Best Buy Geek Squad Employees Were Paid by FBI As Informants, Documents Suggest

[Initech]

Source: Newsweek

New documents suggest that employees who work for Best Buy’s Geek Squad took payments from the FBI in return for reporting illegal images in a cooperation that might raise Fourth Amendment issues.

Records won by the group Electronic Frontier Foundation (EFF) in a Freedom of Information Act lawsuit suggested that the FBI and Geek Squad had been working together for at least a decade, with a memo showing members of the bureau were hosted by Best Buy’s Kentucky repair facility back in 2008.

One document published by the group shows a $500 payment to a Geek Squad informant identified as CHS, or "confidential human source." EFF said some documents named Best Buy employees as initial calls while others referred to them as CHS, suggesting certain employees could have had different relationships with agents.

In a statement provided to Newsweek, Best Buy said that while their employees discover apparent child porn on customer computers around 100 times a year, they do not go looking for it. “Our employees do not search for this material; they inadvertently discover it when attempting to confirm we have recovered lost customer data,” the statement said.

“We have a moral and, in more than 20 states, a legal obligation to report these findings to law enforcement. We share this policy with our customers in writing before we begin any repair.”

Read more: http://www.newsweek.com/best-buy-geek-squad-fbi-informants-834846

---

Holy shit.

[underthematrix]

1. I'm totally okay with this.

[Lithos]

3. it's the pattern/principle

BB had communicated that should any illegal (ex: child porn) was found, then they would alert the authorities. To me that seems very reasonable. I have done some freelance computer work in the past and found tons of material which were very prurient. Thankfully, no child porn, but I would have alerted the police had there been any.

The FBI, however, while ostensibly looking for similar material has established the ability where they can obtain (without warrant or due process) any material they want from any specific customer's computer. This material might include Excel files, phone numbers, or personal data such as medical information, which the FBI has no grounds to obtain. To me this crosses a serious privacy.

L-

[Initech]

4. Child porn and abusers definitely need to be busted.

That I'm fine with.

But searching without having a warrant - that I'm *NOT* fine with. If they have a warrant or at least credible evidence to search these hard drives then that is fine. But if they don't then it's a clear 4th amendment violation.

[Demsrule86]

64. You can't make exceptions to constitutional rights....I hate hate child porn.

[atreides1]

5. Really?

And how do we know that these paid informants won't upload "evidence" in order to get paid???

That's why I'm not okay with it!!!

[dbackjon]

10. Yup

[lostnfound]

38. Exactly... at $500 per customer? Lucrative side businesss? Nt

[elmac]

41. I'm not okay with it for that very reason nt

[dbackjon]

13. So you are ok with violating the 4th Amendment, as long as it does good?

If the Geek Squad found child-porn during normal activity, great, that is legal.

If the Geek Squad made it a practice to SEARCH for it on customer's devices, that is NOT ok, or legal, regardless of what was found.

And, as pointed out downthread, what is to stop said Geek Squad from planting a picture?


While it is easy to go rah rah, glad they busted the pervs, we have a 4th Amendment for a reason.

[underthematrix]

14. I understand but the safety of children should be more important.

My right to privacy is not absolute.

[AtheistCrusader]

15. This is not how evidence, that is actionable in court, is lawfully gathered.

It opens two very real possibilities:

1. False positives for profit, putting innocent people through utter fucking hell and the very real possibility of false conviction/plea bargain by innocent people.
2. Tainted evidence gathering that results in an actually guilty pedophile getting away with the crime in court.

'For the children' is not an absolute either.



https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Blackstone%27s_formulation

[LisaM]

26. And a third possibility, that it could be actual evidence gathered in a criminal investigation.

If you were a lawyer prosecuting people for child pornography, it stands to reason that some of that evidence might be gathered online (hopefully, appropriately labeled).

[AtheistCrusader]

31. Sure, and it would be legal for someone to report it if they saw it in the course of

working on the computer.

It's the introduction of a profit motive that is troubling.
BB is quite up front that they will report such material if found in the normal course of PC repair.

[dbackjon]

17. Children should be protected. So should the Constitution.

We have a legal system for a reason - to protect everyone. Sacrificing one for the other is not a good trade.

[moriah]

22. If the person signs off to give a third party their electronic device and that...

... anything illegal found would be reported to law enforcement..

Aren't they by definition waiving their Fourth Amendment right?

Also, yes, because the Fourth Amendment says "unreasonable" searches, my opinion would differ if they were scanning to find copyright infringing materials vs acting as an agent of the government about child porn.

[elmac]

42. yep, and with the fascists in control

who will they be paying to spy on us for whatever reason.

[LovingA2andMI]

16. Agreed!

Chester's the Child Molesters need to be busted by Whatever Means Necessary!

[dbackjon]

18. Even if it violates the Constitution?

What else are you willing to sacrifice?

[LovingA2andMI]

29. Here a Tip...

If one is a Child Molester with disgusting Child Porn on their Computer, don't take it do Buy Best for the Geek Squad to fix. #FYI (and better yet, get counseling for their disgusting problem).

[dbackjon]

30. I would agree. But stupidity is not a reason to excuse a Constitutional Violation

[LovingA2andMI]

33. It's A Reason...

That Child Molesters should be shunned from society and ANY MEANS to stop their disgusting behavior should be deployed. Period!

[Chemisse]

46. Including reigning in innocent people?

How would you feel if your life was destroyed when an employee planted a photo on your computer to pocket $500?

Everybody would be pointing at you and your 'disgusting behavior.' You would have to register as a sex offender, after you got out of prison. Nobody would ever like or trust you again.

The laws are there for the protection of everybody. Once we sacrifice that, nobody is safe.

[LovingA2andMI]

60. Child Porn on one's personal computer...

Is There because Someone PUT IT THERE. Usually, the Computer's Owner and it's disgusting. What happens to those who do this, happens...PERIOD.

Stop making excuses for those who engage in Molesting Children. It's not a good look at all, #FYI.

[ToxMarz]

39. If they have a moral and, in more than 20 states, a legal obligation to report these finding

Then no payment should be needed or accepted, EVER! Once you make it a profit motive, it alwyts becomes corrupt. Like Private Prisons, Civil Asset Forfeiture, rigged traffic cameras. Etc. Etc. Etc.

[meadowlander]

43. +1 Duty to report is a duty not an easy pay day.

[dalton99a]

2. .

Link to tweet

[mopinko]

6. photo developers used to do this all the time.

not many of them left, but i assume they do still turn in people too stupid to print their own porn.

[NCjack]

7. There should be a general reward program. Find child porn on a customer's machine,

call the FBI, and if the result is a conviction, get reward.

[ehrnst]

9. Agree. Needs to be a conviction prior to any reward

to prevent people from planting it for the reward.

[Chemisse]

47. Are you thinking people could not be convicted for a planted picture?

I would not bet my life on it.

[ehrnst]

48. I'm talking about discouraging people from getting quick money.

You think that requiring a conviction before getting $$ is a bad idea?

[Chemisse]

49. The whole thing is a bad idea.

Requiring a conviction doesn't make it better.

[ehrnst]

50. Incentives to report child porn?

Are you opposed to the the idea of a monetary reward for reporting any crime - or just for child porn?

[Chemisse]

53. Are you okay with people being paid to search through your things?

Or are you making an exception for child porn?

When you let the plumber into your house, you accept that he or she will report you if they see a meth lab in your kitchen. But you don't and should not expect they are being paid to search the whole house in the hopes of finding something to incriminate you in a crime.

Reprehensible crimes can usher in reprehensible law enforcement practices, because people will "do anything" to stop them. Think 911 and Guantanamo.

[ehrnst]

54. I think we are talking about different things.

If a plumber was getting $$ for reporting a meth lab in my kitchen, I would not be worried if that $$ were only going to be awarded for a conviction.

That's a very different thing than the "FBI paying someone to go through my house to find something." That's me paying a plumber to fix a problem with my plumbing. I hope you see the difference....

However, if there was someone that did have a meth lab in their kitchen, especially if there were children present, I would not have a problem with the plumber reporting it to the authorities, or getting a reward if that reporting led to a conviction. Which again, is very different than the FBI paying someone to search someone's home.

My childcare provider told me that she was a required reporter, and if there were signs of abuse or neglect for my child, she would report it to the proper authorities. I had no problems with that either.

Would you you consider that to be "the authorities ordering people to examine my children?"

[Chemisse]

55. Nor would I.

I'm talking about someone being paid to hunt through your whole house (or your whole computer) in search of something that might be illegal.

That is an illegal search (as far as I know).

But you are right. You are talking about requiring convictions and I am not addressing that.

[ehrnst]

56. Thank you.

That is a very, very important distinction.

[Chemisse]

57. My original point was that no, requiring a conviction does not make this okay. n/t

[ehrnst]

62. Are you against rewards for information on crimes that results in a conviction on general principle

If that computer technician saw a child being abused, and reported it, would you also call that an illegal search?

Rewards for information leading to an arrest and conviction has been shown to compel people who would otherwise not come forward with information on a crime to do so.

[Leith]

8. Is This Restricted to Child Porn?

Suppose a member of the Geek Squad found pics of marijuana growing in what was obviously the customer's backyard in a state where it wasn't legal? What if it was a pirated copy of music, a movie, or a TV show?

I'm not defending child porn or the scum who have it. I'm just wondering if other crimes were found and reported. Many things are illegal and evidence is kept on a PC.

There's no problem with busting kiddie porn. But how many of us want to face fines or jail time for recording a TV show for viewing later?

[ehrnst]

63. Are you opposed to that technician reporting anything illegal that they saw?

Or just getting a reward for reporting information leading to a conviction?

Because there is nothing stopping them from simply reporting something illegal that they saw, even without a monetary reward.

If your plumber found human remains in your sewer pipe, they'd likely report that as well.

[Leith]

65. I Agree with You

for the same reasons. How is it different from witnessing a crime?

[UpInArms]

11. Many years ago, we bought a used computer

For our son ... the hard drive was a bit racy ....

But at least no child porn ...

[Ron Obvious]

12. It's no less a 4th amendment violation

When the government pays a private contractor to do its dirty work. In addition to concerns about how easily-planted this sort of material is.

I don't understand how this isn't immediately obvious to anyone who values constitutional freedoms. Just exactly what kind of society do you want to live in?

[dbackjon]

20. Bingo!

[moriah]

27. Still, if the repair contract states they will submit illegal images found to LE...

... and the person signs it, doesn't that inherently waive the right?

Also, say I'm a Best Buy employee and also a member of the clergy (I am, Pagan clergy have to work for a living and I think that's a good thing). That means I'm a mandated reporter. If I was asked to, say, migrate personal data from a device that had a HDD crash to a new computer, I would very likely attempt to recover images from the old drive. If I saw a picture depicting child abuse, I'd have a duty to report the fact I'd found the image to the Child Abuse hotline. If any of their employees also volunteer at domestic violence shelters, they'd have the same duty to report I would in my state.

There is no such thing as computer tech-client confidentiality. And the contract specifically having the person knowingly waive the right to privacy by submitting their devices for repair covers not just legal duties in multiple states about child porn in general, but also employees who are mandated reporters. For mandated reporters it really doesn't matter if we are sure. We have to report, and in my training were taught to be cautious and especially if we're essentially reporting to cover our asses but don't have certainty to say so, because that does help them prioritize a heavy caseload. But we have a duty.

The case mentioned by the EFF was dismissed because the image wasn't of a child, not just because it was likely found through an attempt to recover images.

I do think a distinction must be made between reporting images depicting child abuse and, say, copyright infringement.

[Ron Obvious]

32. I doubt the Geek squad employees would just "come across" illegal material.

It would require an active search and investigation in virtually all cases, and that would constitute an illegal search. At a minimum, the picture files would have to be opened and looked at.

Totalitarian and police state tactics always start with the justification of protecting children, protection against terrorism, etc. But it doesn't end with that. Copyrighted material is an obvious next step.

Also, if any illegal material is "found" on your system, you'd effectively have to prove your innocence and it's virtually impossible to prove you didn't put it there.

[moriah]

35. Uh, Windows previews images when in certain view modes.

I promise you I've seen more porn doing computer repair accidentally than I ever wanted to.

Most uncomfortable moment was more when a client asked me to come clean a porn-injecting virus from her son's computer. The son was six and told his mom he woke up to his computer "broken and gross". Given the nature of the virus once identified, it was likely the dad using the computer to surf porn because that was pretty much the only way those viruses get on there. Dad was a preacher. And not home.

It wasn't yet noon, either.

I wouldn't have wanted to be the fly on the wall that evening, there was so much anger and indignation coming from her even as she was being very courteous and gracious to me as I restored the system and set up a whitelist firewall so that computer could only access the sites she wanted her son to use.

[Ron Obvious]

36. You can tell child porn from regular porn from a thumbnail?

It's possible in an extreme minority of cases, I suppose.

[moriah]

37. File/folder names could be giveaways, too.

If I saw in a file system tree a Tor browser download folder named "HC" with a lot of data in it, and my scope of work was to migrate and verify integrity of data....

I'd immediately get a supervisor/witness before opening the folder for migration.

[dembotoz]

19. last week child porn whats this week

writing in a foreign language?

have a best friend whose mother communicate to her buds in germany via email a lot

is she suspect.... and for the life of me i have no idea how to do an umlaut on a Microsoft keyboard

if they are paid to find it they will look for it.
its the american way

[Blue_Tires]

21. Once upon a time,

you had to take in your camera film to a specific business to get developed... If the developers saw kiddie porn they were obligated to call the cops... Sensationalism aside, how is this any different?

[Egnever]

24. I remember!

[AtheistCrusader]

34. The FBI is paying them to 'go fishing'.

In the process of data recovery, you normally see some of the data to verify you're not recovering garbage.

BB is up front with customers that if illegal material is found in this process, it will be reported. Not in dispute. Not different than a film developer looking at the output to verify the photo actually did develop properly, and seeing/reporting the same material.

Where this went wrong is, the FBI is paying them to go fishing, giving them incentive to go looking throughout every machine for such material, even if unrelated to data recovery, and what would be visible to the worker in the course of normal data recovery processes.

[Chemisse]

51. Taken a step further, the FBI could pay a tech worker

to go through various files when/if a suspect brings his computer in for repairs. Or perhaps just make a copy of everything and hand it over.

[dbackjon]

58. This is the point that many are missing.

[PoliticAverse]

59. Yes, if the government is effectively paying them to search your hard drive that brings the 4th...

amendment into play and the need for a warrant.

Although the Fourth Amendment does not apply to a search or seizure, even an arbitrary one, effected by a private party on his own initiative, the Amendment protects against such intrusions if the private party acted as an instrument or agent of the Government. See United States v. Jacobsen, 466 U.S. 109, 113-114 (1984); Coolidge v. New Hampshire, 403 U.S. 443, 487 (1971). See also Burdeau v. McDowell, 256 U.S. 465, 475 (1921).

...

Whether a private party should be deemed an agent or instrument of the Government for Fourth Amendment purposes necessarily turns on the degree of the Government's participation in the private party's activities

From: Skinner v. Railway Labor Executives' Association [1989]
https://www.law.cornell.edu/supremecourt/text/489/602

[lostnfound]

40. Easy to plant stuff on someones computer, or for a virus to carry it nt

[TheBlackAdder]

23. Years back, Geek Squads had servers they would copy off private family pictures to and view later.

.

Whenever you drop off your computer to Geek Squad, you have no idea what they are doing to your system.

You don't know if they are copying off your Quicken files, private emails, passwords, personal photos, etc.

Sure, Geek Squad were not under company directives to "look for it," they did it anyway.

.

[Egnever]

45. Honestly when you have anyone repair your machine

You have no idea what they are doing.

As someone who does this sort of thing for a living I often compare myself to a priest. I have access to peoples confidential material and passwords all the time. I have never reported anyone but I have seen some crazy shit. No child porn yet but plenty of stuff I am quite sure folks would not share with anyone else.

[Ilsa]

25. Child porn is child abuse. Many of us are bound by a license to report it

to police or other authorities. Doctors, nurses, teachers, other relevant school employees, therapists, counselors, psychologists, etc. I think everyone should report child porn or abuse.

Now, if they were reporting that someone is a nazi, but not violent, or a communist, or Kurd, or Sunni Muslim, or whatever, and that person has not made any threats, then I think the FBI should not expect Geek Squad to tattle.

[Cold War Spook]

28. I have taken computers to be fix ay Best Buy.

Every time they ask me if I have any files on the computer I would not want to lose and is there anything on the computer I should not have. I can not remember the wording, but that is basically what they said. They don't look for any thing but if they see it they should report it. They don't have time to waste checking what is on all the computers they fix. When you give your computer to any one else, to repair or use, it is not against the 4th Amendment for them to report a crime.

[KY_EnviroGuy]

44. Raises another issue or three...

1. This puts your typical Geek Squad kid in the position of judging what is legal and what is not. If they make a mis-call but still report it, they (Best Buy and the geek) could face a serious lawsuit for defamation.

2. This gives the geek incentive to search each computer for those materials, rather than just doing the assigned repair work. Who is paying for that time?

3. What prevents one of the geeks from privately trying to bribe a customer with questionable material on his/her computer rather than report it?

Just asking....... ............. ...........

[nocalflea]

52. Wasn't Newsweek just raided, money laundering ..

Interesting timing.

[Oneironaut]

61. This is awful for a variety of reasons.

A - Best Buy employees aren't trained to deal with child porn, so mistakes might be made that compromise the trial, or cause innocent people to get arrested for having a picture of their own baby in a bathtub, or something like that.

B - Privacy (yes, even if the person is a pedophile - the FBI doing this is not ok)

C - If I understand correctly, every "bust" nets the employee $500? Um - Nobody thinks that could end horribly?

I also hate how pedophiles can be used as a boogeyman to get people to throw their rights away. Yes, everybody knows that pedophiles are horrible people who should be in jail. That doesn't mean the FBI should be able to do whatever they want to find them.

With that being said, I would never use Geek Squad, as they probably find random "viruses" on your machine, and charge you $200 to "remove" them. They're only slightly more trustworthy than the Indian guy from Microsoft who calls you to tell you that your computer has a virus. Find someone who has moderate computer knowledge instead to fix it for you. Most of what the Geek squad does is basic stuff that isn't even worth paying for.