FTC bans 'brazen' SpyFone surveillance app, firm must notify victims

The Federal Trade Commission has banned the SpyFone company and its CEO from the surveillance industry, ordering the firm to delete all data and notify everyone affected.

SpyFone and its CEO, Scott Zuckerman, are now banned from having any connection with "any surveillance app, service, or business," according to the FTC. The app, which the FTC describes as "brazen stalkerware," was used to gain root control on Android, and allowed stalkers to monitor everything from photos to web history on the phone.

"SpyFone is a brazen brand name for a surveillance business that helped stalkers steal private information," Samuel Levine, Acting Director of the FTC's Bureau of Consumer Protection, said in a statement.

"The stalkerware was hidden from device owners, but was fully exposed to hackers who exploited the company's slipshod security," he continued. "This case is an important reminder that surveillance-based businesses pose a significant threat to our safety and security. We will be aggressive about seeking surveillance bans when companies and their executives egregiously invade our privacy."

The FTC says that alongside SpyFone's intentional "stalkerware" functions, it failed to do so in a secure way. Reportedly, SpyFone claimed to take "reasonable precautions to safeguard" the data that it illegally harvested, but the FTC says there was a series of failures.

SpyFone did not encrypt the personal data, and it did not limit that data to authorized users. The company's services also reportedly transmitted purchasers' passwords in plain text.

Alongside the ban of SpyFone maker Support King, and the company's CEO, the FTC's complete filing mandates that all personal data stored by the company be deleted.

Then owners who may unknowingly have phones that have had SpyFone installed, must now be notified by the company. They must be told that their devices were being monitored, and that therefore they may not be secure.

2 Comments

maestro64 5029 comments · 19 Years

About 3 years ago

So how did this software get install on peoples phone, who installed it, was it this company or someone else. If it was installed by someone other than the company how would the company know who has it installed on their phone.

Really the FTC is banning them because the information from the targeted phone when transfer to the listening/observing party was not encrypted, really this is what they are upset about, how about the fact people were being spied on. Oh I forgot they can not be upset about that since our own government does the same things to people, I guess our government encrypts the data before they send it along to the receiving party.

UPDATE: Okay never hear of this software, it is used to keep track of your kids so they claim but it could be used for other things as well. I just simply asked my kids to show me their phones I bought and paid for, and if they were doing something they should not be, the phone got grounded or disconnect from the internet or cell network.