Mobile Spy Software – the Modern Tool for Spying and… Hacking
Okay, let’s have a spy test. You could have watched or at least heard something about the movie “Salt” starring Angelina Jolie as Evelyn Salt. She was a CIA officer but was accused of being a Russian spy. Question – was Salt really a spy?
Before you answer that, let me first brief you on mobile spy.
Mobile Spy is a brand of smartphone monitoring software. As advertised, it can view your child or employee’s smartphone or tablet usage. It can do a lot of spying stuffs – SMS monitoring, GPS tracking, messenger logs, call monitoring, and contacts and notes monitoring. Question – can mobile spy software be used on real-life spying?
According to the law, there are two conditions for spy software to be completely legal when used and they are:
1. You must own or have legal authority over the target phone.
2. You must inform any adult user of the target phone that they are being monitored.
If ever in the Salt movie the CIAs installed mobile spy software on Salt’s phone, did someone break the law? In the meantime, keep the answer to yourself. Let’s learn more about mobile spy software.
I used to read a few good spy software guides like the one from Acisni.com - the Spy Software Guide. In this blog, it was pointed out that aside from jailbreaking and rooting your phone in order to install the spy software (does no apply to all phones), the only way to install spy software is to physically do it on the target phone. I also learned from 10TopTenReviews that the software can run in stealth mode if you use it in monitoring your kids to keep them safe. Another useful insight I learned is that it can also be used as a tool to backup your smartphone activities.
According to Retina-X Studios, maker of Mobile Spy, the live control panel feature - a web-based application accessible on your laptop or mobile browser, is the first of its kind. With this app, you can totally become a spy by instantly monitoring the screen of the target phone. And with features like application blocking and SMS commands, you can also gain control of the target phone.
Because such features made me think of hacking, I then jumped over to the language of the law on hacking. According to 18 U.S.C. 1029, the United States law forbids the practice of hacking to the extent that someone concentrates on the creation, distribution and use of codes and devices that give hackers unauthorized access to computer systems.
By the way, according to an article in HowStuffWorks, the word “hacker”, is thought of by many as “malicious computer users finding new ways to harass people, defraud corporations, steal information and maybe even destroy the economy or start a war by infiltrating military computer systems”. This, however, is contrary to the word “growth hacker”. According to GrowthHackers.com, their mission as a community of growth hackers is to “learn and share about ethical online marketing techniques that drive effective, scalable and sustainable growth”.
We’re learning a lot of things here. Here’s my two cents.
I would say that mobile spy software, as long as its users are meeting the two conditions of the law, can be considered as a growth hacking tool, particularly when used in spying employees’ activities. In fact, an article in WikiHow entitled “How to Become a Hacker” pointed out that by having proper hacking attitudes, anyone can become a good hacker.
We’re done on the spy test.
Now, there are two important things that I would like you to remember when buying mobile spy software. First, you have to figure out if your device’s (Android, iPhone, Blackberry, etc.) operating system is compatible with the spy software. Second, you have to ensure that your carrier (AT&T, Verizon Wireless, Sprint, etc.) offers unrestricted access to internet. Mobile spy software only works if the target phone and the monitoring device are both connected to the internet or Wi-Fi network.
