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Verizon Technician Is Accused of Selling Customers' Call Records and Location Data To Private Investigator (ap.org)
A former Verizon technician who worked in Alabama is being accused of selling customers' private call records and location data to an unnamed private investigator. Authorities said the data was sold for more than four years, from 2009 to 2014. The Associated Press reports: [Daniel Eugene Traeger] logged into one Verizon computer system to gain access to customers' call records, authorities said. He used another company system known as Real Time Tool to "ping" cellphones on Verizon's network to get locations of the devices, according to the plea agreement. He then compiled the data in spreadsheets, which he sent to the private investigator for years, the court records show. "Between April 2009 and January 2014, the defendant was paid more than $10,000 in exchange for his provision of confidential customer information and cellular location data to the PL, an unauthorized third party," court records state. Though Traeger was based in the Birmingham area, the court records do not indicate whether the information that was sold involved Verizon Wireless customers in Alabama or elsewhere. He faces up to five years in prison, but prosecutors are recommending a lesser sentence since he accepted responsibility, according to terms of the plea agreement.
Of course they do. The pioneering sociologist Max Weber defined the government as the group of people that enjoys a monopoly on force.
The question is how accountable you want the people who are licensed to use force (including powers of intrusion) to be.
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Why Richard Stallman refuses to use a phone i.e. surveillance device .
Govt has no such monopoly. You have every right to self defense. Govt monopolizes the rule of law. Otherwise you get lynch mobs and witch hunts.
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He faces up to five years in prison, but prosecutors are recommending a lesser sentence since he accepted responsibility, according to terms of the plea agreement.
I thought the U.S. had a third party consent doctrine, whereby no warrant is needed if your data is stored with a third party, in this case, Verizon. So, I don't understand what they're being charged with in this case.
If I can be modded down for being a troll, can I be modded up for being an orc, or a balrog?
Technician should only have access to this information for accounts that were assigned to him.
love is just extroverted narcissism
If you think this is an isolated issue you are sorely mistaken. I'll bet this is a mainstay for PI's around the country. Especially since it took 4 years to catch him. My guess without details is that he got caught when he started using the Location system since that's not something anyone besides SysTechs and LEO would need.
This is an example of why the cloud is bad. Even if companies are trustworthy, can that be said of every single employee in contact with your data?
Laws are rules for the court, but merely a bottom bar to hit for life. Think beyond laws in your actions always.
They have common IT security practices.
Like Passw0rd as the general password for all accounts with sudo access? :)
I had a friend in the FBI. I asked her to look me up. She said it was a crime to look up someone that isn't under investigation (even yourself). So nobody ever does. Every lookup must be linked to a case, and the case manager will see the request. You *will* be caught, fired, and possibly prosecuted for looking up information you don't have reason to. Such a scheme should be used where customer data is used. Including the private sector.
Learn to love Alaska
Anyone who thinks this doesn't happen a few hundred times a day with every telecom carrier you can think of is a bit out of touch. And it's hardly worrying next to the people paying off NSA analysts, contractors, and interns...
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"Shortly after the charges were filed last week, Traeger pleaded guilty to a felony count of unauthorized access to a protected computer"
So yeah, those over broad hacking laws. Kinda sad to see 'em used for something I agree with.
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The quote was certainly related to the mention of competition with government, and your sad attempt to make yourself feel smarter by dissing someone else, probably does, but that speaks not to the merits of that someone else. Sucks to be you still.
Everyone has a price.
Low paid call center employees just have a lower one.
You companies who seek to get the cheapest labor you can find would do well to remember this.
"I wonder how this open AP got connected to the corporate network ? "
Ea$y An$wer. . . . .
Of course it does. How can you beat people up if you don't know where they are?
Confucius say, "Find worm in apple - bad. Find half a worm - worse."
1 2 3 4 5 is a better password. I use it on my luggage.
I'm a good cook. I'm a fantastic eater. - Steven Brust
"and then sodomized by a gang of homosexuals"
As opposed to being sodomized by a gang of heterosexuals?
Why do most people accept that once in prison, you will likely be raped? And few if any are concerned that that is tantamount to physical and psychological torture.
Ninjas don't carry tic tacs