Get Bug Detectors To Eliminate Devices in Your Office

A bug, in security language and in plain terms, is a hidden listening device. Bugs are normally placed at hidden places in board/conference rooms, phones, near computers using Internet telephony, and in other important places in order to eavesdrop on confidential conversations. Counter surveillance to bugs comes in the form of electronic bug detectors, which can detect the presence of bugs. Phone bug detectors, micro bug detectors, wireless bug detectors form a part of the electronic bug detector equipment.

More information about bugging

A bug is usually a small device that listens using a combination of a miniature radio transmitter and a microphone. The microphone listens and the radio transmitter airs the conversation to the person who is tracking the equipment. With technology entering the “nano” age, bugs too have kept pace; today even commercially available bugs designed to transmit TV signals are no more than the size of a cigarette packet.

A bug is used to grab confidential dialogue and conversations at the workplace. Competitors usually bug a business in order to obtain confidential information about what their rivals are up to. Even an employee/ex-employee or a private detective may want access to confidential information so that either he can sell it or use it for his own benefit.

How to use bug detectors

Bugging a business place was easy once upon a time when businesses were not equipped with electronic security. Nowadays too, it is fairly simple to bug a place provided you can get past the security. If an office has been bugged, there may be some telltale signs such as:

• When others know some confidential information about your business, you can be sure that you are being bugged. Normally, your instincts will tell you if some secret information is floating around.
• When you notice strange sounds (scratching, static, popping sounds) or volume changes on your phone lines. But this scenario occurs only when an amateur is trying to tap you. Sometimes, your phones will emit a sound when they are hung up.
• When your AM/FM radio or your television starts picking up strange interferences.
• When it is apparent that burglars have entered the workplace but nothing has been taken.
• When electrical wall plates start looking jarred or moved.
• When there is a small discoloration on a wall. Or there is a small bump under your flooring. Or, any furniture looks moved.
• When some new items - clocks, radios, picture frames - suddenly appear in your office from no one knows where.
• When personnel of telephone or any other utility company show up though no one has called them.

The latest types of bugs

As bugs have a radio transmitter, they normally emit radio frequency waves. So, bug detection equipment is manufactured based on this principle and bug detectors catch bugs by searching for radio waves. But bugs have grown more sophisticated and smarter now and many of them no more emit radio waves. Here are some examples:

• Mini disk recorders can pick up high-quality sounds. All you need to do is bribe a key employee and show him how to use it in an important meeting. Even a mobile phone can be used as a bug and that's why they are not allowed in confidential meetings.
• New-age parabolic or directional microphones are small and can tap conversations hundreds of meters away.
• Expensive laser microphones are used to record conversations by bouncing a laser beam on an object (such as a picture frame) in a meeting room. When the conversation starts, the voice vibrations hit the object and it begins to vibrate, though not visible to the naked eye. These vibrations are picked up by the laser beam and sent back to a recording device.

Bugging: Some preventive measures

If you suspect you are being bugged, you must call for professional help. They would search for radio waves, indicative of the presence of bugs, using bug detectors. However, some bugs can be shut and restarted as and when desired, and will not be detected in the off mode. Also, a bug detector will not detect a bug whose battery has run out.

Before calling the good old bug detector man, here are some additional preventive measures you can take:

• You must seal and cover up all cavities in walls and in artifacts.
• Electrical plates should be firmly fixed.
• Meeting and conference rooms should get ultrasonic and acoustic protection. This stops the emitting of radio waves and acoustics.
• Appropriate alarms should be installed at strategic locations.
• Computers that are used for telephony should be equipped with encryption software.
• Adequate physical security devices must be installed.
• Clients should be informed that you are taking adequate precautions to safeguard their interest.

Bugs and detecting bugs is a sophisticated game nowadays. Just remember to call up a professional for all the debugging.