Judge dismisses keylogger case

[David Farber <dave () farber net>]

Begin forwarded message:

From: Peter Lowe <pgl () yoyo org>
Date: November 23, 2004 3:18:14 PM EST
To: dave () farber net
Subject: Judge dismisses keylogger case

[ For IP, if you like. ]

Via Slashdot.

http://www.securityfocus.com/news/9978

SECURITYFOCUS NEWS              
        


        Judge dismisses keylogger case

        By Kevin Poulsen, SecurityFocus Nov 19 2004 6:40PM
        A federal judge in Los Angeles has dismissed charges against a
        California man who used a keystroke logger to spy on his
        employer, ruling that use of such a device does not violate
        federal wiretap law.

        Larry Ropp, a former claims adjuster for a U.S. insurance
        company, was caught last year using a "KEYKatcher" brand
        surveillance device on a secretary's computer while secretly
        helping consumer attorneys gather information against his
        employer, Bristol West Insurance Group. The KEYKatcher attaches
        inline with a keyboard connector, and stores every keystroke in
        an internal memory for later retrieval.

        Last March a grand jury in Los Angeles indicted Ropp, in what
        prosecutors trumpeted as the first federal criminal prosecution
        for the use of a hardware keystroke logger. The indictment
        charged a violation of the federal wiretap statute, which makes
        it illegal to covertly intercept electronic communications
        transmitted "over a system that affects interstate or foreign
        commerce."

        Prosecutors maintained that the tapped PC was covered by the
        statute because it was connected to Bristol West's national
        computer network, and the secretary had composed electronic mail
        messages on it.

        But district court judge Gary Feess disagreed, and last month
        granted a defense motion to dismiss the indictment. Feess ruled
        that the interception of keystrokes between the keyboard and the
        computer's CPU did not meet the "interstate or foreign commerce"
        clause in the federal Wiretap Act, even if some of those
        keystrokes were banging out e-mail. "[T]his court finds it
        difficult to conclude that the acquisition of internal computer
        signals that constitute part of the process of preparing a
        message for transmission would violate the Act."

        "The network connection is irrelevant to the transmissions,
        which could have been made on a stand-alone computer that had no
        link at all to the internet or any other external network,"
        Feess wrote. "Thus, although defendant engaged in a gross
        invasion of privacy ... his conduct did not violate the Wiretap
        Act. While this may be unfortunate, only Congress can cover
        bases untouched."

        The court based its decision in part on a controversial ruling
        by the First Circuit Court of Appeals earlier this year that
        threw out wiretapping charges against Branford Councilman, a
        former vice president of an online bookseller who provided
        customers with free e-mail accounts, then set up a system that
        made covert copies of some messages for his later perusal. Feess
        found that here, as in the Councilman case, the e-mail was not
        intercepted as it traveled over the network.

        Electronic privacy groups have joined with government
        prosecutors to try and overturn the Councilman ruling, which is
        now under review by a larger panel of judges.

        The court also cited a 2001 case in which a federal judge in
        Newark, New Jersey ruled that the FBI did not violate the
        Wiretap Act when it installed a covert keylogger on the computer
        of organized crime suspect Nicodemo Scarfo. In that case the FBI
        assured the court that that its keylogger had been configured to
        stop recording keystrokes when Scarfo connected to the Internet.

        In an interview with SecurityFocus following his indictment,
        Ropp admitted to using the keylogger, which he said he'd
        purchased off the Internet. But he defended his office
        skullduggery as a necessary evil to expose improper
        anti-consumer practices at the company, which had previously
        been sanctioned for illegally canceling some customers'
        automobile insurance policies. "The FBI themselves use
        keyloggers quite a bit," Ropp said. "Here, I'm a whistleblower,
        and I'm getting the shaft."

        Prosecutors filed a motion last week asking the court to
        reconsider the Ropp ruling. Ropp's attorney, federal public
        defender Firdaus Dordi, said he couldn't comment on the decision
        until the judge rules on that motion.

--
The Czech Republic: Home of the world's finest beer.
Litres drunk by Czechs so far this year: 1,473,761,188.96

 - http://prague.tv/toys/beer/

-------------------------------------
You are subscribed as interesting-people () lists elistx com
To manage your subscription, go to
 http://v2.listbox.com/member/?listname=ip

Archives at: http://www.interesting-people.org/archives/interesting-people/