A2Z Investigations - Private Investigator NJ private investigator NY

‘Infidelity plus’ – the new defence against murder

2012-02-03T12:43:00.001-08:00

Posted on February 3, 2012 by admin

A partner’s affair can no longer be treated by courts as a defensible reason to lose control and kill – but it can be a factor

Lord Chief Justice Lord Judge gender-neutralised his reasoning. Photograph: Ian Nicholson/PA

Parliament made clear two years ago that sexual infidelity should not be allowed as a defence for murder, whatever the circumstances. A partner’s affair could no longer be treated by courts as a defensible reason to lose control and kill.

However, giving judgment last week, on three domestic killing appeals, Lord Chief Justice Judge ruled: “Where sexual infidelity is integral to and forms an essential part of the context the prohibition does not operate to exclude it.”

It seems that parliament says infidelity doesn’t count and the court says it does.

Killing a wife for infidelity was “classic” provocation under the law prior to 2009. The courts were littered with cases in which men blamed their partner’s adultery for making them kill her.

In the case of Morgan James Smith in 1999, Lord Hoffman noted that historically one of the legal justifications for killing due to losing self-control had been finding a wife in adultery. It was regarded as “the highest invasion of property”.

In 2008 Justice for Women asked a senior judge why he had accepted a plea of guilty to manslaughter instead of murder, when a man had stabbed his wife in fury.

“Because it was classic provocation,” he said. “She was leaving him for another man. I would have been practically ordering them [the jury] to give a verdict of manslaughter!”‘

Lord Hoffman, again in the case of Smith, understanding that this still prevailed, said: “Male possessiveness and jealousy should not today be an acceptable reason for the loss of self-control leading to homicide.”

And that is what this legislation attempted to do. The exclusion of infidelity as an allowable trigger for a loss of self-control defence was not because legislators thought it didn’t make both men and women angry but because it is contrary to modern public policy to allow it as a defence to murder.

Lord Judge accepted that the statute does not allow infidelity to be a “qualifying trigger” capable, in law, of causing someone to lose self-control but, because all the circumstances at the time of the killing have to be examined. If infidelity is present it has to be looked at and may add to the potency of any other conduct which might cause a loss of self-control. So if there can no longer be an infidelity defence there is instead a sort of “infidelity plus” defence, notwithstanding the statute says: “In deciding whether a loss of self-control had a qualifying trigger, the fact that a thing done or said constituted sexual infidelity is to be disregarded.”

Clearly nobody in future will assert that they lost control because of infidelity. The defence will always be “infidelity plus”. For example, she was unfaithful plus she goaded me about it.

Lord Judge studiedly gender-neutralised his reasoning but that does not alter the context that it has been men who kill their unfaithful partners and it is still very rare that the opposite is the case.

Consequently this is mainly a reversal for women, as well as a setback for parliament which intended to pass a law that recognised, like Lord Hoffman, that harmful culture must change. It should be appealed to the supreme court (though without Lord Phillips, who has already criticised the provision).

The campaigning women who fought for this change for women, and are devastated at how quickly the courts have undermined it, should be reassured that the new law has raised the bar considerably for those who kill and plead loss of control.

The defence is only allowed if the conduct provoking the cause of the loss of control was “extremely grave”, gave the defendant “a justifiable sense of being seriously wronged” and would have made someone with “a normal degree of tolerance and self-restraint” lose control and kill as well. These are all far higher tests than before .

Further and importantly, women and men who kill their violent partners now have an equivalent plea if fear of serious violence made them lose self-control. The earlier law of provocation did not work for women, its basis being that the defendant was angered to kill and such women were not angry but afraid. At that time, the court of appeal was helpful, stretching the law of provocation to help, but it took this statute finally to end the appalling injustice which otherwise prevailed where angry men and women who killed their partners were acquitted of murder and frightened men and women who killed their abusers were convicted of it. This surely is new, good, clear-sighted justice and it is unaffected by last week’s judgment on the three domestic killing appeals.

Only one of these appeals succeeded, where the trial judge followed the statute and prohibited the defence of loss of control through infidelity from going to the jury. That man, Jon-Jacques Clinton must now be retried on the defence of “infidelity plus”. In the other two, while the old law might have produced acquittals both were convicted by juries rejecting their case under the narrower new law. Ironically, perhaps the same would have happened to Clinton if his defence were put to a jury. We shall soon see.

Despite the totemic setback for campaigning women, in this judgment, progress has been made in the Coroners and Justice Act and the days when one can legitimately say, as many protesters did about this case last week “Justice for who? Not for women” ought, in this aspect of the law of murder, at least, to be moving towards a close.

source: http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/2012/jan/23/infidelity-plus-defence-murder?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+theguardian%2Fcommentisfree%2Frss+%28Comment+is+free%29

for more information about infidelity or if you think your spouse is cheating, contact the private investigators at A2Z Investigations – www.a2zinvestigations.com

Motion to expand jurors’ background checks met with ACLU furor

2012-01-20T09:01:00.000-08:00

If the Essex County Prosecutor’s Office is granted its request for date of birth information on prospective jurors, and a criminal background check reveals an open warrant on one such juror, will an arrest follow? Will a deal be worked out?

“We’d be running a fugitive safe surrender program,” Superior Court Assignment Judge Patricia Costello said, answering her own question at Friday’s hearing on the motion in Newark.

What about the background check itself? Would it include searching for a prospective juror’s juvenile record or any criminal complaint that never led to arrest?

And at what point would the state conclude its background check?

Those were just a few of the many questions left unanswered during the hour-long hearing in which two assistant prosecutors argued in favor of the motion, with attorneys for the state public defender’s office, a defense lawyers association and the New Jersey chapter of the ACLU expressing their strong opposition.

Costello will issue a written ruling by Feb. 3.

Assistant prosecutors Howard Zuckerman and Sara Friedman told the judge they would agree to the court retaining juror birth date information only if the court ran the check itself then provided any resulting arrest and conviction records.

As it now stands in New Jersey, courts have birth date information on prospective jurors but are only obligated to provide the prosecution and defense with names, occupations and towns of residence.

In its brief requesting the expanded information, the prosecutor’s office cited three instances where jurors were found to have lied about being charged with a crime or having relatives who were charged with a crime.

The background checks were needed, Friedman argued, to avoid the potential of jury’s guilty verdict later being overturned because one of the deliberating jurors was found to have a criminal conviction.

Opposing the motion, Deputy Public Defender for Essex Michael Marucci said three incidents in five years does not constitute an overwhelming need for such change.

Marucci added he was concerned that the motion “was more of an idea than a specific plan.” He argued, too, that if Costello grants the motion, the defense should be entitled to the same information along with any subsequent background check findings.

Zuckerman said should his office be granted date of birth information, it would supply the defense with all relevant data from the background check but would not provide the actual birth dates. “We have concerns for the safety of jurors,” Zuckerman said. “We don’t want that information out there.”

Leslie Stolbof Sinemus, who is president of the Association of Criminal Defense Lawyers of New Jersey, called the motion an invasion of privacy. “Is it appropriate that jurors doing their civic duty are investigated like witnesses and defendants?” she asked in court during the hearing.

Arguing on behalf of jurors, ACLU attorney Alexander Shalom said the prosecutor’s office was “trying to bootstrap a problem of qualification with information they want to have.” Because prosecutors would be unwilling to provide the defense with the same information it is seeking from the court, Shalom told the judge, “we can sense there is a value in the raw data.”

For more New Jersey background check information, please visit http://www.a2zinvestigatigations.com

source:http://www.nj.com/news/index.ssf/2012/01/motion_to_expand_jurors_backgr.html

Security Officials Ramp Up Surveillance For Super Bowl

2012-01-19T07:00:00.000-08:00

“If somebody is thinking about committing a crime, they do see that we have eyes up there and we can see if they do anything and respond to it,” Homeland Security Chief Gary Koons said. “A lot of the cameras were purchased through Urban Area Security Intervention grants through the U.S. Department of Homeland Security. Over the last nine years, Indianapolis has used the grants to purchase cameras, bomb suits and other technologies to keep people safe.”The surveillance network will link in with cameras already installed around the Indiana War Memorial by a state agency that keeps watch on more than 24 acres of property and green space throughout downtown, RTV6′s Jack Rinehart reported.Brigadier Gen. Stewart Goodwin, of the Indiana War Memorial, said keeping tabs on downtown security will be just a click away for some officials.”If you had the right (Internet) address, you could set up a laptop anywhere and you could watch the camera from there,” Goodwin said.Indianapolis police, Homeland Security and FBI officials said they will monitor the camera network around the clock from two separate locations.”If something happens, they can pinpoint where you were, what happened, and that to me gives me more safety,” Goodwin said. “If you have security cameras and more of a police presence, it’s always good for the city. I always feel safe downtown.”Homeland Security officials said they will deploy cameras on moving vehicles, on helicopters and on pods that can be moved to different locations as needed so that fans can focus on having fun.”It’s probably going to be hard not to be on some type of camera while you’re downtown in the vicinity of the Super Bowl,” Goodwin said.

for more security and private investigator information, please visit

http://www.a2zinvestigations.com

source:http://www.theindychannel.com/news/30244695/detail.html

AshleyMadison.com Says Hispanics Are 'Fastest Growing Community When It Comes To Infidelity'

2011-11-21T09:57:00.000-08:00

According to AshleyMadison.com, the Hispanic community is "the fastest growing community when it comes to infidelity."

In a press release sent by the self-described "largest dating site for married people", the company states that since launching the Spanish-language version of their website in 2009, 1.1 million Latinos have signed up, accounting for 31 percent of their total new membership.

The company further suggests that according to their data, "Hispanic members have affairs at the youngest age: Average age of 27 for women and 34 for men (compared to 33 for women and 40 for men in the general U.S. population)."

Considering the stereotype of Latinos as family-oriented and with conservative social values, this may come as a bit of a surprise.

In a 2010 review of General Social Survey data, one intrepid blogger took a look at the "relationship between ancestry and philandering in the U.S." The writer's analysis indicates that 19.6 percent of married Mexican men and 12.4 percent of married Mexican women have cheated on their spouses, whereas the rates for Americans (i.e. those who claim this as their only ethnicity) were 28.2 percent for married men and 15.5 percent for married women, indexing over 40 percent and 25 percent, respectively, versus the Mexican respondents.

Persons of the Iberian peninsula (Spain and Portugal) rated low for women, 10.9 percent, but quite high for men, at 38.5 percent.

While Hispanics are different from Mexicans or Iberians, and while perhaps presenting a bit of a statistical case for the machista reputation of Latino men, the findings possibly reinforce the stereotype that Hispanics are more socially conservative that the U.S. mainstream when it comes to this issue.

A separate finding reported by AshleyMadison.com in their press release corroborates this, somewhat, indicating that Hispanics who are cheating on their spouses "are choosing to have fewer partners: U.S. members average three affair partners per year; Hispanic members average only one affair partner per year."

However, in 2009, the National Institutes of Health published a report which showed that Latino youths are less apt to protect against sexually transmitted diseases and unwanted pregnancy due to their focus "on the emotional and social repercussions of potentially revealing infidelity by advocating condom use than the physical repercussions of unsafe sex."

The findings suggest that this group, Latino youths, are promiscuous and prone to concealing their infidelity, behavior which could persist and lead to the kinds of findings noted by AshleyMadison.com.

So, the jury is still out. The people at AshleyMadison.com may be onto something, maybe they know what’s really going on behind the curtains of Latino marriages. To be sure, they recently announced they are accelerating the launch of their website for Mexico, hoping to launch by end of November.

for more information about infidelity of cheating spouse, please visit http://www.a2zinvestigations.com

source:

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2011/11/10/hispanic-infidelity_n_1086990.html

Big brother using more surveillance devices

2011-11-03T07:38:00.000-07:00

Law enforcement agencies are using more surveillance devices as a part of their investigations, but these may not necessarily be increasing the number of arrests, according to the Attorney-General's Surveillance Devices Act 2004 annual report.

The report (PDF) stated that the Australian Federal Police had seen an increase of about 30 per cent in the number of surveillance device warrants, obtaining 406 warrants in the reporting period, up from 311 in the previous year. It is the main government agency that requests surveillance warrants aside from the Australian Crime Commission, which saw a 10 per cent decrease in warrants obtained from last year, down to 179 warrants from 199.

Overall, there was a 12.6 per cent increase in warrants issued over the previous year. These statistics, while they include NSW and Victorian Police, represent warrants at a federal level. State and territory law enforcement agencies have separate legislation to draw from, and are only included in the attorney-general's report during Commonwealth or joint investigations.

Warrants issued by law enforcement agencies.
(Credit: Attorney-General's Department, CC BY 3.0)

Although the annual report breaks warrants into categories of optical, listening, data, tracking and device retrieval, almost all warrants are listed as a combination of these. This makes it difficult to determine what type of surveillance that government agencies are using, or if there is a trend towards, for example, greater data surveillance over optical.

Warrants were also typically never refused. In the past three reporting periods, only two warrants were refused. In addition, no applications to extend warrants had been refused in the past three years.

In some cases, warrants aren't necessary. According to the report, optical surveillance devices can be used if they can be installed and retrieved without entering a premises or interfering with the interior of a vehicle without permission. Similarly, tracking devices can be installed on or under vehicles so long as they do not require entering a premises or interfering with the vehicle's interior.

Arrests, prosecutions and convictions resulting from surveillance.
(Credit: Attorney-General's Department, CC BY 3.0)

However, although the number of warrants has increased, the total number of arrests, prosecutions and convictions have not necessarily matched. Total arrests dropped by 29 per cent from 108 last year to 77, and prosecutions increased by 23 per cent from 44 to 54, while convictions dropped 38 per cent from 24 to 15.

The report did state that it is possible that the figures may be understated due to consequent arrests, prosecutions and convictions occurring in separate reporting periods, and that, in some cases, convictions are recorded without the need to provide information obtained through surveillance.

for more information about surveillance or any form of private investigation, please visit http://www.a2zinvestigations.com

source:http://www.zdnet.com.au/big-brother-using-more-surveillance-devices-339325377.htm

Scientologists target ‘South Park’ with Private Investigators

2011-10-26T05:33:00.000-07:00

An episode of “South Park” from 2005 that parodied the Church of Scientology was so upsetting to leaders of the religious sect that it secretly investigated the show’s creators Trey Parker and Matt Stone, according to documents made public yesterday.

Private investigators for the church allegedly staked out the “South Park” offices, rifled through Stone’s and Parker’s trash, and even tried to recruit a mole to infiltrate the “South Park” team, former high-ranking Scientologist Mark Rathburn says. The goal, according to Rathburn, was to dig up dirt, which the church could use to pressure the show into not poking fun at the highly secretive sect popular with Hollywood stars such as John Travolta and Tom Cruise.

The Scientology investigator failed to dig up anything juicy enough, so they set their sights on actors John Stamos and Rebecca Romijn -- who were friends with Parker and Stone.

All of this was the result of a “South Park” episode, “Trapped in a Closet,” depicting Stan Marsh becoming a Scientologist because it was “fun and free.” On the show, he was discovered to be the reincarnation of the church’s founder, L. Ron Hubbard.

source:http://www.nypost.com/p/entertainment/tv/scientologists_target_south_park_gBJ4Evi6sUxEtv8E90bY6N

for more information on surveillance and private investigators, please visit http://www.a2zinvestigations.com

Millions of Americans Under Electronic Surveillance with Smart Meters

2011-10-20T09:57:00.000-07:00

Many electric companies have installed “Smart Meters” on homes all over the country, and they plan to do so on every house in America. Such meters track when you turn something on or off, and how many watts your appliances pull. Because they are radio transmitters, they then send the record over wireless networks that bounce from smart meter to smart meter to its final destination, a computer at the electric company.

The data they collect shows when you’re at home, sleeping, on vacation, or have visitors. They know when your turn on your computer, have a cake in the oven, of you may be running a business out of your home. In short, it gets inside your home and monitors your living patterns.

Such personal surveillance amounts to a warrantless search, a clear violation of our 4th Amendment rights. And it goes on continually, day after day.

Once the electric company receives the data, they store it and have the freedom to sell it to whomever it pleases or provide it to the police upon request. In fact, because smart meters are radio transmitters, anyone can intercept the data. In essence, you might as well be living in a glass house. I wonder whatever happened to the right to privacy the Supreme Court read into the 4th Amendment as the basis for Roe v. Wade.

You can tell if you have a smart meter on your home if you look at the meter and find that it has a “1-WATT” written on the label. In addition, it will say that it’s been licensed by the FCC (Federal Communications Commission).

Currently, police in Texas, Ohio, British Columbia and other places, routinely use electronic data to find marijuana grow houses, enforce business licenses and other laws. Unusual power patterns get the attention of the electric company and the police consider it probable cause to raid a residence for a variety of violations.

If you don’t already have a smart meter and the electric company comes to your home to say they’d like to install a new meter, you don’t have to give your consent. They don’t tell you they’re installing a smart meter, yet if you give your consent, they consider that you have agreed to the surveillance device.

If you already have a smart meter on your house, you can send the electric company a certified letter requesting its immediate removal.

source: http://www.huliq.com/10280/millions-americans-under-electronic-surveillance-smart-meters

for more information about security and surveillance, contact A2Z Investigations or visit our website at www.a2zinvestigations.com

Infidelity: How To Cope With A Cheating Spouse

2011-10-11T05:45:00.000-07:00

Infidelity in your fifties can be particularly unsettling and cause a whirl of emotions, says Sarah Cornwell. But you can move on and it can lead to positive change

Finding out that your partner is having an affair is devastating at any age, but if you’re in your fifties and you’ve been together for years the shock is seismic. Suddenly you’re forced to see the person you thought you knew in a totally new light.

“It makes you feel that all the certainties in the world are collapsing around you,” says Andrew G Marshall, one of the wisest and most experienced marital therapists in the business. “Even if you accept your own contribution towards the problem, the realisation that you get rewarded like this just because you took your eye off the ball not only undermines your trust in your partner but in the general sense that the world is a fair place.”

The fifties are a classic time for affairs. The sense of ‘Is that all there is?’ hangs heavy in the air and the kids are no longer the glue that binds couples together. But no matter how commonplace infidelity has become (it is estimated that 30 to 40 per cent of us will stray at some stage) it is always painful.

So how can you handle the emotional chaos of those first few weeks, when you can’t eat, your brain won’t stop and the only thing that gets you through the night is a hefty dose of Temazepam?

With any luck, at this stage in life, you’re able to overcome the initial impulse to reach for the nearest blade – tempting though it may be – or make off with the mistress’ kitten, like MP’s wife Christine Hemming. Rather than storming out, you’re more likely to take a considered view of what you really want.

“I had always assumed that if my husband was unfaithful I’d leave him,” says Anna, who discovered her husband’s two-year affair with a colleague three years ago. “But when it actually happened to me I reacted very differently, I think because I’d learned from previous crises in our relationship that impetuous gestures are usually counter-productive as well as hard to go back on. I thought very carefully about what was at stake.

“My initial instinct was to tell the whole world the gory details – his parents, our kids, the taxi driver, my hairdresser. I held back, and now I’m so relieved I did. We told the kids the bare minimum, and I found that it was better to talk to just one or two good friends, because otherwise I got too much conflicting advice.

“I remember times when it was a huge relief to be with people who didn’t know anything about the affair.”

Andrew Marshall’s book, How Can I Ever Trust You Again?, speaks to the partner who has had the affair as well as the one who discovered it. Marshall says the hardest thing about the immediate aftermath is learning to live with uncertainty. He urges couples to accept the complexity of their emotions.

“It’s normal to be filled with all sorts of contradictory feelings: love and hate, hope and despair, fear and relief. We don’t like living with ambivalence, and often push ourselves to come down on one side or the other, even if it makes things worse. And there is a tendency to think, I’m in so much pain we’ve got to solve this now. In fact, there is no ticking clock.”

It’s reassuring that 25 years spent counselling couples through the aftermath of affairs has convinced Marshall that, despite all the misery and pain, the soul-searching that follows can make those relationships that survive stronger and better.

“There are many positives: you and your partner will probably speak more to each other in five days than you have in five years. Affairs have the capacity to bring all the unburied bodies in your relationship to the surface. So you’re not just dealing with the affair itself, but also with the long-term issues that you ignored beforehand, which usually turn out to be not as big or as scary as you thought. And that, ultimately, must be a good thing.”

How to cope with the shock: Andrew Marshall’s tips

Resist the temptation to throw your partner out straight away. You need answers to your questions.

Equally, don’t forgive too soon. You can’t forgive until you know what’s happened and seen its full impact.

Don’t make major decisions when you’re in shock. Put off the decision to stay or go for as long as possible.

Tell your kids the absolute minimum: “We’re having problems and we’re sorting it out” is quite enough.

Don’t tell the world and his dog. What you need is a sensible friend who won’t tell you what to do, preferably someone who doesn’t know your partner well (and who hasn’t gone through a bitter divorce themselves).

Don’t go in for detective work. You’re not equipped to deal with evidence that is bound to be incredibly painful. The healing process starts when you give your partner the chance to tell you.

If you believe that your spouse is cheating, find out the real answers NOW, visit http://www.a2zinvestigations.com and we will get you the answers you deserve.

source:

http://www.high50.com/archives/family-relationships/infidelity-how-to-cope-with-a-cheating-spouse

'Cheating' Study Claims Men Resent Sexual Infidelity, Women Jealous Of Shared Love

2011-09-27T06:25:00.000-07:00

How would you react if you found out that your partner had cheated? Would the emotional betrayal outweigh the physical one, or would the sexual infidelity hurt more than the undermining of your love?

A new study says that the answer might have a lot to do with your gender.

According to evolutionary psychologist Barry Kuhle's recent study, which was published in Personality and Individual Differences, while men are more likely to interrogate their partners about the sexual nature of an affair, a woman will often ask her partner whether he is in love with the other woman.

How did Kuhle discover which aspect of infidelity bothered men and women most?

Well, since it isn't exactly ethical -- or possible -- to require one group of study participants to go and cheat on their spouses and another group to remain faithful, researchers used the reality television show "Cheaters" to collect observational data about how partners react when confronting their partners about infidelities.

Kuhle, an assistant professor of psychology at the University of Scranton in Pennsylvania, had student researchers catalogue the different tactics used in 75 affair confrontations featured on the show -- 45 in which the victims were women, and 35 in which the victims were men. The results showed that while 57 percent of men versus 29 percent of women were likely to ask about sex, posing questions such as "Did you have sex with him/her?" and "Was he/she better than me in bed?," 71 percent of women -- versus 43 percent of men -- asked if the cheater was in love with the other man or woman.

Kuhle told LiveScience.com that his interest in the "sex differences in jealous interrogations" was sparked after watching "Closer," a 2004 film starring Clive Owen, Natalie Portman, Julia Roberts and Jude Law that chronicled their characters' infidelities.

"During a pivotal, tough-to-watch scene, Clive Owen's character interrogates Julia Roberts' character Anna about the nature of her infidelity, and his grilling centers on sex," Kuhle explained to Live Science. "He bombards her with a barrage of questions about the frequency, timing, whereabouts, type, quality and orgasmic nature of the sex she had with the interloper. Befuddled by the sexually obsessed nature of the interrogation, Anna asks, 'God, why is the sex so important?'"

Reality TV, however, might not be the most reliable source for natural human interaction. Any "Real Housewife" can attest to the fact that shows are often edited to become more dramatic or viewer-friendly, and many other reality show stars complain about editors taking their words and reactions out of context. Paula Abdul, for example, told USA Today that the way different clips were combined made it difficult for her to watch her own Bravo reality series "Hey Paula."

"They'd put a camera on me when I got wind that my dog was in a coma, and they'd make it (seem) like it was about hair and makeup," the former "American Idol" judge said.

"Cheaters", in particular, has been challenged about its accuracy. After host Joey Greco got stabbed on camera while assisting a woman confront her cheating partner, "Inside Edition" reported allegations that the stabbing had been faked. The Houston Press ran an investigative piece that claimed five twenty-somethings who appeared on the show were paid $400 a pop to act out phony scenarios (and 50 more dollars to refer a friend). Producers denied these claim.

But even in spite of the suspect veracity of "reality" television, evolutionary biology supports Kuhle's study, he says.

Kuhle told Today.com, "Modern men have inherited an evolved wisdom from a long line of ancestral men who could never be 100 percent certain that a child was actually theirs." In other words, it makes sense in evolutionary terms for men to be more concerned about the sexual nature of a partner's affair.

Ancient women, on the other hand, did not run the same risks of their partners' sexual infidelities, according to Kuhle. Rather, women were more threatened that their partner would form an emotional bond with a different partner and, therefore, shift their time, commitment and protection to another woman.

Other studies have chronicled the ways men and women differ in how they interpret infidelity and experience jealousy.

A 2009 study published in "Evolutionary Psychology" polled 130 Canadians and found that while men felt guiltier for cheating on their partner sexually, women felt guiltier about being unfaithful emotionally. Men continued that they would feel guiltier about having a one-night stand than falling in love with someone else (without sex). Women had the opposite response.

Furthermore, when Penn State clinical psychologists Kenneth Levy and Kristen Kelley asked 400 people if it would be more upsetting for their partner to form an emotional bond with another person or sleep with them, men tended to be more disturbed by sex and women by the emotional bond.

However, that study, published in January 2010 in "Psychological Science," also implied that these reactions to cheating have to do with more than just gender and are rather explained by how a person was raised to deal with intimacy. Levy and Kelley found that both men and women with "dismissive" or "hyperindependent" senses of detachment -- meaning that they were taught as a child to avoid intimacy -- were more jealous of sexual infidelities. Those with "secure" attachment, male or female, were more likely to be disturbed by emotional infidelity.

if you feel like your spouse is cheating and would like to find out the truth, please contact us at http://www.a2zinvestigations.com

source: http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2011/09/15/cheating-study-men-sex-women-love_n_963872.html

Police Arrest 22 in Phone Tapping Case

2011-09-21T04:09:00.000-07:00

Israel's Hebrew-language Maariv reported Monday that Israel Police arrested 22 'private investigators' for installing spyware on mobile phones allowing access to private conversations and text messages.

Documents filed in a Rishon Letzion court revealed the Israel Police Lahav 433 unit and Computer Crimes unit conducted a covert protracted investigation into 11 detective agencies allegedly using software previously reserved for the security services.

Such eavesdropping softwares have become increasingly popular with private detectives and citizens who suspect their partners of infidelity.

The software allows mobile phones to be remotely accessed without leaving a trace or revealing to the owner they are being surveilled. All calls, text messages, and e-mail messages are transmitted to and from the infected phone can be received and recorded in real time.

A spokesman for the Israel Police said investigators believe hundreds of people across the country are using similar software to spy on competing businesses, family, or romantic partners.

The suspects will be charged with illegally installing a listening device for the purpose of eavesdropping and invasion of privacy. Israeli law restricts the use of eavesdropping technology to police and security services within set guidelines and routine oversight.

One of the private investigators, being charged in the case asserted he believed the Prime Minister's Office had obtained and installed such software in order to listen in on private citizen's conversations.

Police refused to comment on the allegation, but the PMO categorically denied the report.

If you are looking for a private investigator in New York and New Jersey, please visit http://www.a2zinvestigations.com

source: http://www.israelnationalnews.com/News/News.aspx/148057#.TnjZmtSk9Bk

Threat Level Privacy, Crime and Security Online Previous post Next post How 9/11 Completely Changed Surveillance in U.S.

2011-09-13T04:49:00.000-07:00

Former AT&T engineer Mark Klein handed a sheaf of papers in January 2006 to lawyers at the Electronic Frontier Foundation, providing smoking-gun evidence that the National Security Agency, with the cooperation of AT&T, was illegally sucking up American citizens’ internet usage and funneling it into a database.

The documents became the heart of civil liberties lawsuits against the government and AT&T. But Congress, including then-Sen. Barack Obama (D-Illinois), voted in July 2008 to override the rights of American citizens to petition for a redress of grievances.

Congress passed a law that absolved AT&T of any legal liability for cooperating with the warrantless spying. The bill, signed quickly into law by President George W. Bush, also largely legalized the government’s secret domestic-wiretapping program.

Obama pledged to revisit and roll back those increased powers if he became president. But, he did not.

Mark Klein faded into history without a single congressional committee asking him to testify. And with that, the government won the battle to turn the net into a permanent spying apparatus immune to oversight from the nation’s courts.

‘I didn’t expect the terrorists would be so successful ultimately into getting us to abandon our core principles.’

Klein’s story encapsulates the state of civil liberties 10 years after the shattering attacks on Sept. 11, 2001. After a decade, the country is left with a legacy of secret and unilateral executive-branch actions, a surveillance infrastructure whose scope and inner workings remain secret with little oversight, a compliant judiciary system that obsequiously bows to claims of secrecy by the executive branch, and a populace that has no idea how its government uses its power or who is watching out for abuses.

“As someone who was in the Financial District of Manhattan on 9/11, that was a horrifying morning for everyone,” says Kevin Bankston, a lawyer for the Electronic Frontier Foundation, who’s still fighting to reinstate the lawsuits his organization filed against the government and the telecoms. “Yet I didn’t expect the terrorists would be so successful ultimately into getting us to abandon our core principles, and I think the founders would, in many ways, be ashamed of our response to the attack.”

Sen. Ron Wyden (D-Oregon) in August put a hold on Obama’s push to renew the surveillance powers until the administration investigates how many people in the U.S. have had their communications “reviewed” by the feds. The director of national intelligence responded that “it is not reasonably possible” to determine that number.

In the post-9/11 bureaucratic frenzy to never let a similar attack happen again, the Congress rushed to pass the Patriot Act, a domestic-surveillance wish list full of investigatory powers long sought by the FBI. And the government created the Department of Homeland Security, an unwieldy amalgamation of agencies united under a moniker straight out of a bad science-fiction novel.

Those who thought that the election of Obama would “re-change” everything were mistaken. Instead, the administration has carried on the Bush-era policy of using high-level classification and the “state secrets privilege” to block court challenges to the unsavory aspects of the “War on Terror.”

So endemic is the secrecy, that Jim Harper, director of information policy studies at the Cato Institute, says he can’t answer the question about what the state of surveillance and civil liberties is in the U.S. a decade after 9/11.

“The best answer is, I don’t know,” Harper said. “We have had a real breakdown in government and public oversight of government. We have a real secrecy problem in this country.”

But Harper does think that the next decade we’ll begin to see some questioning of the money being spent on Homeland Security programs and that the courts will start to stand up more to the executive branch.

There’s no way to confirm if you are on the No-Fly or Secondary Screening list, and no way to challenge them.

Well-known examples of secrecy are the No-Fly and Secondary Screening lists. The government initially refused to admit the lists existed, and struggled for years to deal with a system that has never caught a terrorist, but has inadvertently caught soldiers, politicians, children and even a prominent nun.

Most recently, the Obama administration was caught using the No-Fly list as a way to keep American citizens from flying back to the States, in order to interrogate them overseas.

There’s no way to confirm if you are on either of these lists, and no way to challenge them or see the evidence against you.

Harper says that’s plainly unconstitutional.

“It’s pretty black-and-white,” Harper said. “It’s just entirely unconstitutional to have a direct executive branch punishment without the intermediary of a judge.”

As for the Patriot Act, government watchers point to National Security Letters as the prime example of abuse of the government’s expanded powers under the “War on Terror.” So-called NSLs are self-issued subpoenas that FBI agents can use to get phone and other transaction records. The FBI began using tens of thousands of such letters every year after the NSLs’ reach was expanded by the Patriot Act.

The Justice Department’s inspector general has issued a series of scathing reports, including one that found that FBI agents used fake emergency requests to gather data on Washington Post and New York Times reporters, and that AT&T and Verizon were paid to open offices inside the FBI, where employees for the telecoms let FBI agents search phone records without doing any paperwork — in blatant violation of federal law. The violations were then effectively legalized retroactively by a ruling from the Obama administration’s Office of Legal Counsel.

Now, the Administration is telling the American people that al-Qaida is on the ropes. But it seems unlikely that Americans will witness, or even demand, the withering away of the Homeland Security industrial complex.

While there are many reasons for that, perhaps the most important one is the imperative that started just post 9/11, when President Bush turned to Attorney General John Ashcroft and said, “Don’t let this happen again.”

It’s those words, and that sentiment, that have kept electronic surveillance powers in effect — even though they’ve largely proved to be a source of dead ends for those battling al-Qaida.

‘We begin to assume that the more our liberties are invaded, the more secure we are.’

“There is no evidence that the ability to conduct broad electronic surveillance with less judicial supervision has been key to the intelligence successes we have seen since 9/11, and the absence of those powers were not an important factor before 9/11,” says Julian Sanchez, a research fellow at the Cato Institute.

And Sanchez notes that the number of U.S. persons who had records siphoned up by the FBI in 2010 reached over 14,000 — a new record. “We have become so accustomed to talking about the balance between civil liberties and security that we begin to assume that the more our liberties are invaded, the more secure we are, when there is very little evidence that is the case,” Sanchez said.

Both Harper and Bankston see reasons for hope that the court system may have lost its post-9/11 habit of deferring to the federal government anytime it invoked the words secrecy and national security.

Bankston cited a recent court win for the ACLU, where the government is being forced to reveal information about the number of people who have been tracked through their cellphones without investigators getting a warrant.

“There are always signs of hope that keep us going where we can occasionally get a window in the what the government is doing, and we will keep looking for those windows,” Bankston said..

for more information about security, please visit http://www.a2zinvestigations.com

The Spy Who Tweeted Me: Intelligence Community Wants to Monitor Social Media

2011-09-09T06:14:00.000-07:00

A research arm of the intelligence community wants to sweep up public data on everything from Twitter to public webcams in the hopes of predicting the future.

The project is the brainchild of the Intelligence Advanced Research Projects Activity, or Iarpa, a relatively new part of the spy community that’s supposed to help investigate breakthrough technologies. While other projects exist for predicting political events, the Open Source Indicators program would be perhaps the first that mines data from social media websites.

The idea is to use automated analysis to sift through the deluge of publicly available data to help predict significant societal events, like a popular revolution. The nascent project, called “Open Source Indicators,” is just the latest move by the national security community to come to grips with the flood of information now available on social media. As Danger Room’s Lena Groeger has reported, it’s also intended to predict natural disasters or economic disruptions.

The science underlying the project is the notion that early indicators of major social upheavals might be hidden in plain, socially-networked sight. “Some of these changes may be indirectly observable from publicly available data, such as web search queries, blogs, micro-blogs, internet traffic, financial markets, traffic webcams, Wikipedia edits, and many others,” the announcement, published August 25, says. “Published research has found that some of these data sources are individually useful in the early detection of events such as disease outbreaks, political crises, and macroeconomic trends.”

Indeed, social media sites, such as Twitter and Facebook, garnered major attention during recent events like the Arab Spring, and have been credited with helping to organize protesters and even foment revolution. Authoritarian governments trying to hold on to power noted the trend, and attempted at times to shut down access to those sites — and occasionally the Internet as a whole — in the hopes of stymieing efforts to organize protests.

The idea of the U.S. intelligence community culling data from social media is still a new one, and is likely to raise a number of questions. For example: what constitutes public data?

Iarpa, for its part, defines public data as “lawfully obtained data available to any member of the general public, to include by purchase, subscription or registration.” That raises its own host of questions, like whether the intelligence community could register a fake profile on Facebook, in order to “friend” people and obtain more information.

For those who fear the all-seeing surveillance state, Iarpa says there are some things the program won’t do. It won’t be used to predict events in the United States, for instance. Nor will it be used to track specific individuals.

for more information about social media and all investigation areas, please visit http://www.a2zinvestigations.com

source: http://www.wired.com/dangerroom/2011/09/social-media-spies/?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+wired%2Findex+%28Wired%3A+Index+3+%28Top+Stories+2%29%29&utm_content=Google+Reader

Americans Polled Support Use of Video Surveillance

2011-09-09T06:07:00.000-07:00

A decade after the 9/11 attacks, Americans polled overwhelmingly support the use of video surveillance in public places as a tool to combat terrorism, and more than half support the use of scanning technology on airline passengers, a new study say.

The study—“Civil Liberties and National Security: 10 Years After 9/11”—was produced by both the Associated Press (AP) and the NORC Center for Public Affairs Research, and it surveyed 1,087 adults from July 28 through Aug. 15, 2011.

The respondents were asked questions focused on national security and the rights that define the American way of life, according to the AP and the center. The research sought to find where the line would be drawn between civil liberties and security. In addition, the survey also looked back at the impact of the events of 9/11 and on how it has affected the way Americans live their lives today, according to the researchers. The data collected includes:

71 percent of those surveyed favor surveillance cameras in public places to watch for suspicious activity.
58 percent favor random searches involving full-body scans or pat-downs of airplane passengers.

The poll also covered security policies that do not involve cameras or screening technology. The results of that section of the study are:

55 percent favor government analysis of financial transactions processed by U.S. banks without a warrant.
47 percent favor requiring everyone to carry a national identity card and that it must be produced to the authorities on demand.
35 percent favor racial or ethnic profiling to decide who should get tougher screening at airports.

for more security of private investigator information, please visit http://www.a2zinvestigations.com

source:http://www.governmentvideo.com/article/111034

10 ways to secure your smartphone

2011-09-07T05:28:00.000-07:00

With smartphone ownership on the rise and users increasingly store important content on their phones, cybercriminals are more and more interested in these devices, which makes mobile security more pertinent than ever.
With the IT consumerization trend, there is a blurring of lines between personal and corporate devices, Myla Pilao, director of core technology marketing at Trend Micro's TrendLabs, told ZDNet Asia in an e-mail.
Citing research released last week by Ovum, she noted that Asia-Pacific mobile phone shipments is expected to hit 836 million by 2016. The market for smartphones will continue to grow and remain a key target of cybercriminals, Philippines-based Pilao added.
A Symantec report also revealed an increase of 42 percent in the number of new vulnerabilities detected in mobile operating systems. According to David Hall, Symantec's Asia-Pacific consumer product marketing manager, they jumped from 115 in 2009 to 163 in 2010.
In an e-mail, Hall noted that smartphones have paved the way for a single communications device, adding that people forget that they are susceptible to hacks and data leakages.
"We can anticipate that these earlier threats will continue to evolve," he said. "While these threats are limited and not likely to make significant inroads right away, their impact is likely to increase in the near future."
That said, there are ways for smartphone owners to minimize impact from data loss when their handsets are lost or stolen. ZDNet Asia uncovers from insiders in the IT security industry 10 measures users can take to secure their smartphones.
1. Set passwords A simple password protection using a strong password or PIN makes it difficult for thieves to gain access, Hall of Symantec said.
Paul Ducklin, Asia-Pacific head of technology at Sophos, highlighted that a recent survey found that 22 percent of users had lost their mobile device in the past 12 months, of which nearly 70 percent of the phones were completely open to the person who found or stole them. The finder of a lost smartphone would be able to make calls, read e-mail, access private photos and even access online services, he explained in an e-mail.
"That's unacceptable in the modern Internet-connected world. Being slack about your own security actually affects other people," Ducklin said.
The security expert added that the main reason people don't protect their phones even with an elementary passcode is because they find it a hassle."They don't want the inconvenience of having to type in four extra digits before they make a phone call, or send an SMS, or indulge their Twitter addiction."
But Trend Micro's Pilao advised that even though typing in a password is time-consuming and tedious, this step ensures data is safe when the phone is physically lost. Passwords were after all created for a reason--to deter cybercriminals from accessing your data, she said.
2. Utilize all security features People often forget to use the features in the smartphones that are already available at their disposal, Pilao said, and that a simple change in the settings is all it takes to add that level of security and safeguard privacy.
Most smartphones come with a phone lock option to enhance privacy, Pilao said, yet people do not use this feature and leave their phones unlocked and unsecured. Smartphones that are equipped with a fingerprint lock option, such as the Motorola Atrix which has a biometric fingerprint reader, ought to be employed, Pilao added. "Currently, this is the safest option as it ensures that you are the only one who can access the information stored in your smartphone," she explained.
3. Download apps from reputable sources and update regularly When downloading apps, users often unknowingly allow malware to be installed in their phones without even knowing how or why, Pilao noted.
Hall cautioned that users have to be wary of applications that do not cost anything. "Consumers sometimes forget to question the authenticity of free applications and downloading such applications can put them at risk of being attacked by criminals."
Only apps from reliable sources should be installed, such as official stores and developers, advised Luis Corrons, technical director at Panda Security's PandaLabs.
The Spain-based expert noted that there have been a number of cases this year whereby cybercriminals have taken legal, non-malicious apps, added malicious items and uploaded them to the Android Market as a free offering. This resulted in thousands of downloads and infections, he said.
Users should also ensure that they regularly update their apps to patch them as soon as a new security patch becomes available, Hall added.
Concurring, Corrons warned: "Many attacks use known security vulnerabilities which are already fixed, but many users don't regularly update and they get infected this way."
4. Disable Wi-Fi auto-connect option With the promise of ubiquitous Internet, mobile phone users may have a tendency to enable their devices to automatically connect to Wi-Fi networks. Pilao pointed out that cybercriminals may take advantage of this by setting up phony Wi-Fi networks in popular areas to attract unsuspecting users and hijack their personal information.
Hall agreed, adding that often, consumers will use any wireless connection available without checking if they are secure.
Elaborating, Pilao said connecting to an open network may be easy, free and convenient but the process is risky. There is the potential for intrusion and identity theft because the information stored in the smartphone transits freely to the wireless router or access point and vice versa.
"Anyone on the same network can access your information," she said. "Turning the automatic wireless connection off is thus another mean to keep mobile threats at bay."
5. Consider a mobile security app According to the Trend Micro spokesperson, being cautious about downloading and installing apps "just isn't enough because cybercriminals will never tire of coming up with ingenious ways to trick you into giving out personal information".
To that end, Pilao urged smartphone owners to use an effective security solution as it is still their "best bet".
Trend Micro's Mobile Security protects digital files stored on phones and secure mobile banking transactions, Pilao said, and identifies and stops malware before they infect devices and reduce vulnerabilities.
Android users can also protect their phones with Symantec's Norton Mobile Security, which upgrades that control over Android devices with antitheft, antimalware and call or SMS blocking capabilities, Hall said.
6. Use a SIM code Sophos' Ducklin advised users to add a SIM (subscriber identity module) card code, which is only required when phones are rebooted. However, he noted that many users seem to think that a device password also protects their SIM so they don't bother to set a SIM-specific code, he said.
"SIMs are intended to allow you to plug your phone's identity into any other device, which is what a crook will do if their goal is to make free calls on your account," he explained.
Ducklin warned that if someone steals a user's SIM overseas and roaming is enabled, calls made by them will be extremely expensive and could quickly "cost thousands of dollars".
7. Sync phone for backup Users should use syncing software to backup their digital data and secure crucial data on their computers, so nothing will not be lost should the mobile device be misplaced, said Symantec's Hall.
"Smartphones contain so much personal information that backing up should be standard practice," Hall noted. "Consumers often become complacent and forget to backup their data by syncing with another computer at regular intervals."
This makes it even more difficult to recover from loss of their device, he said.
8. Reduce location-sharing Checking in and GPS capabilities on smartphones have opened up a "whole new world" of staying in touch with family and friends, Hall added, but these sharing come at a cost to personal privacy.
"Users should ensure they understand the privacy settings of location-aware applications and set them to a level that is suitable for them," Hall said.
Pilao added that users should keep their smartphones safe by properly configuring location and security settings. "Do not disclose your location so easily to strangers," she said. "Keep location broad instead of being specific."
9. Check before clicking links Like computers, smartphones require certain levels of permissions especially when visiting Web sites they are not familiar with, Pilao noted, adding that users should still be wary of what they click.
"Many people make the mistake of clicking on links without checking their authenticity, especially URLS received via social media channels," she said. "Many links could potentially be malicious when executed without permission."
10. Understand permissions Users should also be cautious when accepting requests for personal and device information, or when they come across other actions that aren't necessary for a certain app to work, Pilao warned.
"Giving your permission allows cybercriminals to use them as a backdoor program," she warned. "Cybercriminals can gather and send device information to a remote URL, or perform other functions without your authorization."
for more security information, please visit us at www.a2zinvestigations.com

source: http://www.zdnetasia.com/10-ways-to-secure-your-smartphone-62301902.htm

New surveillance tracker launched

2011-08-22T08:09:00.000-07:00

ROMSEY, England, Aug. 2 (UPI) -- A moving target indicator that tracks and maps vehicle and personnel movement within real-time UAV surveillance footage has been launched in Britain.

Roke Manor Research says its VTA system reduces the risk of an operator missing key events on long unmanned-aerial-vehicle surveillance missions by automatically alerting operators to moving vehicles and personnel.

The system provides visualization of the motion on a map for improved situational awareness. For example, changes in behavior can be identified by comparing the current flow of vehicles and personnel with historical data.

VTA also allows real-time UAV video to be overlaid onto existing satellite images so operators can identify the precise location of unusual activity and quickly share that information.

VTA enables rapid forensic analysis during mission debriefings or after a major event by allowing operators to filter and replay recorded tracks through a simple "click-to-replay" interface. Recorded tracks are automatically tagged with metadata such as location, speed and direction. Operators can filter or search for data of interest using the tags to speed the review process and provide actionable intelligence.

"Moving target indication systems are proving increasingly valuable in counter-insurgency battle situations," said Robert Whitehouse, Business Development manager at Roke Manor Research. "Roke's innovative development of VTA takes this technology to another level by increasing operators' ability to provide actionable intelligence significantly faster than ever before to support operations on the ground.

"Using this application, users are able to detect, track, record, visualize, review and disseminate information about vehicle and personnel movement," he said.

VTA is a software plug-in compatible with all common operating systems for use with both visible band and infrared video imagery.

Read more: http://www.upi.com/Business_News/Security-Industry/2011/08/02/New-surveillance-tracker-launched/UPI-61191312299552/#ixzz1VlqfFmA9

for more surveillance information, please visit http://www.a2zinvestigations.com

How To Become a Licensed Private Investigator

2011-08-17T11:35:00.000-07:00

Private Investigator Licensing, Training, and Services

Following is guide to assist you in learning how to become a licensed private investigator. This reference guide includes a state-by-state listing of contact information for obtaining a private investigators license, links to private investigator training courses, a list of potential services you might provide as a private detective, and more.

Overview of the Private Investigation Occupation

A licensed private investigator, or PI, is a person who undertakes investigations, usually for a private citizen or some other entity not involved with a government or police organization. Licensed Private Investigators often work for attorneys in civil cases or on behalf of a defense attorney. Many licensed private detectives work for insurance companies to investigate suspicious or fraudulent insurance claims. Many private investigators are hired to obtain proof of adultery or other illegal conduct to establish grounds for a divorce. Collecting evidence of adultery or other bad behavior by spouses and partners is still one of the most common and profitable activities that licensed private investigators perform.

Many jurisdictions require PIs, or private eyes, to be licensed, and they may or may not carry firearms depending on local laws. Some investigators are ex-law enforcement officers. Investigators typically keep detailed notes during each case and often testify in court regarding their observations on behalf of their clients. Licensed private detectives take great care to remain within the law (e.g., being forbidden to trespass on private property or break into homes) on pain of losing their licenses as well as facing criminal charges. Irregular hours may also be required when performing surveillance work (e.g., outside a subject's house during the early hours of the morning).

Private detectives also undertake a variety of work that is not usually associated with the industry in the public's view. For example, many PIs are involved in process serving, the personal delivery of summons, subpoenas and other legal documents to parties in a legal case. The tracing of debtors can also form a large part of a PIs work load. Many agencies specialize in a particular field of expertise. For example, some PI agencies deal only in skip tracing. Others may specialize in technical surveillance countermeasures, which is the locating and dealing with unwanted forms of electronic surveillance (for example, a bugged boardroom for industrial espionage purposes).

Increasingly, modern Private Investigators prefer to be known as "professional investigators" rather than "private investigators" or "private detectives". This is a response to the negative image that is sometimes attributed to the profession and an effort to establish and demonstrate the industry to be a proper and respectable profession.

The U.S. Department of Labor, Bureau of Labor Statistics published a useful article in the 2004-2005 edition of the Occupational Outlook Handbook for Private Detectives and Investigators. The guide describes the nature of private investigation work, working conditions, qualifications, employment, training and advancement, earnings, job outlook, and related occupations. If you want to become a private detective, this is a great place to begin.

Private Investigator Services, Training, and Reference Material

View a list of potential private investigator services
View Private Investigator training courses and training books
View a list of Private Investigator books in our book store
Private Investigator salary information
Find your dream job as a private investigator! Post your Resume Today.

Getting Your Private Investigator License

Following is a state-by-state listing of contact information for obtaining your private investigator license, or to find out if a private investigator is properly licensed. Also included are links to various state private investigator associations, and a link to our Private Investigator directory for each state if you are interested in hiring a private investigator.

Some states do not require a license specifically for private investigations, but they may require a business license, or have other legal requirements such as training or certifications. Many states also require that you pass a test to become a licensed private investigator.

If you conduct business in more than one state, you may want to consider getting a private investigator license in all states that you do business in.

source:http://www.einvestigator.com/links/license.htm

for more information visit http://www.a2zinvestigations.com

Trolling with someone else's Facebook is identity theft

2011-08-10T07:14:00.000-07:00

California judge: trolling with someone else's Facebook is identity theft

By Venkat Balasubramani and Eric Goldman | Published 7 days ago

From time to time, we will be running posts from Eric Goldman's Technology & Marketing Law Blog. Sometimes they will look similar to other articles appearing on Ars; other posts will be more "bloggy" in nature. This is one of the latter.

Venkat Balasubramani's take

Rolando was a juvenile who received an unsolicited text message with the victim's e-mail password. According to the court, he used the password to gain access to the victim's Facebook account and posted several sexually inappropriate messages from the victim's account. The Facebook posts included posts on the walls of the victim's friends and the following change to the victim's profile:

Hey, Face Bookers, [sic] I'm [S.], a junior in high school . . . I want to be a pediatrician but I'm not sure where I want to go to college. I have high standards for myself and plan to meet them all. I love to suck dick.

The victim testified that she suffered stigma as a result of these and other posts. "I used to love going to school," she said. "Now, I dread dealing with this every day."

The juvenile was prosecuted under a California statute (section 530.55) which applies to anyone who:

wilfully obtains personal identifying information [of the victim and] uses that information for any unlawful purpose, including to obtain, or attempt to obtain, credit, goods, services, real property, or medication information.

Did the defendant willfully obtain the victim's "personal identifying information"? The court holds that, despite his argument that he "passively receiv[ed] the text message" which contained the victim's password information, he "willfully" obtained it because he remembered it or otherwise recorded it so he could use it later. Moreover, the court concludes that the defendant willfully obtained the victim's Facebook account password. The record was devoid of evidence as to how exactly the defendant accessed the victim's Facebook account, and in the absence of any such evidence, the court says it's "reasonable to infer" that the defendant reset the victim's Facebook password using her e-mail password and then gained access to the victim's Facebook account.

Did the defendant use the victim's information for an unlawful purpose? In addition to obtaining the information willfully, the perpetrator has to use the information for an "unlawful purpose." The first possibility was that the defendant violated section 647.6, which applies when someone "annoys or molests any child under 18." However, under California Supreme Court precedent, this statute requires a motivation by "an unnatural or abnormal sexual interest in the victim." [emphasis added] The court concluded that the facts did not fit into this statute because the defendant had no real contact with the victim other than the Facebook posts and he also testified that he "intended his comments to be taken as a joke."

The second possibility was that the defendant used the victim's personal information to commit a tortious act. The defendant argued that "unlawful purpose" as used in the statute should be restricted to criminal conduct, but the court disagreed, noting legislative intent to expand the scope of the statute in amending it.

The court also pointed to the fact that the definitions section of the statute included the term "crime," and the legislature chose instead to use "any unlawful purpose." The defendant practically conceded that his conduct satisfied the requirements of a civil defamation claim. The court therefore finds that the defendant's act constituted libel and constituted an "unlawful purpose" under the statute. Alternatively, the court held that the defendant's conduct satisfied the statute because it also constituted a criminal offense. The defendant's actions violated section 653m, which makes illegal any contact with another person using "obscene language... by means of an electronic communication device... with [the] intent to annoy."

It's tough to muster much sympathy for the defendant, who was previously in trouble for reckless driving when he drove his car "at three girls in the school parking lot, but stopped abruptly several feet away from them in an attempt to scare them."

The definition of "personal identifying information" in the statute is broad. (We ran into an analogous problem in the Pineda case). It looks like the court focused on the Facebook password as being the information in question that supported the violation of the statute, but the opinion is not totally clear on this. A broad definition of personal identifying information coupled with the court's decision to allow tortious conduct to satisfy the "unlawful purpose" could lead to a statute that is expansive in scope and which should raise everyone's First Amendment hackles. Given that the defendant used the e-mail password to access Facebook, this does not feel to me like a case that pushed the statute to the limit.

Interestingly, the defendant argued that his conduct would violate California's newly enacted e-personation statute (section 528.5) which was effective January 1, 2011, and the fact that this statute was passed demonstrates that the legislature did not view his conduct as violating the previously existing statute. The court disagrees with this argument, noting that the newly enacted e-personation statute has different elements from section 530.5:

Section 528.5 does not include a requirement that a perpetrator obtain personal identifying information. As a result, a person could violate section 528.5 by merely posting comments on a blog impersonating another person. There is no requirement, under these circumstances, that the person obtain a password—a key distinction.

Yikes. This is precisely what is wrong with California's e-personation statute.

Eric Goldman's take

This case plays out as a Greek-style tragedy in three parts.

Part one: Someone sent the victim's e-mail password to the defendant. The court is vague about who did this or how that person got the victim's password.

This brings up one of my modern rules for clean living: never tell anyone else your passwords. Ever. (Another rule for clean living is to constantly change your passwords, but this is harder to obey). I am such a stickler about my passwords that I don't tell them to anyone. Certainly not to campus IT when they want to muck with my computer, but I don't even tell my passwords to my wife. (FWIW, my wife has told me many of her passwords, but I would never use them without her express instructions). I know there's a debate about the spouse-and-passwords dilemma. It's not that I don't trust my wife. I do, completely. But my rule is clean and simple. If someone other than me types in my password, then they ripped it off. (We'll revisit the problem of accessing a logged-in computer in a bit).

In this case, we don't know why the password-obtainer had the victim's password. Perhaps it was hacked. More likely, the victim made an error in judgment. Either way, the defendant apparently used the e-mail password to help reset the Facebook password and access the Facebook account.

Part two: The defendant misused the victim's password. It goes without saying that the defendant had no business logging into the victim's e-mail or Facebook account. Doing so was inappropriate even if the defendant merely just looks around, given the amount of private information stored in email and Facebook accounts. It was even worse to publish content under that person's name, and worse still to post fake come-ons for sex.

Having said this, once a juvenile finds out he/she can access to a peer's Facebook account, it seems like it would be almost irresistible not to muck around with it. I don't want to dismiss this entirely as "kids will be kids," but I'm sure a nontrivial percentage of kids would take advantage of a peer's password if the circumstance presented itself. Perhaps it's like the joyriding of days of old. If people left keys in their cars, some kids would take the cars for a spin. We can enact draconian laws to discourage joyriding, but if keys are left in cars, joyrides are inevitable. Here, the defendant basically took the victim's Facebook account for a joyride. It was unquestionably wrong behavior, but given its inevitability, it probably shouldn't be felonious.

The defendant's behavior here is analogous to the fake online profiles that teens set up for school officials. I blogged in more detail about that phenomenon last year. In connection with the DC v. RR case, I also blogged on the problems of kids saying hyperbolically outrageous things online that aren't amenable to punishment under traditional defamation or bullying laws. All of these examples remind us that kids are going to push limits with electronic tools just like they do offline. We need to find safer ways to let kids be kids online without ruining their lives.

Part three: The court stretched the identity theft statute too far. As Venkat recaps, the court confronted several statutory ambiguities without any good common law precedent. The court also didn't acknowledge or consider any constitutional concerns with its ruling. Instead, the court reaches the counterintuitive and potentially troubling result that publishing fake content through someone else's account steals their identity. Obviously that takes us a pretty far distance from a paradigmatic case of pretending to be someone for commercial benefit (i.e., what I typically think of as "theft").

As Venkat indicates, the ruling reinforces why we should be nervous about California's recent "e-personation" law, which is even more broadly written and applies even when there's no password misuse. It also shows why expansive identity theft laws should be feared, not encouraged. For more on that point, see my post about Illinois' identity theft law.

This ruling leaves open two obvious questions:

Will it always be identity theft to use a third party password to publish fake content via someone else's account?
Will it be identity theft to access a third party or shared computer and publish fake content via someone else's account? In that case, the password isn't obtained at all. Given how many people always leave their computers logged in to various services, I imagine this happens with some frequency.

for more information visit http:www.a2zinvestigations.com

source: http://arstechnica.com/tech-policy/news/2011/08/california-judge-trolling-with-someone-elses-facebook-is-identity-theft.ars

Facebook killer video scam spreads between social networkers

2011-08-01T06:18:00.000-07:00

A new scam has spread quickly across Facebook this weekend, pretending to be a link to a TV news report about an alleged Facebook killer.

Here's a typical message that has been seen spreading between social networking users:

(BREAKING NEWS) Facebook-Killer
[LINK]
07-29-2011 - News гepoгts of a maп they are calling the 'Facebook Killer' have ƍone ramрant, he has claimed 9 lives in the United States so far that we ᴋnow

Correct errors in your background check

2011-08-01T06:09:00.000-07:00

How Do I Correct Any Errors Found on Background Checks?

You’re in luck. The law is on your side when it comes to background checks for employment purposes. Prior to making a decision not to hire you, the employer must give you written notice of their intent to do so and the name of the company that conducted the background check on you. They must also give you a copy of the report and wait at least five (5) days to allow you to dispute the information in the report. If an error is found on the report and you dispute it, the employer and the background check company must reinvestigate the dispute and correct any errors and prove to you that they have done so.

How Can I Avoid Errors on Background Checks in the First Place?

Jobseekers can avoid errors on background checks by making sure their Information is current, accurate, and secure with a “personal” background check. In today’s “Age of Information,” people are what their personal information says they are. Jobseekers consenting to a background check should at least know what information will be uncovered beforehand or else suffer the consequences of lost jobs. Personal background checks protect consumers by protecting their personal information and finding any errors before they find the consumers. Since it is their information, it is up to consumers to make sure their Personally Identifiable Information (PII) is correct with a personal background check.

If there are errors on your background check report, correcting those inaccuracies can be time-consuming and frustrating. MyBackgroundCheck.com can not only provide you with a complete report, but can also filter and help repair your background check.

You can find even more tips to assist you in finding your new job by downloading our free Ultimate Job Seeker’s Guide from http://www.mybackgroundcheck.com/jobseekerguide/. The Ultimate Job Seeker’s Guide is packed with help from cover letters to growing you professional network. It’s a great tool for job seekers in any field.

source:http://www.pinewswire.net/2011/07/correcting-and-avoiding-errors-on-you-background-check/

for more information - visit A2Zinvestigations at http://www.a2zinvesigations.com

Background Checks - they are important

2011-07-07T11:41:00.000-07:00

Keeping your resume up to date is extremely important but, you don’t want to neglect your background check—after all, it is a powerful document detailing your personal history. Even if a report was not required to obtain your current position, you never know when a background check may be requested.

Background checks often include inaccuracies—in fact, up to 80% of background reports include some kind of erroneous data. In many instances, information is included that belongs to another individual of the same name. It can take time to clean up a background check and to filter out the information that does not belong to you. If a background report is requested, you want the data to be correct so that it accurately describes your personal history—this is why it is absolutely crucial to regularly monitor your personal background check report and to correct any inaccuracies.

source: http://www.mybackgroundcheck.com/blog/post/2011/06/22/The-importance-of-maintaining-a-background-check.aspx

for more information regarding private investigator practices - visit http://www.a2zinvestigations.com

Born cheater? Why being unfaithful could be in your genes

2011-06-16T11:18:00.000-07:00

He was clearly born with a significant amount of sporting prowess but was Tiger Woods also born to be unfaithful to his wife?

The inclination towards infidelity could be in your genes, a study suggests.

Researchers examining female zebra finches believe they cheat on their mates due to variations in DNA handed down by male ancestors.

Genetic analysis revealed promiscuous males tend to sire promiscuous daughters - and this explanation for 'playing away' may also apply to humans, believe scientists.

The shamed golfer Tiger Woods is believed never to have forgiven his father Earl for cheating on his mother and last year anthropologists identified a gene mutation linked to the feel-good brain chemical dopamine that is liable to make people more likely to sleep around.

For the latest research, ornithologist Dr Wolfgang Forstmeier and colleagues at the Max Planck Institute in Seewiesen, Germany, observed mating and display behaviour in more than 1,500 captive zebra finches from five consecutive generations.

A study of 1,500 female zebra finches suggests they cheat on their mates due to variations in their DNA handed down by male ancestors

The birds are monogamous and stay together for life although some will mate with others occasionally. For many species that live this way a large portion of offspring are sired by promiscuous males.

The researchers said: 'Individual male zebra finches are known to differ markedly in their readiness to court unfamiliar females.

'These consistent individual differences in courtship rate are partly genetic and affect male success in obtaining extra-pair copulations, not because these males differ in their attractiveness to females, but because of individual differences in the number of extra-pair copulation attempts.'

It has perplexed researchers why female birds with partners mate with other males when it offers no clear benefits and is associated with costs such as withdrawal of paternal care and sexually transmitted disease.

Using video monitoring of colour-banded birds the researchers first observed staged encounters between single males and females and then examined the behaviour of pair-bonded birds in communal breeding aviaries.

The results published in Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences suggest genetic variants found to enhance promiscuous behaviour in males - which results in more and varied offspring - may similarly promote promiscuity in females.

The researchers said: 'Here we show in the socially monogamous zebra finch, individual differences in extra-pair mating behaviour have a hereditary component.

'Intriguingly, this genetic basis is shared between the sexes, as shown by a strong genetic correlation between male and female measurements of extra-pair mating behaviour.

'Hence, positive selection on males to sire extra-pair young will lead to increased extra-pair mating by females as a correlated evolutionary response.

'Our study is a proof of principle that indirect selection on extra-pair mating behaviour can operate. Such indirect selection can work in several ways, of which two are particularly intriguing.

'Positive selection on male promiscuity might lead to a correlated evolution of female promiscuity, despite possible net fitness costs to females.

'Conversely, strong selection against female promiscuity may lead to correlated effects on males, in the sense males would forego opportunities for extrapair mating.'

Source: http://www.pinewswire.net/2011/06/born-cheater-why-being-unfaithful-could-be-in-your-genes/

Check to see if your spouse is cheating - visit http://www.a2zinvestigations.com

Digital Detectives: Custody Battle Leads to Facebook Double-Sting

2011-06-10T08:36:00.000-07:00

A woman pretended to be a 17-year-old to draw out incriminating evidence from her ex-husband via Facebook. But an investigation after his arrest showed that he was the true online mastermind. Oh, the e-intrigue!

According to the Smoking Gun, 29-year-old Angela Voelkert created a fake account for 17-year-old “Jessica Studebaker," complete with a trashily attractive photo, and friended her ex-husband. Then, in an attempt to gain information she could use against him in a custody battle, she chatted him up. He said he put a GPS tracking device on his ex-wife's car, the more easily to monitor her every move. And he told "Jessica" that "you should find someone at your school…that would put a cap in her ass for $10,000." He had plans to "take care of" old Angela, he said. Heavily based on the exchanges, the FBI arrested 38-year-old David Voelkert on Friday, but did he ever have a surprise for them.

Suspecting it was Angela all along, David Voelkert had gotten a notarized affidavit shortly after Jessica came online. In it, he said that he believed this was not a real person but rather his ex-wife or someone she knows. He said he was engaging with this person and lying in order to gain proof that his ex-wife was tampering with his personal life, proof he would then use himself in court. "In no way do I have plans to leave with my children or do any harm to Angela Dawn Voelkert or anyone else," he wrote above the Indiana notary's stamp. He then kept one copy and gave another to a relative for backup.

The timeline worked, his affidavit coming days before he said anything incriminating. The notary was interviewed, the document authenticated, and his case was dismissed. Situations like this are why the phrase "Oh, snap!" was invented.

for information on how to protect yourself visit www.a2zinvestigations.com

http://newsfeed.time.com/2011/06/10/digital-detectives-custody-battle-leads-to-facebook-double-sting/?hpt=hp_t2

NJ Supreme Court Denies Private Investigator, Blogger Protection as Journalist Under Press Shield Law

2011-06-08T04:19:00.001-07:00

(Reuters) - A blogger sued for defamation over comments posted on an Internet message board is not entitled to the same protections as a journalist, the New Jersey Supreme Court ruled on Tuesday.

The court said that blogger Shellee Hale's criticism of a software company on a porn industry bulletin board was not covered by the New Jersey press shield law, which protects members of the news media from revealing their confidential sources.

In an online reader forum, Hale had accused Too Much Media LLC, which provides software to adult entertainment sites, of profiting from a 2007 security breach that exposed customers' personal information. She wrote that the company's owners had threatened the lives of people who questioned their conduct. Her posts appeared on the message board of Oprano, the self-described "Wall Street Journal of the adult entertainment industry."

After the company sued Hale for defamation, Hale claimed that her posts were part of a broader expose of the online pornography industry that she intended to publish on her website, Pornafia, which never fully launched. Hale, a licensed private investigator and former Microsoft employee, said she created the site as an "information exchange" intended to expose criminal activity in the adult entertainment industry.

"(We) do not believe that the legislature intended to provide an absolute privilege in defamation cases to people who post comments on message boards," the court wrote. Otherwise anyone with a Facebook account could claim the journalist privilege, it said. Instead, the court concluded that online message boards are little more than unscreened reader comment pages or public forums for discussion.

The court "has taken a sharp turn against the nontraditional journalist and people writing on the web," said Hale's lawyer, Jeffrey Pollock. He said the decision relegates anyone writing for alternative media to a second class of protection. New Jersey can no longer pride itself on having the broadest shield law in the nation, he said.

Pollock had argued that the court should consider Hale's intent to later disseminate the news to the public. But the court rejected the so-called "intent test" used by some federal courts when applying the press shield.

Joel Kreizman, a lawyer for Too Much Media, said he was relieved the case could now resume before the trial court after a two-year hold caused by Hale's shield law claim. He said the shield issue was significant because it could have prevented him from asking Hale questions about the identity of her sources. "We believe she was put up to this by somebody else," he said.

The New Jersey Supreme Court's opinion affirmed the rulings of both the trial and appellate courts. However, unlike the appeals court, the high court said that the shield law does not require newspersons to identify themselves as reporters, carry certain credentials or follow professional standards like taking notes, fact-checking or disclosing conflicts of interest.

The case is Too Much Media LLC et al v. Hale, New Jersey Supreme Court, No. A-7-10.

Visit http://www.a2zinvestigations.com for more information

source for story: http://www.pinewswire.net/2011/06/nj-supreme-court-denies-private-investigator-blogger-protection-as-journalist-under-press-shield-law/

Facebook changes privacy settings for millions of users – facial recognition is enabled

2011-06-08T04:09:00.000-07:00

When Facebook revealed last year it was introducing facial recognition technology to help users tag their friends in photographs, they gave the functionality to North American users only.

Most of the rest of us found the option in our privacy settings was “not yet available”, which meant we could neither enable or disable it. We simply had to wait until Facebook decided to roll it out to our account.

Well, now might be a good time to check your Facebook privacy settings as many Facebook users are reporting that the site has enabled the option in the last few days without giving users any notice.

There are billions of photographs on Facebook’s servers. As your Facebook friends upload their albums, Facebook will try to determine if any of the pictures look like you. And if they find what they believe to be a match, they may well urge one of your Facebook friends to tag it with your name.

The tagging is still done by your friends, not by Facebook, but rather creepily Facebook is now pushing your friends to go ahead and tag you.

Learn how to protect yourself
http://www.a2zinvestigations.com

source for story:
http://www.pinewswire.net/2011/06/facebook-changes-privacy-settings-for-millions-of-users-facial-recognition-is-enabled/

Identity Theft: How it Works

2011-05-27T05:38:00.000-07:00

Over 11 million Americans fall victim to identity theft each year. North Dakota is one of the least susceptible to this crime, ranking 49th out of the 50 states for I. D. theft cases; but, local law enforcement worry that may soon change. They feel the state would be easy prey for criminals because of our positive economic climate.

West Fargo Police Chief Arland Rassmussen hosted the FBI’s Law Enforcement Executive Development Team and the company LifeLock for more information on how this crime happens and how to combat it.

Every time you use your debit or credit card you are vulnerable to identity theft. Hardware can easily placed in card swiping machines to record your information.

“This device right here is a skimmer and an encoder. What a skimmer does is get the magnetic information off the back of your credit card, ” Paige Hanson, LifeLock I. D. theft expert, said.

Hanson says the technology to help criminals steal personal information has advanced greatly.

Story from: http://www.pinewswire.net/2011/05/identity-theft-how-it-works/

for more information contact A2Z Investigations http://www.a2zinvestigations.com

Call for Stronger Mobile Privacy Law

2011-05-20T08:05:00.000-07:00

With representatives of Apple, Facebook and Google in earshot, several senators Thursday called for stronger privacy protection for smartphones and other mobile devices.

The Senate Commerce, Science and Transportation Subcommittee on Consumer Protection, Product Safety and Insurance called the hearing after reports last month that Apple and Google maintained hidden files on their mobile devices that tracked locations visited by users (see Apple, Google Under Fire at Hearing). Apple and Google reiterate earlier statements that they don’t track the locations of individual users.

Instead, some senators focused on apps downloaded from Apple’s App Store and the Android Marketplace that collect individuals’ location information even though the applications don’t require geographic information to function.

Association for Competitive Technology Executive Director Morgan Reed, whose group represents app developers, conceded the app developers his group represents could do a better job policing themselves yet cautioned lawmakers from developing regulations that could curtail innovation.

Sen. John Kerry, D-Mass, didn’t accept Reed’s contention. “I reject the notion that privacy is the enemy of innovation; it is not,” said Kerry, cosponsor of a bill aimed at protecting online privacy. “In fact, a more trusted information economy will encourage greater consumer participation and in turn, more and better services delivered in a safer commercial environment more respectful of users.”

http://www.pinewswire.net/2011/05/call-for-stronger-mobile-privacy-law/

http://www.a2zinvestigations.com

Technology fueling divorce cases

2011-05-16T12:04:00.001-07:00

The cheating spouse was using email and social media to carry on her affair, even sending nude photos and videos to her paramour.

Little did she know her every steamy message, every photo — indeed every computer keystroke — was being monitored by her husband and his Gulfport lawyer, Harold Grissom, through spyware technology.

Social media such as Facebook and Match.com and communications technology such as smartphones are great people connectors that frequently lead to matrimony. But more and more often, local family law attorneys say, they’re coming into play in divorce and custody battles. If not the cause of the litigation, media and technology frequently provide evidence.

“Absolutely,” Grissom said. “When I say I see it in a bunch of cases, I’d venture to guess about 50 percent. It’s the best thing since sliced bread for me half the time. A client comes in, and you start researching their spouse — see whether they’re on Match.com or some site for swingers. What it does a lot of the time is gives me a way to do as much research as I can about somebody so I can tell an investigator, ‘She’s friends with this person. There’s a lot of photographs of her with this person. Connect the dots.’ Usually, I’ll start to look into it right there with my client. You ask them who these people are. Sometimes the clients are surprised. A lot of times one spouse is computer savvy and the other is not.”

http://www.pinewswire.net/2011/05/technology-fueling-divorce-cases/

Cheaters comes to India

2011-05-16T11:57:00.001-07:00

Cheaters, a popular reality show in the West, will now make its way into Indian households thanks to BIG CBS Spark.

Hosted by Joey Greco, Cheaters helps people find out the truth about their partners. One of the longest-running syndicated shows in the world, it will feature participants in married or long-term relationships.

The show’s cameras have captured a number of unusual incidents, like host Joey Greco being stabbed by an angry suspect who was confronted on a boat. Watch Greco and his team in action helping the victims of infidelity

http://www.pinewswire.net/2011/05/cheaters-comes-to-india/

If you would like a private investigator to contact you about a possible cheating spouse, please contact us at A2Z Investigations Toll Free 800-964-3242

Five things to do when a company leaks your personal info

2011-05-09T09:03:00.000-07:00

Five things to do when a company leaks your personal info

Off-duty N.J. State Police officer used his undercover ID when he hit SUV

2011-05-09T09:01:00.001-07:00

Off-duty N.J. State Police officer used his undercover ID when he hit SUV

2011-05-09T09:01:00.000-07:00

Off-duty N.J. State Police officer used his undercover ID when he hit SUV

Are you looking for a Private Investigator?

2011-04-13T05:17:00.000-07:00

Are you looking for a private investigator in New York or New jersey? Domestic Investigations, Insurance Investigations, Background Investigations. We DO IT ALL at very reasonable rates. We have a professional staff with years of investigation experience. Contact us today Toll Free 800-964-3242 or visit www.a2zinvestigations.com

Catch a cheating spouse

2011-04-03T16:55:00.000-07:00

Certain keylogger programs can help you to catch a cheating spouse. Be careful of scams and if you are not sure which ones work the best, don't hesitate to contact us and we will help you decide.

Safeguarding from debit card fraud

2011-03-22T05:23:00.000-07:00

Safeguarding from debit card fraud

Jean Chatzky - Talking Money | Posted: Sunday, March 20, 2011 12:00 am |

Here's the good news: The number of identity fraud victims went down significantly -- by 28 percent -- in 2010.

Here's the bad: The consumer cost of each of those incidents went up significantly -- from $387 to $631 -- in the same time period.

What's going on there? A decrease in data breaches and increase in security measures is driving cases down, according to a new identity theft study by Javelin Strategies and Research. But the types of fraud being perpetrated (debit card fraud in particular) are more expensive.

I know what you're probably thinking: Your bank advertises zero liability, which means you're not responsible if someone steals your card and goes on a spending spree. That's true -- but there are also plenty of caveats to those policies, says Ed Mierzwinsky, consumer advocate at U.S. PIRG. "The promises of zero liability are just promises, and they're laden with asterisks. For example, with many banks, a consumer who has had a dispute in the last year is automatically rejected for a second dispute. You have to read the fine print."

That means that in practice, you may be on the hook for at least some of the fraudulent charges. Here's how to protect yourself:

• Know the law. Debit cards are regulated under the Electronic Funds Transfer Act, and your liability if your card is lost or stolen is spelled out pretty clearly -- but it depends when you report the fraud. If you report a card missing to your bank before any damage has been done, your liability is zero. If you report a stolen card within two business days, your liability is capped at $50. After that, the cap moves up to $500, and if you wait more than 60 days after your bank statement containing the unauthorized charges is mailed to you, your loss could be unlimited. That means a thief could drain your bank account. It also means you might be on the hook for any outstanding checks that bounce because of the fraud. Keep in mind, though, that most banks have their own liability rules, and very often they're more lenient. And if someone gains access to your number -- but not your card -- you may not be liable at all, says Nessa Feddis, vice president and senior counsel for the American Bankers Association. Bottom line: As Mierzwinsky says above, read the policy carefully, including the fine print.

• Bank online. All banks have online interfaces these days that allow you to track transactions, literally by the second. A thief swipes your card and it shows up immediately. Schedule a time into your day, every day, to log into your bank account. It only takes a minute. "What's really crucial is that you're just monitoring what's going on with your accounts and looking over the details of transactions. One out of every two cases are first detected by the individual, not the provider," says James Van Dyke, president and founder of Javelin. If you see something you don't recognize, call your bank immediately. Maybe it's something you've purchased -- I've called before, only to remember that yes, I did buy a scarf on impulse yesterday -- but you're better safe than sorry.

• Signature vs. PIN transactions. Sometimes at the point of purchase you swipe your debit card and you're asked for a PIN. Other times you're asked for a signature. It's not a small difference. Using your PIN is considered more secure -- after all, it's a lot easier to forge a signature than figure out a four-number password. But many banks cover only signature transactions, says Mierzwinsky. "The liability promises made by banks in credit card networks generally only apply to signature debit. They take the view that anytime the card is accessed with a PIN, it's the consumer's fault." Javelin says that only 44 percent of the nation's top 25 banks offer zero-liability for PIN debit purchases. (The thinking here is that it's your responsibility to keep your PIN close, but that's getting harder all the time: Thieves are installing "skimmers" into machines that will read your information.) Bank of America, Chase and Wells Fargo all have zero-liability policies for both, according to Javelin. If your bank doesn't, run your card as a signature purchase when possible to get the most protection, but make sure your PIN is still rock solid. That means avoiding birthdays, anniversaries, your age and anything else that can be gleaned from your Facebook profile. "Friendly fraud" -- perpetrated by people you know and who are likely to know these things about you -- is on the rise, up 7 percent in 2010.

• Set up a network of accounts. The scariest thing about debit card fraud is that it's your own money at risk. That means the cash in your bank account, but also the money in any linked savings accounts, lines of credit or overdraft protection. (If you haven't opted out of this option, here's the push you need.) "When you call and say you're a victim, they don't say, 'OK, we're pressing a button, here's your money back.' They say, 'We're doing an investigation and it could take up to 10 days,' " explains Mierzwinsky. Feddis confirms this, but stresses that most banks will credit your account within three to four days. Either scenario can be a nuisance, so my suggestion is to set up a few different accounts that aren't linked in any way, and, ideally, are at different banks. Stash a small amount of money in one for everyday purchases, some in another for bill pay, and house your savings under a different roof. That way, all of your liquid cash isn't at risk.

Finally, keep your information up to date. Make sure the bank has your correct phone number, so they can contact you if they suspect fraud.

With reporting by Arielle McGowen.

• Jean Chatzky is financial editor of NBC's "Today" show, a contributing editor at More magazine and the author of "Money 911." She recently launched the JeanChatzky Score Builder in partnership with smartcredit.com. Check out her blog at jeanchatzky.com and follow her on Twitter @jeanchatzky.

Distributed by United Feature Syndicate, Inc.

Cost to the economy from cyber crime is $43.8 billion annually

2011-03-22T05:22:00.000-07:00

Cost to the economy from cyber crime is $43.8 billion annually

The hardest hit sectors are pharmaceuticals and biotech, electronics, IT and chemicals. Industrial espionage has the second most impact at £7.6 billion ($12.3 billion), followed by £2.2 billion ($3.5 billion) from extortion, £1.3 billion ($2.1 billion) from direct online theft and £1 billion ($1.6 billion) from the loss or theft of customer data.

The overall cost to the UK economy from cyber crime is £27 billion ($43.8 billion) per year, according to the first joint Government and industry report into the extent and cost of cyber crime across the UK, launched recently by the Office of Cyber Security & Information Assurance in the Cabinet Office and information intelligence company Detica.

The report was undertaken to look at the overall cost to the UK of cyber crime and, in particular, to gain a better appreciation of the costs of Intellectual Property (IP) theft and industrial espionage.

The Cost of Cyber Crime report reveals that whilst government and the citizen are affected by rising levels of cyber crime, at an estimated £2.2 billion ($3.5 billion) and £3.1 billion ($5.03 billion) cost respectively, business bears the lion’s share of the cost. The report indicates that, at a total estimated cost of £21 billion ($34 billion), over three-quarters of the economic impact of cyber crime in the UK is felt by business.

Financial exploitation of elderly on rise, official says

2011-03-22T05:21:00.000-07:00

Financial exploitation of elderly on rise, official says

By Donna Hales Phoenix Staff Writer The Muskogee Phoenix Sat Mar 19, 2011, 10:38 PM CDT

Rebecca McGowen is concerned that the trend for financial exploitation of the elderly is on the rise.

“It’s not OK to spend your inheritance before people die,” said McGowen, state program manager for Adult Protective Services.

Financial exploitation of the elderly is on the rise in Muskogee County, statistics show.

Part of the Department of Human Services, the division received 633 complaints of eldercare neglect or exploitation in fiscal year 2010.

Of that amount, 448, or 71 percent, of the complaints were confirmed, McGowen said.

Statewide, 17,662 complaints were received in fiscal year 2010, with 10,672, or 60 percent confirmed, McGowen said. Those figures include self-neglect cases, she said.

Muskogee County figures were almost the same as fiscal year 2009, with 630 complaints and 446 of those confirmed, McGowen said. But the trend is up for financial abuse, she said.

There is almost no way for an elderly person to overcome or recoup their money once it’s gone, McGowen said.

“It’s almost impossible to get it back,” she said.

“We’re seeing more and more of the financial exploitation — it’s so bad,” said Kim Williams.

She is an Adult Protect Services supervisor based in Muskogee.

“It’s no longer just family, which is a more common thing. We’re also seeing neighbors who have discovered an elderly person has little or no family.”

She said neighbors often start befriending an elderly person and running errands for them. Some then start taking the elderly person’s credit card or go so far as to take them to their bank and have them write a check, Williams said.

That happens even if the elderly person doesn’t know what is going on, Williams said.

“We’re definitely seeing a lot more very blatant things,” she said. “It’s pitiful.”

The rise in financial exploitation started last year, but in the last six months has gotten really bad, Williams said. She believes a lot of it has to do with the economy.

“A lot of it is just greed,” McGowen said.

Some banks alert state workers to what is going on, and sometimes the police do, she said.

Many elderly, neglected, abused or exploited people are afraid what will happen to them if someone finds out, McGowen said.

Dependence grows as people get older. Those needing help are afraid if relatives find out about their bad situation, they’ll have to go to a nursing home. It’s rare for them to talk about it, she said.

Only about 20 percent of the complaints come through the DHS office, McGowen said.

“A lot of people we work with aren’t able to tell their story — someone has to tell it for them,” McGowen said.

The informant could be a health care provider, who often notices when someone deteriorates. Other information comes from neighbors or an out-of-state relative checking up on a loved one, she said.

“If you’re older, frail and with dementia, you’re not able to seek help on your own behalf,” McGowen said. “The largest growing segment of the population is 80 plus. So, it’s a double whammy. Many elderly people become isolated, and that adds to the risk.”

DHS confirmed cases are referred to district attorneys, McGowen said. Only about 5 percent of confirmed cases ever go to court, she said.

And sometimes they can take two or three years to go to trial, McGowen said.

“This is a crime — this is a felony.”

A recent police complaint of elder abuse in Muskogee County was made last week. It involved a woman whose last check was supposed to have been put on her debit card, but wasn’t, said Muskogee Police Lt. Bobby Lee.

Another person allegedly got the benefit of her money, Lee said.

Two criminal cases recently were filed in Muskogee County District Court.

Nicky Gene Parker and Maranda Dawn Parker, both of Council Hill, are accused of conspiracy to commit exploitation of an elderly person or disabled adult. They are accused of conspiring to steal checks, forge the checks and charge their Dish Network and OG&E bills to the elderly person’s bank account.

The crime is punishable by up to 10 years in prison and/or a fine up to $5,000, the filing states.

The Parkers also are accused of exploitation of an elderly person or disabled adult by deception or intimidation.

That crime is punishable by imprisonment for up to 10 years and/or a fine of up to $10,000, the filing states.

The elderly man told a Muskogee County Sheriff’s deputy that the Parkers worked around his home.

Area elder abuse cases in 2010

County Complaints Confirmed

Muskogee 633 448

Cherokee 367 255

McIntosh 275 173

Wagoner 291 185

Michael Jackson Surveillance Tapes Wiped

2011-03-22T05:20:00.000-07:00

Michael Jackson Surveillance Tapes Wiped

Surveillance footage from Michael Jackson’s house on the day he died has been erased. Dr. Conrad Murray, the personal physician to the ‘Thriller’ singer who died of acute Propofol intoxication in June 2009, is current facing manslaughter charges over his death but as police originally did not suspect foul play, they failed to make copies of the footage. The tape has now been recorded over according to gossip website TMZ.

Police only used four minutes from the tapes, which are copied over every 24 hours, to establish the time Michael entered the house on the day he died.

Lawyers for Dr. Murray are Wednesday (03-16-11) expected to ask the judge to order authorities to turn over 24 hours of surveillance footage to help with their defense but the remainder of the video, which would show who entered the house and when on the day he died, is lost.

It was revealed earlier this month that the trial has been delayed from April 5 to May 9, as the prosecution and the defense are still passing information between them even though Murray wanted a quick court case due to financial difficulties.

His lawyer J. Michael Flanagan said: “We need to go to trial right away. We don’t have the budget that would let us draw this out.”

Cheating spouse - another cheating spouse caught - visit a2zinvestigations.com

2011-01-07T09:08:00.000-08:00

Don't cheat the Insurance

2011-01-07T09:02:00.000-08:00

Private Investigations in New York and New Jersey - 2011

2010-12-31T06:44:00.001-08:00

Whether you have a domestic issue, legal issue with the court systems and need concrete evidence, or insurance investigations. A2Z Invesitgations is there to help you with all of your needs. Contact one of our professionals today and get answers tomorrow!

Employment Background Checks

2010-10-20T08:31:00.001-07:00

Employment Background Checks - are you thinking of hiring an employee but you want to discreetly check out their background before hiring them? Contact A2Z Investigations. Our professional staff will handle your case quickly and accurately

Private Investigator in New York City / New Jersey / New York

2010-08-09T05:25:00.000-07:00

Seasoned professionals available to you for any private investigation needs. Service the New York, New York City, New Jersey.

Affordable - Discreet - Professional

At A2Z Investigations, our private investigators are equipped to handle cases right in your own backyard. We will get you the answers you desire and deserve; in a quick, discrete, professional and reliable manner. Our number one priority is you.

Private Investigator New York / New Jersey

2010-06-08T05:50:00.000-07:00

•Surveillance Investigation

•Child Custody

•Missing Persons

•Matrimonial / Infidelity

•Background Investigation

•GPS Tracking

•Insurance Investigations

Serving the New York, Long Island and New Jersey areas
Toll Free 800-964-3242
New Jersey Residents 732-631-4168
Long Island Residents 631-741-6349

Employment Search - Background Search

2010-05-06T12:39:00.001-07:00

Employment Search - we know how critical the hiring process is to you. Quite literally, the next person you hire could be the reason for your company's success or failure. That is why at A2Z Investigations, our private investigators are dedicated to providing you with timely, accurate and cost-effective background checks designed to help you make those important hiring decisions.

Child Custody

2010-05-06T12:38:00.001-07:00

A2Z Investigations - Child custody situations are a major concern. Do you know where your spouse is taking your child and what kind of environment they will be subjected to? Who will come in contact with your child? We can help you by collecting evidence and providing answers. In child custody cases having this information and...

www.a2zinvestigations.com

Don't be the last one to know

2010-03-02T12:32:00.001-08:00

If you are thinking that your spouse or significant other is cheating on you, don't be the last one to know. Get the peace of mind that you deserve. Call us, our private investigators can help you with your domestic investigations - we will help you sort through the puzzle.

http://a2zinvestigations.com/contact_us.asp

Toll Free 800-964-3242
New Jersey Residents 732-631-4168
Long Island Residents 631-741-6349

Catch a cheating spouse

2010-02-10T08:06:00.000-08:00

If you or a loved one is worrying about their spouse, please contact us today to put your mind at ease. Our professional private investigators will help you to get the answers that you need. Contact us today and get your life back!
www.a2zinvestigations.com

GPS Tracking Systems

2009-12-30T20:12:00.000-08:00

GPS Tracking Systems

What is GPS tracking system?A GPS tracking system is a device that uses the Global Positioning System to determine the location of a vehicle which it is attached and to record the position at regular intervals. The recorded location data can be stored on an internet-connected computer, using a satellite modem embedded in the unit. This allows the location to be displayed against a map backdrop either in real-time or when analyzing the track later, using our sophisticated software.

If you suspect that your husband, wife or partner is having an affair, a GPS tracking device placed on their vehicle can help you determine if they are lying about their daily activities. Data can be obtained that will show dates, times and locations.
With a GPS tracking unit the device is placed on the car and will record locations as the car drives around. The device can be retrieved at intervals for real time tracking and connected to a computer to read the data. Data will show locations, times and speeds traveled while in place on the vehicle.

These GPS tracking devices may not be used to violate the privacy rights of others, or in violation of local, county, state or federal statutes. GPS tracking may be illegal in certain states. We strongly advise you to find out if a GPS tracking device is legal in your state before using one. In no way will A2Z Investigations or its subsidiaries, dealers or partners be held responsible for inappropriate or illegal use of these products.

Background Checks

2009-12-30T20:09:00.000-08:00

Our private investigators are equipped to provide the following type of background checks:

Asset Search
Bankruptcies, Judgments and Liens
Criminal Search
Employment Search
Civil Record Search
Missing Persons
Property Searches
Social Security Number Verification
Phone Information
Computer Forensics

Background Investigations - Using databases, courthouse records, public records, interviews, confidential sources and investigative research techniques, we are able to provide a detailed report that outlines the background of an individual or business and tailor it to meet our clients needs.

Basic Asset Search - Utilizing databases this investigation will confirm given address of an individual and possible employment. We will also provide ownership of confirmed property.
Comprehensive Asset Search - Includes personal profile, motor vehicles to include boats, recreational vehicles, plaintiff litigation records, bankruptcies, real property ownership, UCC filings & corporate affiliations.

Criminal Record Check - The Criminal Background Check is used in insurance investigations to uncover information in a person’s past, which sheds light on their claim or discredits information they have provided. It is a crucial tool in the investigation of a person suspected of liability insurance fraud and workers compensation insurance fraud.

Employment Search - we know how critical the hiring process is to you. Quite literally, the next person you hire could be the reason for your company's success or failure. That is why A2Z Investigations is dedicated to providing you with timely, accurate and cost-effective background checks designed to help you make those important hiring decisions.

Litigation / Prior Claims Search - Civil litigation, Plaintiff and Defendant records.

Skip Locator Search - This service is used when you do not know the whereabouts of the subject. This search provides the most recent address and ownership information of such property.

DMV Searches – Obtain information pertaining to Registration Verification, Vehicle Insurance, Insurance in household, Individual Insurance searches, VIN # searches, Vehicle Title History and Drivers Abstract.

Insurance In Household - Utilizing databases, the subject's residence will be verified as well as household members. All names and vehicles found will be checked through DMV for insurance coverage on the date of loss.

Insurance Investigations

2009-12-30T20:07:00.000-08:00

A2Z Investigations provides invaluable assistance to insurance companies and self insurers in establishing the factual basis of casualty insurance claims, including workers compensation, auto liability, third party administrators, subrogation and rate evaders. Information is obtained to enable clients to properly evaluate and make equitable settlements or defense of claims.

A complete video and photographic package is available with covert video and still cameras for documentation of evidence. Special purpose vehicles and other specialty equipment is used to assure successful results.

• Scene Investigations (photos and/or diagrams)
• Personal and Commercial automobile investigations
• General Liability
• Workers' Compensation
• Property (all lines)
• Hazardous / Environmental Claims
• Professional Liability
• Product Liability
• Recorded or written statements
• Claims Consulting

Private Investigator - Domestic Investigations

2009-12-30T19:19:00.000-08:00

Infidelity

Do you have an uneasy feeling you just can’t seem to put your finger on? Has your relationship turned cold? It may not be “all in your mind”.
Call us, our private investigators can help you with your domestic investigations - we will help you sort through the puzzle.

Some signs to look for:
Increase in time away from home
Decreased interest in sex with you
Unavailability at work
Personality change

At A2Z Investigations, our private investigators can help you by providing you with guidance and an investigation that is quick, discreet and private. Call us for a free consultation.

Divorce
Divorce matters include some of the most important decisions you will ever make. We can help you find and document the facts that can protect your best interests and, in some cases, allow your marital dispute to be settled without the need for a long, drawn out trial.

Child Custody
Child custody situations are a major concern. Do you know where your spouse is taking your child and what kind of environment they will be subjected to? Who will come in contact with your child? We can help you by collecting evidence and providing answers.

In child custody cases having this information and knowledge can help you and your attorney. We will work with you to collect the evidence necessary to prove your custody (or sole custody) of a child.

Welcome to A2Z Investigations - serving the New York, Long Island, New Jersey area

2009-12-30T19:08:00.001-08:00

A2Z Investigations is a full service private investigator agency serving the New York, Long Island and New Jersey areas.

We are headed up by a seasoned, licensed and bonded private investigators with well over 30 year’s investigative experience. The private investigator staff at A2Z Investigations will handle your case with total confidentiality, respect and understanding of your individual situation.

At A2Z Investigations, our private investigators are equipped to handle cases right in your own backyard. We will get you the answers you desire and deserve; in a quick, discrete, professional and reliable manner. Our number one priority is you.

At A2Z Investigations, we offer competitive rates. We are available to our clients around the clock 24 hours a day, 7 days a week, we are just a phone call away.

http://www.a2zinvestigations.com/