Framed for Child Porn by a PC Virus

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Registered: 08-30-2008
Framed for Child Porn by a PC Virus
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Sun, 11-08-2009 - 10:09pm

"While Fiola and his wife were out to dinner one night, someone logged on to the computer and porn flowed in for an hour and a half."


"Pedophiles can tap viruses in several ways. The simplest is to force someone else's computer to surf child porn sites, collecting images along the way. Or a computer can be made into a warehouse for pictures and videos that can be viewed remotely when the PC is online."


"Watts found that while surfing the Internet for ways to play computer games without paying for them, the manager had visited a site for pirated software. It redirected visitors to child porn sites if they were inactive for a certain period."


"In all these cases, the central evidence wasn't in dispute: Pornography was on a computer. But proving how it got there was difficult."


"But pedophiles need not be involved: Child porn can land on a computer in a sick prank or an attempt to frame the PC's owner."


AP IMPACT: Framed for child porn _ by a PC virus


AP -

Sunday, November 08, 2009 3:25:41 PM By JORDAN ROBERTSON


http://www.mail.com/Article.aspx/tech/0/APNews/Tech/20091109/U_US-TEC-A-Virus-Framed-Me?pageid=1


Of all the sinister things that Internet viruses do, this might be the worst: They can make you an unsuspecting collector of child pornography.


Heinous pictures and videos can be deposited on computers by viruses -- the malicious programs better known for swiping your credit card numbers. In this twist, it's your reputation that's stolen.


Pedophiles can exploit virus-infected PCs to remotely store and view their stash without fear they'll get caught. Pranksters or someone trying to frame you can tap viruses to make it appear that you surf illegal Web sites.


Whatever the motivation, you get child porn on your computer -- and might not realize it until police knock at your door.


An Associated Press investigation found cases in which innocent people have been branded as pedophiles after their co-workers or loved ones stumbled upon child porn placed on a PC through a virus. It can cost victims hundreds of thousands of dollars to prove their innocence.


Their situations are complicated by the fact that actual pedophiles often blame viruses -- a defense rightfully viewed with skepticism by law enforcement.


"It's an example of the old `dog ate my homework' excuse," says Phil Malone, director of the Cyberlaw Clinic at Harvard's Berkman Center for Internet & Society. "The problem is, sometimes the dog does eat your homework."


The AP's investigation included interviewing people who had been found with child porn on their computers. The AP reviewed court records and spoke to prosecutors, police and computer examiners.


One case involved Michael Fiola, a former investigator with the Massachusetts agency that oversees workers' compensation.


In 2007, Fiola's bosses became suspicious after the Internet bill for his state-issued laptop showed that he used 4 1/2 times more data than his colleagues. A technician found child porn in the PC folder that stores images viewed online.


Fiola was fired and charged with possession of child pornography, which carries up to five years in prison. He endured death threats, his car tires were slashed and he was shunned by friends.


Fiola and his wife fought the case, spending $250,000 on legal fees. They liquidated their savings, took a second mortgage and sold their car.


An inspection for his defense revealed the laptop was severely infected. It was programmed to visit as many as 40 child porn sites per minute -- an inhuman feat. While Fiola and his wife were out to dinner one night, someone logged on to the computer and porn flowed in for an hour and a half.


Prosecutors performed another test and confirmed the defense findings. The charge was dropped -- 11 months after it was filed.


The Fiolas say they have health problems from the stress of the case. They say they've talked to dozens of lawyers but can't get one to sue the state, because of a cap on the amount they can recover.


"It ruined my life, my wife's life and my family's life," he says.


The Massachusetts attorney general's office, which charged Fiola, declined interview requests.


At any moment, about 20 million of the estimated 1 billion Internet-connected PCs worldwide are infected with viruses that could give hackers full control, according to security software maker F-Secure Corp. Computers often get infected when people open e-mail attachments from unknown sources or visit a malicious Web page.


Pedophiles can tap viruses in several ways. The simplest is to force someone else's computer to surf child porn sites, collecting images along the way. Or a computer can be made into a warehouse for pictures and videos that can be viewed remotely when the PC is online.


"They're kind of like locusts that descend on a cornfield: They eat up everything in sight and they move on to the next cornfield," says Eric Goldman, academic director of the High Tech Law Institute at Santa Clara University. Goldman has represented Web companies that discovered child pornographers were abusing their legitimate services.


But pedophiles need not be involved: Child porn can land on a computer in a sick prank or an attempt to frame the PC's owner.


In the first publicly known cases of individuals being victimized, two men in the United Kingdom were cleared in 2003 after viruses were shown to have been responsible for the child porn on their PCs.


In one case, an infected e-mail or pop-up ad poisoned a defense contractor's PC and downloaded the offensive pictures.


In the other, a virus changed the home page on a man's Web browser to display child porn, a discovery made by his 7-year-old daughter. The man spent more than a week in jail and three months in a halfway house, and lost custody of his daughter.


Chris Watts, a computer examiner in Britain, says he helped clear a hotel manager whose co-workers found child porn on the PC they shared with him.


Watts found that while surfing the Internet for ways to play computer games without paying for them, the manager had visited a site for pirated software. It redirected visitors to child porn sites if they were inactive for a certain period.


In all these cases, the central evidence wasn't in dispute: Pornography was on a computer. But proving how it got there was difficult.


Tami Loehrs, who inspected Fiola's computer, recalls a case in Arizona in which a computer was so "extensively infected" that it would be "virtually impossible" to prove what an indictment alleged: that a 16-year-old who used the PC had uploaded child pornography to a Yahoo group.


Prosecutors dropped the charge and let the boy plead guilty to a separate crime that kept him out of jail, though they say they did it only because of his age and lack of a criminal record.


Many prosecutors say blaming a computer virus for child porn is a new version of an old ploy.


"We call it the SODDI defense: Some Other Dude Did It," says James Anderson, a federal prosecutor in Wyoming.


However, forensic examiners say it would be hard for a pedophile to get away with his crime by using a bogus virus defense.


"I personally would feel more comfortable investing my retirement in the lottery before trying to defend myself with that," says forensics specialist Jeff Fischbach.


Even careful child porn collectors tend to leave incriminating e-mails, DVDs or other clues. Virus defenses are no match for such evidence, says Damon King, trial attorney for the U.S. Justice Department's Child Exploitation and Obscenity Section.


But while the virus defense does not appear to be letting real pedophiles out of trouble, there have been cases in which forensic examiners insist that legitimate claims did not get completely aired.


Loehrs points to Ned Solon of Casper, Wyo., who is serving six years for child porn found in a folder used by a file-sharing program on his computer.


Solon admits he used the program to download video games and adult porn -- but not child porn. So what could explain that material?


Loehrs testified that Solon's antivirus software wasn't working properly and appeared to have shut off for long stretches, a sign of an infection. She found no evidence the five child porn videos on Solon's computer had been viewed or downloaded fully. The porn was in a folder the file-sharing program labeled as "incomplete" because the downloads were canceled or generated an error.


This defense was curtailed, however, when Loehrs ended her investigation in a dispute with the judge over her fees. Computer exams can cost tens of thousands of dollars. Defendants can ask the courts to pay, but sometimes judges balk at the price. Although Loehrs stopped working for Solon, she argues he is innocent.


"I don't think it was him, I really don't," Loehrs says. "There was too much evidence that it wasn't him."


The prosecution's forensics expert, Randy Huff, maintains that Solon's antivirus software was working properly. And he says he ran other antivirus programs on the computer and didn't find an infection -- although security experts say antivirus scans frequently miss things.


"He actually had a very clean computer compared to some of the other cases I do," Huff says.


The jury took two hours to convict Solon.


"Everybody feels they're innocent in prison. Nobody believes me because that's what everybody says," says Solon, whose case is being appealed. "All I know is I did not do it. I never put the stuff on there. I never saw the stuff on there. I can only hope that someday the truth will come out."


But can it? It can be impossible to tell with certainty how a file got onto a PC.


"Computers are not to be trusted," says Jeremiah Grossman, founder of WhiteHat Security Inc. He describes it as "painfully simple" to get a computer to download something the owner doesn't want -- whether it's a program that displays ads or one that stores illegal pictures.


It's possible, Grossman says, that more illicit material is waiting to be discovered.


"Just because it's there doesn't mean the person intended for it to be there -- whatever it is, child porn included."













Mail.com Media Corporation 

Copyright © 2009 The Associated Press. All rights reserved

Avatar for ddnlj
iVillage Member
Registered: 03-26-2003
Mon, 11-09-2009 - 8:04am
Investigating child sex/molestation crimes has become the new Salem Witch Hunts.
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iVillage Member
Registered: 03-18-2000
Mon, 11-09-2009 - 8:33am

Once an accusation is made, true or false, it calls into doubt someones good reputation & lost almost impossible to recover.


Not only porn. attacking computers.


Scam Alert: When ��Dirty’ Websites Attack
Just looking at a site can trigger a drive-by download of trouble. Here’s how to protect yourself

http://bulletin.aarp.org/yourmoney/scamalert/articles/scam_alert_when_dirty_websites_attack_.html


The first rule of protecting your computer from infection has long been to avoid risky downloads. And while that remains good advice, it may no longer be enough to keep you safe.


We’ve known for a while that clicking on links or attachments from unknown senders can launch viruses and malware that could slow your computer’s performance and allow crooks to steal your private data, including passwords to online financial accounts. But now, many computer infections occur as people surfing the Internet land on a “dirty” website—a site that can put your personal and financial information into the hands of cybercriminals without ever clicking on any attachments or links.


That danger is highlighted in a new report by Symantec, which makes Norton online security products. “Today’s online threats include attacks that can happen silently, without the user’s knowledge,” says company official Dan Schrader. “Often just looking at a Web page is enough to trigger a drive-by download, where malicious software installs itself on the user’s computer.”


Drive-by danger


And it’s no longer enough to avoid websites you might expect to be contaminated, like those offering pornography or free Viagra. “Nowadays, cybercriminals are compromising legitimate websites to launch attacks on consumers,” Schrader tells Scam Alert.


Hackers have become adept at planting malicious scripts on unprotected sites. Those scripts then serve up malware onto the machines of Web surfers by exploiting browser security holes.


The sites listed in Symantec’s August report, “The Dirtiest Web Sites,” contain the greatest number of threats to a computer—about 18,000 different threats on average, says company official Rowan Trollope. By comparison, the typical malicious website averages 23 threats.


About half of the wickedest websites are indeed “dirty”—containing pornography and other adult-themed content—but a slight majority were dedicated to seemingly innocent subject matter, such as figure skating, deer hunting, legal services, family photo albums and buying electronics. One site for a Texas-based catering company contained more than 23,000 threats.


The dirtiest websites often have innocuous-sounding names, such as clicnews.com, fantasticfilms.ru, texaswhitetailfever.com and wadefamilytree.org. (Remember, do not enter!)


Free protection


But since hackers constantly target new sites, how can you stay safe when you’re surfing the Internet?


First, make sure that your Web browser is up to date, because many browsers’ security measures rely on a database of sites known to be dangerous.


Keeping current is easy if you use the browser that came with your computer. Apple computers, which are less vulnerable to viruses, automatically check weekly for updates, or you can also check more frequently by clicking “Software Update” in the System Preferences panel and choosing “Daily.” For PC users, Microsoft also provides an option for automatic updates for Windows.


And before you visit a website, here are two ways to check it out:


• Bookmark Norton’s Safe Web, used for the report by Symantec, which manufactures Norton online security products.


At this free service, you type a website address and get a red “warning,” yellow “caution” or green “safe” rating before you actually access it.


• Download a similar no-cost product, McAfee’s SiteAdvisor, which is especially helpful in detecting possible dangers when you do online searches with Google, Yahoo or other search engines.


Once on your computer, it also provides red, yellow or green indicators of a website’s threat level, preventing a potentially troublesome click.


Sid Kirchheimer is the author of Scam-Proof Your Life.


 


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Avatar for ddnlj
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Registered: 03-26-2003
Mon, 11-09-2009 - 8:46am

It never fails that when a law is put into place with good intentions, it ends up taking on a life of its own and begins doing as much harm as it was supposed to do good.


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iVillage Member
Registered: 03-18-2000
Mon, 11-09-2009 - 9:14am

"....a law is put into place with good intentions, it ends up taking on a life of its own and begins doing as much harm..."


I've read of other cases similair to these. It's plain wrong to classify these people as sex offenders. IMO they haven't broken law.


 


Photobucket&nbs

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Registered: 08-30-2008
Mon, 11-09-2009 - 9:41am

"It never fails that when a law is put into place with good intentions, it ends up taking on a life of its own and begins doing as much harm as it was supposed to do good."


I totally agree.