Selling trojans semi-ligitimately is still a bad idea...

[jinxy]

LOl Zen,
You didn't close the bold tag mate and yes I am some what English challenged.

[Maestr0]

The problem was not that he created the tool. the problem was the the creator himself, was using it illegally. He was recieving the information from the trojan that was installed w/o the victims consent or knowledge, and was obviously completely aware of that (intent). Think of it this way, it is NOT illegal to manufacture wiretappers and spy gizmo's and then sell them (or give them away) with a disclaimer discouraging illegal use. It is illegal to manufacture the same items, tap someones phone then sell the tapes to some *******.

But the toughest job is to get the proof to show beyond any reasonable doubt that he is guilty.

Of course it is, and thats the way it shoud be. Thats what courts and lawyers, and chains of evidence and investigations are for. I'd rather let a thousand guilty men go free then convict an innocent one. That innocent one could be me or you.

-Maestr0

[Katja]

Ah! There we have it. We shouldn't convict him for creating this tool. He should be convicted for using it illegally. That does make things very different, though. If he has used the tool himself, to spy upon some unwilling victim, then yes... He'd have to end up in the same prison as all those people who bought it and used his tool in illegal ways too.

Still, an interesting point here. Say, you're making binoculars. Do you have to add a disclaimer to them that you're not allowed to use them to look into the bedroom of the woman next-door?

And of course other points of discussions are possible. Say you hide a small camera in your house to spy upon the babysitter while she's babysitting your child. Would the use of that be legal? And what if you hide one camera in the toilet, one in the bathroom and a few more at other places to have all her actions covered. Would that still be legal? Or would you commit a crime because the camera in the bedroom and bathroom are invading her privacy or whatever?

Making it worse, assume you have a camera in your bathroom to keep an eye on what's happening there when the babysitter is putting your child into path. And on this camera you see the babysitter undress (not in front of your child) to wash some puke off her since the baby puked over her.
Or when the camera sees the babysitter getting naked in bath with your child doing some "weird things" with the child...

I feel that all these espionage gadgets are in some grey area and the rules aren't very clear about this for most people. Would you be allowed, for example, to record a phone conversation without notifying the person on the other side about the conversation being recorded? Modern phones are getting more and more gadgets these days so I won't be suprised about phones with recording options. But are they legal, if you don't warn the other person about the message being recorded?

I've heard about two police officers who were questioning some dumb suspect. They put him in a room with a Xerox machine and told him it was a lie detector. They then connected some wires to the suspect and started questioning him. And after every answer one of the police officers would press on the "copy" button and the machine would spit out a piece of paper. Whenever that happened, they told the suspect that he was lying. And the suspect believed this and gave a full confession of his crimes.
The court released him simply because the police officers had used an illegal way to question him... The suspect had confessed and was free to go. Worse, the double jeopardy rules made it impossible for him to be arrested for the same crimes again. In the end, the suspect was laughing the hardest...

[nihil]

We shouldn't convict him for creating this tool

That is very true, the dipsh1t couldn't create a paper bloody bag. If you had fully read other people's posts you would see that he took someone else's software and had it modified to suit his nefarious purposes. That IS a crime. Just like modifying a weapon to fire full automatic, or sawing shotgun barrels off.................you have now created something illegal.

As you said:

Say, you're making binoculars. Do you have to add a disclaimer to them that you're not allowed to use them to look into the bedroom of the woman next-door?

That is exactly my point!...................binoculars are innocent per se, only their usage might be illegal. What we are talking about here is MODIFIED SOFTWARE which is more like the illegal firearms scenario?

[jinxy]

Still, an interesting point here. Say, you're making binoculars. Do you have to add a disclaimer to them that you're not allowed to use them to look into the bedroom of the woman next-door?

Nooooooooooooooooooow,

But if you sell them as. The ultimate look here, you will see sectrets, naked people and all things you should not see, maybe you are breaking the law.

This is done to death................Thread closed????????????

[Juridian]

Originally posted here by zencoder
Depending on the locale, using 'spyware' *is* legal to do against your employees...providing they have been properly notified (again, varies by country/state/city law).

I'd say his lawyers probably have a better idea of how to defend this than anyone here (do we have any JP's here at AO? I don't recall anyone ever admitting it...) Free Speech is a tricky subject; for example, is Free Speech ok when it is used to incite violence? I'm not saying yes or no...just giving up some food for thought.

Actually, I have been trained in corporate/business law and computer security (Doesn't make me an expert...but does at least give me half a clue). And this guy isn't doing it to his own employees....he's giving people software to spy on their spouses on other people's computers (the boyfriends, the companies, the schools, etc).

[¤The¤Spe©ialist]

Actually, I have been trained in corporate/business law and computer security (Doesn't make me an expert...but does at least give me half a clue). And this guy isn't doing it to his own employees....he's giving people software to spy on their spouses on other people's computers (the boyfriends, the companies, the schools, etc).

Actually his users did that.

Thing is most sites that actually do these flash greeting things will actually e-mail the link to it to other people for you... in that case he did.

[devpon]

he's giving people software to spy on their spouses on other people's computers (the boyfriends, the companies, the schools, etc).

But he is using computers operated by him to transmit illegally obtained information.

The Loverspy program, disguised as an electronic greeting card showing images of puppies and flowers, was sent as an e-mail. When it was executed, it would begin recording victims' e-mail messages and the Web sites they visited, prosecutors said. The information would be transmitted to computers operated by Perez-Melara and relayed to customers, authorities said.

[zencoder]

Originally posted here by devpon
But he is using computers operated by him to transmit illegally obtained information.

And that is the point TheSpecialist has been making, I believe. He was part of the chain of transmittal of illegally collected data.

[Juridian]

Ahh, I think I see what the issue with our viewpoints is.

Yes, his clients were the ones who were the agents propagating his software. But by selling this software for these explicit reasons, that also gives him liability. If I create a trojan and stick it on my website for anyone to download with the explicit knowledge it is a trojan and is for research purposes only.....that is one thing. If I SELL YOU the trojan for the explicit purpose of using it as such....that is an entirely different thing. This isn't the same as selling guns, unless your add says 'Our brand of gun is the best for robbing liquor stores and shooting unfaithful spouses'. Gun stores generally don't sell you guns when you tell them you want to use them to rob and shoot people.

I doubt that the majority of the people he sold software to even knew that the intended activities were illegal.

By having the software pushing the data to his own servers he was adding more rope to hang himself with.

Kind of funny tho, slap a price tag on it and you get paid for your social engineering and hacking in a pseudo legit fashion. *sighs*