Mon Sep 30, 2002
Security Scrapbook - Espionage & Privacy News of the Week.
To: Clients, colleagues and friends.
Subject: Espionage & Privacy News of the Week.
===================================================
Kevin's Security Scrapbook is published on an irregular
basis for a select audience. HTML versions are archived at http://www.spybusters.com/Security_Scrapbook.html
=================================================== SPECIAL SECTION -- Security Director News
SPECIAL SECTION -- World Spy News
SPECIAL SECTION -- SpyCam News
SPECIAL SECTION -- Our DC Peregrinations
SPECIAL SECTION -- Head Shakers ===================================================
SPECIAL SECTION -- Security Director News
Okay, we'll ban empty Pringles cans instead... WASHINGTON - Secret Service agents are putting a high-tech twist on the idea of a cop walking the beat. Using a laptop computer and an antenna fashioned from a Pringles potato chip can, they are looking for security holes in wireless networks in the nation's capital. The agency best known for protecting the president and chasing down counterfeiters has started addressing what it calls one of the most overlooked threats to computer networks. ... Because of security concerns, the White House recently proposed banning some wireless networks in federal agencies. Faced with industry protests, the administration dropped the idea when it released a draft version of its cybersecurity plan this month. http://apnews.excite.com/article/20020929/D7MBJKPG0.html
Hellomoto!!! - Just coincidence? You decide... Nokia, the world's largest cell phone maker, on Thursday unveiled its first "third-generation" handset, which has a camera so users can view and edit video clips and send them to another phone or an e-mail address. ... Minutes after Nokia's announcement Thursday, rival manufacturer Motorola unveiled new details about its own equivalent handset. http://channels.attbusiness.net/index.cfm?
SPECIAL SECTION -- World Spy News
Politics is a dirty business... 'mole' type dirty. Des Moines, Iowa -- Ganske campaign officials and state Republican leaders are calling for a state and federal investigation into the apparent taping of a campaign strategy session. In letters to a U.S. Attorney and the Iowa Division of Criminal investigation, campaign officials said someone at the September 3rd meeting either was wearing a wire or illegally taped the conversation. A lawyer for the Ganske campaign said it is illegal to tape a meeting without the consent of those being taped. http://www.theiowachannel.com/news/1681768/detail.html Mole loophole... The lawyer is mistaken. Iowa is a one party consent state. http://www.rcfp.org/taping/states/iowa.html Mole Man revealed... Sources confirmed that Brian Conley, 53, who served as a junior member of Harkin's U.S. House staff prior to 1976, is suspected by GOP officials of recording the Sept. 3 meeting of Ganske campaign backers and strategists at the Hotel Savery in Des Moines. ... "The bottom line is a mole was sent into the room to capture the entire conversation, which was promptly returned to the Harkin campaign," said Republican state GOP Chairman Charles Larson Jr. http://www.dmregister.com/news/stories/c4789004/19326598.html Mole heads underground... A Des Moines Democrat who publicly supported U.S. Sen. Tom Harkin, D-Iowa, has asked for immunity from prosecution before he talks to police about allegations that he taped a closed-door meeting of Republican U.S. Rep. Greg Ganske’s Senate campaign. ... Conley could not be reached for comment Wednesday night or Thursday. He did not return telephone messages or receive visitors at his home or business. A woman at his house declined to answer questions. http://www.qctimes.com/internal.php?
Spies on Campus... "Please use this page to provide Campus Watch with reports on Middle East-related scholarship, lectures, classes, demonstrations, and other activities relevant to our work. Information not yet been published or only reported in the local/campus press is most useful." http://www.campus-watch.org/incident.php
Costly? India - The cellphone used by Imam Ali, ISI-trained head of the extremist gang (who was shot dead in a operation carried out on early Sunday) proved costly for him. Use of the phone by Imam confirmed to the police his presence in Bangalore, and conversations made over the phone led the joint police team of Tamil Nadu and Bangalore to their hideout, sources said. http://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/cms.dll/articleshow?artid=23696161
Soon to be renamed Henny Youngman Point... Japan - A National Police Agency white paper made public Friday stated that since World War II police have cracked about 50 cases - some previously undisclosed -involving North Korean agents, 20 to 30 of which involved agents who entered or escaped Japan from the coast of Niigata Prefecture. An NPA official said: "It's easy for spy ships to approach Niigata Prefecture's coast, because there are intermediary stops like Sado Island on the way there. Perhaps that's what makes the area perfect for abductions." (N. Korea recently admitted it abducted Japanese as part of their spy training.) http://www.yomiuri.co.jp/newse/20020928wo21.htm
R-E-S-P-E-C-T, Find out what it means to me... Seoul (as in Korea) — Former South Korean spies demanding state recognition and compensation for their past missions involving North Korea clashed violently with police Sunday in downtown Seoul, leaving at least 26 injured. (... sock it to me, sock it to me...) http://japantoday.com/e/?content=news&cat=7&id=232285
Gotta spy, but bad credit slowing your down? No problemo... Tokyo — A Japanese prepaid cellular phone has been found in a North Korean spy ship salvaged earlier this month from the East China Sea, the Japan Coast Guard said Sunday. Since North Korean agents may have used the phone in Japan, coast guard officials are hoping to find call records from it at a telephone company. http://japantoday.com/e/?content=news&cat=1&id=232258
If we let you in, we'll have to kill you, eh. The spy gadgets used in Canada during the Cold War were put on display for the first time yesterday as Canada's intelligence service opened its collection of hidden cameras, recording devices and other espionage tools to the public. ... CSIS has a vast collection of spy gadgets -- more than 750 items have been catalogued so far. At one point they were put on display in a room at CSIS headquarters, but they were so highly classified even employees were not allowed into the makeshift museum. http://www.nationalpost.com/national/
SPECIAL SECTION -- SpyCam News
Serial Mom...
1.0 When a young mother struck her 4-year-old daughter in a car parked outside a Kohl's department store in Indiana 10 days ago, she couldn't have picked a worse place. Few areas are watched as closely these days as shopping centers and their parking lots... http://www.miami.com/mld/miami/news/nation/4140996.htm 1.1 Tennessee officials are investigating a possible fraud case against Madelyne Gorman Toogood, the woman who gained national attention after she was caught by a surveillance camera beating her daughter in a Mishawaka, Ind., parking lot. The local case involves the paperwork on a white 2002 Cadillac Escalade registered last year in the name of Madelyn Gorman through the Shelby County Clerk's Office. 1.2 Toogood's legal problems continued to grow Friday. In addition to a felony charge, she now faces additional charges of false informing - giving several false home addresses, according to Indiana police. Police said she gave an Elkhart dry cleaners as one address, as well as an address in Texas that turned out to be a post office box. http://www.gomemphis.com/mca/local_news/
Instinct detects spycam... California - A man admitted in court yesterday that he secretly videotaped a 17-year-old girl for several weeks while she was using his bathroom. Marvin "Scott" Wilmarth, 40, could spend three years behind bars for the secret tapes. Wilmarth, of Vista, admitted using a wireless surveillance camera hidden inside a clock radio to videotape the girl. The camera was hooked up to a receiver on his television. The girl's mother discovered the camera and receiver after becoming suspicious when the girl said she felt uncomfortable around Wilmarth and thought he was watching her. The woman said she confronted him and he denied knowing about the camera and receiver, but she discovered several videotapes in a bag showing the girl taking showers and in various degrees of undress. Then she called the Sheriff's Department. http://www.signonsandiego.com/news/
Knox. Knox. Who's there?
Police!
Police who?
Police can we have our camera back... An Ohio man filed a $1.5 million lawsuit Tuesday against the Knoxville Marriott hotel after finding a hidden camera in a bathroom light fixture in July. Bryan Brewer discovered the small video camera after noticing a tiny black spot - which he thought was an insect but turned out to be a hole - in the fixture, according to the lawsuit. At the time Brewer, the vice president of a California company, was staying at the Marriott while on business. According to the lawsuit, Brewer, 27, discovered the camera on the morning of July 11. "Thinking it might be an insect, Mr. Brewer swatted at the black spot, thereby inadvertently breaking the plastic cover on the light fixture," Herston wrote in the lawsuit. "He called the front desk, apologized and offered to pay for the fixture." But while he was waiting for someone to fix the damage, Brewer noticed wires and discovered a small video camera. A further look by security personnel confirmed that it was an elaborate, self-contained, video recording system. "The video camera was connected to the bathroom light switch such that the camera would begin recording when the bathroom light was turned on and would stop recording when (it) was turned off," the lawsuit states. Herston said that the equipment had a film of dust on it indicating that it had been there for some time. It also had a piece of tape on it indicating the room number, Room 253. Herston said that Marriott employees let Brewer view the tape in their presence but refused to give it to him. The tape and video equipment have been turned over to the Sheriff's Department. The Sheriff's Department also has refused to give him the tape, Herston said. He also said he's not sure why the Sheriff's Department is investigating the case since the Knoxville Police Department is next door to the Marriott. http://www.knoxnews.com/kns/local_news/
SPECIAL SECTION -- Our DC Peregrinations
Have yourself a spy day...
Visit The International Spy Museum... Just go. Give yourself at least 3 hours, plus a half hour in their humongous gift shop. You'll get a complete history lesson; a good look at real spy gadgets; and you'll see excellent multimedia presentations from the likes of H. Keith Melton. Must do's... memorize a cover story when you enter, and get interrogated; crawl through the ceiling air vent - spy on the other visitors; and try all the interactive exhibits. http://www.spymuseum.org/
Then, head north and get the best crabcakes in America... 'G&M' has baseball-sized crabcakes (you get two). You can order them over the Internet. Delivered FRESH (not frozen) by FedEx. http://www.gandmcrabcakes.com/directions/
All Things Considered A special thank you to National Public Radio (NPR), the All Things Considered crew, and Senior Producer Art Silverman for your warm hospitality this week. Being in the studio during the show was a real kick. When in the Oldwick, NJ area, you're all invited to visit the Countermeasures Compound, relax and not consider nothin'. P.S. Your web site rocks. http://www.npr.org/programs/atc/
Art's true phone scam story... I know. http://search.npr.org/cf/cmn/cmnpd01fm.cfm?
SPECIAL SECTION -- Head Shakers
Spies Like Us... ASIO does not need to look far for new training films. All its recruiters need to do is to go the movies... more spies are heading to the cinemas than to the KGB Christmas party:
- The Sum of All Fears
- The Crocodile Hunter: Collision Course
- The Bourne Identity
- Lilo and Stitch (the social worker is ex-CIA)
- Tuxedo
- Undercover Brother
- Die Another Day
- I Spy
- Spy Kids 2
- Johnny English
From a film-maker's perspective, spies make great central characters. They have a lot at stake dramatically - usually life-and-death struggles to save the world. In real life, they might be immersed in debates about phone tapping but on the big screen they drive exotic cars and use ingenious gadgets. They are existential loners, which leads to endless romantic possibilities. http://www.smh.com.au/articles/2002/09/30/1033283435830.html http://www.asio.gov.au/
Just like in the movies... Australia's top intelligence agency is being undermined by sex scandals, nepotism and corruption according to a dossier of complaints leaked by a group of disgruntled spies. The dossier claims that the conduct of senior staff at the Defence Signals Directorate (DSD), the equivalent of Britain's GCHQ, poses a grave risk to national security. ... The disaffected spies allege that extramarital affairs are rife within the secretive agency, which intercepts telephone and radio communications across the Asia-Pacific region and is linked to espionage networks in Britain, the United States, New Zealand and Canada. In one case, officers from the US National Security Agency (NSA) were severely embarrassed by a senior DSD employee who... The Defence Minister, Robert Hill, ordered a review of security procedures at the agency yesterday but rejected calls for an independent inquiry. http://news.independent.co.uk/world/
C4 K9 Dog language interpreter launched ... an immediate hit when it went on sale in Tokyo yesterday. "Bowlingual," by toymaker Takara Co Ltd, comprises an eight-centimetre microphone to be attached to a dog collar and which transmits sounds to a palm-sized console. The console, equipped with a small display, immediately classifies the sounds into six emotional categories: frustration, menace, joy, sorrow, demand, and self-expression. It then shows Japanese-language phrases to fit the emotional state, such as "I am sad. I want to play," and "I am super angry. I am going to explode!" http://www.theage.com.au/articles/2002/09/27/1032734330352.html http://www.takaratoys.co.jp/bowlingual/index.html
"Arf, Arf," said Sandy. (Translation: "Your eyes creep me out.")
Mon Sep 23, 2002
Security Scrapbook - Espionage & Privacy News of the Week.
To: Clients, colleagues and friends.
Subject: Espionage & Privacy News of the Week.
===================================================
Kevin's Security Scrapbook is published on an irregular
basis for a select audience. HTML versions are archived at http://www.spybusters.com/Security_Scrapbook.html
=================================================== SPECIAL SECTION -- Security Director News
SPECIAL SECTION -- The SpyCam Epidemic Continues
SPECIAL SECTION -- Odd Spy Stuff ===================================================
Hellomoto... Motorola, Inc. to offer a wireless solution that provides security personnel with mobile access to encrypted messages and full-color digital images sent securely over a network to wireless devices. http://www.motorola.com/mediacenter/news/
Question of the week... "What is eavesdropping?" We get several interesting questions in our email every week. This deceptively simple question was asked by a person with an overseas email address. I thought everybody knew what eavesdropping was. Wrongo!
The word evolved this way...
Eavesdropper, one who eavesdrops, from Middle English evesdropper, from evesdrop, place where water falls from the eaves.
Today, the common meaning is...
Listening, in secret, to the conversations of others. It is no longer necessary to stand at the 'evesdrop' to do this, of course. Microphones and electronics now capture the speech / visual images and transport them to the eavesdroppers. This activity is illegal in the Unites States (and many other countries) without a court approved warrant.
SPECIAL SECTION -- The SpyCam Epidemic Continues
Not all spycams were adjudicated the same way in the state of Washington this week...
Case #1... Joseph Richard Warner, the Issaquah man who placed a video camera in the ladies' room of Coco's restaurant in Bellevue, has been sentenced to a year in jail. http://www.eastsidejournal.com/sited/story/html/105842
Case #2... Jolene Jang was standing at an ice-cream booth ... unaware that a man had secretly lowered his video camera so he could film up her dress. ... Now she's appalled that Richard Sorrells, the man found guilty of voyeurism for doing it, is no longer guilty of anything. On Thursday, the state Supreme Court ruled that filming up women's skirts, though "disgusting and reprehensible," isn't actually against the law. The high court unanimously agreed the state's voyeurism law "does not apply to actions taken in purely public places." http://seattlepi.nwsource.com/local/87863_voyeur20.html
Case #3... Prosecutors will dismiss voyeurism charges against James Hackney because he has died. Hackney was to go to trial last week for having a spy camera in his bathroom and videotaping a female roommate when she bathed, unaware of the camera. ... The manner of death is being left as "undetermined" and means that police didn't find enough evidence to classify the death as one of four other manners of death: natural causes, accident, suicide or homicide. (Hmmmmmm.) http://www.southcountyjournal.com/sited/story/html/103802
Meanwhile, just across the border... ...three young women sharing a basement suite in Vancouver's West Side made a shocking discovery: one of those little cameras had been placed in an electrical outlet. Vancouver Police Department Detective Scott Driemel says the matter has been brought to the police's attention, and is presently under investigation. But he says he can't talk about the case. http://canada.com/national/story.asp?
A niki nookie no no... Hawaii - Prosecutors said Tyler Takehara, 49, of Pearl City secretly videotaped at least 29 unsuspecting women at Ala Moana center three weeks ago on Aug. 27. Prosecutors said Takehara followed women who were wearing short skirts onto escalators at the shopping center, holding his video camera low enough to invade their privacy. One woman spotted him and called Ala Moana security. Using the videotape, prosecutors charged Takehara with 29 counts of violation of privacy in the second degree. Each count can bring up to a year in prison. http://www.thehawaiichannel.com/news/1670890/detail.html
Pinhole Dot Gone... California - A 24-year-old Felton man was charged with invasion of privacy after he hid a tiny Web cam inside the bathroom of a Scotts Valley home, police said. If convicted of the misdemeanor charge of invasion of privacy, Sanders could face up to a year in jail and a hefty fine. http://www.theksbwchannel.com/news/1643143/detail.html
Hopefully, not cleaning loos... UK - A man who installed a hidden camera at his business premises to spy on the ladies' toilet has had his nine-month jail sentence quashed by the Court of Criminal Appeal. Instead, the judges have placed Christopher Elphick on probation for three years and ordered him to carry out 200 hours unpaid work in the community to give him the chance to address his sexual problems. Elphick, 41, pleaded guilty at Ayr Sheriff Court to a bizarre charge of committing a breach of the peace by installing and operating a hidden camera system within the toilet at Seaplane Mechanical Services in Green Street Lane, Ayr, between March 1 and April 9 last year. He then viewed video recordings of two female employees while they used the toilet. http://www.theherald.co.uk/news/archive/
Hopefully, not shining shoes...
UK - A stunned secretary discovered a CCTV camera had been hidden under her desk, looking up her legs. But the man who put it there yesterday denied the camera was being used for a sexual motive. Delivery firm boss James Wright told a court that he was attempting to spy on the secretary's boss. At Selkirk Sheriff Court yesterday, Wright, 41, was ordered to pay £500 compensation to the unnamed woman and was sentenced to 80 hours of community service. http://www.dailyrecord.co.uk/news/page.cfm?
Some SpyCams see too good... A mother turned herself in to police Saturday to face a child battery charge after a nationally televised videotape depicted her shaking, slapping and punching her 4-year-old daughter in a store parking lot. Police had been searching for Madelyne Gorman Toogood, 26 and her daughter since the Sept. 13 incident, caught on video by a surveillance camera outside a Kohl's department store in northern Indiana. Authorities said the mother had left the store angry because she was refused a cash refund for goods. The woman is then seen putting her daughter in the back seat of a sport utility vehicle, then pummeling, slapping and shaking her for nearly a half-minute. http://apnews.excite.com/article/20020921/D7M6ER401.html http://apnews.excite.com/image/20020920/VIDEOTAPED_BEATING (photo)
FutureWatch - Phone cameras - boon or bane? Dubai - The trendy digicam-cum-mobile phone is the talk of the town. These new gadgets from Nokia and Ericsson can store pictures. ... Recently, a teen was taken to court after plainclothesmen believed that he was surreptitiously photographing girls sitting in a restaurant. The court decision will be known this week. The Saudis recently banned the sale and use of these cell phones. Some people interviewed on Sharjah TV think these new contraptions should also be banned in the UAE. ... Saif Ali Ahmed, an Omani engineer on a visit to Dubai, has a Nokia 7650. "I think it's an amazing gadget. If I am in another country and I want to send my pictures to my family, its all done within seconds. If I want to get my wife's opinion before buying a certain item, I can send her a picture of that item first before buying it," he said. "Some young guys may misuse it by taking pictures of unsuspecting girls in a mall or a public place. The thing is, every new technology is prone to misuse." http://www.gulf-news.com/Articles/news.asp?ArticleID=63618 http://www.digit-life.com/articles/nokia7650/
The Nokia 9290 Communicator. "It stood out as an ultimate geek toy / spy gadget." http://www.smaller.com/article.cfm?
SPECIAL SECTION -- Odd Spy Stuff
"Better coffee a millionaire's money can't buy..." Lima - Former spy chief Vladimiro Montesinos is not only accused of embezzling hundreds of millions of dollars belonging to dirt-poor Peru's government, but he might have also been the man who spilled the world's priciest cup of coffee, a state attorney says. "One time Montesinos lost $1 million when he carelessly spilled his cup of coffee on a bank certificate, which was ruined." ... In Peru, bank certificates are used like cash and cannot be replaced. http://news.excite.com/odd/article/id/268775
"How do you spell indigestion?" An Osama Bin Laden henchmen in the Philippines was tracked down and killed in the jungle after a spy plane followed the heat trail of a pizza being delivered to him. http://www.people.co.uk/homepage/news/
"Afghanistan Banana Stand..."
The FBI monitored the alleged members of a terror cell in suburban Buffalo, N.Y., since before Sept. 11, 2001, but it was a flurry of recent coded messages — including one that referred to the delivery of a "watermelon" — that spurred authorities to swoop in. Law enforcement officials say they are not sure exactly what "watermelon" referred to, but they think it may have been a code word for some kind of terrorist activity. ...officials say that the names of all of these men were found on documents seized in Afghanistan, and they are just a handful of the several hundred Americans who have been targeted for investigation across the country as possible al Qaeda sympathizers. Some of them are the subjects of extensive eavesdropping, ranging from taps on their telephones to bugs in their cars and homes. http://abcnews.go.com/sections/us/DailyNews/ http://www.luraburnette.com/r_thehotrock.asp
"Who ya gonna call?"
"Under the E-FOIA Amendments, you can ask for and get email that mentions your name at federal government agencies. ... There is some surprising and illuminating email out there with your name on it - literally." - Michael Ravnitzky mikerav@mindspring.com http://www.usdoj.gov/04foia/foiacontacts.htm
The "usual gang of idiots," of course! It is only now that we are able to present - courtesy of documents publicized under the US Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) - the full story of Mad Meets the FBI. The bureau's documents on the magazine cover the years 1957-1971, and consist of 36 separate files. How many hours in the working lives of trench-coated investigators these yellowing documents represent we cannot say - but we do know, because the files tell us, the hilarious upshot of Hoover's sledgehammer being applied to the Mad nuts... http://www.counterpunch.org/randall0916.html
Spy Trick #623 - "The Old Switcheroo" In an astonishing concession, North Korean leader Kim Jong Il admitted Tuesday that North Korean spies abducted about a dozen Japanese decades ago and said at least four were still alive. ... Kim admitted that North Korean agents had kidnapped the Japanese in the late 1970s and early 1980s to train the North's spies in Japanese language and culture and to allow spies to assume their identities. http://www.nytimes.com/aponline/international
Beware Experts & Wizards... South Africa - A member of the National Intelligence Agency (NIA) backtracked on Monday on evidence he gave the Desai Commission on the controversial Watchdog electronic device. ... He told the commission he erred when he told it, in May, that the sale of the Watchdog to anyone other than a government department employee was illegal. ... The device sparked a bugging scare when it was discovered in the offices of the Western Cape Provincial Administration in March this year. However, former members of the administration have told the commission it was there only to guard against electronic eavesdropping. http://www.iol.co.za/index.php?set_id=1&click_id=13
Crikey, it's Steve Irwin - Spybuster! The plot of Crocodile Hunter: Collision Course is straightforward... a couple of dodgy CIA operatives arrive in the outback in search of a spy satellite that has unexpectedly fallen to Earth. What they do not know is a section of the satellite containing high security data has been swallowed by a 4m saltwater croc. http://www.heraldsun.news.com.au/common/ http://www.apple.com/trailers/mgm/crocodile_hunter
Quotes of the Week... "The universe is big, really big."
"Space is spacious."
From “Star Trek: I’m Working on That: A Trek from Science Fiction to Science Fact” by William Shatner http://www.msnbc.com/news/809159.asp
Sun Sep 15, 2002
Security Scrapbook - Espionage & Privacy News of the Week.
To: Clients, colleagues and friends.
Subject: Espionage & Privacy News of the Week.
===================================================
Kevin's Security Scrapbook is published on an irregular
basis for a select audience. HTML versions are archived at http://www.spybusters.com/Security_Scrapbook.html
=================================================== SPECIAL SECTION -- Security Director News
SPECIAL SECTION -- Little Red Eavesdroppinghood
SPECIAL SECTION -- Light Parts
SPECIAL SECTION -- Odd Parts ===================================================
SPECIAL SECTION -- Security Director News
Pretty Good Privacy (PGP) is back - Version 8.0 Some say this is, "the best hope for the average PC user to have a robust email and PC security solution." http://www.pgp.com
SPECIAL SECTION -- Little Red Eavesdroppinghood
What a big mouth you have... A (US) soldier was indicted on federal charges for allegedly trying to sell information on the top-secret military facility where he worked to a Philadelphia publication. Army Spc. Maurice D. Threats, 22, of Cascade, Md., who worked as a security guard in the Alternate Joint Communications Center, was charged with transmitting defense information, bribery and seeking a gratuity as a public official. http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/
What big eyes you have... - Wave detectors
Surveillance experts can "see" through the walls of your home...
- Optic taps...
- Window bouncers listeners...
- Power surveillance...
- Microchip implants...
- Radiation analysis...
- Keystroke logging...
(The usual list of media suspects real and imagined.)
http://www.guardian.co.uk/bigbrother/privacy/
What big ears you have... James Bamford reports on the listening stations that ring the world, capturing our personal conversations... Nowhere is the danger greater than in the area of wholesale electronic espionage, the kind performed by the ultrasecret giant ears in Britain and the US - the United Kingdom's Government Communications Headquarters (GCHQ) and America's National Security Agency (NSA). The pair are key players in the highly secret UKUSA Communications Intelligence Agreement. Signed on March 5, 1946, the partnership links the major English-speaking nations of the world, including Canada, Australia and New Zealand, in a worldwide and highly secret eavesdropping network known by the codename Echelon. Since the late 1980s, there has been barely a corner of the earth that is not covered by a listening post belonging to one of the Echelon members - or an American eavesdropping satellite. http://www.guardian.co.uk/bigbrother/privacy/
Hey, computer mice don't have ears. About two dozen nurses at Eden Medical Center who were required to wear personal locator devices turned in their electronic badges to protest the new system. The system, which allows clerks and administrators to locate a nurse or supervisor anywhere at any time, has raised concerns over invasion of privacy and the potential for managers to use the system for disciplinary action. Nurses also charge that supervisors can use the devices -- which resemble a miniature computer mouse -- to listen in on conversations. http://allnurses.com/news/jump.cgi?ID=1126
Ramzi Binalshibh (9/11 mastermind) reached out and touched someone... Pakistan - It was still dark when the small squad of intelligence agents (Pakistani InterService Intelligence along with CIA) began staking out the apartment block where suspected al-Qaida members had been living for several months. ...a satellite telephone call was traced to the house. http://story.news.yahoo.com/news?tmpl=story2&cid=524&
Welcome to Woop Woop... Australian police are tapping telephones at twice the rate in the US prompting calls for an agency to oversight the use of listening devices. Government reports show 2157 telephone interception warrants were issued in Australia in 2000-01. In 2001 US judges issued only 1491 authorisations for telephone taps. http://www.news.com.au/common/story_page/0,4057,5102456%255E2,00.html
Murray's Movie of the Week - Top Ten Pick http://www.mgm.com/woopwoop/
SPECIAL SECTION -- Light Parts
...who then flickered over to the US for Jerry Springer's show on
Quantum Men and the Women Who Love Them... simultaneously. Two Australian scientists have brought the world of Star Trek just a step nearer. They have "teleported" information between two laser beams a metre apart. They used a ghostly phenomenon called quantum entanglement to dismantle a signal - transmitted in photons, or particles of light - in one shaft of laser light and instantaneously rebuild a replica of it in a second laser beam." What we have demonstrated here is that we can take billions of photons, destroy them simultaneously, and then recreate them in another place," Ping Koy Lam of the Australian National University told the Australian newspaper. http://www.guardian.co.uk/international/story/0,3604,739373,00.html
Meanwhile, back at the ranch... Researchers at the Los Alamos National Laboratory announced recently that they have written data into single photons, the tiny packets of energy that make up light. They then fired these photons through the sunny desert sky. A mile later they picked those exact same photons out from the billions of others also hitting a detector, and then pieced the message together. This mile-long path is a crucial breakthrough. The turbulent part of the atmosphere that can disrupt signals is about a mile thick, so it is now feasible to put data into a single photon and send it to a satellite. The information it contains can then be beamed to anywhere in the world. And, even more importantly, the nature of photons makes it impossible to eavesdrop: these coded messages are absolutely unbreakable. (Two years and nothing new reported on this.) http://www.guardian.co.uk/science/story/0,3605,234968,00.html
FutureWatch - The Secret World of 4G Wireless Future wireless tech could enable the use of hologram-generating virtual reality programs to give users an artificial presence just about anywhere. Industry experts are predicting that such technologies are about 10 years out. http://www.wirelessnewsfactor.com/perl/story/19381.html
SPECIAL SECTION -- Odd Parts
"...Jamie is just smashing, but I do hope Bobbie rings me up..." UK - On 26 occasions in 2000, police and security services mistakenly bugged the wrong people. MI5 bugged innocent people on three occasions because numbers were completely wrong or transposed.
Not to mention the pants with stainless steel threads... Levi Strauss today unveiled the world's first clothing designed to protect against mobile phone radiation. S-Fit trousers will have pockets designed to carry a mobile phone and lined with " antiradiation" material to shield wearers from potentially harmful phone emissions. ... Some industry experts accused Levi of cashing in on consumer fears over mobile phone emissions. Previous ideas have included clothes with built-in radio receivers, microchips for stock control, skin moisturiser and even fragrance-enhanced fashion wear. http://www.thisislondon.co.uk/dynamic/news/
Beware Wizards... Europe's first school for witches and wizards has opened in Austria. Students can take a six-semester course, including learning to make potions and cast spells, ending in a "sorcerers' diploma." http://www.ananova.com/news/story/sm
School's site and store where you can buy wooden Rune Stones. Hummm. http://www.hexen-schule.de/
Weird coincindence, or Murray's Fractal Theory... On the first anniversary of the terrorist attacks on New York City, a date often and reductively repeated as simply 9-11, the evening numbers drawn in the New York Lottery were 911. http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2002/09/11/national/main521749.html
We Love Ya Mates! Thousands of motorists have been stranded with flat batteries across Sydney after this morning's September 11 headlight parade. An NRMA spokesman said the flat battery reports were running at about 530 an hour during the afternoon - 150 more than usual - and the distress calls skyrocketed after 5pm (AEST) as people finished work. Drivers were asked to put on their headlights this morning as a gesture of remembrance for people who died in the terrorist attacks a year ago. http://www.news.com.au/common/story_page/
Sat Sep 7, 2002
Security Scrapbook - Espionage & Privacy News of the Week.
To: Clients, colleagues and friends.
Subject: Espionage & Privacy News of the Week.
===================================================
Kevin's Security Scrapbook is published on an irregular
basis for a select audience. HTML versions are archived at http://www.spybusters.com/Security_Scrapbook.html
If HTML links are not active here, visit the above link.
=================================================== SPECIAL SECTION -- Security Director News
SPECIAL SECTION -- World Spy News
SPECIAL SECTION -- Cool Techno-stuff
SPECIAL SECTION -- Weird, huh? ===================================================
SPECIAL SECTION -- Security Director News
Spies in the Boardroom? A tiny rival accuses Thomson Corp. of espionage. Board members have gotten flak for looking the other way as executives looted their companies. Now come charges of corporate espionage. ... CCBN.com, a Web-based communications firm that handles investor relations, filed suit against the Canadian information services giant Thomson Corp. Seeking treble damages, the suit accuses Thomson of using its two CCBN board seats to steal confidential information--including pricing data and competitive analysis--that helped it create a rival service, and of hiring people who had confidentiality agreements with CCBN. http://www.forbes.com/forbes/2002/0916/045.html
Kevin's Open Rolodex - Card #10050 - The Phone Guru Stan Rosenzweig - Office Technology Consulting, Inc.
"The right place for business and technical telephone information." Lots of it too. Ask him for his 7 Secrets to Network Security. http://www.phoneguru.com/ stan@phoneguru.com
Off-site Meeting Gear - Paparazzi-Proof Wireless Stage Microphones For the first time, a whole new world of performance is open to the television and film Industries. Recent advances in digital modulation, battery technology and electronics miniaturization have allowed an entire rack of equipment to fit into a matchbox sized transmitter.
A digital system has many basic advantages.
- Studio quality audio transmission
- Freedom from many sources of interference that affect analog wireless
- Consistent audio quality
- Secure audio transmission (you've been warned) http://www.zaxcom.com/audio/wireless.html
Undercover investigations version... http://www.zaxcom.com/wirelesslaw.html
Santa Software... Silent Watch 2.0 was designed specifically for businesses and educational systems. ...allows you to view in real time the activity within your network. ...allows you to control misuse of your computers and restrict objectionable content that may harm or distract others on your computer network along with remote control. ...will also record keystrokes, instant messaging, URL logs, monitor incoming and outgoing e-mail and monitor an unlimited number of computers on your network. You can print reports that are date and time stamped, freeze a remote computer, print the contents of a remote computer screen and record and playback specific incidents. http://www.adavi.com/
Quote of the Week... "Writing a book on wireless security is like writing a book on safe skydiving -- if you want the safety and security, just don't do it." - Ben Rothke, CISSP - Senior Security Architect with QinetiQ Trusted Information Management, Inc. http://www.unixreview.com/documents/s=7459/uni1030461766479/
Predaceous Crop Circles... ...more than you probably want to know about "warchalking" wireless networks. Links to articles... plus, a variety of symbols and their meanings. (Hi ho. Hobo. It's off to whack we go...) http://www.warchalking.org/
SPECIAL SECTION -- World Spy News
Stayed tuned for The Manchurian Candidate II MKULTRA was the government's attempt begun in 1953 to respond to "brainwashing" activities attributed to Soviet and Chinese governments by conducting drug and other behavior modification experiments on unwitting victims. It involved more than 149 subprojects contracted out to 80 institutions. ... A federal district court in Washington, D.C., August 8 granted reporter John F. Kelly limited but highly unusual access to some Central Intelligence Agency operational files... http://www.rcfp.org/news/2002/0819kellyv.html http://www.filmsite.org/manc.html (a must see)
Rosebug... The owner of Israel's second largest newspaper, "Maariv," was convicted Sunday of obstructing justice and intimidating witnesses in the wiretapping trial of his son. Yaacov Nimrodi was found guilty of harassing two prosecution witnesses in his son Ofer's trial but was acquitted of intimidating a third witness. Nimrodi also paid a co-defendant, Arieh Krishnev, money to harass witnesses, the Tel Aviv Magistrates Court ruled. http://www.spa.gov.sa/html/archive_e.asp?srcfile=548864
Pain in the class action due to slipped disk... Buried among the thousands of "spy files" that Denver police are accused of wrongly compiling on innocent citizens are 22 that may involve secret federal investigations of serious criminals. The secret slipped out when Denver officials turned over all the files to the American Civil Liberties Union and other lawyers who have sued the city claiming the spy files are an illegal violation of people's civil rights. The files are on a computer CD. ...the city wants the 22 "sensitive" files back. http://www.rockymountainnews.com/drmn/local/article
Here's your junk... The wreckage of a suspected North Korean spy ship that sank in the East China Sea after exchanging fire with Japan Coast Guard vessels in December is expected to be brought to Japan for inspection late this month, the transport ministry said Monday. http://www.japantimes.co.jp/cgi-bin/getarticle.pl5?nn20020903a8.htm
...and please, no seltzer bottles at the wake. A Peruvian general, who was a key witness in a corruption case against former spy chief Vladimiro Montesinos and who faced trial himself, was found dead late Sunday in an apparent suicide, officials said. Retired Gen. Oscar Villanueva, under house arrest on embezzlement and
conspiracy charges, also faced allegations he used $20,000 in state funds to buy jewels for Montesinos to give to top Latin American television personality Laura Bozzo. http://www.chron.com/cs/CDA/story.hts/world/1558104
Smoking gun, or just Export, Eh? Canada has asked Israel to respond to allegations that two Israeli agents posed as Canadians when gathering intelligence for the assassination of a Palestinian militant in Gaza. A 23-year-old Palestinian college student, Akram Azzatma, is in Palestinian custody on charges he gave Israeli intelligence information on the whereabouts of Salah Shehadeh, leader of the military wing of the Islamic militant group Hamas. ... Azzatma told a news conference in Gaza City last week that the two Israeli agents posed as a Canadian college professor and his assistant when they befriended him in August 2000, a month before the outbreak of Israeli-Palestinian fighting. The agents later revealed their true identity, and used blackmail to collaborate with Israeli security services, Azzatma said. The agents threatened to distribute fake photos showing him in sexual encounters, unless he supplied the information, Azzatma said. They also promised him travel to Canada if he complied, he said. http://www.haaretzdaily.com/hasen/pages/ShArt.jhtml?
Youz too late. Fuhgetaboutit... Surveillance cameras in Times Square triple between 1998 and 2002... Our intention was to double-check and update information. ...And so it isn't too late for us to start fighting (again) against the use of surveillance cameras in public, but we haven't any time to waste. http://www.notbored.org/times-square.html http://www.notbored.org/times-square-map.jpg (camera map)
"...but there is nothing good on." Today is the 75th anniversary of the first successful demonstration of television. Making it happen was Philo T. Farnsworth, who, hardly a household name, remains television's invisible inventor. ... since the networks won't likely re-enact Farnsworth's big moment, you'll have to visualize it for yourself. The setting: his modest San Francisco lab where, on September 7, 1927, the 21-year-old self-taught genius transmitted the image of a horizontal line to a receiver in the next room. Later that day, he triumphantly wired one of his backers in Los Angeles: "THE DAMNED THING WORKS!" http://www.cnn.com/2002/SHOWBIZ/TV/09/06/apontv.tvs.75th.birthday
SPECIAL SECTION -- Cool Techno-stuff
Ra, Ra, Ra...
2.4 GHz wireless monitoring system. Color pinhole color camera. Up to three cameras may be monitored in auto-sequence mode. 3"x4.5"x2" StealthCam by Samsung CCTV / GVI Security Inc. http://www.samsungcc.tv/
FutureWatch - Connect the dot to dot to dot to dot...
Inxight Star Tree - Not quite the surround-your-body hologram of pic-and-pluck-data you want, but getting there. See the hidden relationships in your junk drawer of data. Take the free test drive. You'll 'see' what I mean. http://www.inxight.com/products/
Ultra Wideband (UWB) - First App - Steroids for CATV Once a super secret military technology, UWB is finally going commercial... UWB over-wire technology for coax cable provides 2 Gigabits and more of additional data, at low cost, on differing CATV architectures. http://www.pulselink.net/
Don't be a Unix eunuch... So you've deleted an important file(s), or perhaps been broken into and have your file system smashed by a vindictive system cracker, or some other disaster has struck. You need that file back, but Unix has no way to recover lost data that hasn't been backed up. You hunt around for help, answers, anything... (check here) http://www.fish.com/tct/help-recovering-file
Kevin's Hot Stock Tip of the week... Hop-on.com, Inc. (thinkaboutit) The staples of criminal investigations are well-recognized. Fingerprints. Weapons. Eyewitnesses. Now detectives are relying on a new tool: cell phones. Because more than 40% of Americans own mobile phones, law enforcement personnel see them as a powerful resource in investigations and trials. Detectives say phone records, from both suspects and victims, can provide key evidence in murder, robbery, drug and rape cases... http://www.latimes.com/news/local/la-me-onthelaw6sep06 http://www.hop-on.com/
SPECIAL SECTION -- Weird, huh?
The Coptic New Year celebration is held on September 11 This is when Egyptians celebrate the return of Sirious (star) to the sky. It was a signal for the Egyptians that the River Nile would soon overflow. http://www.saintmark.com/easter.html
'Worried' that you didn't get enough summer reading done?
Check out The Paranoid's Pocket Guide...
- How long has that pencil sharpener been in your office,and why doesn't it work?
Why are there two smoke detectors in the employee lounge?
This year more than $2-billion will be spent on (covert) video equipment.
- Remember those hostile memos you wrote to vent at your boss, and then deleted?
They're still in the computer system.
- Does your personal password give you a sense of security?
Any MIS person can override your password and access your files.
- Most wiretapping devices emit no audible sounds.
- There are at least 18 different ways to tap a telephone. http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/0811816656/
Sun Sep 1, 2002
Security Scrapbook - Espionage & Privacy News of the Week.
To: Clients, colleagues and friends.
Subject: Espionage & Privacy News of the Week.
===================================================
Kevin's Security Scrapbook is published on an irregular
basis for a select audience. HTML versions are archived at http://www.spybusters.com/Security_Scrapbook.html
=================================================== SPECIAL SECTION -- Security Director News
SPECIAL SECTION -- History's Eavesdropping Mysteries
SPECIAL SECTION -- Cell Phone News
SPECIAL SECTION -- Coming Attractions
SPECIAL SECTION -- ThoughtPokers
SPECIAL SECTION -- Weird, huh? ===================================================
SPECIAL SECTION -- Security Director News
If it could happen to them, it could happen to you... The case marks the biggest and most sensational accusation yet of corporate cybercrime, a shadowy, unsavory and increasingly popular activity... Millions of Europeans were buying counterfeit Canal Plus smart cards on the black market and instantly getting free access to premium channels that carry soccer games and adult movies. Canal Plus, a division of French entertainment conglomerate Vivendi Universal, learned that the code controlling the cards had been posted on a Canadian Web site specializing in the secrets of digital technology. Using the code as a blueprint, it was relatively simple for counterfeiters to make cards. But who had actually cracked the code that Canal Plus had spent $35 million developing in total secrecy? The firm's investigation ultimately led not to some maladjusted youth or embittered ex-employee but to an entire company... http://www.latimes.com/news/printedition/la-fi-sabotage29aug29005045 Quote of the week... "From information theft to manipulating and destabilizing competitors, espionage and sabotage are getting worse," - William C. Boni, Jr. CPP, chief information security officer, Motorola Inc. http://www.latimes.com/news/printedition/la-fi-sabotage29aug29005045
SpyWare Alert #036 Think using Yahoo or Hotmail e-mail at work protects you from your bosses prying eyes? Think again. New spy software essentially lets employers or parents co-pilot virtually any kind of e-mail account, including private Web-based e-mail accounts like Yahoo and Hotmail. A new version of eBlaster spyware will secretly forward all e-mail coming and going through such Web-based accounts to a spy's e-mail, allowing anyone to "ride-along" even the supposedly private e-mail. http://www.msnbc.com/news/800409.asp
Not all clients/customers are created equal... Your client/customer may not be who you think.
Your client/customer problems may be bigger than they think. The following news story explains... "If it seems strange that communist Cuba is exporting "business managers" to work for capitalist firms abroad, that is only one of the intriguing angles in the tale of a little-known government agency in Havana, Cubatecnica. Most of the approximately 400 Cubans contracted by Cubatecnica to work abroad are former top intelligence officials or relatives of senior government officials who obtained their jobs through thinly veiled blackmail, current and former agency employees say. A former Interior Ministry colonel is running a warehouse in Panama, an electronic eavesdropping expert works as an accountant in Madrid, and the son of a Cuban Revolution hero is fixing computers in Venezuela, the sources said. Cuba is well known for sending thousands of doctors, teachers and sports coaches to work abroad under government contracts..." http://www.journalstar.com/nw.php?story_id=16907 http://www.oss.net/extra/news/?module_instance=1&id=26
Do diligence? You should.
The Seven Top Investment Frauds of 2002... - Promissory notes, which typically involve loans to companies made by investors in exchange for a fixed amount of periodic income. Legitimate corporate promissory notes are not usually sold to the public and some schemes are fraudulent.
- Prime bank schemes that promise investors risk-free, triple-digit returns on debt notes said to be guaranteed by the world's biggest banks.
- Viatical settlements, which, when done legally, involve buying into the insurance policies of the terminally ill, who get a portion of the money to help with medical bills. The investor is supposed to get paid when the person dies, but in some fraudulent cases the policyholders aren't really dying or don't even exist.
- Affinity fraud investing schemes that target religious, ethnic and professional groups and are performed by members of the groups who use their common backgrounds to gain trust.
- Charitable gift annuities, in which a donor gives cash or stock to a charity in return for lifetime fixed payments based on age - the older the donor, the larger the payment. Regulators said investors should be cautious of little-known organizations offering such investments.
- Oil and gas schemes, including investments in fraudulent operations or wells that don't produce.
Idea... Substitute 'your company name' for 'Australia',
and 'company policy' for 'law'. Australia's spy laws will be toughened and rewritten in clearer language under a bill passed by Federal Parliament's lower house. Under the new laws, maximum prison terms for the most serious cases of espionage will be increased to 25 years, up from seven years. ... The new laws cover the operations, capabilities, technologies, methods and sources used by Australian security and intelligence agencies. The definition of espionage has been expanded to include persons disclosing information that could prejudice Australian security or defence. http://www.themercury.news.com.au/common/story_page/
SPECIAL SECTION -- History's Eavesdropping Mysteries
History's Eavesdropping Mysteries - Case #322 It was March 1965, in the early days of J. Edgar Hoover's war against the Mafia. F.B.I. agents, say Congressional investigators, eavesdropped on a conversation in the headquarters of New England's organized-crime boss, Raymond Patriarca. Two gangsters, Joseph Barboza and Vincent Flemmi, wanted Mr. Patriarca's permission to kill a small-time hoodlum, Edward Deegan, "as they were having a problem with him," according to an F.B.I. log of the conversation. "Patriarca ultimately furnished this O.K.," the F.B.I. reported, and three days later Mr. Deegan turned up dead in an alley, shot six times. ... Four other men were tried, convicted and sentenced to death or life in prison for the murder, though they had had nothing to do with it. One, Joseph Salvati, who spent 30 years in prison, filed notice with the Justice Department last week that he planned to sue the F.B.I. for $300 million for false imprisonment. ... Mr. Salvati, a former truck driver, now 69, had his sentence commuted in 1997 by Gov. William F. Weld. Last year, while he was still on parole, his murder conviction was dismissed by a Massachusetts state judge after the Justice Department task force made public documents suggesting his innocence. Two of the other wrongly convicted men died in prison. ... Mr. Salvati lives in a modest apartment in Boston's North End with his wife, Marie, who visited him in prison every week during those 30 years. Each week Mr. Salvati sent her a romantic card, which she put on the television set. "It was all they had of each other," said, Mr. Garo. (Mr. Salvati's lawyer) http://www.nytimes.com/2002/08/25/national/25FBI.html?
History's Eavesdropping Mysteries - The Museum A good place to learn all about spying is at the International Spy Museum, which opened recently in downtown Washington, D.C. ... One note: The museum is bugged. No kidding. Microphones have been planted at various locations in the walls. The conversations are piped into other parts of the museum, for visitors-turned-eavesdroppers to listen in on. http://seattletimes.nwsource.com/html/artsentertainment/ http://www.spymuseum.org/siteintro.asp
SPECIAL SECTION -- Cell Phone News
Poke-men... Gotta catch them all. Cell phone users in Japan have already had to contend with spam and technical glitches, but that may seem like a breeze when hackers finally turn their attention to the wireless world. http://news.com.com/2100-1033-955294.html
SMS - Send More Spam A decision by federal election regulators to exempt text-based wireless ads from campaign disclosure rules has critics warning that consumers could find their mobile phones subject to a flood of political spam as campaign 2002 kicks into high gear. SMS (Short Message Service) is featured on a wide range of wireless devices, from digital mobile phones to Blackberries to two-way pagers. http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A49356-2002
...but only 10 years if you just "totally misplaced"it. South Africa - You could be jailed for up to 20 years or fined R20-million for not reporting your lost, stolen or destroyed cellphone and/or SIM card. These seemingly draconian penalties are to be imposed in terms of a bill presently before parliament. The aim is to help nab cellphone thieves. http://www.iol.co.za/index.php?click_id=6&art_id=
SPECIAL SECTION -- Coming Attractions
For legions of reasons... The Second BioDefense Mobilization Conference & Exhibition will occur October 22-24, 2002 at Loews Philadelphia Hotel. Workshops on bioterrorism and biotechnology are scheduled October 21. http://www.bio-defense.org/
Modern Moat Building... The Essentials of Securing Enterprise Assets:
From the Front Gate to the Hard Drive
October 17th - 18th, 2002
Embassy Suites La Jolla / San Diego
December 4th and 5th, 2002
Doubletree Hotel San Jose / Silicon Valley http://www.riskanalysisgroup.com/
FutureWatch - Spiderman Gloves for the kids,
police and fire departments... Tiny little hairs and not any kind of chemical glue help a gecko race up and down vertical surfaces as smooth as glass, researchers reported Monday. The finding could help scientists invent better adhesives that will work virtually anywhere, the researchers at Lewis and Clark College in Portland, Oregon, the University of California and Stanford University said. "We have solved a centuries-old mystery of what makes a gecko's toes so sticky," Lewis and Clark's Kellar Autumn, a biologist, said in telephone interview. http://www.cnn.com/2002/TECH/science/08/26/
FutureWatch - Operation TIPS still looking for a good home. Blasted for plans to link the spy program to "America's Most Wanted," John Ashcroft has tapped another private firm to run its volunteer hotline. ... The Richmond, Va.-based nonprofit company, called the National White Collar Crime Center, confirmed Wednesday that it is discussing plans with the Justice Department to operate a hotline that would take calls from citizens that the department signs up in its planned Terrorism Information and Prevention System (TIPS) spy program. Civil libertarians are outraged by the plan to privatize the operation. "It's troubling that the Justice Department would go out of its way to try to get around the Fourth Amendment and the Freedom of Information and Privacy Act this way," says John Whitehead, president of the conservative Rutherford Institute. http://www.salon.com/news/feature/2002/08/30/tips/
"The NW3C provides nationwide support services for enforcement agencies involved in the detection, investigation, and prosecution of economic and high-tech crime." http://www.nw3c.org/
SPECIAL SECTION -- ThoughtPokers
ThoughtPoker - Best Contest Since the $25,000 Orteig Prize... The X PRIZE is a $10,000,000 prize to jumpstart the space tourism industry through competition between the most talented entrepreneurs and rocket experts in the world. The $10 Million cash prize will be awarded to the first team that:
- Privately finances, builds & launches a spaceship,
able to carry 3 people to 100 kilometers. (62.5 miles)
- Returns safely to Earth.
- Repeats the launch with the same ship within 2 weeks.
ThoughtPoker - 9/11
What if terrorism is more about venting than attacking? Would that change your counter-terrorism security strategy? http://www.opinionjournal.com/extra/?id=110002122 (long, but good)
ThoughtPoker - Big Brother is an airbag...
"An electronic device on board the Pontiac, however, told police exactly how fast the car had been going — 124 mph in a 40 mph zone." (...but what if the wheels had left the ground? Would that falsely boost the reading?) http://www.activedayton.com/ddn/local/0822car.html
ThoughtPoker - FutureWatch - Minority Reportish?
Defense lawyers and the American Civil Liberties Union are up in arms over a police file of potential criminals in Delaware. The database contains a list of people who police believe are likely to break the law. It features names, addresses and photographs of potential suspects -- many of whom have clean slates. http://www.local6.com/sh/technology/stories/national-technology http://www.filmmonthly.com/Video/Articles/MinorityReport
SPECIAL SECTION -- Weird, huh?
Hollywooded, Zhivagoed or just cost-effective? You decide... An Italian man imprisoned last year for spying in Belarus was released on Friday, saying he would now marry the woman whom secret police say first embroiled him in espionage. ... Leaving the notoriously overcrowded prison colony on the outskirts of Minsk, 51 year-old Piu, said he wanted to get on with his life, and that he and his former interpreter Irina Ushak planned to wed. ... KGB spokesman Fyodor Kotov said Ushak was probably the reason Piu resorted to crime. Neither knew their every step was being monitored by the secret services, he said. "The love of an old man for a young woman is always very touching," Kotov said. "I think they just needed the money." http://in.news.yahoo.com/020705/64/1rc23.html
Just cost-effective... A former general in the Soviet secret service has been jailed in his absence for treason and spying for the United States. Oleg Kalugin, who now lives in the US, was given a 15-year term in a maximum security prison. Mr Kalugin had denied any wrongdoing. He ran the KGB's exterior counter-intelligence department from 1973-1980, and wrote a book in 1994 about Soviet intelligence operations. http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/europe/2067229.stm
Spycam News - Of course the pig squealed...
California - An Oxnard man faces felony charges for torturing and dissecting his daughter's pet guinea pig because he thought it was a camera-equipped robot placed in his home by government agents... If convicted on all counts, Zavala faces a maximum sentence of three years in prison... According to Deputy District Attorney Tom Connors, Zavala called a neighbor over to his home the night of Sept. 13, 2001. The neighbor found Zavala poking the guinea pig with a utility knife, "He said the guinea pig was a robot and it was spying on him," Connors said. "He said it had a camera in the back of its head." http://www.insidevc.com/vcs/county_news/article/
Ring around the campus now... next auto-fill fridges? USA Technologies' will network 9,000 university washers and dryers in Indiana, Kentucky, Michigan and Ohio. These Internet connected washers and dryers will be retrofitted with e-Suds(TM) technology making it possible for college students to go online to check if washers and dryers are available in their laundry room, charge the cost of doing laundry to their university accounts, have detergent and fabric softener automatically added to their wash and receive an email when their wash is complete. http://media.prnewswire.com/en/jsp/latest.jsp?resourceid=2301915
It could even turn a city back into a desert... The technology behind E-bombs - electromagnetic pulse devices (EMP) - has been around a long time. According to Popular Mechanics the idea can be traced back to 1925, when physicist Arthur Compton suggested it could be used to help study atoms.
(cat toy alert - stay tuned) http://www.newsmax.com/archives/articles/2001/9/20/185816.html
Eavesdropping Detection Services
United Kingdom Eavesdropping Detection Services
