HP Tries A Little Voodoo To Get Spying Scandal Out Of The Headlines

from the do-something-pressworthy-quick! dept

Thu, Sep 28th 2006 8:54pm — Mike Masnick

With 10 of the folks involved in the HP spying scandal choosing to plead the fifth at various times during Congressional hearings, Patricia Dunn still acting combative and HP CEO actually taking some responsibility (which Dunn still refuses to do), it's no surprise that someone at HP decided they might as well try to announce something unrelated to the scandal. Apparently, the company has followed Dell's purchase of Alienware and bought VoodooPC to act as their high-end line for gamers. The company claims that they've been in discussions with HP for almost two years, but the talks only recently sped up. Yes, it's cynical to think the timing of the announcement had anything to do with the scandal (or, specifically, the hearings today) -- so we'll give the company the benefit of the doubt here and assume it's just a coincidence.

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Donald Duck, 28 Sep 2006 @ 9:57pm

HP video games
Can see one of the missions in a HP video game. You have to place a secret wiretap in one of the board members phone?
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mhorizon, 29 Sep 2006 @ 1:28am

sily
i still dont get this...when you work for someone else you have no rites. Its company's building, they pay the bills, your on their time clock. If they want to bug THEIR phone, and intercept emails that you send from THEIR COMPUTERS ON THEIR NETWORK. Woopie...the crime here is that that actually employee idots that would send sensitive info like this at work. DUH
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Mike (profile), 29 Sep 2006 @ 2:05am

Re: sily
i still dont get this...when you work for someone else you have no rites. Its company's building, they pay the bills, your on their time clock. If they want to bug THEIR phone, and intercept emails that you send from THEIR COMPUTERS ON THEIR NETWORK. Woopie...the crime here is that that actually employee idots that would send sensitive info like this at work. DUH

Hmm. I don't think you've actually been following the case, because that's not what happened.

They spied on many people outside the company. They used identity theft to get their private (home and cell phone) records of a bunch of reporters (non-HP employees) and even their family members. They followed around some reporters. They sent a trojan horse that was designed to track what a reporter did on their computer.

This is not about them watching what some of their employees did. Not even close. So, no. It wasn't their computers. It wasn't their network. It wasn't their employees.
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Anonymous Coward, 29 Sep 2006 @ 4:58am

thanks Re:sily.

i've only been following this very lightly. it didn't spark much interest when i first heard about it. until last night. it was around 11ish when i came upon cspan, and they had the hearings on. i wasn't aware of teh exact charges and what pretext was, but it sparked my interest. if i wasn't going to sleep, i'd have dones ome research on the net. but thanks for the briefe summary of what's going on .
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Chuck Norris' Enemy (deceased), 29 Sep 2006 @ 8:48am

Re: sily
They followed a lady on her family vacation to Disneyland! They accessed the relatives phone records! I am pretty sure HP doesn't own these.
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Anonymous Coward, 29 Sep 2006 @ 10:34am

Re: HP video games
lame.
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Anonymous Coward, 29 Sep 2006 @ 10:37am

Re: sily
The problem is that HP stepped outside their business and dug into the personal records of private residences and individuals - including people who don't work for HP.

Next time you "still don't get something" try reading - this has been top news for weeks so apparantly you just like to read headlines and don't bother to actually educate yourself on current events.
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Donald Duck, 29 Sep 2006 @ 11:47am

Employee Rights
You lost your civil rights when you work in a company in the united states? If your boss is listening to your phone calls with out you KNOWNING is not legal period.

http://www.taipeitimes.com/News/worldbiz/archives/2006/09/07/2003326601

Besides the President of Verzion is on the board and reading some news stories about this makes me wonder how secure our infomation is with private companies in bed with our government. I mean AT&T had a office for those people to listen to phone calls? Then they try to defend it.

http://news.com.com/Dunn+grilled+by+Congress/2100-1014_3-6120625.html?tag=nl

From what I can remember those pretext records was legal and congress just made new laws making phone records more private because regular people was getting online and purchasing records of others.

From the link above
A number of other former HP employees and contractors refused to testify earlier Thursday, invoking their Fifth Amendment rights against self-incrimination.

Just because you took the fifth does not me you done something illegal. You have to PROVE that they done something illegal.

Pretexting

http://www.wired.com/news/technology/0,71769-0.html

See verizon was doing that to their employees. You think the verizon dude didn't know what that was? LOL

Now in Boston, Ma pretexting could be legal ?

http://legalethicsforum.typepad.com/blog/2006/09/lawyers_involve.html

http://www.washingto npost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2006/09/20/AR2006092001964_pf.html

Now for HP to purchase VooDooPC they want to beat Dell on the market. They have firms across the usa telling them what Dell is doing 24/7 to stay the top dog I guess HP was just one that got busted a little bit. To think HP is the only one that flirts with the law is NUTS.
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RichardatDELL, 29 Sep 2006 @ 4:40pm

Dell Leadership in Gaming; VooDoo at HP
Interesting that HP is following Dell's lead...a good three steps behind.

We acquired Alienware 6 months time ago, and they continue to be the market leader.

Second, we launched our own high-end XPS product line which has many high-end gaming features, while also serving the high-end PC market....something the Sood's say they look forward to doing at HP. You got to wish the Sood's luck.

Ensuring their product "innovations" make it through the HP departments all the way to approval and then inclusion in the PC, one of the HP businesses not making much money anyway, is a big wish.

On the otherhand Dell's leadership in this market is already taking hold and will continue, with Michael and others at Dell having over a year head start on PCs and gaming. Michael himself is an avid gamer, who has been meeting other gamers and speaking at gaming conferences. We dont need to "make the case" inside our business and already understand the value of technology and innovation in this sphere.

We expect to continue our business leadership. See our corporate blog at www.direct2dell.com for some video and information about gaming and the PC
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