Eavesdropping Statistics

[Excerpted from Kevin Murray's Espionage & Privacy News of the Week – March 22nd, 2002]

SPECIAL SECTION - On Eavesdropping Statistics

We are regularly asked...

• How many electronic "bugs" are planted per year?
• What percentage of them are illegal?
• What percentage is industrial or business related?
• What percentage are domestic?
• What are the most common types?
• What is the percent of sweeps that are productive?
• What is the most common eavesdropping method?

Here is the truth...

In eavesdropping and espionage matters, there are:

• no accurate statistics
• no most common methods
• no typical clients.

Don't let people scare you with made-up statistics - they can't possibly know. Successful attacks go unnoticed. Most unsuccessful attacks go unreported. And the rest are just news stories. No one is officially keeping track.

All attack scenarios have unique qualities, and are usually quite complicated. Everyone has enemies (competitors, activists, disgruntled employees and customers, disloyal partners, unions v. management, management v. unions, etc., etc.).

There is always somebody who wants what you have, or wants you out of their picture.

Here are more truths...

• All properly conducted sweeps are productive.
• It is less expensive to protect and deflect than to defend and fix.
• If you wait until the attack takes place to protect yourself, the 'survival price tag' will be high... and you may not even be successful.

You need to detect pre-attack signs of intelligence gathering (eavesdropping) BEFORE the attack. At this stage, security is both cheap and effective.

The goal is to detect and deny.

Here is another truth we know...

Our clients don't care about statistics (other people's bugs). They care about their bugs.

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