You can now buy smartphones with preinstalled spyware
Did you know that instead of installing a spying app on a target’s phone, you can now gift them one with the app already preinstalled on it?
MTechnology LTD has released four popular smartphone models preloaded with its well-received mSpy monitoring software.
“Currently available on the HTC One, Nexus 5, Samsung Galaxy S4 and iPhone 5s, consumers worldwide no longer have to worry about smartphone compatibility with the software or obtaining physical access to the target phone,” they boasted.
“The bundle includes a one-year subscription to the premium mSpy software, capturing a wide range of mobile data, including calls, emails, SMS, keystrokes, Viber, WhatsApp and Skype chats, location and more.”
The software was initially designed as a parental control tool, but it has since become popular in another niche market: small businesses that are worried about its employees exfiltrating or leaking company data or about how they use company devices.
The company puts the onus of using the app and devices legally on the customers.
“My Spy (mSpy) is designed for monitoring your employees or underage children on a smartphone or mobile device that you own or have proper consent to monitor. You are required to notify users of the device that they are being monitored,” says a disclaimer on the company website.
But we all know that this tool is bound to be used without notifying the target – especially when it comes to doubting spouses and potentially abusive partners. By offering phones (and in the future tablets) already preinstalled with the monitoring app, the company makes it even more easier for customers to spy on others without their knowledge and consent.
The app itself is undetectable and invisible, so the chances of targets discovering by accident they are being spied on are pretty slim. The app does not interfere with the targeted device’s daily operations.
The “spy” can access the information about the target’s activity via a cloud-based, password-protected control panel, from where he or she can also remotely block access to certain programs, websites and apps, restrict incoming calls, lock the phone, and so on.
In a world where it’s become normal to assume that governments may bug your phone or spy on your activities, this type of offering will not, I’m afraid, elicit much public outrage.
In fact, I believe Andrei Shimanovich, COO of mSpy, when he says that “the mSpy software bundle is in direct response to the feedback we have been receiving from our customers.”