This reminds many of the FBI's Carnivore massive
network sniffer software. It also revives the old dilemma
between privacy and security. An Omni Consulting
survey of 3200 companies worldwide pegged damage
caused by insecure networks at $12 billion.
There is no end to the twists and turns of espionage cases
and to the creativity shown by the perpetrators.
On June 2001 an indictment was handed down against
Nicholas Daddona. He stands accused of a unique
variation on the old theme of industrial espionage: he was
employed by two firms - transferring trade secrets from
one (Fabricated Metal Products) to the other (Eyelet).
Jungsheng Wang was indicted last year for copying the
architecture of the Sequoia ultrasound machine developed
by Acuson Corporation. He sold it to Bell Imaging, a
Californian company which, together with a Chinese firm,
owns a mainland China corporation, also charged in the
case. The web of collaboration between foreign - or
foreign born - scientists with access to trade and
technology secrets, domestic corporations and foreign
firms, often a cover for government interests - is clearly
exposed here.
Kenneth Cullen and Bruce Zak were indicted on April
2001 for trying to purchase a printed or text version of the
source code of a computer application for the processing
of health care benefit claim forms developed by ZirMed.
The legal status of printed source code is unclear. It is
undoubtedly intellectual property - but of which kind? Is it
software or printed matter?
Peter Morch, a senior R&D team leader for CISCO was
accused on March 2001 for simply burning onto compact
discs all the intellectual property he could lay his hands on
with the intent of using it in his new workplace, Calix
Networks, a competitor of CISCO.
Perhaps the most bizarre case involves Fausto Estrada. He
was employed by a catering company that served the
private lunches to Mastercard's board of directors. He
offered to sell Visa proprietary information that he
claimed to have stolen from Mastercard. In a letter signed
"Cagliostro", Fausto demanded $1 million. He was caught
red-handed in an FBI sting operation on February 2001.
Multinationals are rarely persecuted even when known to
have colluded with offenders. Steven Louis Davis pleaded
guilty on January 1998 to stealing trade secrets and
designs from Gillette and selling them to its competitors,
such as Bic Corporation, American Safety Razor, and
Warner Lambert. Yet, it seems that only he paid the price
for his misdeeds - 27 months in prison. Bic claims to have
immediately informed Gillette of the theft and to have
collaborated with Gillette's Legal Department and the
FBI.
Nor are industrial espionage or the theft of intellectual
property limited to industry. Mayra Justine Trujillo-Cohen
was sentenced on October 1998 to 48 months in prison for
stealing proprietary software from Deloitte-Touche, where
she worked as a consultant, and passing it for its own.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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