Clearer line needed on phone-hacking

The information commissioner is right when he calls the legislation ‘very
uneven and very unclear’

Peter Preston

The Observer, Sunday 1 May 2011

Acting Met commissioner Tim Godwin is investigating alleged phone-hacking.
But the law is ‘very uneven and very unclear’, says information commissioner
Christopher Graham.

When Christopher Graham, the ex-BBC man turned information commissioner,
tells MPs that anti-phone-hacking legislation is “very uneven and very
unclear”, who could disagree? Suppose I use a private eye to blag, con or
wheedle private mobile and pin numbers out of some dozy phone company. That
infringes section 55 of the Data Protection Act of 1998 – and I could be
fined up to £5,000. But if I hack into the mobile in question and hear the
messages left there, I’m committing a crime under the Regulation of
Investigatory Powers Act 2000 – and could face two years in clink.

See full Article at http://www.guardian.co.uk/media/2011/may/01/peter-preston-phone-hacking-law

Feel free to comment and let us know your thoughts.

Regards,

Frank

www.nig.co.uk Nationwide Investigations Group Established 1963

One of Britain’s premier private investigation organisations, Nationwide Investigations Group or NIG at NIG.co.uk has extensive experience in investigative matters that are known throughout the United Kingdom, Europe and the world.

Click Here for the full press release

A few of our members have asked for an explanation regarding what a boiler room scam actually means, so we thought we would draft this article for all interested in this type of scam.

The following explanation provides a simple insight

Boiler Room Scams – what they are and what to look out for

What is a Boiler Room?

Boiler Rooms are businesses that use high-pressure sales techniques to sell ‘sure thing’ investments with the promise of massive returns. In fact, what they’re selling is worthless stock in often unquoted companies that are either overvalued, or simply don’t exist at all.

How they work

Boiler Room operatives generally cold-call their targets, using phone numbers from publicly available shareholder lists.

Because it’s against the law for investors to cold-call in the UK, they tend to be based abroad (often Spain, Switzerland, or the US) where they’re beyond the jurisdiction of the Financial Services Authority (FSA). They can approach anyone, anywhere.

Boiler Room techniques

A Boiler Room can look and sound legitimate. They may mention companies you’ve heard of, give themselves a UK address or phone number, and have a professional looking website.

They’re notoriously persistent, and can hound a victim for months in the hope of a sale, catching out even seasoned investors. According to the FSA, Boiler Room Scam victims lose on average £20,000.

Remember, as a general rule, if an investment sounds too good to be true, then it almost probably is.

Anyone interested in a pretty accurate understanding of what a boiler room scam looks like should take it upon themselves to watch the movie released in 2000 about a bunch of scam artists selling all sorts of stocks and sinking peoples lives based on hard selling techniques into products and stocks that don’t exist.

What to do if you’re called

If you think you’re being targeted by a Boiler Room, the FSA’s advice is not to worry about being polite, just hang up. You should then dial the FSA contact centre on 0845 606 1234 with as much detail as you can remember. You’ll find more information about Boiler Rooms on the FSA website www.fsa.gov.uk

Social Networking website used to serve a court summons

A lawyer based in Britain has used a Social Networking website to serve a court summons, in what is believed to be the first such case in Britain.

Hilary Thorpe a solicitor based in Eastbourne was finding it difficult to reach a debtor in order to issue him a court summons regarding his finances. She had exhausted all avenues in trying to reach the debtor and recalled a rare case in Australia whereby the Supreme Court had given the solicitor permission to utilise a social networking website to serve a summons.

She wondered if a British court would accept the same principle.

Hastings Count Court in East Sussex accepted her request, and Ms Thorpe had logged onto Facebook and served the court order.

“It is great to see that the courts are willing to embrace new technology”.

This case has proven to be an effective way of resolving an age old problem in the legal system! From a private detectives point of view this case should be the bench mark for serving a wide range of legal documents and summons to those hard to reach individuals, speaking from experience this type of service would have made my job and life a million times easier.

Frank

With the extremely high rise in identity theft it’s become an increasingly popular practice to purchase encryption based software to further protect sensitive information. While the major operating systems provide a certain level of encryption security to your emails and telephony calls, this type of standard software based applications does not provide 100% guaranteed security.

It has been seen from recent press reports that organisations & individuals have been able to access other people’s emails, telephone calls and more, only because these people failed to protect themselves, probably because they didn’t know that this could be done. We of course to not condone or advocate this type of activity,  Private Investigators / Private Detectives who use this route to obtain information run extremely high risks and bring our whole industry into disrepute.  

We would however like to suggest that most people investigate the possibility that your information is never 100% secure, therefore make certain that when you are sending personal and sensitive information you check that encryption box. On a closing note here are a few good practices that might help you secure your information.

Since your documents and information are unlikely to start a war here are a few simple options (sorted by complexity):

• Archive your document in an encrypted 7-zip file. Since 7-zip is pretty much “standard” it’s likely the recipient will be able to open the file without installing anything on its side. 7-zip AES 256 to encrypt the archives.
• Encrypt your files with AxCrypt. The issue will be that it’s likely that the recipient will have to install it on its side. AxCrypt uses AES 128 to encrypt the files.

Send the encrypted files by email. Then give the recipient the password over the phone (or by other means of communication).

In today’s day and age a major concern for all parents is that their children are so vulnerable to a number of different types of bullying and attacks. From mobile phones to internet cyber bullying our children and families are exposed to a whole new world of bullying. Here are a few forms of bullying that are currently taking place in and around the United Kingdom.

• Texting threatening or nasty messages to people.
• ‘Happy slapping’, which is when people use their mobiles to film and share videos of physical attacks.
• Posting an embarrassing or humiliating video of someone on a video-hosting site such as YouTube.
• Harassing someone by repeatedly sending texts or instant messages in a chat room.
• Setting up profiles on social networking sites, such as Bebo or Facebook, to make fun of someone.
• Excluding people on social networking sites.
• Stealing someone’s identity by hacking into their account.
• Sending or forwarding personal or private information or images.
• Sending viruses that can cause damage to another person’s computer.
• Making abusive comments about another user on a gaming site.

Research done on 15000 children in the UK found that 47% of 14-year-old, 41% of 15-year-olds and 29% of 16-year-olds reported being bullied. The children most likely to be bullied were the most vulnerable in the class. Those with special educational needs, who were disabled or were in the care of the local authority, were much more likely to be targets.

This alarming report brings me to my next point that these children are not alone and there is something we can do as parents. Private Investigators across the world are able of putting together certain tracing procedure that can expose these bullies, such as mobile traces, tracing of IP and Mac addresses of certain devices used to send harmful emails and different forms of harassment.

Be warned that you are being watched bullies even if you think you’re safe behind your fictitious profiles and wrongful use of technology.

www.nig.co.uk Nationwide Investigation Group

After we received intelligence about the centres, Operation Nevada was launched involving our investigators, the Metropolitan Police, awarding bodies (HABC, EDI, Edexcel), the qualifications regulator Ofqual, and the UK Border Agency. Police have arrested one individual on suspicion of fraud, and the police and the UKBA are continuing to investigate various offences.

Unannounced visits led by us took place at training providers in locations across London and the South East of England on 12 November 2010. We found evidence of serious training malpractice, such as the centres registering candidates and awarding them certificates when they had not sat the examination.

As a result, four London-based training providers – Divine College, St Joseph’s College of Science and Technology, ME Training and Inter-Continental College – have had their approval to provide training withdrawn by their awarding bodies.

The awarding bodies have withdrawn more than 300 certificates awarded to candidates registered with these centres. Of these qualifications, 69 candidates had used them to obtain an SIA licence (door supervision), all of which we have suspended. These licence holders have a 90 day period following the suspension to gain a valid qualification, after which time we will revoke their licence.

SIA Director of Compliance and Enforcement Dave Humphries said:

“Investigations into allegations of training malpractice are a key part of our compliance activity. In the interest of public protection it is vital that all operatives working in the security industry are properly trained to deal with the demands of their role.

This operation involved very successful joint working with partner organisations and has provided a model that will be used again in the future to close down training providers where there is evidence of misconduct.”

The SIA have confirmed  that the API (Academy of Professional Investigation) Edexcel BTEC Advanced Private Investigation Level 3 Diploma Course sufficiently covers the scope of the SIA Specification for Private Investigators when the licensing of private investigators commences which will lead to an exemption for proof of competence for those applicants who have achieved the qualification.

It should be appreciated that the API Edexcel BTEC course is a comprehensive A to Z teaching course for either new investigators or the more experienced investigator who wants to achieve a recognised qualification. Whereas what is currently available is only for the purpose of obtaining a license which would enable a person to conduct licensable activities, it is not intended to teach individuals the required skills of a professional private investigator .

Its never good to be caught with your trousers down!

In the 70′s a young man came to our London office with what seemed to be at first an unbelievable story. He said he had recently been released from prison having been sentenced to 12 months for theft from his and his wife’s employer who supplied car parts. He said that following a reported theft by his employer the Police raided his flat and searched his car finding car accessory items still in the packaging and clearly marked with his employers name.He went on to say that he had been fitted up by a Senior Police Officer who was having an affair with his wife and who wanted him out of the way. He told us that he had had a previous conviction for theft some years ago which didn’t help him in trying to prove his innocence. He was estranged from his wife who was still living in what was the matrimonial home and he said that the Police Officer was visiting his wife at her address at least twice a week.

We agreed to take the case on, although being honest we were very sceptical about the whole situation. We set up a surveillance on the premises which were a block of high rise flats in South London. On the second day of the surveillance and to our complete surprise we saw a dark blue Hillman saloon which at that time Senior Police Officers would often use together with a driver as their method of transport. A male person who fitted the description that had been given to us by our client got out of the back seat of the vehicle . We immediately followed this person into the building where the doors of the lift were just closing. We watched as it ascended to the tenth floor. We then immediately got in the other lift and went to the clients wife’s flat on the tenth floor. We listened at the door and could hear voices and laughter from within the flat. Having waited for about 30 minutes we knocked at the door, which was eventually opened by the clients wife in a dressing gown. We immediately rushed into the bedroom and found the Police Officer struggling to get his trousers on. Having photographed the situation and been threatened with certain death from the Police Officer we hastily left.

Our evidence and photographs enabled the client to have his conviction quashed, and receive compensation. The Police Officer was suspended for planting evidence and eventually resigned. He should have gone to prison. As expected the client and  his wife divorced. The unbelievable can sometimes be true.

If you have a similar problem and think that your partner may be cheating on you with someone else call Nationwide Investigations on 0800 181 383 to set up a surveillance and find out the truth.

We have all had potential clients who have appeared to be more in need of psychiactric help rather than a Private Investigator although it’s always prudent not to dismiss these people out of hand.

One good example of this was a client who approached us many years ago seeking help to catch a ghost that was tormenting her. First impressions of course were leaning towards disbelief in as much as she had the appearance of a witch, lived in a large old Victorian house in London and had two rooms let out to tenants.

She went on to say that two or three times a week, over the last year this ‘ghost’ would bang and crash around the house, slam and rattle doors and knock things over. She said she was too frightened to leave her bedroom and see what was going on. She asked her tenants whether they heard this ‘ghost’ which they denied hearing. We arranged to have an agent stay at her house and do an undercover surveillance without the tenants being informed. I should say agents because no one would do it on their own.

During the first week our agents were lucky enough to be in the house when at about 2AM they heard ghostly noises and thumps during the night, door rattling and banging and things being knocked over.  Having built up enough courage and probably holding hands they rushed into the hallway and low and behold witnessed two ‘ghosts’ in the form of the two tenants who were more shocked at seeing our agents than our agents would have been if they had been ghosts.

Well in the end it all turned out to be an exercise in gaining possession of the old lady’s property, her property being the only one that had not been acquired by developers in a proposed supermarket development.