Finally – a new update for the Exec Security News.

You may have noticed that our news has not come out for a number of months, but I hope to be getting back to a regular flow very soon.

I had surgery performed on my eye muscles last October to help correct my vertical alignment, which had been a problem for many years. It is a fairly common surgery, but unfortunately, the procedure overcorrected my eyes and caused them to be worse in the opposite directions, and requiring additional surgery to correct it. This basically gave me a bit of vision trouble for the past five months, often having to function with one eye closed. My second surgery is scheduled for this week. So I’m looking forward to being able use both eyes “real soon now” and to be able to read the computer screen without having to close one eye.

But enough about me, there are still interesting news items worth paying attention to!
Here are a few to help catch up.

From Wired.com Ben Nassi and his colleagues at Ben Gurion University have found more ways to surreptitiously extract audio.
https://nassiben.com/little-seal-bug

An Optical Spy Trick Can Turn Any Shiny Object Into a Bug

Anything from a metallic Rubik’s cube to an aluminum trash can inside a room could give away your private conversations.

THE MOST PARANOID among us already know the checklist to avoid modern audio eavesdropping: Sweep your home or office for bugs. Put your phone in a Faraday bag—or a fridge. Consider even stripping internal microphones from your devices. Now one group of researchers offers a surprising addition to that list: Remove every lightweight, metallic object from the room that’s visible from a window.

What do these items have in common?

At the Black Hat Asia hacker conference in Singapore this May, researchers from Israel’s Ben Gurion University of the Negev plan to present a new surveillance technique designed to allow anyone with off-the-shelf equipment to eavesdrop on conversations if they can merely find a line of sight through a window to any of a wide variety of reflective objects in a given room. By pointing an optical sensor attached to a telescope at one of those shiny objects—the researchers tested their technique with everything from an aluminum trash can to a metallic Rubik’s cube—they could detect visible vibrations on an object’s surface that allowed them to derive sounds and thus listen to speech inside the room. Unlike older experiments that similarly watched for minute vibrations to remotely listen in on a target, this new technique let researchers pick up lower-volume conversations, works with a far greater range of objects, and enables real-time snooping rather than after-the-fact reconstruction of a room’s audio.

“We can recover speech from lightweight, shiny objects placed in proximity to an individual who is speaking by analyzing the light reflected from them,” says Ben Nassi, the Ben Gurion professor who carried out the research along with Ras Swissa, Boris Zadov, and Yuval Elovici. “And the beauty of it is that we can do it in real time, which for espionage allows you to act on the information revealed in the content of the conversation.”

Other students are up their tricks and getting off easy.

UCSB Student Arrested for Hiding Cameras in I.V. Bathroom Released From Custody; Charges Reduced.

From dailynexus.com
February 27, 2022 at 5:38 pm by Holly Rusch

A UC Santa Barbara student was arrested on Feb. 15 for allegedly hiding a camera in the bathroom of an Isla Vista residence and was released from custody Thursday, according to the Santa Barbara County Sheriff’s Office.

Fourth-year Justin Asinobi is currently charged with two misdemeanors: invasion of privacy by secretly videotaping another person with the intent to view them in a state of full or partial undress and eavesdropping. At the time of his arrest, Asinobi was charged with a misdemeanor and a felony: invasion of privacy by means of an electronic device and eavesdropping. A crime like eavesdropping is considered a ‘wobbler’ offense, where the defendant can be charged with either a misdemeanor or felony based on past criminal conduct, current criminal conduct and sophistication of the crime, according to the Santa Barbara District Attorney’s office.

Asinobi was previously held on a $400,000 bail after deputies contacted Asinobi at his residence and uncovered several “surreptitious recording devices” that they believe were used to record victims without their knowledge.

Deputies contacted Asinobi at his residence and uncovered several “surreptitious recording devices” that they believe were used to record victims without their knowledge. Courtesy of Santa Barbara Sheriff’s Office

From down under…

Leaked training video of sports team Sydney University Flames leads to University of Canberra Capitals coach Paul Goris being banned from the Women’s National Basketball League.

Canberra Capitals coach Paul Goriss has been banned for a month and referee Simon Cosier axed for the rest of the WNBL season after the pair exchanged confidential footage of a rival club’s training session.

Basketball Australia (BA) announced on Tuesday that the Opals Asia Cup coach Goriss and Cosier had been found guilty of engaging in prohibited conduct under Basketball Australia’s framework for ethical behaviour and integrity. BA claim Cosier supplied Goriss with confidential video clips of a Sydney Uni Flames’ training session that had been used for referee education purposes.

The Capitals narrowly beat the Flames in the first round, while a round-two rematch was delayed due to a positive COVID-19 case. Following a BA investigation the matter was referred to an independent panel, who found no actual advantage was obtained.

The panel still recommended bans for the pair, a BA statement claiming they were “misusing inside information and engaging in conduct that would impair public confidence in the integrity and good character of basketball and its participants”. Basketball Australia chairman John Carey labelled the incident “unprofessional and extremely disappointing”. “We will not tolerate this behaviour in basketball,” he said. But BA’s lenience has stunned Sydney Uni Flames owner Paul Smith.

“This strikes at the heart of integrity in our league and basketball generally,” he tweeted. “The penalties, or more pointedly the lack thereof, raise more questions than answers today.”

And from the “Will they never learn?” Department…

Victims of Walmart ‘Peeping Tom’ waited for him outside the restroom, Georgia cops say

A group of men took matters into their own hands after coming to the conclusion someone was photographing them in stalls at a Walmart restroom, according to police in Georgia. “The witnesses stated they and others waited outside the bathroom to confront the male,” the Griffin Police Department said in a news release. “However, upon seeing everyone, he fled the store on foot.”

The suspect made it to the parking lot, got into a vehicle and drove away, but Walmart surveillance cameras recorded his speedy exit, police said. Investigators later arrested Montavis Dixon, 25, as a suspect in the case, officials said.

…A search of the area led to Dixon being located in a vehicle near the Walmart, officials said. “He admitted that he had been to Walmart but denied taking photos in the bathroom,” police said.

A search warrant led officers to find “evidence beneficial to the investigation” at Dixon’s home, officials said. He was later arrested and charged with eavesdropping, Peeping Tom and loitering, and prowling, police said.

Update! Student research, student spying, university sports spying, and more.

An Optical Spy Trick Can Turn Any Shiny Object Into a Bug

Victims of Walmart ‘Peeping Tom’ waited for him outside the restroom, Georgia cops say