Internet Insecurity

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Data brokers get most of their information from government records. Privacy advocates want governments to be more selective about what information they allow brokers to harvest. California, for example, has a law that permits police to release arrest data to reporters while withholding it from businesses that would use it for commercial purposes. Privacy advocates say more jurisdictions should follow California's lead.

The Internet makes it easier for people to broker information about people they don't like. In Seattle, a battle is raging over Justicefiles.org , a frequent critic of local law enforcement. The group began posting police officers' Social Security numbers on its website. A state court has ordered the group to stop, holding that it was infringing on the officers' privacy rights. Free-speech advocates are fighting the ruling, arguing that there is no basis for preventing the dissemination of truthful, legally obtained information.

7 YOUR COMPANY OR YOUR SPOUSE MAY BE USING YOUR COMPUTER TO SPY ON YOU

Companies have the legal right to monitor their employees' Web surfing, e-mail and instant messaging. Many do, whether they warn their workers or not--so don't count on any of it remaining private. Last month the University of Tennessee released more than 900 pages of archived e-mail between an administrator and a married college president in which the administrator wrote of her love for him and of her use of drugs and alcohol to deal with her unhappiness. Employers, including the New York Times and Dow Chemical, have fired workers for sending inappropriate e-mail.

But the fastest-growing area for Internet spying is the home. SpectorSoft, a leading manufacturer of spyware, at first marketed its products to parents and employers. Sales jumped fivefold, however, when the company changed its pitch to target spouses and romantic partners. "In just one day of running Spector on my home PC, I was able to identify my fiance's true personality," a testimonial on the company's website trumpets. "I found all 17 of his girlfriends."

What can you expect if someone puts SpectorSoft's Spector 2.2 on your computer? It will secretly take hundreds of snapshots an hour of every website, chat group and e-mail that appears on your screen, and store them so that the special someone who is spying on you can review them later. A new product, SpectorSoft's eBlaster, will send the spy detailed e-mail reports updating your computer activities as often as every 30 minutes. These products work in stealth mode, so that the people being spied on are totally unaware.

SpectorSoft has sold 35,000 copies of its spyware, and it has only a piece of a booming market. WinWhatWhere, another big player, sells primarily to businesses, but what it calls the "disgruntled spouse" market has been finding WinWhatWhere. Many smaller companies have sites that sell relatively crude "keyloggers," software that records every keystroke typed on a computer.

Isn't all this spying on loved ones a little creepy? Not to SpectorSoft president Doug Fowler. "If you're in a committed relationship and you get caught because of evidence online, as far as I'm concerned you deserve to be caught," he says. Richard Eaton, president of WinWhatWhere, recognizes that in a perfect world users would reveal that they have placed monitoring software on a computer. But WinWhatWhere Investigator has a feature that allows it to be completely hidden. "Our customers demanded it," he says.

8 a Stranger May Be Using Your Computer to Spy on You
Hackers can get into your computer and look through everything on it if your defenses are down. Computers hooked up to the Internet through cable or DSL connections, which are always on, rather than dial-up services, are particularly vulnerable. A home firewall is the best protection against these sneak attacks.

Another prime method of turning your computer against you is tricking you into downloading spyware. Hence the name Trojan horse. This software's danger is hidden inside a benign exterior. That's why so many viruses--like last year's "I Love You," and recent ones promising photos of Anna Kournikova and Jennifer Lopez--are wrapped in appealing packages.

A lot of viruses are designed to damage computers, but some are aimed at stealing information. The "I Love You" virus retrieved passwords from victims' computers to send back to its creator. Other viruses are programmed to strip e-mail addresses from your address book. Back Orifice, a notorious piece of software created a few years ago by a hacking group called Cult of the Dead Cow, takes over a host computer completely. Among its privacy-invading features: it can dig up passwords and monitor every keystroke typed into it.