FBI Develops Eavesdropping Tools

by Ted Bridis, AP

Sat, Nov 24, 2001 7:13PM

It's an open question whether the covert installation of something on a computer without a physical entry requires a search warrant," said David Sobel, a lawyer with the Washington-based Electronic Privacy Information Center, a civil liberties group.

WASHINGTON –– The FBI is going to new lengths to be sure it can eavesdrop on high-tech communications, secretly building "Magic Lantern" software to monitor computer use.

...

For more information: http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/artic...

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§Robert Mueller

by nana

Sun, Nov 25, 2001 2:26PM

This is sort of interesting. The commercial press seems to be interested but the security press is treating this like a non-story at the moment. But the coverage is very squishy & weird (like the
one in your link). Some say virus, some say trojan. MSNBC, that bastion of truth, seems to have started the story. This one: http://news.cnet.com/news/0-1003-200-7944351.html?tag=mn_hd seems to think it has to do with key-logging.

What's interesting about key-logging is that Mueller, the new head of the FBI is some sort of expert on it, although he felt it necessary to lie about that fact in his confirmation hearings in a question referring to the Scarfo case. http://www.theregister.co.uk/content/archive/20894.html.
So maybe it's a bit of career building going on here.

Oh by the way, Safeweb, the Oakland based anonymiser service financed by the CIA seems to be having financial problems: This past week the shut down their free services.

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§password stealing trojans

by nana

Tue, Nov 27, 2001 1:03AM

Also, interestingly I just got (Nov 26) a notice from Searchsecurity about password stealing trojans.
BADTRANS VARIANT STEALS PASSWORDS | News: searchSecurity
A variant of the Badtrans worm has been spotted in the wild, and it
leaves behind a password-stealing Trojan horse program. It also
spreads in "clever" ways, according to Sophos' Graham Cluely.

For full story, click: http://www.searchsecurity.com/qna/0,289202,sid14_gci783050,00.html

Hmmm. This all just keeps getting more & more conveniently timed.

[ps: another piece of this story about the FBI software has been posted at http://www.indybay.org/2001/11/110454.php but I don't think it has been linked to this page]

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