[ Changed 6th February 1998 ]
So often overlooked by those who would maintain the confidentiality of their dealings, is that much of the most sensitive and most valuable information first occurs as the act of speech, a personal dialogue. If uninhibited speech can be eavesdropped as it is created, then there is no panoply of technical security that can subsequently make good that breach of security. Even in this computer age, the eavesdropping of speech in sensitive areas remains important in intelligence gathering, commercial as much as state.
This presentation outlines the main varieties of the electronic eavesdropping threat to confidential discussions and looks at advanced countermeasures to bugging where RF transmission is used to extract sensitive conversation from secured premises.
Until starting a technical surveillance countermeasures business in 1991, Owen Lewis was a signals officer in the British Army for 22 years. For some years, he was a visiting lecturer to the NATO Joint Services Advanced Electronic Warfare courses. Keith Penny is an engineer with 20 years of experience of the design, manufacture and systems deployment of a range of electronic surveillance and countersurveillance equipment. They have developed the SysRx system for RF spectrum monitoring, which is to be launched at the Police Scientific Development Branch closed exhibition in March 1998 and is first presented at this seminar.