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Lawyer Sues Apple Over FaceTime Eavesdrop Bug, Says It Let Someone Record a Sworn Testimony (cnbc.com)
A lawyer in Houston has filed a lawsuit against Apple over a security vulnerability that let people eavesdrop on iPhones using FaceTime. "His lawsuit, filed Monday in Harris County, Texas, alleges that Apple 'failed to exercise reasonable care' and that Apple 'knew, or should have known, that its Product would cause unsolicited privacy breaches and eavesdropping,'" reports CNBC. "It alleged Apple did not adequately test its software and that Apple was 'aware there was a high probability at least some consumers would suffer harm.'" From the report: The suit says that Williams was "undergoing a private deposition with a client when this defective product breached allowed for the recording" of the conversation. Williams claimed this caused "sustained permanent and continuous injuries, pain and suffering and emotional trauma that will continue into the future" and that Williams "lost ability to earn a living and will continued to be so in the future." The lawsuit also says that iOS 12.1, the latest major release of the iPhone operating system, was defective and "unreasonable dangerous" and that Apple "failed to provide adequate warnings to avoid the substantial danger" posed by the security flaw. Williams is seeking compensatory and punitive damages as a result of the exploit.
Lawyers are the scum of the earth. Another episode that confirms this truism.
Why do people love lawsuits in the US?
'cos there's money in them thar lawsuits.
Donte Alistair Anderson Roberts - hi son!
Karma: Chameleon
Scanning the lawsuit as filed it doesn't actually seem to provide any evidence that his call was illegally recorded. He doesn't seem to have any reason to think that it might have been.
const int one = 65536; (Silvermoon, Texture.cs)
SJW, n: "Someone I don't like, and by the way I'm a fuckwit" - AC
"Allowed for the recording" could just mean that the possibility was there, or it could mean that an actual recording took place. No way to tell unless Williams has evidence of the recording, which is possible if you assume that was the reason for the harm and loss of living alledged in Clause 30, which seems rather hyperbolic to say the least; this somehow resulted in "physical pain" and "diminished quality of life"? Unless his client got physical upon finding out or something, I'm not sure how that's supposed to work, and if anything makes this sound much more like an attempt at a cash grab, quite possibly with aspirations for class status.
UNIX? They're not even circumcised! Savages!
Just that the bug "allowed for" recording. Gotta watch those lawyers.
The full complaint is here and makes for some entertaining reading. This 30-page gem was filed by a local personal injury attorney 4 years out of law school the next day after the plaintiff supposedly found out about the bug. 'Nuff said.
> Williams claimed this caused "sustained permanent and continuous injuries, pain and suffering and emotional trauma that will continue into the future" and that Williams "lost ability to earn a living and will continued to be so in the future."
Yeah, the fuck it did.
"Wait. Something's happening. It's opening up! My God, it's full of apricots!"
Unless the alleged recording lost him a leg or some other maiming, not sure how "permanent injury" can be remotely close to true. Hurt feelings don't count.
"Wait. Something's happening. It's opening up! My God, it's full of apricots!"
It is how due to how the US legal system was written. A lot of US regulation depends on DIY justice. Rather than reporting a violation and having the state investigate and enforce, private citizens have to pony up the time and money to take each other to court. So it is less that people love lawsuits and more that is how one actually triggers the legal and regulatory process in many cases.
Unless his client got physical upon finding out or something, I'm not sure how that's supposed to work
It sounds like the loss claimed will be fanciful and theoretical, not actual and certain.
At most he loses Facetime as a tool for recording these types of depositions in the future, but Apple never marketed Facetime as software secure for sensitive business use, and besides which, there are numerous warranty disclaimers you agree to in the Apple click-through EULA you agree to before using the software, so if you find the software doesn't do what you need, you are not so much as entitled to a refund: Which an attorney using the software for professional purposes has a higher burden than the general public to read and understand --- That is, someone who is an Attorney or legal firm cannot get out of a contract or EULA by claiming the contract was confusing, or they were ignorant, etc.
Why did he think bringing a powered on recording device to private meeting where no recording should take place was good opsec?
Smart phones have no place in a secure facility.
Repeal the 17th Amendment TODAY! Also Please Read http://www.gnu.org/philosophy/right-to-read.html
From a previous Slashdot article. Apple knew about it for about a week. before they closed down the service. A week seems like a long time, for us who work in small development shops, but for a company the size of Apple, a Week to decide to turn off the feature is indeed a rapid response to a problem. Being that they have millions of users, doing things willy-nilly just isn't good policy.
Lawyers, like Medical Doctors, Engineers and Computer Programmers, seem to think because they are an expert in their field, they are an expert in all things, which is false, but then they start doing stupid things and not listening to the experts in such fields.
Who in their right mind would use any internet service especially any one that isn't peer to peer for dealing with critical and sensitive. Apple is in the Business to Consumer market. and Facetime group chats are Consumer to Consumer communicated with each other. If you are in Legal, Healthcare, Defense, or any other sector that requires high levels of security. You better be sure you are working with a vendor who will setup your own contract and personally deal with your security concerns, and not just the basic EULA that you hit OK because you want your multi-hundred dollar product to work out of the box.
If something is so important that you feel the need to post it on the internet... It probably isn't that important.
Or are you just a pure Apple Hater?
Americans no matter their political leaning, really don't like the idea of legal suits over small and silly things, where the lawyer then exaggerates the amount of suffering caused. Often shown on TV with the "victim" in a neck brace trope.
Accidents occur and people get hurt. But the line between frivolous vs necessary legal action is needed. You go to a restaurant, and you get ill the next day, and sue the restaurant, that is frivolous, if you go to the restaurant and dozens of folks get ill the next day, then there is a problem.
Suing for the quick money grab, will often hinder a businesses ability to do good things, because they have to walk on eggshells and be sure not to break the rules. You may notice this effect if you are at a hospital, and the x-ray tech will not comment if you arm is broken or not, but you wait a half an hour and the doctor walks in glances at the X-Ray and says yep its broken. The reason for this, isn't because the doctor will get paid more for doing this, but because if the tech explains this to a patient, then they are doing a diagnosis that they are not qualified to do. And if the patient does something stupid from that initial diagnosis from the unqualified individual, then the hospital is legally responsible for this.
If something is so important that you feel the need to post it on the internet... It probably isn't that important.
Except for the fact that a judge would toss any zero-party consent recording that didn't also have a court order for electronic surveillance applied to it, previous to the recording being made as an illegal search.
This is no different than what would happen with the recording from an illegal wiretap, or illegal audio bug planted in the room. It would get tossed during evidence discovery, long before any jury would be able to see / hear the recording. And then there would be sanctions for any prosecutor trying to use such evidence.
Slashdot still doesnâ(TM)t support Unicode after it was added to the HTML standard in 1997.
More than that, why did he have any phones at all in the room while taking a secret deposition?
Not like it's news that phones can record audio and transmit it to other people - that's kind of the fucking point.
Slashdot still doesnâ(TM)t support Unicode after it was added to the HTML standard in 1997.
If such a recording happened, and it was done by someone involved in the case, it could cause permanent injury in terms of people having information in the case they should not have, which is a horse that is very difficult to put back in the barn.
My legal experience is somewhat limited, but I don't think that's a possible scenario. If it was really a deposition, which is done with the intention of putting sworn testimony on record, there would be a court reporter and/or videographer present (as a neutral party to record what is said), as well as an attorney from the opposing party (who is allowed to cross-examine the witness being deposed).
More than that, why did he have any phones at all in the room while taking a secret deposition?
My understanding of the bug is that it affects group conferencing, so I assume they were using FaceTime to conduct the deposition. They could set up a FaceTime group with the witness, attorneys from both sides, and probably a court reporter, instead of paying to get everyone together in the same room somewhere.
but unless there was an actual recording
Currently, this a known unknown. We know it matters, and we know we don't know the answer.
So any hand-waving at all is speculative. You take it a step further and jump right to pejorative attacks; is that because your English comprehension is too poor for you to understand which facts have been disclosed, and which haven't been? Or is that just a personality feature?
And who wrote the system, designing it to benefit the lawyers above all else? That's right, lawyers.