Think Your Spouse is Cheating? Use Spyware

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Most people associate spyware or remote control trojans as part of a toolkit used by spammers or fraudsters. But such utilities are also common tools of jealous or abusive spouses that either don’t trust their partner, or feel the need to control every aspect of their lives.

McAfee even included such analysis in a recent white paper according to the Register here:

Spyware is becoming a tool of domestic abuse. Privacy-invading software packages are most commonly associated with surreptitiously snooping on victims to find out the passwords they use for online banking sites or bombarding them with invasive pop-up ads. But spyware can also be used as a tool to monitor and control their spouses by abusive partners, McAfee researcher Anna Stepanov warns.

“With so much of our lives dependent on computers and other technologies such as cell phones, the use of spyware is ideal for abusers, who often feel the need to control all aspects of a victim’s existence,” she writes. “Monitoring a victim’s online, cell phone, or general computing activity is of more value than ever in controlling or hurting a victim.”

Safe computing has joined finding safe housing as a list of requirements for people fleeing abusive relationships. A mobile phone is an obvious target for snoopers, but email inboxes are also a tempting target for control-freaks looking to keep tabs on their partners.