|
Q. I am involved with federal litigation and have reason to believe that my phone is tapped by the government--legally with a warrant. Can you determine this?
A. No. A legal wiretap placed under a warrant is installed on the far side of the telephone mainframe and there is no variance in the voltage. If we were to test such a line, it would appear normal. While most of our clients have no concern in this area, it is always pointed out prior to accepting work, and again mentioned in the report to the client.
Q. Can you locate a transmitter that is present, but no longer operable?
A. This is seldom a concern of clients and our proprietary electronic testing equipment will not locate such a device. However, as a regular part of our surveys, we also conduct fairly extensive redundant physical searches anyway and would likely discover such a device. If this is a significant concern, a non linear junction detector must be used and we do have access to one through an out of state associate. However, this service is very costly and can result in some damages to the target facility, since corroded metal joints in walls and the like can cause false "hits" and must be resolved.
Q. I am an attorney and I received a call from a person claiming to be a debugging expert who said he was doing some random sweeps of phone systems and that he unintentionally connected to my home phone line. He said he found there was an active infinity transmitter on the line in use at the time and he was able to listen to my conversation in the room. He added that at that time, this conversation was being monitored by a business which he can identify for me. He said that business has been listening to my phone conversations as well as my conversations in the home with this device. For a healthy charge, he said he can remove it. What is an infinity transmitter?
A. An infinity transmitter is a device usually placed in a telephone instrument (or ancillary piece of equipment) which uses the telephone line to transmit the audio occurring in the room. It is incapable of being used for monitoring telephone conversations since it is occupying that line for the purpose of monitoring. Once the device is installed, it can be activated remotely. From that point on, the privacy invader can telephone the number where the infinity transmitter was installed at his or her leisure. Once the connection is made, but before the phone rings, this person sounds an electronic tone or series of tones. This signal turns on the device and the privacy invader can begin listening to, or recording, the conversation in the room. Infinity transmitters will not work on most electronic and computer-based systems used in business. In your case, the so-called debugging expert who called you was trying to rip you off. His claim to be running random sweeps of phone systems is improbable to say the least. Additionally, it is not technically possible that he could have connected with your line if it was being used for monitoring at that time. The line would have been busy and inaccessible. Additionally, as previously mentioned, infinity transmitters will not work for monitoring phone conversations. There is a legitimate consumer counterpart to the clandestine infinity transmitter. Many answering machines have a security feature--perhaps better termed an insecurity feature--where the homeowner can call the answering machine, sound a tone, and listen to the audio in the room for thirty seconds or so. Obviously, if the homeowner can do this, so can anyone else with the patience to try various
|
|
