Your Weekend Movie – “A Call to Spy” Now Streaming

“A Call to Spy” is now available to watch via streaming services and in select theaters across the United States and United Kingdom...

Premiering on June 21st, 2019 -- the 75th anniversary of D-Day -- at the Edinburgh International Film Festival, the film has gone on to win numerous awards...

In the beginning of WWII, with Britain becoming desperate, Churchill orders his new spy agency—the Special Operations Executive (SOE)—to recruit and train women as spies. 

Their daunting mission: conduct sabotage and build a resistance. SOE's "spymistress," Vera Atkins (Stana Katic), recruits two unusual candidates: Virginia Hall (Sarah Megan Thomas), an ambitious American with a wooden leg, and Noor Inayat Khan (Radhika Apte), an Indian Muslim pacifist. Together, these women help to undermine the Nazi regime in France, leaving an unmistakable legacy in their wake. Inspired by true stories. more

New York’s KGB Espionage Museum Will Soon Go Up for Auction

It’s a sad fact that as the coronavirus crisis stretches on, many museums and galleries won’t be able to survive the economic crunch, and will likely be forced to sell off their collections. 

However, this also means that vast and unusual troves of items will be redistributed to the public, which is the case with an upcoming Julien’s Auctions sale of the entirety of the items within the KGB Espionage Museum in New York City. 

Set to take place on February 13, 2021 at Julien’s Auctions in Beverly Hills and online simultaneously, the auction will include the world’s largest collection of authentic KGB spy equipment dating back to the Cold War...

“The KGB Espionage Museum’s collection of Cold War era items is one of the largest and most comprehensive in the world,” Martin Nolan, the Executive Director of Julien’s Auctions, told Observer on Thursday. “We anticipate the auction will attract a wide range of collectors from museum curators to historians to James Bond fans, particularly in this election year." more

Missing Wirecard Executive Could be Austrian Spy

German authorities say a missing Wirecard manager, who vanished just as the digital payments company collapsed, may be an informer for Austria’s intelligence agency.

Austrian-born Jan Marsalek, Wirecard’s former chief operating officer, disappeared without trace in June just as it emerged the company had inflated its balance sheet by at least €3 billion.

While the worldwide hunt continues for the fugitive 40 year-old executive, German prosecutors have told Bundestag MPs there is evidence that Mr Marsalek, who was in charge of all Wirecard operational business, was a source for Austria’s BVT intelligence agency. more

The Modern Detective: How Corporate Intelligence Is Reshaping the World

Tyler Maroney has written The Modern Detective, in which he reflects on a two-decade career as a PI, detailing his pursuit of corporate fraudsters, missions to conduct due diligence for blockbuster mergers and acquisitions, and even how he helped free an innocent man from prison...

"Private detectives are brought into projects throughout the entire life cycle of a company’s existence."

Maroney seeks to demystify the job of private investigators and debunk myths ingrained from television and pulp fiction. He argues that the modern detective is a vital cog in corporate life and can be a force for good in society. more

Sir Sean Connery Has Died at the Age of 90

The Scottish actor was best known for his portrayal of James Bond, being the first to bring the role to the big screen and appearing in seven of the spy thrillers.

Sir Sean died peacefully in his sleep in the Bahamas, having been "unwell for some time", his son said. more

In Other Spy News...

Whistle-blower Edward Snowden will become a father by the end of the year and his child is eligible to be a citizen of Russia, where the U.S. citizen has been living since in 2013 after releasing details of the U.S. electronic-surveillance program. more

Florida Woman Arrested for Hacking Home Camera System

A woman from Naples, Florida has been arrested after allegedly hacking into the home camera system of a family member as part of an extortion attempt.

Agents with the Florida Department of Law Enforcement arrested Jennifer Lenell Small on October 26 and charged the 44-year-old with a third-degree felony cybercrime.

Agents say that Small accessed the home camera system of a male family member as part of an extortion attempt that involved a contested will. Her alleged victim was a former employee of her husband's construction company.

"Small gained access to the camera and stored recordings after her husband’s construction company fired the victim and he turned the cell phone back into the company," said a spokesperson for the Florida Department of Law Enforcement.

The company cell phone that the victim had returned to his employer had an app installed on it that allowed the victim to view footage from his home security camera system...

A FDLE spokesperson said: "Small sent a short video clip to the victim telling him she had hours of videos that she would use against him in court if the victim did not agree to mediation." more

Spybusters Tip #934: Wipe your devices before passing them on.

New York Times — Fighting the ‘Bugging Epidemic’

With surveillance gear cheaper and easier to use, security experts say checking your environment for cameras and microphones is not a crazy idea.

People worry that Big Brother and Big Tech are invading their privacy. But a more immediate concern may be the guy next door or a shifty co-worker. 

 A growing array of so-called smart surveillance products have made it easy to secretly live-stream or record what other people are saying or doing. Consumer spending on surveillance cameras in the United States will reach $4 billion in 2023, up from $2.1 billion in 2018, according to the technology market research firm Strategy Analytics. Unit sales of consumer surveillance devices are expected to more than double from last year.

The problem is all that gear is not necessarily being used to fight burglars or keep an eye on the dog while she’s home alone. Tiny cameras have been found in places where they shouldn’t be, like Airbnb rentals, public bathrooms and gym locker rooms. So often, in fact, that security experts warn that we are in the throes of a “bugging epidemic.”

It is not paranoid to take precautions. A lot of spy gear is detectable if you know what to look for, said Charles Patterson, president of Exec Security, a firm in Tarrytown, N.Y... more

STEVE WOZNIAK & STEVE JOBS — Blue Box up for Auction

Blue Box, 1972. An original first iteration "blue box" populated circuit board made by Steve Wozniak and marketed by Steve Jobs and Wozniak, 51 x 72 mm, with speaker wire and 9volt battery connector.

Provenance: Purchased directly from Steve Wozniak by the consignor in Autumn 1972 during a drive together from Sunnyvale to Los Angeles.

Bid estimate:
US$ 4,000 - 6,000
£ 3,100 - 4,600

While "phone phreakers" (hobbyists who were fascinated by the phone system) had used a "blue box" since the 1950s to avail themselves of free phone service, the first digital blue box was designed by Steve Wozniak in 1972. 

It was marketed and sold by Wozniak (who took the phone phreak name "Berkeley Blue"), Jobs (known as "Oaf Tobar"), and friends in Berkeley and throughout California in 1972 and 1973. 

Wozniak cites the number of boxes they produced at 40 or 50, while Jobs put the number at 100; but certainly many of those were confiscated as phone phreaking arrests increased throughout 1973 to 1975, in part due to the commercial distribution of the devices. 

These blue boxes represent the first commercial collaboration between the two Apple computer giants, and the circuit boards the first printed boards by Woz. 

Very few of the Wozniak originals have survived and even fewer of these first iteration boards as Wozniak soon changed the circuit board layout to accommodate a less expensive membrane keypad. The early models would have been made by Wozniak himself. more

Back Story: I examined the photos closely. The IC chips have manufacturing dates of 1973 & 1974, thus the provenance appeared misleading. I advised the specialist at Bonhams. To his credit, and that of the auction house, they very quickly researched it further. The auction now has an addendum which clears up the mystery...

"PCB was purchased unpopulated directly from Steve Wozniak by consignor and parts were later added by consignor. Wozniak confirmed in an email to the consignor that this was one of his boards and that Steve Jobs had it printed."
 

Scarier than Halloween - Ponder This Over the Weekend...

In an influential 2003 paper, University of Oxford philosopher Nick Bostrom laid out the possibility that our reality is a computer simulation dreamed up by a highly advanced civilization. In the paper, he argued that at least one of three propositions must be true:

1. Civilizations usually go extinct before developing the capability of creating reality simulations.
2. Advanced civilizations usually have no interest in creating reality simulations.
3. We’re almost certainly living inside a computer simulation.

Now, Columbia University astronomer David Kipping took a hard look at these propositions, also known as Bostrom’s “trilemma,” and argued that there’s essentially a 50-50 chance that we are indeed living in a simulation, Scientific American reports.

Microsoft Says Iranian Hackers Targeted Conference Attendees

Microsoft says Iranian hackers have posed as conference organizers in Germany and Saudi Arabia in an attempt to break into the email accounts of “high-profile” people with spoofed invitations. 

The targets included more than 100 prominent people invited by the hackers to the Munich Security Conference, which is attended by world leaders each February, and the upcoming Think 20 Summit, which begins later this week in Saudi Arabia but is online-only this year.

“We believe Phosphorus is engaging in these attacks for intelligence collection purposes,” said Tom Burt, Microsoft’s security chief, in a prepared statement. “The attacks were successful in compromising several victims, including former ambassadors and other senior policy experts who help shape global agendas and foreign policies in their respective countries.” more

Surveillance Startup Used Own Cameras to Harass Coworkers

A surveillance startup in Silicon Valley is being accused of sexism and discrimination after a sales director used the company’s facial recognition system to harass female workers. 

Verkada, which was valued in January at $1.6 billion, equips its office with its own security cameras. 

Employees at Verkada accessed the company's facial recognition system to take photos of women colleagues and make sexually explicit jokes.

Last year, the sales director accessed these cameras to take photos of female workers, then posted them in a Slack channel called #RawVerkadawgz alongside sexually explicit jokes. The incident was first reported by IPVM and independently verified by Vice. more

Phones, Cameras, Cardkeys - What Will Track You Next?

Thanks to a new system developed at EPFL, building owners can detect the number of occupants and track their movement using sensors installed on floor slabs. This novel approach could be particularly useful for enhancing safety in retirement homes or managing buildings' energy use more efficiently...

Scientists at ENAC's Applied Computing and Mechanics Laboratory (IMAC), headed by Professor Ian Smith, have developed an alternative approach.  

"By installing sensors in a building's floor slabs, we can measure the vibrations created by footsteps. That lets us calculate the number of people in the building as well as where they are located and their trajectory," says Slah Drira, the IMAC Ph.D. student who completed his thesis on this topic.

To each his own gait...

"The signals our sensors record can vary considerably depending on the person's anatomy, walking speed, shoe type, health and mood," says Drira.

His method uses advanced algorithms—or more specifically, support vector machines—to classify the signals recorded by the sensors. Some interpretation strategies were inspired by the convolutional neural networks often employed in pixel-based image recognition, and can identify the footstep characteristics of specific occupants. more

Have Some Free Time? Learn How to Detect Spy Cameras

On-line, self-paced, professional video training course to detect spy cameras in “expectation of privacy” areas for organizations and private individuals. more

Brit Accused of Spying on 772 People via Webcam...

... tells court he'd end his life if extradited to US.

'I've seen programmes on American prisons' says wife

A Briton is reportedly fighting extradition to the United States after deploying webcam malware onto hundreds of women's laptops so he could spy on them undressing and having sex.

Christopher Taylor, a 57-year-old labourer, appeared by video link at Westminster Magistrates' Court to contest an extradition attempt by the US government, according to the Court News UK newswire.

Taylor told District Judge Michael Fanning that both he and his wife would kill themselves if he was forcibly removed to the US...

A US grand jury in the state of Georgia indicted Taylor, of Vicarage Road, Wigan, with computer fraud and wire fraud charges in January last year, the court was told. The Briton is accused of spying on 772 victims from 39 different countries after tricking them into installing CCTV camera management software called Cammy. more