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8 UNIVERSITY
PTZ IP AUDIT AV SURVEILLANCE SYSTEM MAY BLOW AN FBI WITNESS PROTECTION PLAN
STUDENTS’ COVER
Confidential NOT for Public Release
UNIVERSITY PTZ IP AUDIT AV SURVEILLANCE SYSTEM MAY BLO= W AN FBI WITNESS PROTECTION PLAN STUDENTS’ COVER
By Professor A. Rushinek, Ph.D. University of Miami, Business School
University PTZ IP Audit AV surveillance system may blo= w an FBI witness protection plan students’ cover, whenever a university instal= l it without the required notice that such a system is at work. Cindy Krischer Goodman, Goodman@miamiherald.com wrote “th= ere is no privacy with office e-mail,” in the MiamiHerald.com and The Miami Herald, Page 8c, Miami Herald, September 26, 2008. She posted it on http://miamih= erald.typepad.com/worklifebalancingact/ at 12:15 PM in Job Security.<= span style=3D'mso-spacerun:yes'> In this article she writes “= Suppose I'm at work and log on to my AOL account. Is the personal email I shoot off= to my friend a private message or can my employer read it? Going forward, priv= acy will be a HUGE issue for American workers as we try to use electronic devic= es to help ease our work/life balancing act.”
Little does she know this is not in the future? This is in the present, and in the= past. Further it is not limited to e-mai= l, it is everywhere. Further it is = much more serious than just embarrassing a reporter as she describes ” = 230; embarrassing saga of former Miami Herald reporter … embroiled in a scandal over= the past few weeks … had an intimate relationship with her while she cove= red the school district. The e-mails were sent back and forth from their work computers.”
She concludes with a question “Do you think elec= tronic devices are making it too easy for our employers to spy on us?” Little does she know that employer= s do not have to labor so hard as to read an employee’s e-mail on the mail= server? Employers can install a surveillan= ce, audit, reconnaissance system to spy on employees from a WI-FI cell phone (a= cting as a DVD remote control) or from the internet’s World Wide Web server located inside the camera, as well as a software camera inside the computer both broadcasting, recording and archiving any AV (Audio Video) signal in stereo, from the microphones inside the computer and inside the surveillanc= e PTZ (Pant, Tilt, and Zoom) IP (Internet Protocol) cameras. The employer can enable the “= ;guest” account on the PTZ IP cam web server and let the WWW public see, hear, reco= rd and interrupt the “private” activities of any such employee, any time they want all they have to do is post a note say “our AV surveillance audit systems can record any activity in these facilities, by remaining on the facilities you are aware that we may use it for training or audit purposes.”
Many employers forget to post such a note, threaten the livelihood of people who are in dire need for privacy, such as a student on= an FBI witness protection plan, who blows his cover due to the absence of such= a note in a classroom containing such a system. Such a student may be sitting in a classroom, blowing his FBI cover on the WWW, indicating to the mob that he = is available to be killed every week MW 5-6:30 in the Memorial Building of XYZ university, un-benown to him, risking not only his life, but the life of the whole class (students and instructor) exposed to the revenge drive by shoot= ing.
All it takes is a sign that will alert such a student = so he can ask the instructor to sit where the camera cannot reach him and blow his cover.
There is a good reason for such measures of limited pr= ivacy as posted by Cindy Goodman at 02:00 PM
In an article on September 11, 2008, “I'm scared= on 9/11,” http://miamiherald.typepad.com/worklifebalancingact/ besides the huge cost savings, distance education, terror and crime prevention and early detection.
As she proceeds to describe “… I watched a= s the North Tower of the World Trade Center burned. The gaping hole was huge, the smoke and fire horrendous …” and the rest is history. All of us “… often bec= ome frustrated with all the security checks and say something like, "You know, when I traveled for work years ago, it was never like this."
The trick is to strike a balance between privacy and security and enforce the requirement to place a note when ever such a syste= m is at work so the attempt to improve the security is not self defeating exposi= ng all of us to added risk, especially those of us that are under some special circumstances, such as an FBI or an Interpol witness protection plan, remin= ding institutions that have such systems to post such important alerts.
Such surveillance systems are linked to a DVD burner a=
nd in
addition to broadcasting, archiving, and storing the AV streams, can also b=
urn
them to DVD, and upload them to a DVD burner on the WWW for a professional
printing and packaging job for FREE for the 1st DVD and for $2.00
for any additional DVDs (http://www.kunak=
i.com
). This way the user does not=
even
need a “Dymo DiscPainter,” http://www.m=
iamiherald.com/business/story/706981.html
as Bridget Carey reports in t=
he MiamiHerald.com
and The Miami Herald, Page 8c, Miami Herald, September 26, 2008, bcarey@miamiherald.com. With a price tag of $279.95, and E=
xtra
cartridges, for $39.95, it will take about 150 DVDs to break-even and justi=
fy
the cost of a DVD printer, at a rate of $2.00 in addition to the free 1
Professor A. Rushinek, Ph.D. University of Miami, Busi= ness School, is a disabled veteran of the Israeli Armed Forces, where A. Rushinek served in the Israel Military Intelligence Research Unit, teaching and researching computer audit surveillance reconnaissance and industrial spying for the past 35 years at UM, University of Maryland, USC, Tel-Aviv Universi= ty, the Technion, the University of San-Francisco and other organizations around the world.
References
Bridget Carey “Dymo DiscPainter,” http://www.m= iamiherald.com/business/story/706981.html MiamiHerald.com and The Miami Herald, Page 8c, Miami Herald, September 26, 2008, bcarey@miamiherald.com
Cindy Krischer Goodman, Goodman@miamiherald.com “there is no privacy with office e-mail,” MiamiHerald.com and The Miami Hera= ld, Page 8c, Miami Herald, September 26, 2008, posted it on http://miamih= erald.typepad.com/worklifebalancingact/
To:
Bridget Carey bcarey@miamiherald.com
Cindy Krischer Goodman, Goodman@miamiherald.com
Regarding:
Your articles in the Miami Herald
I enjoyed your articles in the Miami Herald, and I wou= ld like to invite you to UM to talk about it.= Enclosed is an article for your information. Please do not release it to the pu= blic.
Thank you,
A. Rushinek, Ph.D.