Industrial espionage

[D-Angle]

Hi,

Does anyone know if it's possible to find out if your telephone or e-mail is under surveillance? A friend of mine thinks this might be happening to her due to some of the actions of one of her biggest competitors, and if there is anything to it, she'd like to know if she can prove it's them.

Ta,
Justin

[billb]

u can get various bug / phone tap detectors eg

http://spy-store.co.uk/shop/product_info.php?cPath=23&products_id=63

but doubt if they can detect if ure being bugegd further up the line. Any decent security firm can test ure companies firewall, logs etc to see if someone is trying to get to ure emails but again dont know whether its possible to tap them further up the tree eg at the isp.

best send out some false information and see if they follow up - more likely to be an employee feeding them info that anything bond like.

[D-Angle]

billb said:

best send out some false information and see if they follow up - more likely to be an employee feeding them info that anything bond like.

That's the thing though, she's a one-woman band! I will suggest she tries this though, thanks.

[Broccers]

D-Angle said:

billb said: best send out some false information and see if they follow up - more likely to be an employee feeding them info that anything bond like. That's the thing though, she's a one-woman band! I will suggest she tries this though, thanks.

I know of a few people who go bin diving at their competitors in the middle of the night. You'd be amazed what people place unshredded in bins.

Personally I dont condone such action but it gives you all you need to know about your competitors suppliers / costings etc if they arent careful with information.

>> Edited by Broccers on Tuesday 20th April 12:44

[D-Angle]

Does anyone know if there's someone at BT she could contact? She's had a look round the site but no luck.

[simpo two]

Heard on R4 this morning that the 'National Security Association' already 'sniffs' e-mails for certain words.

[HiRich]

It is possible to snoop, but needs some serious backing. A few suggestions:

- Change her internet connection password, and webmail password. The competitor may have found these and be peeking. Change them every month.
- As mentioned, a £30 shredder for all potentially sensitive documents (including email printouts)
- Write to the ISP (er, not by email), and ask whether they can provide a log of account access attempts. Explain why, and keep a diary. Scour the log for accesses that your friend could not have made. If she finds any, there's a breach, and I would suggest a discussion with the ISP, PC Plod, and a lawyer.

[ultimasimon]

simpo two said:

Heard on R4 this morning that the 'National Security Association' already 'sniffs' e-mails for certain words.

And they have done since email began. Every email that is sent is passed through a massive security complex, code-named 'Echelon', somewhere in the midlands.

There is no doubt that it breaches personal rights, but the Government has a clever way to deal with it - The Data Protection Act. They can withold any information which 'they' believe could cause us, the end user, damage or distress, and so they remove content automatically by not allowing it into your report. Therefore, all 'secret' information, ie personal data which is aquired by them about you is never shown on your print out, but it does exist, although not visible to people that work within the public facing departments.

It is also kept on file for 6 years if flagged, or two years if not. Flagging is either keyword-combination triggered, or as a result of an investigation. Since the 9/11 incident, both America and England now cross-reference systems: ie they watch us and we watch them, whilst watching ourselves. This is only the beginning.

For more info, see HERE
The original trials were a success and we actually sold the technology to the Americans.

FACT:The KGB used to install small CCTV camera's with audio into the TV sets of the Russian public during the 70's as counter inteligence against so called spys

CCTV on every street soon, the new microwave radar system which can track you without you carrying your mobile, the personal identity card, toll roads, cars with speed limiters, black boxes being used to record accidents now but motoring offences soon, and who knows what's next. Either way, there will be no such thing as aninimity in the near future.

Worried yet? You should be. It's a free country.

[samn01]

If you mail me offline I know someone who maybe able to check this sort of thing.

Sam

[maddog[uk]]

yes GCHQ have that system...I heard. At the risk of breaking the officials secret act I heard its predecessor was used by to win a contract for GEC from daimler-benz in the 80's.

thanks

Simon


>> Edited by maddog[uk] on Wednesday 21st April 23:53

[Plotloss]

Every email goes through one centre in the Midlands?

How does that work then? I only ask because it sort of fundamentally flies in the face of how the internet was designed...

[tim_s]

Plotloss said:

Every email goes through one centre in the Midlands? How does that work then? I only ask because it sort of fundamentally flies in the face of how the internet was designed...

all major isp's were required by law to install black boxes to intercept all uk traffic a couple years back.

[Size Nine Elm]

ultimasimon said:

And they have done since email began.

Don't think so. There has been a security requirement for ISPs to track emails in the last couple of years, but I don't think they were monitoring UUCP connections in the early 80s... [geek mode]

[simpo two]

Send misinformation. Make it look like your bad debtors are serious prospects. Let your rival reap the harvest!

Think curly.

[ultimasimon]

Size Nine Elm said:

ultimasimon said: And they have done since email began. Don't think so. There has been a security requirement for ISPs to track emails in the last couple of years, but I don't think they were monitoring UUCP connections in the early 80s... [geek mode]

Oh God, sometimes you just know that your going to post and start something that you wish you hadn't, but here goes...

So you think that they were going to make that public information, before email and internet had even started to take off?? They would have killed it off before it even took a hold. The same as Internet Banking was a total security failure; but the banks just kept paying people off because they knew that e-banking was the way forward and they didn't want the bad publicity – they had to ride it out until security developed.

The government was merely admitting recently that email was being monitored under the banner of national security, but that is just their way of breaking the news They knew what they were onto and didn't want to frighten everyone away.

Do you think that by installing 128 or 256bit WEP encryption you will be safe and secure, if it is publicly available? Think not, as if we have access to it, the military has been able to crack it for ages, after all it was their 'scientists' that invented the whole system in the first place.

You have to look right back to the beginning when TCPIP was first invented by the American military, and ARPANET, the first TCP network. But anyone who has studied IT professionally would know this as it's basic IT training - packets and layers, not at all secure as it is.

I have been previously been in a 'privileged' position and am aware of facts that have certainly opened my eyes. This is not chest beating, as I have served my 10 year OSA period, so they can just *uck themselves as it's not that confidential now, but it does pain me when it comes to the misguidance that the general public believe.

Anyone who poses a real threat to national security certainly would not be daft enough to use email or the www as a means of communications (one would hope), but equally the government cannot be seen to overlook this, so they have a wonderful opportunity to monitor what we do, and bring it into the public eye, especially in the light of 9/11.

You have to remember that security is a ‘paranoia’ industry, and people will lap up as much as they believe they need for their own personal security.

If you think for one minute that this is a free country; wake up and smell the coffee. The legislation that is about to come into force in the next two years will blow you away (although we may never know whether or not it has been brought in as it's bloody classified). If as a motorist, you think that this government's stance is that of a war on motorists: then what lies ahead for the IT industry is a drop in the ocean.

If you can enlighten me on why we would NOT be monitored prior to a few years ago, then I'm all

I believe that in the UK we have more CCTV cameras per square mile than any other country in the world. So just ask yourself this question - If we have so many cameras now, would you have trusted the government with your privacy ten years ago with what we know now?

[simpo two]

Do you think that Identity Cards are really anything to do with 'countering terrorism', or is that simply an excuse for nailing down honest taxpaying Joe Public yet further?

[maddog[uk]]

I carry a pass for work with my photo, a drivers license with my photo, and a tube pass with my photo every day of my life. I personally welcome an indentity card! But I a little hacked off that Jack Straw is trying to derail it because he thinks we should not be asked to produce them and we can be asked for them when asking for benefits or treatment etc. To be honest whats the point of having them. I welcome being asked to prove who I am, if anything because its stops fraud and makes me feel safer.

[mondeoman]

[quote=maddog[uk]]I carry a pass for work with my photo, a drivers license with my photo, and a tube pass with my photo every day of my life. I personally welcome an indentity card! But I a little hacked off that Jack Straw is trying to derail it because he thinks we should not be asked to produce them and we can be asked for them when asking for benefits or treatment etc. To be honest whats the point of having them. I welcome being asked to prove who I am, if anything because its stops fraud and makes me feel safer.[/quote]

Yeah right, course it does .......

I'm me, I know I'm me - YOU prove I'm not.

[danhf]

ultimasimon said:

....

To have any one central system checking all UK emails would require one big mofo (well, 50) server. I think that the chances are that they don't really "check" emails as such - they probably have a method of tracing but that's about it. Even then, there's ways and means of throwing people off the scent.

Web proxys cause all sorts of problems - there's nothing stopping me hacking [insert any local hotel] and using their PC to get back out to the internet and exchange information (HTTP, etc, etc) with others. I believe that with the right people involved, you could exchange any information over the internet without it being traced or even known about.

To scan and store every email would be almost impossible imo.

Oh, and WEP is one thing but as I understand it PGP is, at present, uncrackable.

I'm not a security expert and I stand to be corrected if necessary!


dan

[JohnL]

tim_s said:

Plotloss said: Every email goes through one centre in the Midlands? How does that work then? I only ask because it sort of fundamentally flies in the face of how the internet was designed... all major isp's were required by law to install black boxes to intercept all uk traffic a couple years back.

OK, lets go for minor ISPs