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Student Lets Thief Steal His Phone, Spies on Him for Documentary [video]
- jahnu 10y agoVery creepy thing to do.
- mrlatinos 10y agoYeah I really don't understand the point... Obviously thieves have sad lives for the most part. No reason to put this man's shame on display, especially when you baited them in the first place.
- jasonkostempski 10y agoIf anything, stories like this being out in the wild are a good deterrent.
- kiliantics 10y agoI don't get the feeling that the thief here had all the wonderful opportunities that the student or most readers of HN have. I'm sure he's making the best of a bad situation and making choices that many of us would if we were in his position, given the deterrents or not.
- mikekchar 10y agoTo be fair, I've known a fair number of people with serious problems in their life and a large percentage of them started out life in an advantageous position. I don't doubt that there are people who would consider that just being born in the US is advantage enough. Advantage is a relative term. People often make bad choices in their life. Sometimes it is easy to understand why, other times it is really obscure. It is my experience that even when someone makes such a bad choice, they rarely understand how bad it is. People are strangely optimistic in this way. People weigh alternatives based on the best case outcome. If an alternative does not give them what they want, they will disregard it out of hand -- even if it turns out to be the best course of action. Ironically they will consider it stupid to pursue something that has no chance of leading to what they desire. Instead they will dig themselves a pit they can't get out of. Having done so, they will often remark, "It is so unfair. All I wanted was X, which should be everyone's right. Society has let me down so badly, why should I care about anyone else?" I remember being taught in high school that a tragedy is a type of story where the main character's own actions lead to their downfall. In that way, I have witnessed many tragic stories. I have, indeed, been party to my own personal tragedies. I also believe that deterrents are not particularly effective in these cases (because people optimistically believe that the deterrent will not apply to them). I don't, however, believe that most people will make the same choices in the same circumstances. Neither do I believe that most people's situations are hopeless from the beginning. Having said all that, I am powerless to act because I have no idea how to help people who make bad choices. I have a hard enough time doing it when people decide to choose some ridiculous framework rather than to write code. I hope, over time, we as a society will be able to help people like this more effectively, though.
- briandear 10y agoWhy not? The thief deserves it. It wasn't like they sold the phone to feed starving kids.
- MichailP 10y agoTowards the end of movie I felt sorry for everybody involved. Including me for watching :P
- 1337biz 10y agoOdd. I never did. I always waited for the moment he confronted him.
- arjie 10y agoYeah, me neither. I'm hoping that this becomes easy to do and hard to detect. Poison the stolen phone market.
- tasty_freeze 10y agoit would poison the used phone market in general. I'm currently using a Nexus 5 that I got via a craigslist transaction. Even if the phone came from the original buyer, how do I know the college-aged seller didn't put on the spy software for the lulz?
- arjie 10y agoHow do you know that right now?
- tyingq 10y agoIncludes remote video of the thief watching porn on the phone while, er, entertaining himself. Ouch.
- cgvgffyv 10y agoReddit is leaking again.
- tasty_freeze 10y agoThat was a very redditesque comment.
- 1337biz 10y agoSo, how do I root my phone similar to that guy so I will have access to it for the rest of my life?
- mrlatinos 10y agoJust follow standard instructions from XDA to root your Android phone and then buy Cerberus pro and install it.
- jacobkranz 10y agoI'm not familiar with Cerberus but what's stopping Cerberus from being hacked and having every phone be snooped on?
- LordWinstanley 10y agoCerberus gets pretty bad reviews recently on the Play Store. Seems like the developer reneged on a load of lifetime licences and locks people out of the app because "you're not using it properly" [©Apple]... also, quite a few people say it doesn't work very reliably anyway
- tdkl 10y agoThe dev had a giveaway of lifetime licenses then changed his mind because of fallen revenue and set those licenses to expire after a year. Nothing was taken from customers who bought the app. I rather did see this happening then service shutting down or implementing a subscription fee instead. Lifetime license otherwise costs 3$ for up to 5 active devices at the same time, so it's quite cheap. I bought it 4 years ago and used in on about 5 different Android phones, you can remove older unused devices to keep the limit down. The main difference between this and other solutions or Android Device Manager is functionality to control the device over SMS commands. Because ADM is useless when the device doesn't have internet connectivity. Even when someone takes out your SIM and inserts another, Cerberus notifies you about the new SIM and sends you the number of it, so you can control the device over the new number.
- kapitza 10y agoSpoilers: thief is a 40-something Egyptian, appears to live in a French migrant shelter in Mulhouse and work as some kind of a pimp in Amsterdam, very religious but also watches porn and smokes a lot of hash. Director develops sympathy for him, even sends him free credits because the spyware is eating his bandwidth. Later goes to one of the thief's hangouts and realizes that in fact, the thief is a weird scary guy and not lovable at all. Sequel hook: phone has been reactivated in Romania. Stay tuned for next episode. "Diversiteit is onze kracht."
- atmosx 10y agoIMHO the most interesting aspect of this is the FAQ, specifically Q4: 4. Why did you feel sorry for the thief? I started to feel sorry for the thief because I interpreted all of the data I got in a way which made me feel sorry for him. What if I wanted to see him as a criminal? Or a terrorist? The data would allow me to do that because some of his behaviour can be found suspicious. In the end I was actually shocked when I saw the guy in real life. He didn't look as lonely, sad and old as I thought he looked in the footage I took. Instead he looked pretty fit, smelled like drugs and came very aggressive and suspicious towards me. I saw this man every day, two weeks long so I thought I knew him. The para-social band I had with him (a one-sided band trough a screen) fooled me.
- aub3bhat 10y agoI remember a similary story, though not creepy, where journalist gave out free credit cards, and then tracked their usage. https://www.thestar.com/news/gta/2010/08/28/how_panhandlers_use_free_credit_cards.html https://www.thestar.com/news/gta/2010/08/28/how_panhandlers_...
- tyingq 10y agoSeems creepy to me, given that he didn't disclose that he would look at what was purchased later. He did disclose that he wanted the card back after they used it, which I suppose is halfway there. Edit: LCBO, in the article, is apparently the state-run liquor stores in Ontario.
- iamjeff 10y agoThat was quite a difficult story to read. While there is an expectation of accountability for gifts/donations, it was still a little discouraging to find out that this expectation was not clarified beforehand. This was in no way empirical and the reporting feels anecdotal, even the repeatedly suggestive mentions of the liquor store purchases (can't the poor get drunk too...). But I find it difficult to accept that researchers are the only ones encumbered with ethical responsibilities. However, it is worthwhile to know that he did disclose that he is a reporter, although the fact that he gave them free credit cards, but could not bring self to find further assistance leaves a bitter taste in the mouth. That said, OP reminds me of two interesting DEFCON talks [1] [2] [3] re similar issues. In the contexts delivered in the talks, it seems permissible to say that the crooks were fair game. 1- DEF CON 18 - Zoz - Pwned By The Owner: What Happens When You Steal A Hacker's Computer (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Jwpg-AwJ0Jc https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Jwpg-AwJ0Jc) 2- DEF CON 23: Confessions of a Professional Cyber Stalker (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zVJGY2bZ-Ko https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zVJGY2bZ-Ko) 3- bonus resource on how to set up something similar to Zoz's Inspired by the defcon hacker who found his stolen laptop... how to update for present day routers? (https://www.reddit.com/r/Defcon/comments/2428pf/inspired_by_the_defcon_hacker_who_found_his/ https://www.reddit.com/r/Defcon/comments/2428pf/inspired_by_...)
- aub3bhat 10y ago
- wernercd 10y agoThe question I have is, without watching the video, is this the ACTUAL thief? or someone who bought a "used" phone? I had a co-worker who had his iPhone stolen... and it ended up in some other country. He locked the phone (standard iPhone capability) and then got contacted by the new "owner". That person obviously didn't steal it (east coast US -> somewhere far away). I'd worry about recording someone who simply bought a "used" phone on ebay - and the legal ramifications of such a move.
- albemuth 10y agoIt's faster to cmd + l, start typing Kaza..., autocomplete, copy, paste, than the dismissive comment inside parens.
- deleted 10y ago[deleted]
- krzrak 10y ago> Khazackastan (or somewhere out there, however you spell those names) You know this "Google" thing? You can look up the spelling there, if you don't remember countries names from school.
- deleted 10y ago[deleted]
- oh_sigh 10y agoPoster obviously remembers the name of the country - just not how to spell it. Did you not understand what the poster was trying to say?
- Fnoord 10y ago> The question I have is, without watching the video, is this the ACTUAL thief? If you watched the video, you'd know. Also, from the FAQ: "1. How do you know the guy in the pictures is the thief? Please watch the film again, we were witnesses of the theft and filled a police report which described the person we later saw in the pictures. Besides that, there is a lot of supporting evidence for the fact the thief didn't sell the phone the fist few days. I won't go into to much detail now. If you don't believe that there is an other argument: The person who used the phone must have known the phone was stolen because it had all my pictures and accounts still on it for a whole week. If he bought it, which he didn't he at least could have known the phone was stolen because of that."
- jostmey 10y agoThe ending is a bit of a twist. I thought the student would encounter a broken man--most of the homeless I see are broken individuals--but not so.
- deleted 10y ago[deleted]
- kiliantics 10y agoI was disappointed in the ending. The dutch student had managed to find some empathy for the thief. He seemed to be getting an understanding of how tough it is to live as an immigrant with so much less - in terms of belongings and prospects - than he himself has. But then a brief glimpse of someone that had an "aggressive attitude" and smelled of hash, completely reversed this. It turns out that his prejudice, based on superficial stereotypes, wins after all.
- arjie 10y agoAggression and drug abuse are not superficial, man.
- kiliantics 10y agoIt's the impression that is superficial. The dutch guy obviously didn't have a real interaction with the egyptian man, so I get the feeling that the notion he gets that the man is "aggressive" stems more from a superficial reading of him based on prejudices he has for people of the arab community. Also, smoking hash is hardly drug abuse... The notion that hash is associated with people of lower class or aggressive behaviour is another superficial stereotype.
- adrusi 10y agoThey tried recording video of the theft to have proof that they didn't provoke it, and then conveniently it gets stolen after they stop filming...
- koolba 10y agoNote to self: Continue never buying used mobile phones.
- hyperliner 10y agoNote to self: NEVER assume privacy when using ANY phone with a camera or a mic.
- koolba 10y agoLooks like you can't assume it when you're not using it either.
- stryk 10y agoI'd go so far as to say, these days, to just NEVER assume privacy. With ANY tech. Ever. Doesn't matter where it's manufactured, nor where it's sold. Everything is data mined, one way or another. The "cloud" (really "someone else's machine") opposes privacy by definition. If the leak isn't in the hardware, it's in the software, and if not there it's in the pipe. There's no feasible way to control every point along the line.
- wfunction 10y ago
- mattmanser 10y agoIs this not a serious crime of illegal wiretapping in Holland? Doesn't usually matter that it's his phone. Does he address it in the video?
- cmurf 10y agoReally? You're concerned of the privacy rights of a thief? The card/account owner clearly has a right to know the activity on their card. The usage information are facts. They can't be copyrighted by either the issuer or the account holder. I don't see where any privacy rights for the thief come into play, they definitely did not agree to be bound the the account terms and conditions. What could be true is if the account holder violated the terms and conditions by knowingly allowing someone else to use the card. I'm actually not even sure what my license agreement allows, but it wouldn't surprise me if technically I can't give my card to a spouse or child to use, instead the issuer wants additional cards issued to make sure anyone using the card is bound to the account contract.
- pavel_lishin 10y ago> You're concerned of the privacy rights of a thief? These rights must apply to everyone. If you catch an intruder in your home, you can't tie him up and beat him with a crowbar, either. If someone attempts to mug you in the street, and you overpower them, you're not allowed to take money out of their wallet.
- briandear 10y agoThe 'invasion' of privacy was caused by the thief's own actions. He could have avoided it by not taking people's things! It's like feeling sorry for a rapist because he caught a venereal disease from his victim.
- icebraining 10y agoThe question was whether it's legal.
- 10y ago
- M4v3R 10y agoThe film seems to imply that there is a way to circumvent iCloud account protection on iOS. Is this really the case? I know there are services which promise that, but as long the phone is on the latest firmware I cannot imagine how anyone could reset the iCloud lock. So these services are either hoaxes or work only for certain phones (with old, vulnerable OS versions). Or maybe I'm missing something?
- hrrsn 10y agoGenerally, no.
- ikeboy 10y agoIt's possible they have access to internal apple tools. I know there are paid tools for phone cellular network unlocking which do work, and I assume those have some kind of internal access. Don't have experience with icloud though.
- fucking_tragedy 10y agoI bought an iPad three years ago. I played with it for a couple of months before packing it in storage for a renovation. Forgot about it and found it again last week. Apple has since deleted the account that my iPad synced with. I am completely unable to use the iPad after upgrading it to the latest iOS, as my account simply doesn't exist. I even tried registering an account with the same username/password combo. It registered, but the iPad won't have it. If there is a way to circumvent iCloud protection, I'd love to know.
- astrange 10y agoCall support?
- deleted 10y ago[deleted]
- callesgg 10y agoDon't know how they do it, but i know you can go to one of those small phone stores, that are located everywhere in European countries. They have tricks in their sleeves. I gave my only iPhone 5 to my father, i had forgotten to disconnect it from my account and it was looked to a carrier. They "fixed" it in an hour.
- saycheese 10y agoHere's the post to the original content: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=13201134 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=13201134
- AlexCoventry 10y agoThis would be illegal in some US states. What are the EU laws regarding covert video and audio surveillance?
- briandear 10y agoIt's also illegal to steal phones. The proximate cause of the surveillance was itself a criminal act, thus it would be rather hard to prosecute. If I have my phone set to record and someone steals my phone and thus they are recorded, the thief himself is the one that 'caused' himself to be surveilled.
- chopin 10y agoAt least in Germany, you can't retaliate an illegal act with another illegal act. I'd expect that this was the rule in any civilized state.
- jasonlotito 10y agoConsidering it was still the film makers phone, and he was recording through his phone (and the person holding the phone knew it wasn't his phone, and that the phone had a camera that could record when the user wanted), what would the illegal part be? Just curious as to what specific law covers this.
- biafra 10y agoThe recording might not be the biggest problem here. I'd say publishing it could get the filmmaker in trouble. But probably only if the thief sues.
- moomin 10y agoI misread Thief as Thiel. Now, THAT would have been a great story.
- LolWolf 10y agoThank god I'm not the only one who did this on a first read.
- transposed 10y agoInteresting development of the narrative - how the author began to feel guilty once he noticed the thief had to buy extra call credits since the spyware was depleting his data faster than normal. I kind of felt bad watching as well. Here is a man who is driven to steal, sleeps in homeless shelters, gets ditched by friends when he's unable to pay for a bus. . . And he prays to God every hour on Fridays, so that all his prayers will be answered.
- _audakel 10y agosee above comments, but it is just as likley he was a sex traffiker who picked up women at the homeless shelter
- pascalmemories 10y agoMy guess is the 'new owner' was involved in trafficking people for sex exploitation (the overnight journey to the shelter in France - somewhere vulnerable people could be easily tricked with a work offer and easily moved within the EU due to the lack of internal borders). Meeting the 'Russian' woman and going along with her irrational story and the suggestion of drugs being supplied and her 'loving' him all sounds like an exploitative relationship. Consistent with a sex trafficker. Swapping SIMs (to change phone identity - albeit poorly) and only using for a few weeks indicates someone used to taking steps to avoiding tracking/identification. Not someone new to criminal activity nor evading detection. Being overnight at homeless shelters suggests he was more likely exploiting women at these shelters rather than him being homeless and sleeping there (I'm astonished the filmmaker started for feel sorry for him at the idea he was homeless - that's just naive; this was someone already demonstrated to be heavily involved in criminality). Trying to confront him at the property and finding an aggressive person with a strong smell of drugs at least gave a reality check. This is a dangerous criminal and it was reckless to go near him.
- wheelerwj 10y agoIt's easy for you to make these assumptions the way the story was told, but your points are all completely unfounded. An older homeless man fits the profile just as easily. > I'm astonished the filmmaker started for feel sorry for him.. that's just naive; this was someone already demonstrated to be heavily involved in criminality I think you should spend more time in society of this astonishes you. We're an incredibly empathetic species, often going out of our way to connect with people and help them out. Especially when they are members of our communities. Developing a connection with people you are viewing isn't even uncommon. Media and entertainment exploit this (and we love that they do) by getting us to connect with characters in TV shows and movies. Analyst and investigators are often encouraged and evaluated to ensure their emotions aren't effecting their performance, and victims of kidnapping often learn to love their captors. A young student feeling a connection with a man who appears to be on the outs is anything but astonishing, it's called being a human.
- Justin_K 10y ago
- ChuckMcM 10y agoI enjoyed that. I was in a free ranging discussion back around the time Snowden made his move and we talked about constructing a laptop with a cellphone embedded inside of it such that it would record things that went on around it. We figured we could remove the hard drive and replace it with the guts of a cell phone and an SSD equivalent storage. Then use the existing laptop's Wifi antenna as a (likely not great) cell phone antenna. The idea being that you could download analytics from it if it was seized at border crossings or searched. No, I never had the courage to actually try something like that. This phone hack seems like a modest equivalent with the exception that the phone could be unhacked by a forced OS wipe. That said, the effectiveness of this as a surveillance tool was pretty eye opening. It seems possible that the criminal in this story steals phones every couple of weeks and puts their sim card into it, use it for a while, and then resell it. Which is pretty good operational security when you think about it (caveat keeping the same sim card) Mapping the meta data and contacts for this person then lets you know who else is in their community. So with law enforcement powers you could presumably "seed" the stolen phone market with pre-compromised phones and develop a pretty quick understanding of who the criminals were, their infrastructure for moving phones around, etc. Which would make it pretty straight forward to roll up these criminal networks. Of course when it became known that the police were seeding the stolen phone market with 'mark' phones it would probably cut down on the number of phones stolen. But if you have prepared for that and are now supplying a line of cheap "new" burner phones in the shops that you have compromised. Well it is scary how effective that might be. Now you tie that analysis with the fact that the Paris attackers all had burner phones and you start to see how such actions by the authorities would be justified to law makers.
- _audakel 10y agothe fbi/nsa does a similar program where they supply a large number of tor exit nodes
- darpa_escapee 10y agoThey do a similar program where they tap and track a large number of Americans, as well.
- cdevs 10y agoThat was well done for what was available to him. I could see how you could feel bad eventually if you dangle a fancy phone in front of a junkie or homeless person and watch their every move for weeks but this could also be a great tactic for infiltrating real theft based organizations.
- samirillian 10y agoCouldn't get too far into this before feeling like a total voyeur. I'm uncomfortable with the tacit assumption that the guy would've stolen someone else's phone if not this guy's planted phone, and that the theft justifies covert surveillance, like two wrongs make a right.