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HP Spying More Elaborate Than Reported
theodp writes "The NY Times reports the secret investigation of news leaks at HP was more elaborate than previously reported. In addition to illicitly gathering private phone records almost from the start, detectives reportedly followed and videotaped some directors and journalists, were given photos of reporters to help identify them, and tried to plant surveillance software on a CNET reporter's computer. HP also fessed up to spying on its own spokesman, whose personal phone records were taken."
This just in, Patricia Dunn has been discovered to be more evil than Hitler and Stalin ... combined.
More at eleven.
I certainly didn't vote for them in 2004.
Rock is dead. Long live scissors and paper!
So did HP take a secret contract from the Bush Administration to become a covert version of the FBI/CIA/NSA without any government oversight? News at 11!
The interesting question is, will anyone care enough about this to stop doing business with HP? Will any major corporate clients reject these practices and refuse to deal with a company that engages in them?
I'm guessing not.
There will be a few people punished in a very public fashion, while behind the scenes this sort of behavior becomes commonplace.
Maybe it's just Monday Morning talking here, but I hope I'm wrong.
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It occurs to me that this is probably a fairly common practice among companies of a certain size, to get a better handle on the sort of press they're getting. HP's just the one unlucky enough to have gotten caught this time.
Before this "even worse news" about the extent of the spying, HP's board should have forced Dunn to resign immediately from the board. Instead, they allowed her to continue as chairwoman until January and to continue as a director after that. I predict that the board will now force her immediate resignation, but will they also strip her of her directorship? What about severance? They should take it all, retroactively. IANAL, but I'll bet that's legal, somehow.
I've seen countless stories about this in various media outlets, and I seem to be missing the point or something. Everyone seems so shocked, and outraged by this as if it's not common place in "Corporate America". I shocked that a company actually got caught, and more so the over the top reaction of the media.
The sad part is the monitoring of a few board members is, and likely will continue to get more coverage/outrage than the Bush administration doing this to the whole country.
I am from Italy. My parents were young adults during the brief time Mussolini was in power. While many Italians dislike discussing that time period, my parents were always willing to inform people of it, in the hopes that similar situations may be avoided in the future.
This is the sort of activity that became widespread during that period. Spying was omnipresent, be it on the street, at work, or while at restaurants. Collaboration between the elites of the business world the government allowed for this sort of privacy invasion to take hold, and further promoted it as time went on. Individual freedoms were thrown out "for the sake of the nation".
The very same appears to be happening in America and other "democratic" countries these days. On one hand, you have the government spying domestically on its own citizens (the whole NSA scandal, for instance). Security cameras are being installed all over the place, from street corners to ATMs. In some countries, the cameras apparently will have loudspeakers to direct the citizenry that are being observed. Now we find that the very same sort of actions are being taken by corporate executives. Soon enough that will translate down to regular workers. In short, it's a case of fascism much like Italy experienced in the mid-20th century.
Well, this new story has a hidden gem.
According to TFA: "People briefed on HP's review of its internal investigation say that it was authorized by Dunn, the chairwoman, and put under the supervision of Kevin Hunsaker, a senior counsel who is the company's director of ethics."
How could it be otherwise?
"...and we at Hewlett Packard also regret using false pretenses to obtain the personal phone reacords of their spokesman, one Mr..... the freaking HELL?!"
Slashdot Burying Stories About Slashdot Media Owned
Like the subject line says.
One one hand, I sympathize for HP. To have a board member that fails to respect the privacy of board room material can be very hard, and the fact that he leaked that previous information was very uprofessional.
Of course, on the other hand, the way this was handled by HP was totally out of hand. Young adults walking out of business school know that to hit somebody up with a wiretap is illegal and should not be done. How is it that the chairman and the head of their Ethics group don't? So those two should definitely go away. As to anybody else remaining, it is quite hard to see what other roles were played in this. I don't think that people should take this as an indicator of what the whole company is like though.
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"HP will be changing it's slogan from 'HP: Invent' to 'HP: Indict'"
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According to this newly disclosed recording:
Naaa!!! No American Corporation would ever spy on people in everyday business (and HR) dealings, right?
It is your personal duty to fight for what is right on a daily basis. Ignoring injustice is identical to approving
It is your personal duty to fight for what is right on a daily basis. Ignoring injustice is identical to approving
Would that make him a "Bene-factor"?
emt 377 emt 4
http://www.nytimes.com/2006/09/18/technology/18hp. html?ei=5094&en=0af37191eea65e08&hp=&ex=1158638400 &partner=homepage&pagewanted=print
/. story says "a NY Times Article" but doesn't reference or link to the article. I wonder if thats supposed to be so that karma whores like me can post a link to the actual story?
:-) And try http://www.nytimes.com/2006/09/18/technology/18hp. html?hp&ex=1158638400&en=0af37191eea65e08&ei=5094& partner=homepage if ya wanna see the scarey pictures of the HP execs.
I'm still new enough here to hate when the
Oh, and enjoy the link to the print version of the article without ads
http://www.hp.com/hpinfo/globalcitizenship/csr/sbc brochure.pdf
This is a link to the SBC or the standards of business conduct. This was the bible of HP for many many years and it appears that although some question whether these rules are practiced at the lower levels, it appears that they are not at the higher levels either. If this was actions of any HP employee, they would be TERMINATED. This is several magnitudes more extreme of a situation.
The idea is not to operate within just the language and the loopholes, but to abide by the intent of the document which is to set the stage for proper conduct with a low threshold in cases where there is any question of being appropriate.
This saddens many HP employees who have worked hard to reinforce a positive image of the company which did operate on a much more noble level in the past.
No, that would be the "Hewlett Haderach"
Fascism starts when the efficiency of the government becomes more important than the rights of the people.
So, is this a field deployment of the Carl Voth Reaper exploit? Prudent settings on email software will prevent that from working but plenty of older popular mail clients shipped with clueless defaults.
Dunn orchestrated the entire thing and it went off as scripted. Her intentions all along was to give up the Chairman position at the beginning of the year. She is seriously ill.
The sad part... she is no dummy and covered her tracks completely. The firm they hired to do the dirty work will take the fall.
You give me such a haderach.
Do you have an aspirin?
emt 377 emt 4
The article says "detectives tried to plant software on at least one journalist's computer that would enable messages to be traced", but if you read the end, it sounds like they put a web bug (image link) in an email to see who the email was forwarded to.
While this investigation as a whole seems abhorent, a web bug seems less invasive (and probably less illegal) than the implied act of installing spyware on someone elses's computer.
Had somebody in the mailroom been outed as the leaker, would we be hearing about this at all? With all the rulings that have stated employees have no reason to expect privacy when it comes to the use of company resources (phones, e-mail, Internet use), I'm sure a lower level employee would have been easily and quietly dismissed.
But since this happened to a suit... all the other suits got scared and decided to attack?
Interesting.
The interesting question is, will anyone care enough about this to stop doing business with HP?
Busines harm, in this case is counter productive. The guilty have been embarrassed and might even be punished. No one wants to be the next Newsweek posterboy of corporate corruption and the behavior will be avoided. Anyone who tries a stunt like this gains little but puts themselves at the mercy of anyone who finds credible evidence. Corporate spying is not a core part of HP's business so crushing HP will only make their competitors fewer and stronger. Having one less place for employees to run just gives those competitors more power to abuse. It's better to punish the people responsible than it is to punish the company they abused.
Friends don't help friends install M$ junk.
Otherwise we're going to have to watch this thing unfold for months. Just end it now and let's all move on.
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Wow, what HP's doing sounds amazingly familiar.
Here's an article on a bill immunizing the Bush Administration from prosecution for basically doing the same thing. Too bad HP can't call him up and ask to be included on the bill.
BTW, here's another article, this one by the ACLU on exactly what the Cheney-Specter bill does.
1. 2.
Bill Clinton admits to trying Marijuana BUT he didn't inhale. Nobody asked if how many times he tried it, whether he bought any for himself and if he still used it.
Paris Hilton got caught driving drunk so her story was she didn't eat that day and had ONE drink. She registered something like
The interesting question is, will anyone care enough about this to stop doing business with HP? Will any major corporate clients reject these practices and refuse to deal with a company that engages in them?
I'm all for holding companies responsible for corporate misconduct. But this wasn't corporate misconduct, it was individual misconduct. The proper course of action is to take the responsible individuals to court. They should face hefty fines and jail time.
What should happen?
Spying on people is illegal; the people involved should be charged and tried criminally. If found guilty, they should go to jail.
The failure to act is not on the part of HP (they have done all they should), it's on the part of the DA.