At 9 AM on Monday morning we received a call that there was a break-in over the weekend.  By noon we had installed a new dead bolt on the front door, downloaded the surveillance video, and checked every computer in the office for evidence of a security breach or file download.

The Wolfe Group’s computer forensic investigators were able to extract the video and produce enhanced still photographs and video of the men.  The surveillance was given to the Police within 48 hours of the break-in and should prove to be very helpful in possibly catching the men responsible.

The Wolfe Group is not only involved in investigating what people have done in the past, we are experts in preventative measures as well, including:

• Office/Home Security
• Surveillance Systems and Alarms
• Network and Computer Security
• Personal and Business Computer Encryption
• Executive Protection
• Background Checks

By examining the ex-employee’s personal laptop, given up through discovery of the case, the Wolfe Group’s investigators were able to find screen shots of the man’s personal Yahoo email account.  The screen shots showed the emails coming in from the man’s business email account and then being forwarded on to corporate executives of competing companies.

The investigation of the computer also turned up a previously unknown trip that the ex-employee had taken to a competitor’s business while still employed with the Dallas company.  The competing company’s executive sent an email to the ex-employee with an airplane itinerary attached and detailed instructions of the planned meeting.

For information regarding The Wolfe Group’s computer forensics team, private investigators, or security professionals visit http://wolfegroup.us, or call 214-335-3210.

We were able to, through the combined work of our computer experts and private investigators, match up the dates from the husband’s recent business trips with web searches for Escort Services in the same cities across the nation.  Our computer investigators also recovered partial and full conversations through internet dating sites between the husband and several women.  Contact information was exchanged, services and activities planned, and even costs were discussed.

However, the most damaging information was discovered from the pictures found on the hard drive.  There were thousands of pictures of the family, the husband, wife, and their kids, involved in various activities on vacations, at birthday parties, and around the house.  But another folder on the drive, hidden deep within the user folder of the husband had hundreds of pictures of scantily clad or nude women.  Some of the pictures were obviously downloaded from the internet, but several appeared to be taken with a handheld camera.  Through examination of the metadata The Wolfe Group’s computer investigators were able to determine specific information from the camera used to take the pictures of the women and match that information to many of the pictures taken of the family.

Below is an example of one of the exhibits shown in court comparing the metadata of two of the pictures. The picture on the left was of the family’s children at a birthday party, and the one on the right taken of a woman in a hotel room.  As you can see, they are nearly identical:

The private investigators, hired to determine whether the aide, Kafi Lindsay, 34, was going to work, concluded that her attendance was “sporadic,” that she may have done private legal work on PHA time, and that she appeared “to be in violation of one or more PHA policies,” including the agency’s residency requirement.

The five-page report, stamped draft, was secretly ordered up by Greene last year in an extraordinary effort on his part to investigate his boss, former Mayor Street, who appears to have been the ultimate target of the eight-month investigation.

Vladislav Anatolieviech Horohorin, 27, was seized at the Nice airport Saturday en route from the Mediterranean principality of Monaco to Moscow, where he resides, authorities said. Horohorin, a citizen of Israel and Ukraine, where he was born, was indicted in November by a federal grand jury in the District on charges of credit card fraud and aggravated identity theft.

The Secret Service called Horohorin one of its five most wanted cyber-criminals in the world. He is part of a “network that has been repeatedly linked to nearly every major intrusion of financial information reported” to international authorities, said Michael Merritt, the Secret Service’s assistant director for investigations.

There was no indication Wilson misused anything in the files. Wilson, 80, says he came forward because he recognizes the irony of it falling into the hands of someone like him.

The case, Facebook v. Power Ventures, arose because Power offered software that allowed users to aggregate Facebook friends and other data with similar sets of data from other social networking sites.

Facebook argued that because its Terms of Service forbid users from using automated methods to access user data, Power’s software violated California’s computer crime law, specifically section 502(c) which prohibits access to computers or information that a person is not authorized to access.

The EFF filed an amicus brief arguing that any Terms of Service violation should be treated as a civil contract dispute rather than a crime. Which would significantly lessen the potential penalties.

For questions about internet security violations, Terms of Service, or for information about private investigations, contact The Wolfe Group.

Think of the all the highly confidential information that could be contained on a photocopier hard drive.  Social Security numbers, employer identification numbers, bank accounts, employee and client lists, passwords and other information is routinely placed on a copier without so much as a second thought.  Unless security provisions are in place, data is stored unencrypted and remains there until the drive is full and new data overwrites old.

Sharp, a major copier maker, commissioned a survey that found 55% of Americans plan to photocopy or print out copies of their tax returns and supporting documents this year. And almost half of that number will do so outside the home, using copiers and intelligent printers at their offices or public machines at libraries and copy centers.

Sharp’s survey also indicated that 54% of those polled had no clue that digital photocopiers store an image of what’s duplicated and that a majority believed running off returns on copiers or printers is a safe practice. When told of the security threat posed by unsecured hardware, however, two-thirds of the people surveyed said they were less likely to copy their financial information on a public digital photocopier.

For more information on how to protect your Dallas or Texas based company from identity theft of copied documents, or to request a forensic analysis of potentially sensitive information, contact The Wolfe Group today.

Ron McQuilter, of Paragon Investigations, one of the country’s largest private investigators, says much of that increase can be put down to fraudulent insurance claims.

If you have any information about a possible arson or other crime, contact the authorities, or call The Wolfe Group for more information on how to properly handle the situation.