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Consumerist Catches Geek Squad Stealing Porn
mekane8 writes "Consumer-advocate blog Consumerist ran a sting operation to catch a Best Buy Geek Squad member searching for and stealing media files from a customer's computer. The article includes the story with screen captures and a video of the technician's actions. From that piece: 'Reached for comment, Geek Squad CEO Robert Stephens expressed desire to launch an internal investigation and said, "If this is true, it's an isolated incident and grounds for termination of the Agent involved." This is not just an isolated incident, according to reports from Geek Squad insiders alleging that Geek Squad techs are stealing porn, images, and music from customer's computers in California, Texas, New Jersey, Virginia and elsewhere. Our sources say that some Geek Squad locations have a common computer set up where everyone dumps their plunder to share with the other technicians.' A related story from a former Geek Squad employee details the decline of the Geek Squad and Best Buy ethics in general."
Are you kidding me? You expect these people, who are the low-paid,
bottom-of-the-IT-food-chain to have ethics? Why are they any different
from a parking lot attendant or car wash guy? Because they're techies?
Don't kid yourself.
Heck, at two companies I've worked for (both big-name, publicly traded),
they've caught (and fired) one or more sysadmins reading other people's
email.
Sadly, The Ethical IT Guy is on the verge of becoming a quaint holdover
from the previous century.
Encrypt it, or lose it.
"I'd rather be a lightning rod than a seismometer." -Ken Kesey
Hold on, my hypocrisy meter just went red.....
If this was any of you guys downloading stuff off Bittorrent all we'd here is "It's NOT STEALING WAAHH!!!"
However, now if the guys at GeekSquad do the exact same thing it's now 'stealing'....
So what you are saying is that if I get something from Bittorrent over my comparatively slow link that's not stealing, but being efficient about it (which these guys seem to be) is now 'stealing'. Check.
Oh, and don't even try that: 'But on Bittorrent it's OK since I have permission' bit with me, unless you yourself made the content (and for the love of God I hope it ain't Porn), your 'permission' is about as relevant as me giving you 'permission' to buy the Brooklyn Bridge.
AntiFA: An abbreviation for Anti First Amendment.
The issue isn't GS guys stealing a customer's porn. It's the tech stealing the customer's HOME MADE porn.
Like pictures of the customer and his gf getting it on, for example.
That's quite a bit different.
If someone wants to copy my \music\mp3 directory, more power to them. But, as another person posted, if they go into my \documents\creative_writing I'd be a bit ticked. I'll admit that. Mostly because unlike the music directory, none of the stuff in there is for public consumption. Also, the mp3 directory is 100% reproducible from public networks. It's already out there. Them taking a copy of all my mp3s is just a way for them to save time and bandwidth. My personal files, on the other hand, aren't.
Of course, as a use case this isn't likely, because I wouldn't buy a computer from Best Buy, let alone entrust them with repairing my box. (And of course, I can fix my own damn computer, so...)
This isn't a matter of stealing or copyright or anything like that. It's an invasion of privacy. Best Buy is giving you a contract (both social and written) saying that they respect you private data, and that you can trust them. If their employees root around in stuff they shouldn't, that's a breach of privacy.
Plus, it's a chance to lay down a strawman beat on Best Buy, and who wants to pass up that opportunity?
UTF-8: There and Back Again
Insterestingly enough, a while back on that same blog, there was an article about how Geek Squad snooping around some customer's computer revealed he had child porn.
While computer repair regulations don't exist like, say, auto repair regulations do, at the time I wondered if it would become compulsory for a computer repair shop to search and disclose child porn and similar because won't someone please think of the children.
If you have a safety deposit box at a bank, you're entrusting them not to open it while you're away and look at all the sparklies. If you take your clothes to a cleaner, you entrust them not to wear it out on the town ala. Seinfeld. If you get your car fixed, you entrust them not to wade through those papers in your glove compartment and snicker at that condom from 1974. I think it's a reasonable expectation that you'll have files not related to your problem remain unexamined.
Were it my repair shop, the first thing I'd think of is "wow, we're so not busy right now my employee has the time to search for goodies on client computers?"
More Twoson than Cupertino
Look. Most comments aren't seeing the picture here. It's not the copying of some 3rd party pron that is the issue. It's the copying of private made at home pictures that are the concern.
when you take something from someone and deprive them of it.
If someone makes copies of files they find on my PC, they are invading my privacy and that is bad. They are not stealing from me. I still have all my pictures.
If I have found that someone has invaded my privacy in this way, I will be unhappy but I should not accuse them of theft!
I'll see your Constitution and raise you a Queen.
No. In fact, I haven't seen a single post saying that (note: I'm browsing at +2, so I may have missed some). Moreover, I've seen several posts (like this one) reiterating that it isn't stealing.
So, frankly, I think your hypocrisy meter needs recalibration. Or are you calling it hypocrisy because Consumerist calls it stealing, while Slashdot (often, perhaps even generally) doesn't? 'Cause that strikes me as a sort of weird definition of hypocrisy. I mean, I wouldn't normally call my boss hypocritical for not giving me a raise when my wife thinks I deserve one.
For the record: copyright infringement isn't stealing, though it may be unethical. Copying people's porn stashes off their hard drives isn't stealing, though it may be unethical (due primarily to the - naive - presumption of privacy that consumers likely have).
Reality has a conservative bias: it conserves mass, energy, momentum...
Is it unethical to protect a customer's data?
Maybe they were just backing up important files prior to software install?
It could happen... and apparently did.
*Still* negative function...
I (occasionally) do support / repair / recovery for individuals. Never do I look into media like this, let alone copy it. It's not really that hard - just follow the golden rule. If I wouldn't want someone poking around my files, I do the same for them. Come on, people!
Cheers
It's not entrapment. Entrapment would be forcing them or coercing them to commit the crime, often with another illegal act. Prostitution sting operations, for example, are often very close to (or over the line of) entrapment, as the police plant streetwalkers (an illegal act) in order to catch another illegal act.
There is nothing like that here -- it's a computer with stuff on it, and their job is not to grab that stuff, it's to fix the computer. End of story.
How about a folder called "Music"? Can they steal from that because it's labeled as such?
Living ethically is a lot easier when you have enough ethics to avoid doing bad things for reasons better than "I might get caught."
It is pitch black. You are likely to be eaten by a grue.
Small issue (and I don't know if you're trying to be funny or not because of your sarcasm sig): Unless they were to know otherwise, the pictures and iTunes music was not 'stolen'. That is a very bad and overly false assumption to make.
And, believe it or not, there are those on the 'net that pay for their pr0n, so that isn't a safe place to assume 'stolen' either.
AccountKiller
Stealing homemade sex videos and that sort of thing from customers' computers is another matter.
Watch the video from TFA. That's what he does (on a smaller scale.) He downloads personal photos including vacation photos of a girl in a bikini on the beach. He notices that as well and doesn't delete them.
He didn't LOOK at the porn but it might have been homemade. Who knows? The article makes a good point. Once the computer's broken, you can't necessarily clean it up. If your comp won't start but you happen to have sex videos and nude photos (or equally private but more mundane things) on your desktop. . . well . . .
It doesn't have to be porn. It could be important business files, personal writing, etc. If it's copyrighted material, that's one thing. If it's personal material, that's completely different. And the guy they caught definitely wasn't bothering to distinguish.
My car has some niceties I have added on myself. While I certainly do not take my car to just any mechanic, there are some (rare) exceptions when it cannot go to my usual mechanic (i.e. warranty work I had done in the past). An example of once such feature is a very loud stereo system. I actually take the electronic toll pass, change, and especially the amplifiers, and sub woofers out of the car before taking it in because I know the volume would otherwise be maxed out when I get it back from the shop. I simply do not trust just anyone outside of myself and my close friends to have those items within their reach. Furthermore, I am also careful, as with anybody else, to only hand them the keys they need to operate the vehicle, and do not provide them with my house keys or keys to anything other than the car.
People need to take the same types of precautions with computers. If possible, back up your files elsewhere (i.e. optical media, portable hard drive) or consider using a network storage device (many home network storage devices are available now with RAID, and are not terribly high in price). Just as you would with a car, take out any money and private/personal belongings and put it elsewhere for while it is in the shop. Also, use different passwords for your logins than you use for your email accounts and the-like, as this is synonymous to only providing them with the key/keys they need.
I ran a repair shop too, but stealing or even viewing customer files was NOT company policy. We did steps 1-6 and then told the customer we'd keep their backup for at least a week 'just in case'. We also deleted the backups on request of course.
Unfortunately, thumbnail previews and accidental views sometimes showed me far more than I wanted to see. I think the worst was when a client warned me about the porn videos of his wife, and ASKED me to critique them. That's just creepy. I gave her a B- (hey, it's like an accident, you HAVE to look).
Ethics mean everything if you want to truly grow a business. You don't gossip about other clients, you look away when they type their password, you try not overhear conversations (and if you do, you mentally stuff those tidbits into a bag, tie a concrete block around them, and throw them to sink in the pool of forgotten memories). It's not just out of consideration for them, but it gains you trust and respect. It's also just the right thing to do.
Every time it happens, you should behave as though it is the first time you have ever been so accosted. Ask for identification. Ask the door person his name and his specific relationship to the store. Make sure a long line of angry customers builds behind you. Demand to speak to the manager. Make sure the manager understands that you have never been so insulted in your life, demand and receive a refund on your merchandise and a written apology from the store and the regional manger. Do this in every town you visit.
Don't complain on slashdot. Become an activist and make institutions change.
Comment removed based on user account deletion
What he found after breaking in does not justify him breaking in! I agree that he should have reported those abuse images to the authorities, but in general, ex post facto justifications are almost never good:
"so I did kill the guy, but he turned out to be a child molester" -- Should you be going around killing people in the hopes you eventually catch one?
"so I raped that girl, but she liked me in the end" -- should you be going around... you get the point I think.
Obama likes poor people so much, he wants to make more of them.
Or mebbee Freak Squad?
Yo... The photo processor at Thrifty and Walgreens been lookin' at your stray pookie shots for some tyme now, my brother.
"Flyin' in just a sweet place,
Never been known to fail..."