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How The FBI Used Geek Squad To Increase Secret Public Surveillance (ocweekly.com)
In 2011 a gynecology doctor took his computer for repairs at Best Buy's Geek Squad. But the repair technician was a paid FBI informant -- one of several working at Geek Squad -- and the doctor was ultimately charged with possessing child pornography, according to OC Weekly. An anonymous reader quotes their new report:
Recently unsealed records reveal a much more extensive secret relationship than previously known between the FBI and Best Buy's Geek Squad, including evidence the agency trained company technicians on law-enforcement operational tactics, shared lists of targeted citizens and, to covertly increase surveillance of the public, encouraged searches of computers even when unrelated to a customer's request for repairs. Assistant United States Attorney M. Anthony Brown last year labeled allegations of a hidden partnership as "wild speculation." But more than a dozen summaries of FBI memoranda filed inside Orange County's Ronald Reagan Federal Courthouse this month in USA v. Mark Rettenmaier contradict the official line...
Other records show how [Geek Squad supervisor Justin] Meade's job gave him "excellent and frequent" access for "several years" to computers belonging to unwitting Best Buy customers, though agents considered him "underutilized" and wanted him "tasked" to search devices "on a more consistent basis"... evidence demonstrates company employees routinely snooped for the agency, contemplated "writing a software program" specifically to aid the FBI in rifling through its customers' computers without probable cause for any crime that had been committed, and were "under the direction and control of the FBI." The doctor's lawyer argues Best Buy became an unofficial wing of the FBI by offering $500 for every time they found evidence leading to criminal charges.
Other records show how [Geek Squad supervisor Justin] Meade's job gave him "excellent and frequent" access for "several years" to computers belonging to unwitting Best Buy customers, though agents considered him "underutilized" and wanted him "tasked" to search devices "on a more consistent basis"... evidence demonstrates company employees routinely snooped for the agency, contemplated "writing a software program" specifically to aid the FBI in rifling through its customers' computers without probable cause for any crime that had been committed, and were "under the direction and control of the FBI." The doctor's lawyer argues Best Buy became an unofficial wing of the FBI by offering $500 for every time they found evidence leading to criminal charges.
or less?
Top 976 Complaints and Reviews about Geek Squad Quote: "I feel that they're a scam. They get people to buy their support and anytime they help it costs more money."
9 Confessions Of A Former Geek Squad Geek Quote: "A high percentage of Geek Squad employees lack basic troubleshooting skills such as correctly identifying malfunctioning components."
Geek Squad Complaints and Reviews Quote: "$430 Average loss"
Yelp Reviews for Geek Squad in San Francisco Quote: "Dealing with Geek Squad has been an absolute nightmare!! And judging by the hundreds of other reviews here, im guessing most of you feel the same way."
Geek Squad Consumer Reviews Quote: ""Cheat Squad," Not Geek Squad"
It's disconcerting but in the end there is no 'right' against having your files searched for illegal material. Unless you're the President, then you've got a whole 1/3 of government to fuck around with.
I've long heard the horror stories about Geek Squad's obsession with searching through customer files. Didn't realize they weren't at arm's length from the FBI, though.
Once, I did come across a couple of videos portraying what appeared to be child pornography on a client's system. They were in with a mish-mash collection of porn that could be most kindly referred to as "eclectic". Didn't do anything about it; that client was somewhat old, and died a few years later, anyway.
I don't go looking through stuff that's none of my goddamn business when I'm working on a system.
I think this is OK. And far better than remote surveillance and hacking.
I find these prosecutions rather disturbing, as they amount to victimless thought crime.
Yes, there is a child victim, and the story is terrible, but there is no causal connection, and no need to demonstrate one. The child is the victim of a very different crime, by a different person, possibly long ago. In other cases, there may not even be a single child who has suffered, ever. And that makes no difference to the law.
Whats the point of treating it as a criminal problem? It makes about as much sens as the war on drugs.
What does all this achieve? Is there the slightest bit of evidence that our children are any safer for all these destroyed lives from the War on Porn ?
And if it helps you consider the question more objectively, the images themselves were not particularly shocking. Nothing compared to the sex and violence on an average night's TV.
Agent Tracey Riley admitted to U.S. District Court Judge Cormac J. Carney the so-called "Jenny" image found by a Best Buy Geek Squad technician, who doubled as a paid agency informant, "wasn't child pornography by itself."
Riley tried to recover by explaining that the picture, which contains no sex or genital angles, originated from a "well-known" child-pornography video.
I'm quite sure people give their computers to be fixed with some form of agreement, whether written or implied, that the contents of their computers is not passed on to third parties. Doesn't look great for the company involved...
Because those geek-squad FBI moles were trained by the FBI and could be considered a direct part of the operation.
If so the evidence could be obtained illegally.
And this is different than narcotic informats - except the geek-squad-moles are considered criminals ;)
Didn't this story run a few months ago? Has it happened again? Has anything changed, or is EditorDavid new?
This crap has to be illegal.
It's like giving a plumber access to your house to fix a plumbing problem, but then he also goes through the underwear drawer in your little girls bedroom as well as through all of your mail on your desk etc etc. I cannot believe that would be considered legal and I can't believe that what Best Buy is doing should be either..
And this is why I'm so glad life is finite. I'm ready to die now
This sounds straight out of the show Chuck where a Nerd Herder working at BuyMore is part of a joint CIA/NSA task force.
to dump Best Buy stock before the rumor has investors running away.
Makes me wonder how many other computer repair businesses were corrupted. How far did the FBI go in their
vampire-like grab for information and control?
We know they distributed kiddie porn, infected, of course.
So what else s the FBI interested in that they would take similar actions?
I'm sorry, but after all the tech support jobs I've been at, someone is going to search for *.jpg/gif/png/whatever.
I never have myself, but at every job I've been at, a bored nerd is going to do a random search for pics/porn. It takes 30 seconds when they are spending hours on a computer.
These days, I work for a company that has a long disclosure that people ignore while I read it to them, but the big thing is "if you have shit you don't want us seeing, make a second account with a password that we can use to fix your shit."
Again, I have never done it myself, but I have seen so many colleagues do it that I can only assume it's common over all areas.
"Well kids, you tried your best, and you failed. The lesson is, never try." -Homer Simpson
When someone receives training from Law Enforcement to act on Law Enforcement's behalf, they become State Actors, and State Actors need warrants. The Gynecologist should have his conviction overturned.
Sometimes we may be required to share personal information for legal reasons, for example, if we are required to do so by a regulation, court order, subpoena or other legal process. We may also share information when we believe it's necessary to comply with the law or to respond to a government request, or when we believe disclosure is necessary or appropriate to protect Best Buy, our customers, or others.
The rest of the policy is immaterial. In other words - we can disclose whatever we want whenever we want if we believe it will "protect" somebody. I'm not arguing against the CP case disclosure - but the way this is written is wide open for interpretation.
I thought "Geek Squad" was a meme? Did people really take their computers to Best Buy to be touched by "GEEK SQUAD"!? Haha
Anyone remember the show "Chuck"? I guess it was closer to the truth than anyone expected.
If only we had some protection against this sort of oppressive Police State intrusion... oh, like, say, the 4th, 5th & 14th amendments to the Constitution of the United States.
Wake up and smell the freedom, please, We the People. Please?
Error: NSE - No Signature Error
This story has already been done on Slashdot, though it doesn't hurt to remind people I guess.
This got modded down, but it's true. Child traffickers are being arrested in record numbers. Not a peep out of the media. Who are they protecting?
Is it illegal to view kiddie porn because if you look close, you will see the abusers are all politicians and other rich and powerful people?
What would be an interesting investigation would be to install surveillance software onto a computer and bring it in to these repair places such as Best Buy. The reason for bringing it in for repair can be various intentional problems. I would love to see what some of these techs do once they are working on the computer. Interesting observations would be to see if they unnecessarily access files and folders unrelated to the issue. Perhaps create a honeypot folder with apparent home made video or photographic content or with personal financial data etc. perhaps create a file somewhere with websites, usernames and passwords to see if the technicians decide to check them out. I suspect that the issue of unauthorized access to data is widespread.
Wouldn't ever take any of my computers to Geek Squad for repair. But I have heard this before, that Geek Squad found some under age porn on someone's computer and turned them in. But the law in most states requires people to report this kind of crime to authorities or face charges of concealing evidence.
If your a security agency your going to approach services like Geek Squad that interact with customers data. So nobody should be surprised by this. But I would also be surprised if any terrorists would take their hardware to a Geek Squad for repair risking exposure of data.
If you have shit to hide, just flush the F**KING TOILET!
Pizza...nuff said
Ever again. Nazi's had citizen spys.
I'm an American, I've seen how little reason there is and how public discourse has eroded into total pointlessness beginning with the 80, maybe before that...
The psychological definitions which have been around for decades are not even remotely used in the law. The legal definitions are ignorant at best, every man is a pedophile according to US law. Since human sexuality is based upon fertility not age, as soon as a child passes puberty nature indicates adulthood has arrived; this clashes with cultural beliefs (which changed themselves over time... and we only think the last 50 years was "the way always has been.")
Science has been showing and will only get closer to proving that pedophiles are BORN. It's a natural defect just like homosexuality. Furthermore, evidence shows that pedophiles simply have a lower threshold of attraction, they are still into adults. They do not go rape adults anymore than normal - but if they are going to one would assume that they would prefer an easier target. It is not P.C. these days but that is actual reality and eventually science will beat back the SJW. We can not even have a discussion of science in this country - it changes entirely how one views the problem and even if we could get people educated, the public discourse is idiotic just dealing with easy problems. Reality has a way of messing with your ignorant beliefs and people need to toughen up more.
The inability to control one's impulses should be considered an illness (in the most extreme it is.) Rapists must be included. Not a crime; but insanity where "can do harm to themselves or others" is the reason we put them into hospitals in the civilized world (not the USA, we put them in jail with sane people.) If you can't cure a rapist (of adults or children or animals) then they can't be allowed out in society. It is that simple, no need to make distinctions between victims. Sure you lose the comfort of feeling righteous for punishing evil in god's name (which is a form of blasphemy, BTW) but you can feel safer knowing those sick people will not be released having learned better how to not get caught next time.
Democracy Now! - uncensored, anti-establishment news
Not exactly, but close enough, I'd call it digital rendition. Paying somebody else to collect evidence in a way you can't should be a crime.
Reward the sort of Geek Squad technician who would work as 'an informant for the FBI' with $500 worth of Cheetos. That would attract a better class of Geek Squad informant. The police cadet wannabe types presently being attracted are obsessed with keeping the greasy orange crumbs off their hands, and as junior martinets can only provide tainted evidence.
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A second account won't help one bit as you need to be an admin to install or remove programs and execute repairs and all admins have access to everything.
More importantly, if you have direct access to a system, nothing is safe from anyone capable of using Google.
It seems that way after enough LDS LSD.
Table-ized A.I.
This entire debate is rife with just-so soup of the day.
Doh! We're a hundred miles down the road into The One True Cause and most people can't even distinguish rate from order.
Time is short. Right?
List of shit I'd like to poke into.
* item
* another item
* many more items
Some item from laundry list comes up in everyday circumstance. That particular item becomes momentarily top of mind. Return home. Ten minutes to kill. What's top of mind? Bingo. That thing that came up around the water cooler that was on your shits and giggles list anyway.
News headline the following day: in recent trends, the BDSM zeitgeist is hot, hot, hot.
No, actually. It just went through a minor flush of suggestibility-sort synchronicity. No kittens were renamed.
What if they actually planted the evidence?!
I am all for catching and stopping child porn.
However, I am also all for catching and stopping illegal invasions of constitutional rights! GET A WARRANT FIRST!!!
Self-importance and self-indulgence is the root of ALL evil.