Cyberspies Invade Silicon Valley

Fictional super spies like James Bond may have to retire from all the action, sizzle and international intrigue of days past if the recent trend in stealing company secrets through computer hacking in Silicon Valley continues.

Silicon Valley homes were raided by FBI Agents and two engineers, Lan Lee and Yuefei Ge, were arrested on computer espionage charges, which included the charge that they stole copyrighted software from NetLogic Microsystems of Mountain View and Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Company, based out of San Joes, CA. Economic espionage is an emerging and continual problem for the United States, especially in today's globally competitive marketplace. To stay on top of the developing problems in Silicon Valley, the Heritage Foundation, who headed China intelligence analysis at the State Department in the early '90s. Naturally, the Chinese government denies its part in all computer espionage cases, downplaying it to a "few overzealous radicals" when they're caught. It's interesting to note that despite the seriousness of these thefts, the economic espionage units usually end up charging alleged perpetrators with a lighter charge of trade secret thefts' as opposed to heavier espionage charges. In the meantime, most corporations that are victimized by such crimes handle the problem internally and don't end up prosecuting perpetrators to the full extent of the law, fearing that bad publicity and tumbling public stock prices will hurt them far more than what has already been stolen by spies. Tag: Add to Del.icio.us | Digg | Reddit | Furl Bookmark Murdok: Tim Ritter is a staff writer for Murdok covering technology and business.