by Corey Mark » Thu Jun 09, 2011 3:22 pm
FULLERTON, Calif. (KTLA) -- A computer service technician is accused of planting spyware on dozens of women's computers that allowed him to remotely activate their webcams to watch them in their homes. Trevor Harwell, 20, was arrested Wednesday and later released on bond. Harwell worked for a computer service company called Rezitech, Inc., and provided residential computer service to users with Macintosh computers.
"While he had physical access to the computers, he would install a spyware-type application that allowed him remote access to the user's computer and webcam," Sgt. Andrew Goodrich said. "Once he had access, he would take photographs of the users, usually women. Often, the female victims were undressed or changing clothes. Harwell then stored the photos on a remote server, and eventually downloaded them to his own computer." Goodrich estimated hundreds of thousands of images were collected as part of this investigation.
The case came to light in summer 2010 when a Fullerton resident contacted police about suspicious messages that were appearing on his daughter's computer. Goodrich said one of these messages, which mimicked the appearance of a system message, said "You should fix your internal sensor soon. If unsure what to do, try putting your laptop near hot steam for several minutes to clean the sensor."
In response to this message, many of the victims would take their laptops into the bathroom while taking a shower.
[i]FULLERTON, Calif. (KTLA) -- A computer service technician is accused of planting spyware on dozens of women's computers that allowed him to remotely activate their webcams to watch them in their homes. Trevor Harwell, 20, was arrested Wednesday and later released on bond. Harwell worked for a computer service company called Rezitech, Inc., and provided residential computer service to users with Macintosh computers.
"While he had physical access to the computers, he would install a spyware-type application that allowed him remote access to the user's computer and webcam," Sgt. Andrew Goodrich said. "Once he had access, he would take photographs of the users, usually women. Often, the female victims were undressed or changing clothes. Harwell then stored the photos on a remote server, and eventually downloaded them to his own computer." Goodrich estimated hundreds of thousands of images were collected as part of this investigation.
The case came to light in summer 2010 when a Fullerton resident contacted police about suspicious messages that were appearing on his daughter's computer. Goodrich said one of these messages, which mimicked the appearance of a system message, said [color=#FF0000]"You should fix your internal sensor soon. If unsure what to do, try putting your laptop near hot steam for several minutes to clean the sensor."[/color]
In response to this message, many of the victims would take their laptops into the bathroom while taking a shower.[/i]
