Would-Be Akamai Spy Busted By Feds 171
itwbennett writes "Elliot Doxer, an Akamai Technologies staffer, was charged on Wednesday with wire fraud. The case began in June 2006 when Doxer sent an e-mail to the consulate of a foreign country (referred to as 'country X') in which he 'expressed his desire to help that country with whatever information he could obtain in his position,' according to an article on ITworld. 'The foreign consulate that Doxer contacted turned his e-mail over to law enforcement authorities, and a little over a year later, he was contacted by an FBI agent posing as a representative of 'country X.' Over the next 18 months, Doxer left confidential business information such as customer lists and contracts at a designated spot called a dead drop, acts captured via video surveillance.'"
Re:for those who wonder what the hell akamai might (Score:3, Interesting)
The funny thing is, almost everyone has probably used Akami without realising it. They provide up to 30% of web traffic. I assume most of that comes in the form of updates and software downloads that loads of big players seem to use them for.
Re:An Analog 'Dead Drop'? (Score:5, Interesting)
Re:What kind of moron (Score:4, Interesting)
China is hardly the only country guilty of this. I've heard more stories from co-workers about issues in France than anywhere else, to the point that it is against company policy to take a company issue laptop there. And I don't mean random guy approaches you in the bar and asks what you do for a living, I mean coming back from dinner to find 3 suits and 2 uniformed cops in your hotel room that all refuse to tell you what they were doing there.
Aside from just being a dumbass... (Score:5, Interesting)
(The previous is no more than commentary and opinion and should not be construed as encouragement or advice to commit treason/fraud/etc.)
Think of it in Reverse (Score:2, Interesting)
Doesn't something seem wrong with the response of the foreigner who informed on him. Wouldn't the proper response be to say something like, "we value transparent relations with the US and wouldn't want to jeopardize them" instead of turning over the man's emails to the US.
Think of this in reverse. Let's say the man worked for Baidu, the Chinese Internet search engine and his loyalty was to the US. The man emails a member of the US government saying, if they wanted help he'd be willing to help them out. Now, wouldn't it then seem really wrong to then turn over that man's emails to the Chinese government so they could use them to trap him in some set up?
Shouldn't the US or anyone else in that situation just say "thanks, but no thanks" instead of starting these cloak and dagger games?
Re:What kind of moron (Score:2, Interesting)
When travelling back from Israel, custom agents took my laptop from me for an hour, just to check if the battery could be some kind of explosive. Of course, I could not stay around while they checked. I have missed my flight, and had to fly in a crappy El-Al plane.
Re:What kind of moron (Score:3, Interesting)
Yes, in light of his apparently 'lack of mental balance' they figured they'd have a loose cannon on their hands. As a poster replying to my initial post pointed out, it seems very likely that the country in question is Israel. I figured that the people most likely to benefit from this type of information would be China (and I was apparently wrong.)
Re:An Analog 'Dead Drop'? (Score:3, Interesting)
Give it a couple of years, and the companies will have defined theft of IP to give to a foreign entity as treason.
They've already managed to make the government the enforcement arm for what should be civil proceedings. Treason isn't too far away.
Re:wrong charges.... (Score:3, Interesting)
However; as you correctly noted this was just industrial espionage, and not very effective espionage at that.
The crime of espionage requires an attempt to transmit National Defense information to a foreign party with intent, or reason to believe that the information will be used to the injury of the US, or to the advantage of a foreign nation. (paraphrased from 18 US 794)
This "intent" or "reason to believe" does not exist in this case so Espionage is out, so they chose a charge that they could be sure would stick and still have a hefty penalty (20 years).
Re:What kind of moron (Score:3, Interesting)
Re:What kind of moron (Score:1, Interesting)