On Q Professional Investigations

Some 60 years ago, Alfred Kinsey delivered a shock to midcentury sexual sensibilities when he reported that at some point in their marriages, half of the men and a quarter of the women in the U.S. had an extramarital affair. No one puts much stock in Dr. Kinsey’s high numbers any more—his sampling methods suffered from a raging case of selection bias—but his results fit the long-standing assumption that men are much more likely to cheat than women.

Lately, however, researchers have been raising doubts about this view: They believe that the incidence of unfaithfulness among wives may be approaching that of husbands. The lasting costs of these betrayals will be familiar to the many Americans who have experienced divorce as spouses or children.

Among the most reliable studies on this issue is the General Social Survey, sponsored by the National Science Foundation, which has been asking Americans the same questions since 1972. In the 2010 survey, 19% of men said that they had been unfaithful at some point during their marriages, down from 21% in 1991. Women who reported having an affair increased from 11% in 1991 to 14% in 2010.

A 2011 study conducted by Indiana University, the Kinsey Institute and the University of Guelph found much less of a divide: 23% for men and 19% for women. Such numbers suggest the disappearance of the infidelity gender gap, but some caution is in order.

An enduring problem for researchers—even those who sample with meticulous care—is that any such survey is asking for confessions from people who are presumably lying to their spouses. Researchers generally believe that actual infidelity numbers are higher than the results indicate.

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As the rest of the nation’s citizens sit on on pins and needles about who will win the presidential election — Barack Obama or Mitt Romney — information security pros are even more anxious in their wait to see whether this is the year that hackers find a way to subvert or disrupt the increasingly electronic-voting process. According to security experts, the situation is ripe for the bad guys to strike.

Hacktivist groups like Anonymous and LulzSec have perfected their crowdsourced attack methods, and nation-state hackers have more resources than ever to carry out complicated attacks. Meanwhile, voter databases are increasingly interconnected within complex and often insecure local and state IT infrastructure, while the electronic voting systems many states depend on are plagued with vulnerabilities that the security community has been warning citizens about for the better part of a decade.

“If big, Internet-based companies like Yahoo, LinkedIn, or Sony can fall to hackers, then, yeah, big government databases and local authorities who actually administer the election process can be hacked,” says Stephen Cobb, security evangelist for ESET. “I’m somewhat surprised it hasn’t happened yet.”

First on some security experts’ watch list is the potential for hacking online or networked voter databases. Some experts expressed worry that thieves could steal these databases for financial gain, but as Rob Rachwald, director of security strategy for Imperva, put it, “Most voter databases don’t contain a whole lot of sensitive data; they typically contain your name and address, which isn’t terribly private.”

However, if bad actors were able to make changes in the database, that’s where the real trouble would start. If attackers can gain access to these databases to switch addresses for the sake of disenfranchising certain select groups of voters who’d find themselves missing from precinct list on election day, or to institute wide-scale mail-in voter fraud, then they could still affect an election’s outcome.

Such scenarios are hardly far-fetched or improbable, numerous experts warned. And with states like Washington and Maryland opening up data voter registration online, the potential threat surface only increases.

“Any system that is networked, especially to the Internet, is inherently vulnerable to attacks on its availability, and the confidentiality and integrity of its data,” says Steve Santorelli, director of global outreach for the security research group Team Cymru.

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The Transportation Security Administration has been quietly removing its X-ray body scanners from major airports over the last few weeks and replacing them with machines that radiation experts believe are safer.

The TSA says it made the decision not because of safety concerns but to speed up checkpoints at busier airports. It means, though, that far fewer passengers will be exposed to radiation because the X-ray scanners are being moved to smaller airports.

The backscatters, as the X-ray scanners are known, were swapped out at Boston Logan International Airport in early October. Similar replacements have occurred at Los Angeles International Airport, Chicago O’Hare, Orlando and John F. Kennedy in New York, the TSA confirmed Thursday.

The X-ray scanners have faced a barrage of criticism since the TSA began rolling them out nationwide after the failed underwear bombing on Christmas Day 2009. One reason is that they emit a small dose of ionizing radiation, which at higher levels has been linked to cancer.

In addition, privacy advocates decried that the machines produce images, albeit heavily blurred, of passengers’ naked bodies. Each image must be reviewed by a TSA officer, slowing security lines.

The replacement machines, known as millimeter-wave scanners, rely on low-energy radio waves similar to those used in cell phones. The machines detect potential threats automatically and quickly using a computer program. They display a generic cartoon image of a person’s body, mitigating privacy concerns.

“They’re not all being replaced,” TSA spokesman David Castelveter said. “It’s being done strategically. We are replacing some of the older equipment and taking them to smaller airports. That will be done over a period of time.”

He said the TSA decided to move the X-ray machines to less-busy airports after conducting an analysis of processing time and staffing requirements at the airports where the scanners are installed.

The radiation risk and privacy concerns had no bearing on the decision, Castelveter said.

Asked about the changes, John Terrill, a spokesman for Rapiscan — which makes the X-ray scanners — wrote in an email, “No comment on this.”

The TSA is not phasing out X-ray body scanners altogether. The backscatter machines are still used for screening at a few of America’s largest 25 airports, but the TSA has not confirmed which ones. Last week, Gateway Airport in Mesa, Ariz., installed two of the machines.

Moreover, in late September, the TSA awarded three companies potential contracts worth up to $245 million for the next generation of body scanners — and one of the systems, made by American Science & Engineering, uses backscatter X-ray technology.

The United States remains one of the only countries in the world to X-ray passengers for airport screening. The European Union prohibited the backscatters last year “in order not to risk jeopardizing citizens’ health and safety,” according to a statement at the time. The last scanners were removed from Manchester Airport in the United Kingdom last month.

Here’s a side-by-side comparison of the two types of body scanners the TSA uses.

The X-ray scanner looks like two blue refrigerator-sized boxes. Unseen to the passenger, a thin beam scans left and right and up and down. The rays reflect back to the scanner, creating an image of the passenger’s body and any objects hidden under his or her clothes.

The millimeter-wave scanner looks like a round glass booth. Two rotating antennas circle the passenger, emitting radio frequency waves. Instead of creating a picture of the passenger’s body, a computer algorithm looks for anomalies and depicts them as yellow boxes on a cartoon image of the body.

According to many studies, including a new one conducted by the European Union, the radiation dose from the X-ray scanner is extremely small. It has been repeatedly measured to be less than the dose received from cosmic radiation during two minutes of the airplane flight.

Using those measurements, radiation experts have studied the cancer risk, with estimates ranging from six to 100 additional cancer cases among the 100 million people who fly every year. Many scientists say that is trivial, considering that those same 100 million people would develop 40 million cancers over the course of their lifetimes. And others, including the researchers who did the EU study, have said that so much is unknown about low levels of radiation that such estimates shouldn’t be made.

Still, the potential risks have led some prominent scientists to argue that the TSA is unnecessarily endangering the public because it has an alternative — the millimeter-wave machine — which it also deems highly effective at finding explosives.

“Why would we want to put ourselves in this uncertain situation where potentially we’re going to have some cancer cases?” David Brenner, director of Columbia University’s Center for Radiological Research, told ProPublica last year. “It makes me think, really, why don’t we use millimeter waves when we don’t have so much uncertainty?”

Although there has been some doubt about the long-term safety of the type of radio frequency waves used in the millimeter-wave machines, scientists say that, in contrast to X-rays, such waves have no known mechanism to damage DNA and cause cancer.

The TSA has said that having both technologies encourages competition, leading to better detection capabilities at a lower cost.

But tests in Europe and Australia suggest the millimeter-wave machines have some drawbacks. They were found to have a high false-alarm rate, ranging from 23 percent to 54 percent when figures have been released. Even common things such as folds in clothing and sweat have triggered the alarm.

In contrast, Manchester Airport officials told ProPublica that the false-alarm rate for the backscatter was less than 5 percent.

No study comparing the two machines’ effectiveness has been released. The TSA says its own results are classified.

Each week, the agency reports on various knives, powdered drugs and even an explosives detonator used for training that have been found by the body scanners.

But Department of Homeland Security investigators reported last year that they had “identified vulnerabilities” with both types of machines. And House transportation committee chairman John Mica, R-Fla., who has seen the results, has called the scanners “badly flawed.”

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Do You Have a 4th Amendment Privacy Right Over Your Public Postings?

Once you publicly display your images or thoughts on public forums, they are no longer your private property. If you have a run in with the law, the court may use this information against you. And rest assured that the prosecuting attorney charging you will find a way to subpoena those tweets and images.

Twitter Submits Subpoenaed Tweets to Judge

A Wall Street protester named Malcolm Harris was arrested and faced criminal charges for disregarding police orders during the Wall Street protest at the Brooklyn Bridge. Apparently, the protestors were told not to cross the bridge. During the protests Harris apparently tweeted information relevant to his was awareness of these police orders. Judge Matthew A. Sciarrino Jr., who is overseeing his criminal trial, wanted access to these tweets. Harris argued that his tweets are private property and cannot be made available to the court. However, the Judge opined that Twitter users do not own their tweets and Twitter should hand them over when subpoenaed. His tweets for the period of September 15, 2011 to December 31, 2011 were eventually submitted to the Judge. Of course, Harris was not too happy when Twitter handed over his private information to the Judge.

Unfortunately, it seems as though neither Harris nor any of us have Fourth Amendment privacy protection when it comes to our social networking accounts.

Consequences of Posting Photos or Thoughts on Social Networking Sites

The next time you think about posting an inappropriate photo, or tweeting about how much you like to party with your “bros” in Las Vegas, sleep on it before posting it. You never know how it will effect your rights at let’s say, your child custody hearing.

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In the latest embarrassing spectacle for the Secret Service, one of its officers was found passed out and apparently drunk on a Miami street corner less than 12 hours after President Barack left the city following a day trip to campaign, police in Florida said.

Aaron Francis Engler, an officer with the storied agency’s uniformed division, was not on duty when he was found unresponsive on a sidewalk near a popular nightlife area in downtown Miami about 7 a.m. Engler was in Miami in a support role for Obama’s trip, which included an afternoon campaign rally at the University of Miami and an evening fundraiser. His exact duties during Obama’s visit were unclear, but he was not part of the president’s personal security detail.

Edwin Donovan, a Secret Service spokesman, said the case will be turned over to the agency’s Office of Professional Responsibility, which investigates allegations of wrongdoing by Secret Service employees.

This is the second alcohol-related incident for the agency in the last six months. In April, 13 officers and agents were implicated in a prostitution scandal in Cartagena, Colombia, in advance of Obama’s arrival for a South American summit.

After a night of partying in some of Cartagena’s bars and clubs, the employees brought women, including prostitutes, back to the Hotel Caribe, where the employees were staying. The event became public after one agent refused to pay a prostitute and the two had an argument in the hotel hallway.

Eight of the Secret Service employees have been forced out of the agency, three were cleared of serious misconduct and at least two employees are fighting to get their jobs back.

The incident prompted Secret Service Director Mark Sullivan to issue a new code of conduct that included barring employees from drinking within 10 hours of the start of a shift.

It is unclear when Engler was scheduled to work again. He did not immediately respond to a telephone message seeking comment.

In August, a Secret Service agent left a gun in the bathroom of Republican presidential nominee Mitt Romney’s campaign plane and a reporter found the weapon. The Secret Service said the agent was assigned to Romney’s security detail.

Miami police say Engler was arrested on two misdemeanor charges and released to members of the Secret Service’s Miami field office. It’s unclear where he is based.

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Lance Armstrong may take a lie detector test to clear his name after the U.S. Anti-Doping Agency labeled the cyclist a “serial cheat” who ran “the most sophisticated, professionalized and successful doping program that sport has ever seen,” the Guardian and other news outlets reported.

Additionally, Armstrong’s lawyer Tim Herman said he would like to see the 26 witnesses who testified against Armstrong to the Usada take polygraphs as well. “A lie detector test properly administered, I’m a proponent of that frankly, just personally. I wouldn’t challenge the results of a lie detector test with good equipment, properly administered by a qualified technician. That’s a pretty simple answer.”

Herman said Armstrong might not take a lie detector, however, “Because he’s moved on. His name is never going to be clear with anyone beyond what it is today. People are fans, most of the people that I’ve talked to, this is their opinion, it is: ‘We don’t care whether he did or he didn’t.”

Armstrong became the most famous cyclist in the world after he recovered from life-threatening testicular cancer to win the Tour de France seven times in a row, most recently in 2005. During his streak and forever after he’s been dogged by accusations of using banned performance enhancing drugs.

In August of this year he essentially guaranteed that his Tour de France titles would be stripped when he declined to contest the Usada’s arbitration process. Armstrong, who has often repeated that he has never tested positive for a banned substance called the process an “unconstitutional witch hunt” and a distraction.

This week Usada released its 200-page report of evidence against Armstrong including testimony from 11 of his former teammates.

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Another day another issue with an Apple product. Sigh. Except maybe you should hold off on that sigh, because this one’s serious. Apple has, once again, been caught tracking iPhone users.

In April 2011, analysts at a UK security conference discovered that iPhones and iPads running iOS4 had been secretly tracking their users’ every movement. Apple then denied that it was tracking users, although it did so without directly addressing the evidence brought forward by the security company.

Now it has emerged that Apple has started tracking iOS6 users so it can target them through a new tracking technology called IFA or IDfA.

The technology has, in fact, been around since June. Mobile app engagement specialist Apsalar calls it “great news for the mobile app advertising industry” and a “better alternative to the UDID”. A UDID, is the unique, indestructible serial number that every iOS number comes with. It’s also what developers were using to track people — and what Apple stopped them using in the wake of the last tracking scandal.

IFA is definitely in iOS6 — in fact that Apsalar blog post we linked to earlier mentions the fact that it’s sanctioned by Apple as one of the pros of IFA — but, as Business Insider notes, it’s definitely not listed among the features on the iOS6 page.

IFA stands for Identifier for Advertising and is sort of like a persistent cookie which works across apps and publishers. According to Business

Insider, it triggers as soon as you enter a site on your browser or use an app. The IFA is passed on to an ad server. The advertiser now knows what site you’re looking at and can send you a targeted ad.

It also allows advertisers to track you all the way to “conversion”, in the form of an app download for instance. That’s big news for advertisers and gives them a much more serious measure of their success than they could otherwise hope for. What it won’t do however is track you as an individual person. Your device is just part of a series of aggregate data points.

While tracking is turned on by default, it is at least possible to turn it off in iOS 6, although not necessarily easy.

To turn off tracking, go to the settings menu. Look under “General”, then go to “About” and then “Advertising”. Look for “Limit Ad Tracking” and turn switch it to On. It might seem a little counter intuitive but it makes sense when you think about it. You have to turn the limiter on to turn the ads off. Simple.

Given the large number of steps and the fact that Apple hasn’t exactly been shouting from the rooftops about the new technology, it’s likely that most iOS 6 users will end up being tracked.

“It’s a really pretty elegant, simple solution,” Mobile Theory CEO Scott Swanson told Business Insider. “The biggest thing we’re excited about is that it’s on by default, so we expect most people will leave it on.”

At this point, the Fandroids are probably leaning back with smug smiles on their faces. Woah there cowboy (or girl). You Android device also tracks you according GPS location, Wi-Fi hotspots the phone has encountered, and the device ID.

That said, it’s always given you the option to opt out.

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After years of dodging bullets, drinking martinis and indulging in espionage former operatives tell us, covertly of course, which spy films cut the mustard…

This list was compiled by several real-life former spies from the CIA, NSA, the US. State Department’s Bureau of Intelligence and Research, and more agencies — all of whom are founders or Board Members of the Long Island Spy Museum www.longislandspymuseum.org

Tinker, Tailor, Soldier, Spy (1979)

“Real-life spies love the plot focus on recruitment of assets, betrayal and subterfuge; this is the ‘bread and butter’ of spycraft,” said one former CIA officer.

Many former and existing spies relate particularly well to Smiley’s character and the duality that he represents: patriotic and capable without ego combined with that nagging suspicion that defending democracy can be a thankless job and, in the end, he will almost certainly be the last victim in the saga. There is an old saying in espionage: ‘There is nothing more dangerous than an honest man with no agenda.’ This makes Smiley incorruptible to the enemy but also makes him a long-term threat to his political masters.

Munich (2006)

Like real-life spying, the movie is slow and steady with moments of underlying tension and moments of pure ‘dynamite’ particularly when moral dilemmas present themselves. The way Munich proceeded was a lot like real-life spying. It’s not glitz and glamour and flash all the time…successful espionage is slow, methodical, careful; sometimes there’s gripping tension when plans seem to go not quite according to plan, and other times — like in Munich — moral dilemmas can turn even the best laid plans on their head. The movie is realistic in this way.

Ronin (1998)

“NOC officers do not have the protection of diplomatic immunity so when they are caught working in foreign lands, it usually results in incarceration, death or severe bodily harm,” said one Defense Intelligence Agency Spy. “Shifting loyalties and alliances are not fiction in real-world spying. It’s critical to be careful; sometimes that’s the difference between life and death.”

Spying makes strange bed-fellows and there are many cases of two opposing deep-cover operatives inserted into a situation: being forced to work together for the greater good.

39 Steps (1935)

Spies love this movie because of the unexpected twists and turns; something that is ‘par for the course’ in the world of espionage. There is an old saying used by spies all over the world – ‘It’s a great plan until the first shot is fired!’ Any self-respecting spy will tell you that adaptability is critical in the field.

Eye of the Needle

This movie happens to be a personal favorite for spies tasked with counter-intelligence. The only mission for a CI operative is to identify, deceive and mind-fuck other enemy spies. This movie epitomizes the Spy-versus-Spy battles that take place every day without the public’s knowledge.

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A lot of affairs happen with co-workers. The reasons for this are many; you spend a lot of time with co-workers, sometimes more than with your partner or spouse. People at work are often putting their best foot forward in terms of how they dress and present themselves. You don’t see what they look like first thing in the morning before hair and make-up; you don’t really see them when they are sick and miserable, and people usually try to get along with their boss and co-workers, so they save their “grumpy” selves for when they are at home.

Wrong though it may be, people often give their best at work and save the leftovers, emotionally and physically, for their partners and kids.

All of these factors combine to create an atmosphere where unhealthy emotional connections can start to develop that can evolve into an adulterous relationship over time. This cheating can be either emotional or physical. Before this happens though, there is usually one key ingredient that needs to be there to get the ball rolling.

This one key ingredient is made up of two parts: first, there is strain in the person’s marriage to begin with, and they are feeling like their needs are not being met in some way. Second, they meet someone at work who meets those exact needs for them in a way their partner does not.

For example, a guy is feeling under-appreciated at home by his wife. She is not praising him a whole lot, not speaking his love-language, perhaps she is an Intimacy Anorexic (see previous posts). As a result his “love tank” is empty. The emotional bank account is “over-drawn”. Then he goes to work and his rather attractive co-worker, who always looks fantastic and is upbeat and perky, starts to compliment him on things. She pays attention to him, and validates him. She is “into him” and he feels wanted and important. This goes on for months and months….meanwhile at home he feels like he is living in an emotional wasteland. If he is with an Anorexic he feels like a roommate. Meanwhile, the attention from Ms. Coworker is intoxicating…he can’t get enough.

Guess what? He starts to feel an emotional “connection” with this co-worker. He starts to think about her when he is not at work. He thinks about her when he is getting dressed in the morning and putting his cologne on (“I wonder if she will like this” he thinks). He tries to go out of his way to make sure he talks to her at work, perhaps they have lunch or coffee breaks together. One thing leads to another…

This is a classic text-book case of how affairs happen. One person is not getting their emotional needs met at home, and someone at work fills in the gaps. They feel “whole” when they are around this person. The big mistake they make is that they think that it is the person who is fulfilling them, but it is actually the behaviours that they are doing that is making them feel so good. If their husband or wife at home started to do the same behaviours, they would feel fulfilled in that relationship.

If this is happening to you, be careful. An affair is just around the corner. Take the time you spend investing in that co-worker and start to invest it in your primary relationship. Get counselling, read a book, have a heart-to-heart talk and plan on how you can improve your marriage. Read this blog and see if one or both of you is anorexic. If you are, get some help. Just know this….everything you think that this affair with the co-worker will give you, it won’t. If you develop feelings for this person, it will only end in pain. Either pain for your spouse when they learn you cheated on them, or pain for the co-worker when they develop feelings for you and then realize that it can never happen. Some things are just never meant to be.

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You Know Companies Use Background Checks in their Hiring Process – But How Can YOU Use Background Checks in Your Daily Life?

Background Checks are designed for protection. Even in your personal life, using a background check to provide a sense of security to yourself and your family is sound advice. Don’t think you would ever need to use a background check? Think again! The following list may get you thinking!

1. Babysitters or Nannies – Your children are the most valuable people in your life. Making sure that the person you hire to watch them when you are not around is safe and reliable makes sense. You can check with previous employers for a good part of the information you need. Many teens also take a Red Cross Course in babysitting and you can ask if they have this certification.

If you are hiring a nanny through an agency, verify that they have run a criminal background check and ask for the results! You should also see that they have been certified in basic first aid and child CPR.

2. Home Health Care Providers – If you have elderly parents or anyone in need of a home health aide, knowing that those people have the certifications and training they need is crucial. Making sure they do not have any criminal record (especially anything to do with abuse or drug offenses) is also essential to the protection of those you love. The agency providing the health care worker should have run a background check containing this information. Make sure you know what they found before you allow them in your home.

3. Housekeeper or Maid Service – Do you really want the people that clean your home unsupervised to have a criminal record? At the very least you want to know what kind of job they do and if they are reliable. Check their references carefully and, if they are employed through an agency, check to see what you can expect in the event of any problems with the service.

4. Home Contractors or Handymen – Checking references of past customers may give you information on their skills and work habits. If they own their own business, checking with the Better Business Bureau or your local township offices for complaints and how they resolved them is good business.

5. New Roommate – While getting a new roommate rarely escalates into an incident like the one depicted in the movie “Single White Female”, checking out a potential new roommate is both practical and sensible. Do they have a criminal record? Do they pay their rent on time? You may not be able to access their financial records, but contacting their previous landlords or roommates is a good step. You can also check your county’s civil and federal court records to see if they have filed bankruptcy or been involved in litigations.

6. Renters and Tenants – Do you own any rental property? A vacation home you are thinking of renting? You need to take the necessary steps to protect both your property and ensuring the safety of your other tenants (if you have them) and your neighbors. A basic check of any criminal or civil actions against them is the first step. You should also check any past landlords to determine whether they pay their rent on time and if they left the rental property in good order.

These are just some suggestions on how you can use background checks to make you and your family safer, the additional peace of mind you will have is invaluable.

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