voyeurism
Latest
'Upskirting' is now a crime in the UK
After some setbacks, the UK's bill forbidding "upskirting" has become law. The Voyeurism Act takes effect in April and gives creeps up to two years in prison if they take photos under a person's clothing without consent for the sake of "sexual gratification or to "cause humiliation, distress or alarm." The most egregious perpetrators will also find themselves on the sex offenders register. Summary convictions can involve a year in prison, a fine or both.
Laptops and flat panels also vulnerable to Van Eck eavesdropping
Those who wander into the realms of spying, phreaking, and dubious eavesdropping are likely familiar with Wim Van Eck, but for those new to remote screen-grabbing scene, you should probably take note. Back in the day, Mr. Eck "proved it was possible to tune into the radio emissions produced by electromagnetic coils in a CRT display and then reconstruct the image," effectively rending the images on a distant monitor without the user knowing. Now, however, a modern day guru in his own right has found that the methodology used in 1985 can still be potent today, albeit on laptops and flat panel LCDs. Markus Kuhn has since discovered that by tuning into the radio emissions produced by the cables running into a monitor, hackers can garner the pixels one at a time, and carefully stack them together to form a picture of someone else's screen. Reportedly, Markus was able to "see a PowerPoint presentation from a stand 25 meters away (pictured)," and he also noted that laptops with metal hinges were particularly good targets as they tended to broadcast the necessary signals quite well. Of course, we aren't encouraging the act of on-screen voyeurism without appropriate consent, but if you're interested in seeing what's behind the (faraway) LCD, be sure to hit the read link and push aside those morals for a moment. [Warning: PDF read link][Via Slashdot]
Geek Squad technician arrested for invading customer's shower
Sure, it's easy (and sadistically enjoyable) to bust on Best Buy, especially when it considers frugal shoppers "devils" and shoos away loyal customers holding down the fort for a PS3, but the latest knock against the retailer will be even tougher to shake. While it's no surprise that BB cashiers aren't the easiest to deal with when bringing back demolished goods, a pair of sisters also realized major holes in the company's personality screening process over at Geek Squad. Reportedly, a hired technician actually set up a cameraphone to record one of the siblings whilst she was taking a shower, but obviously wasn't sly enough to hide the "blinking red record light" from view. Subsequently, the violated duo supposedly ganked the internal flash card, made haste for a Verizon store to confirm the contents, and of course, phoned up the boys in blue to come take care of business. Needless to say, the shady criminal is now facing "two counts of invasion of privacy and one count of child molestation," but apparently it's still not a crime to charge clueless customers outrageous rates to tackle the simplest of tasks. Sheesh, where's the justice?[Via Digg]
Wireless Camera Hunter makes spying fun
If you thought Billy Baldwin had a pretty sweet setup in Sliver, but you don't have the time nor the funds to build your own monitor-filled "observatory," then a product called the Wireless Camera Hunter may be just the ticket to feeding your voyeuristic jones. Sporting two antennae and a 2.5-inch TFT LCD for maximum peeping enjoyment, the WCH DD9000 is a video Walkman-sized device that scans the airwaves for wireless video transmissions in the 900MHz to 2.52GHz range, and locks in on any usable signals within 500 feet. For $500, it would be nice to get some rechargeable batteries instead of having to use your own AAs with this model, but sometimes you have to sacrifice the little things for the greater good of spying on your friends and neighbors.
