Security flaw helps criminals avoid wiretaps

UK Inquirer | December 1 2005
By Nick Farrell

TECHNOLOGY used for decades by law enforcement agents to wiretap telephones has a security flaw which makes it a doddle to overcome.

According to the New York Times, the glitch means that a tech savy criminal, with off the shelve kit can falsify the numbers dialled and switch off the spooks tape recorders.

The problem has been revealed by an associate professor of computer and information science at the University of Pennsylvania, Matt Blaze, in a paper in Security & Privacy, a journal of the Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers.

Sheepish spooks for the FBI have admitted that it has been aware of the possibility that older wiretap systems may be foiled through the techniques described in the paper, however they say it only effects 10 percent of cases.

Since the Justice Department's most recent wiretap report, says that state and federal courts authorized 1,710 "interceptions" of communications in 2004, this means that about 171 cases could have gone belly up because of the flaw.

The technique involves sending an "idle signal" to the taping gear. While the signal, known as a C-tone, is playing, the alleged criminal could continue to have a conversation unrecorded

Last modified December 1, 2005