Intrusive Software for Anyone

In my third book, The New Cyberwar, I talked about some of the software out there marketed to parents of teens that opened e-mail, tracked users, and blocked sites the parents found inappropriate.  These can be purchased and used by anyone, without anyone asking for a birth certificate proving you actually have children.  There is a relatively new report (April 2016) on this from the Government Accountability Office [http://www.gao.gov/assets/680/676738.pdf#page13 ]. It surveys software and how it is marketed:  for parents of children who want to see more about what they do in their spare time, (2) for spouses who think their husband or wife is cheating on them, and (3) employers who think their employers are cheating on them, or (4) people with Alzheimer's.  

The important thing this study does is look at laws that apply to these kinds of software.  I don't want to get into that right now, but suffice it to say, there are some since these devices are tracking and monitoring someone when they are not at home/work or anywhere where it is legal to monitor another.  There are plenty of good reasons for the kind of monitoring that is done here, but we have to wonder whether those good reasons are the ones this software is purchased for, or whether intent of use is even a factor in purchasing this kind of thing.  I wrote about what governments do with this kind of software, often made in the U.S for law enforcement.  We call this spying.  

This is a tricky area to say the least.  I should point out that these are the kinds of things this software does:  (1) geo-fencing i.e. Tracking based on a defined boundary.  When the subject leaves that boundary a message is sent to the tracking party.  (2) intercepting and reading texts and e-mail (3) the ability to access and view photos on the tracked device (4) listen in and record phone calls (5) read the phones browser history (6) accessing and reading social media postings and (7) using the speaker to listen in to events going on around the phone.  I'm really glad my parents didn't have this capability when I was a teen, but I'm wondering why we allow this kind of software to be sold.  It records phone calls without permission of either party;  it looks at things that would clearly require a warrant if law enforcement used it;  it looks at things that a spouse could get from a private investigator following a cheater, but only if those events were in a public place.  This software gives us access to things we don't need and certainly have no right to have.  

This report was for Senator Grassley, Judiciary Committee so we will shortly be seeing things related to this kind of surveillance, but I wonder if the good Senator can get consensus, especially on monitoring of employees in the workplace.  Any business using this kind of thing would not be a good place to work.  Imagine how you would feel about your employer doing all of the things this software will do.  A tool to detect this kind of thing might be a better use of our money.  

This is the kind of thing Willis Ware wrote about years ago, when he said we could stop computer crime but the things we have to do are things we might not want to do in a democracy.  There is something wrong with us when this kind of thing is available in the marketplace and can define its use solely on the basis of its legality in a narrow corner of law.  States have laws that ban devices on cars that look only at radar units that police use, but they have no laws that ban this kind of thing.  We clearly do not have our priorities in the right place.