Feed The Children president Larry Jones fired

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The board did not disclose in its statement why Jones was fired. His attorney said Jones was dismissed over his decision last April to place hidden microphones in three executives’ offices.

Jones has denied wrongdoing, insisting he only intended to record his own conversations with executives who had twisted his statements before. The owner of the company that installed the microphones told police the recorder never worked and the microphones were later removed.

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Building in Surveillance

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But that’s not the most serious misuse of a telecommunications surveillance infrastructure. In Greece, between June 2004 and March 2005, someone wiretapped more than 100 cell phones belonging to members of the Greek government — the prime minister and the ministers of defense, foreign affairs and justice.

Ericsson built this wiretapping capability into Vodafone’s products, and enabled it only for governments that requested it. Greece wasn’t one of those governments, but someone still unknown — a rival political party? organized crime? — figured out how to surreptitiously turn the feature on.

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Gold Lock video on YouTube

 

Report: NSA tried to eavesdrop on Congress member

 

The National Security Agency tried to wiretap a member of the U.S. Congress without a warrant, and has engaged in “significant and systemic” illegal surveillance activities in the last few months including e-mail and telephone call interceptions, according to a report this week.

The article in Wednesday’s New York Times said the Obama administration acknowledged there had been abuses but said they had been resolved. The attempted eavesdropping on a congressman came about because he or she was part of a delegation to the Middle East in 2005 or 2006, and was ultimately blocked.

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Peru’s illegal wiretaps fight corruption with corruption

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The recordings revealed by the media were taped by Business Track (BTR) — a 5-year-old company controlled by former Peruvian navy officials — which formally provided services to protect companies’ information and informally intervened private conversations related to “illegal businesses”. 

According to Mario Vargas Llosa, writing in El Pais, this practice seems to be “dictatorship’s sequels” , a leftover from Fujimori’s regime. The head of the Peru’s intelligence service, Vladimiro Montensinos, generalized the use of chuponeo to track and intimidate opponents, and to extort politicians, military officers, officials and others engaged in illegal activities or even bribed by Fugimori’s government. Apparently, Business Track was created by former officers who were used to do this job during Fugimori’s rule and that found profitable to offer their services to the private sector. As a result of these disclosures, the Peruvian Prosecution has imprisoned six members of Business Track for illegally intervening private phone conversations. 

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Colombian spy agency no longer to control wiretaps

 

BOGOTA, Colombia (CNN) – Colombia’s domestic intelligence agency, which is embroiled in an illegal wiretap investigation, no longer will be directly in charge of electronic interceptions, President Alvaro Uribe said Thursday.

Colombian President Alvaro Uribe has said that he did not order any wiretaps.

All wiretaps now will be under the control of the National Police, Uribe said at an early-morning news conference.

The Administrative Department of Security, known by its Spanish acronym DAS, is under investigation over allegations that it illegally wiretapped judges, opposition politicians, members of the ruling party and journalists.

“We will continue reform of DAS,” Uribe said.

Electronic intelligence gathering will continue, Uribe said, but DAS will have to obtain a judge’s order and approval from the National Police.

“The police will verify that the request contains all the legal documents, and then the interception will proceed,” Uribe said.

The president sought to reassure Colombians that the National Police, which also had been accused of conducting illegal wiretaps, has made strenuous efforts to fix the problem.

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Colombia secret police face wiretap scandal

Colombia is investigating its secret police over allegations of illegal wiretapping.

Five unnamed officials from the DAS domestic intelligence agency have told a magazine that agents have unlawfully recorded judges, politicians and journalists.

The head of DAS Felipe Munoz says an investigation is being set up to determine whether rogue agents illegally intercepted information and passed it on to criminals.

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Colombian prosecutors probe illegal wiretap scandal

BOGOTA (Reuters) – Colombian state prosecutors swooped on headquarters of the national intelligence agency on Sunday to probe charges that rogue agents illegally wiretapped politicians and judges as a paid favor to drug traffickers.

The telephone bugging accusations are the latest scandal to rock the state security agency, known as DAS, and could further stain President Alvaro Uribe’s campaign to stamp out corruption of state law enforcement in the world’s top cocaine supplier.

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Colombia police in wiretap probe

Colombia’s secret police is under investigation over claims rogue agents may have intercepted phone calls and passed on information to criminals.

Magistrates, politicians, officials and journalists may have had phones tapped.

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Peru prosecutor charges 8 with illegal wiretapping

 

By CARLA SALAZAR

Associated Press Writer

LIMA, Peru —Peru’s attorney general presented criminal charges Friday against eight people, including a recently demoted rear admiral, accused of making illegal wiretap recordings that forced the entire Cabinet to resign.

Attorney General Gladys Echaiz said six suspects run a private security company, Business Track SAC, that allegedly tapped the phone lines of as many as 30 people. Two others worked for a subcontractor.

A judge must ratify the charges before a criminal process begins.

One of the recordings leaked to the news media in October appeared to show a state oil company executive discussing kickbacks for steering government contracts to Norway’s Discover Petroleum AS.

The scandal caused the worst political crisis in the two-year administration of President Alan Garcia, who accepted the resignation of his entire Cabinet and canceled Discover’s contracts.

Ten of the 17 ministers were later reinstated and three other ex-ministers were recently cleared of wrongdoing by Congress. But 14 other people, including four top state oil officials and Discover CEO Jostein Kjerstad, still face charges of corruption, criminal conspiracy and influence trafficking. Discover denies wrongdoing.

Echaiz said she expects to announce the names of those whose phones were tapped and could bring more charges later.

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