From Business Today:
A ruling in favor of Marcone Supply has been upheld by the Appellate Division of State Supreme Court. The ruling bars competitor 1st Source Servall from soliciting business from 640 of Marcone’s customers. The Cheektowaga company claims two of its former employees used inside information to lure clients away to Servall when tasked with establishing three new Northeast distribution sites. Marcone claims the two Buffalo-are executives, Mark J. Creighton and Karl P. Rosenhahn, stole a confidential list of 3,300 Marcone customers then tried to cover up the theft by destroying evidence.
A federal judge has declined to dismiss charges against Google that it allegedly violated the Federal Wiretap Act when it collected personal data from Wi-Fi networks.
U.S. District Court Judge James Ware on Wednesday tossed accusations that Google’s Street View vehicles broke several states’ laws when they harvested usernames, passwords, and e-mail from consumers’ and businesses’ wireless networks, but allowed the claim that the company violated federal law to continue.
Google’s Street View vehicles began cruising American roads in 2007 as part of the company’s mapping program. Along with snapping photographs of each street and collecting GPS data, the vehicles also mapped the location of Wi-Fi networks to build a database that could be accessed by mobile devices to determine users’ whereabouts.
Google acknowledged the privacy problem in May 2010, but said collection of personal data from Wi-Fi hotspots had been inadvertent. The company blamed an unnamed engineer for adding code to the Wi-Fi location detection software.
Although Google initially said that the packet sniffer grabbed only data fragments, it later acknowledged that the vehicles had harvested complete usernames and passwords from unprotected wireless networks, as well as emails.
To arrive at his ruling, Ware threaded his way though years of legislative history of federal privacy laws related to over-the-air communications, and even went to the Oxford English Dictionary in an attempt to define “radio communications.”
He concluded that the exemptions built into the Federal Wiretap Act did not apply to Google’s snooping.
“The Court finds that Plaintiffs plead facts sufficient to state a claim for violation of the Wiretap Act,” Ware wrote in his ruling. “Defendant’s contention that Plaintiffs fail to state a claim for violation of the Wiretap Act, as Plaintiffs plead that their networks were ‘open’ and ‘unencrypted,’ is misplaced.”
Jim Dempsey, the vice president for public policy at the Center for Democracy and Technology (CDT), a Washington D.C.-based advocacy organization, said that intercepting data communications from a Wi-Fi network, even one unsecured with a password, “should certainly be illegal.”
But he also argued that Congress needed to clarify the law. “It’s certainly far preferably to clarify the statute legislatively,” Dempsey told Computerworld on Friday, rather than require judges like Ware to parse the ambiguous and outdated language of the 25-year-old Electronic Communications Privacy Act (ECPA). “But whichever way this case comes out, clarifying the statute on this particular point is not going to be easy.”
Google said it was considering its next move.
“We believe these claims are without merit and that the Court should have dismissed the Wiretap claim just as it dismissed the plaintiffs’ other claims,” a Google representative said in an emailed statement today. “We’re still evaluating our options at this preliminary stage.”
However, a trade group co-sponsored by Microsoft, eBay, Intel, Oracle and others applauded Ware’s ruling.
“Google has been a bad actor in our industry when it comes to privacy,” Jonathan Zuck, the president of the Association for Competitive Technology (ACT), said by email Thursday. “We have long been aware of the negative impact Google has had on consumers’ faith in the security of their online privacy. It is our hope that the courts continue to treat the Wi-Spy matter seriously so consumer confidence may be restored.”
“Wi-Spy” is the name some, including ACT, have pinned on the Street View debacle.
ACT has regularly voiced anti-Google opinions when the search giant has been in legal hot water. Last week, for example, the group said it supported the Federal Trade Commission’s (FTC) investigation into possible antitrust violations by Google, saying, “Government intervention in the case of Google is what is best for the technology space” and calling the Microsoft rival’s behavior “reckless.”
Ironically, the ACT was a very vocal backer of Microsoft when the company was accused by European Union antitrust regulators of abusing its monopoly position.
Ware also dismissed the plaintiffs’ charges that Google violated California business practice laws, but gave the plaintiffs until Aug. 1 to amend their complaint.
The demand by the 22 plaintiffs that their lawsuit be granted class-action status is still pending.
“This is just another in a whole long series of cases that, case after case, show that the ECPA is a complicated statute that’s very hard to understand,” said Dempsey of the CDT. “Congress needs to respond.”
Gregg Keizer covers Microsoft, security issues, Apple, Web browsers and general technology breaking news for Computerworld. Follow Gregg on Twitter at
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Read more about privacy in Computerworld’s Privacy Topic Center.
A law change has made it legal to install secret cameras to spy on workers, and companies are employing private detectives to do so.
But Wellington International Airport has fallen foul of the Employment Relations Authority for using a private investigator to install cameras to spy on the sexual activities of a manager before the law was changed.
The airport recordings caught duty manager Dieter Ravnjak engaged in “sexual activity” with a woman in an emergency management room and he was dismissed for serious misconduct.
The cameras were installed by private investigator Cedric Hardiman, who also managed the airport’s taxi and parking facilities.
At the time, the Private Investigators and Security Guards Act prohibited investigators from making recordings without the consent of the person recorded – in effect banning secret recordings.
Relying on this, Ravnjak appealed to the ERA, which has thrown out the evidence, calling it “fruit of the poisonous tree”. It is understood Hardiman is being investigated for violating the act – unluckily for him, his indiscretion was a year too early.
A law change that came into effect on April 1 has removed that part of the law and it is now legal for private investigators to make recordings.
New Zealand Institute of Professional Investigators chairman Ron McQuilter said he did not know of a single person prosecuted for breaching the 1974 act and now Hardiman was in trouble after the section he violated had been removed.
McQuilter said even though the law preventing recordings had been lifted, there were still restrictions relating to filming people within their private residence. “It’s taken a restraint off. What it allows us to do is give best evidence.”
In the past, investigators had to give the evidence themselves, which often turned into questioning the investigator’s character, he said.
The law change allowed the evidence to speak for itself.
“Private investigators only seek to determine the facts.”
In another recent case, Coca-Cola Amatil used a private detective to track employee Keith Hooper on his lunch break. He had worked at the Christchurch bottling plant since 1992. Hooper was observed smoking cannabis in a park in September 2009 but was not drug-tested until seven months later, under the “reasonable suspicion” clause in his contract.
He was found to have 20 times the allowed amount in his system and was dismissed. The ERA said it was “troubled” at the interval between detection and testing but upheld the decision to sack him.
New Zealand Council of Trade Unions president Helen Kelly said using a private investigator and holding on to evidence “isn’t the way to run a good business and include staff”. Kelly said the employer should raise issues with employees as they occurred so they had a chance to defend themselves.
Coca-Cola Amatil managing director George Adams said the company had “zero tolerance for consumption of drugs or alcohol during work hours”.
“We will use whatever lawful methods that are available to us as a responsible employer to ensure the safety and wellbeing of our employees.”
– Sunday Star Times
MI5 wrongly collected subscriber data on 134 telephone numbers as a result of a software error, according to interception of communications commissioner Sir Paul Kennedy’s annual report.
A spreadsheet formatting error caused the service to apply for data on the identity of telephone numbers ending in 000, rather than the actual last three digits. “The subscriber data acquired had no connection or relevance to any investigation or operation being undertaken by the Security Service,” writes Kennedy.
He adds that the resulting material was destroyed, the formatting fault fixed and numbers are now checked manually before MI5 requests subscriber data from communications providers.
MI5 also acquired data on the histories of 927 internet protocol addresses without authorisation from a sufficiently senior officer, of GD3 rank or above. This was due to an “incorrect setting on the system used by the Security Service,” according to Kennedy, although the requests themselves were necessary and proportionate. MI5 has corrected the setting on its systems.
Overall, Kennedy reported that public authorities submitted 552,550 requests for communications data during 2010, and the number is increasing by about 5 per cent a year. He could not give a precise reason for the growth, but said “it is indicative of the growth in communications technology”, with “certain police forces” increasing their use.
Nearly two-thirds of requests for communications data – about communications rather than contents – were for subscriber data. This was usually part of an attempt to find the owner of a mobile phone. About a quarter of requests were for traffic data.
Sir Peter Gibson, the intelligence services commissioner, also published his annual report. Having been granted powers under the Identity Cards Act to monitor use of the National Identity Register by intelligence services, he reported that he is “not aware of any acquisition, storage and use made” by such organisations before the register was destroyed earlier this year.
He collected statistics on the number of warrants and authorisations issued to the security and intelligence agencies or armed forces, but these have only been included in a confidential annex. He defended the secrecy by saying publication would “assist those unfriendly to the UK were they able to know the extent of the work” of those agencies.
This article was originally published at Guardian Government Computing.
Guardian Government Computing is a business division of Guardian Professional, and covers the latest news and analysis of public sector technology. For updates on public sector IT, join the Government Computing Network here.
New Delhi, Jun 21 (PTI) BJP today said the reported case of bugging of the office of Finance Minister Pranab Mukherjee was a “serious” issue, especially as it has occurred at a time when several high-profile cases of financial scams have come to light.
“It is a serious matter. If what has come to light is true then it needs to be investigated. This has come at a time when there are so many cases of financial irregularities and scams,” BJP vice-president Mukhtar Abbas Naqvi said.
He wondered as to who could be behind such an act and alluded to somebody in government having an interest in bugging the Finance Minister”s office.
“Pranab Mukherjee is no. 2 in the Cabinet. Who is bugging its own ministers. It needs to be investigated. This raises a lot of disturbing questions,” Naqvi said.
In reply to another question on differences between the government panel- headed by Mukherjee- and civil society members of the Joint Drafting Committee on Lokpal Bill, Naqvi said, “This has become a war of words between those who want a Lokpal Bill and the others who are for a Jokepal.”
He maintained that BJP will take a call on the proposed all-party meeting on Lokpal when it receives an invitation from the government.
“We are against corruption and want that strong steps are taken to end it,” Naqvi said.
