Colorado Business Litigation Lawyer Blog

In a previous blog, Denver Businesses are Vulnerable to Compromising their Trade Secrets and Confidential Information, Part I, I introduced the topic of the new era of spyware software. I would now like to outline what implications this may have on Colorado businesses.
The implications of this spyware can be a very serious threat to a business’s trade secrets and other confidential information. Just imagine the competitive advantage a competitor could have with your confidential information! The effects could be devastating to your business.
Some partial safeguards you should know about include:

• Don’t leave your cell phone lying around or out of your sight for long periods so that someone can install spyware in it.

• Protect your phone with a password.

• When not in use, turn off your phone and remove the battery.

• Assume your calls and text messages are being intercepted and don’t reveal things that you don’t want overheard by a competitor.

• With some cell phones, a “traffic sniffer” can be used to catch the cell phone sending the information to the remote server at which point the cell phone can be reset to factory defaults to erase the spyware.

It should be noted that intercepting telephone calls without the permission of either the caller or the person called is illegal. That does not mean that it is not being done, however. In fact, it is being done by unscrupulous persons. So protect your business secrets from being compromised. If you suspect that software has been installed on your cell phone or that confidential information or trade secrets have been given out, contact this office so that we help you minimize the damage and hold the responsible person or persons accountable.

Although cell phone spyware has been around for several years, few Colorado businesses or residents in general are aware of the existence of such invasive spyware, its capabilities and its consequences.

The spyware software application must first be installed surreptitiously by someone on your cell phone. After installation, when you make a call or send a text message, a recording is made. An email is then immediately sent to the person intercepting so that such person can listen to the live conversation or have it played back in full.

The spyware is so sophisticated that it can detect and send a record of call logs from the compromised cell phone, even if the phone owner erases the call logs on the compromised phone. And even more sinister, the spyware can pick-up background conversation even if the compromised cell phone is present but turned off. The cell phone I.D. of the person called can also be detected. The spyware is completely invisible and undetectable. The cell phone of the person called is tracked by satellite technology, so that the location of the person called can be pinpointed.

In my next blog post, I will outline the implications this spyware can have on local businesses.