Social engineering at its best.......

Social engineering at its best.......

quote:
Police bypass subpoenas to get Americans' phone recordsPractice raises civil liberties questions

Tuesday, June 20, 2006; Posted: 8:05 p.m. EDT (00:05 GMT)

These brokers, many of whom market aggressively across the Internet, have broken into customer accounts online, tricked phone companies into revealing information and sometimes acknowledged that their practices violate laws, according to documents obtained by The Associated Press



quote:
"Agencies from all across the country took advantage of it," Slade said.


quote:
Congressional investigators estimated the U.S. government spent $30 million last year buying personal data from private brokers


quote:
The police agencies told AP they used the data brokers because it was quicker and easier than subpoenas, and their lawyers believe their actions did not violate the Fourth Amendment's guarantee against unlawful search and seizure.


And you guys arent worried about your rights???

looks like ANYBODY can buy this kinda info...................

quote:
The records also list some of America's most famous corporate names -- from automakers to insurers to banks -- as buying information on private citizens from data brokers, which often help companies track down delinquent customers.


Wow.......

http://www.cnn.com/2006/US/06/20/pol....ap/index.html

MLF

edit>I originally posted this on another thread...but decided it deserved its own......the cut and paste mucked up the quotes.....but I think you will get the gist

The link still works
;)

The weakest link in the chain of security will always be human.

If I'm not mistaken, there's a move afoot to tighten up such practices as releasing cell phone records w/o warrants. I use one of the major carriers and I know for a fact they've tightened up their policies very recently.

The information age is really a new paradigm. Data is so easily had via database technology that there are few precedents. Combine that with money-is-everything-anything-goes mindset and you got what we got.

Maybe it'd pay to bone up on a little phreaking...

the only surprise i have left is that of the depths our government is now going to, and have the audicty to rationalize it:

Quote:

---

"If law enforcement is encouraging people in the private sector to commit a crime in getting these records, that would be problematic," said Mark Levin, a former top Justice Department official under President Reagan. "If, on the other hand, they are asking data brokers if they have any public information on any given phone numbers, that should be fine."

Levin said he nonetheless would have advised federal agents to use the practice only when it was a matter of urgency or national security and otherwise to stick to a legally bulletproof method like subpoenas for everyday cases.

---

sorry, but i am still naivily :eek:

Quote:

---

"We must break various rules of law in acquiring all the information we achieve for you," Touch Tone Information Inc. of Denver wrote to a law firm in 1998 that was seeking records of calls made on a calling card.

---

:rolleyes:

Thanks for the link morganlefay .... it was a nice reading ....

But i'm afraid that you have used the wrong term to depict the situation here. This, and to the best of my knowledge, is called Privacy Violation, not social engineering.

Cheers

well they used social engineering to get the info....


As for the privacy issues........I am sure most people are quite aware of my views of your current administration :rolleyes:


MLF

This is the kind of thing that a government can do after mining all thet information on the general public....

http://edition.cnn.com/2006/SHOWBIZ/....ap/index.html

Quote:

---

An anonymous telephone call" has been placed to the New York Daily News, an FBI report notes at the time. The caller stated that the "religious" wedding -- Miller was Jewish and Monroe had converted -- was an obvious "cover up" for Miller, who "had been and still was a member of the CP (Communist Party) and was their cultural front man." Monroe also "had drifted into the Communist Party orbit."

The memo is one of many included in Miller's FBI files, obtained by The Associated Press through the Freedom of Information Act. Miller, who died last year at age 89, was a longtime liberal who opposed the Vietnam War, supported civil rights and, in one play, "The Crucible," linked the Cold War pursuit of communists to the Salem witch trials of the 17th century.

---

The funny thing...norma always suspected she was being watched by the FBI

MLF