "pampas ass."

The mayor of the Argentine capital, Buenos Aires, has been indicted on charges of illegal wiretapping of citizens including political and business leaders.

Mauricio Macri has allegedly authorized the secret recordings of many individuals, including politicians and business moguls, in the 1990s...

Despite his indictment, Macri says he will not resign. (more)

Cordless Phone Question

via The Journal Times...

When we're using cordless phones, can others pick up our conversations?

"Yes, depending on the kind of phone you use," according to a fact sheet from the Privacy Rights Clearinghouse, a nonprofit consumer-oriented group based in California. "In most cases, your cordless phone conversations are probably overheard only briefly and accidentally. But there are people who make it a hobby to listen to cordless phone calls using radio scanners."

Analog phones, which include most older ones, are more susceptible to eavesdropping. Nothing's a guarantee, the mildly paranoid-sounding fact sheet points out, but newer digital models often have better built-in security features.

Those include channel hopping, which constantly changes the frequency during a call, and more complicated stuff known as digital spread spectrum technology (DSST) and digital enhanced cordless technology (DECT). (more)

For more information on both cordless and cellular phone privacy click here.

Theft & Espionage Awareness Slide Show

(more)

I created life... and I own it!

Scientists for the first time have created a synthetic cell, completely controlled by man-made genetic instructions, which can survive and reproduce itself, researchers at the private J. Craig Venter Institute announced Thursday. Created at a cost of $30 million, the experimental one-cell organism opens the way to the manipulation of life on a previously unattainable scale.

Synthetic Genomics, a company founded by Dr. Venter, funded the experiments and owns the intellectual property rights to the cell-creation techniques. (more)

Hope they have a good counterespionage strategy. They will need it.