The Department of Justice brought its first-ever criminal...
The Department of Justice brought its first-ever criminal case against so-called “stalking apps,” which use spyware to track smartphones, said a Monday DOJ news release (http://1.usa.gov/1pomOUo). The maker and CEO of the app StealthGenie was indicted in the U.S. District…
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Court in Alexandria, Virginia. “Apps like StealthGenie are expressly designed for use by stalkers and domestic abusers who want to know every detail of a victim’s personal life -- all without the victim’s knowledge,” said Assistant Attorney General Leslie Caldwell. StealthGenie -- hosted at a Virginia data center but run by Hammad Akbar in Lahore, Pakistan -- contained spyware that can also intercept communications to and from smartphones. Sen. Al Franken, D-Minn., reintroduced in March the Location Privacy Protection Act to ban stalking apps and the secret collection of location data (S-2171), later holding a hearing on the issue in the Privacy, Technology and the Law Subcommittee that he chairs (WID June 5 p3). “People ought to be able to control who can access their sensitive information, and stalking apps on cell phones directly violate that principle,” Franken said in a Tuesday statement. “There is no federal law banning the secret collection of location data.” Akbar could not be reached for comment. DOJ did not comment on whether it was pursuing action against similar spyware apps. Several other spyware app companies we contacted did not comment.