"contained proprietary
information that could be valuable to foreign governments."
Kinda interesting statement about a
telecoms machine. Foreign
govts?
PC with Corporate Secrets
Disappears
Qualcomm Chiefs Laptop Taken from Podium
Sept. 18, 2000
IRVINE, Calif. (AP) -- The personal portable
computer of Qualcomm Inc.s chief executive
officer, which apparently contained valuable
company secrets, disappeared from a hotel
conference room moments after he addressed a
national business journalists meeting.
Irwin Jacobs left the computer unattended on a
podium or an adjoining table in the Hyatt
Regency-Irvine ballroom on Saturday for 15-20
minutes when he stepped down to talk to a small
group after addressing about 90 members of the
Society of American Business Editors and
Writers.
Proprietary information
Jacobs told people at the conference that the IBM laptop, which he
had used for a slide show-type presentation focusing on Qualcomms
wireless telecommunications technology, contained proprietary
information that could be valuable to foreign governments.
Qualcomm is a leader in wireless technology -- a boom market of the
burgeoning telecommunications revolution -- with $3.9 billion in
revenues last year. It designs and produces chips for wireless
communications devices and holds hundreds of patents whose
royalties provide it with the bulk of its earnings.
SABEWs president Byron Calame, deputy managing editor of The
Wall Street Journal, expressed sorrow at the event and noted that
people with access to the area "included registrants, exhibitors and
guests at our conference, hotel staff and perhaps others."
Very disturbing
"Its very disturbing to him," company spokeswoman Christine
Trimble said of the 66-year-old Jacobs, Qualcomms chairman and
founder. Jacobs, whose company is based in nearby San Diego, had
driven to the conference with his wife and without any security.
Trimble would not discuss details of the apparent theft except to
confirm that the laptop was used by Jacobs for "business purposes."
Company officials would not say whether Jacobs had contacted the
FBI.
"The FBI was never called that were aware of," said Irvine police
desk officer Sgt. Tim Smith. "We took it as a straight laptop theft,
which is pretty typical for a hotel."
However, several attendees at the SABEW conference said they
noticed three unattended laptops shortly after the theft as they
passed through an adjoining exhibitors room.
"It doesnt seem (Jacobs laptop) would be the obvious choice if the
individual was looking for an easy target," noted Shawn Abbott, chief
technical officer of computer security company Rainbow
Technologies.
Just 30 feet away
Jacobs and about a half-dozen journalists were no further than 30
feet from his laptop when it disappeared. More than 100 reporters
and editors from across the nation attended SABEWs 4th annual
technology conference, a two-day event that ended Sunday.
Trimble said the laptop, valued at about $4,000, was password
protected and the data was backed up on a computer at Qualcomms
San Diego headquarters. However, password-protected computers
running Windows operating systems, as Jacobs was, can be easily
be broken into.
The level of security on Jacobs laptop could not be determined.
Qualcomm is the worlds leading developer of a technology known as
CDMA, which seems to have won the global battle to become the
standard technology for making high-speed Internet access available
on wireless devices.
Wireless technologies
Those so-called third-generation wireless technologies are expected
to connect the Internet to handhelds and other devices in the next
few years -- initially in the Far East and Europe. Those markets are
considered to have a potential value in the tens of billions of dollars,
as everything from cars to airplanes are equipped with broadband
wireless connections.
If security on Jacobs laptop was limited only to password protection
_ rather than a more advanced encryption scheme -- "its extremely
unlikely that it will take any more than removing the hard drive and
hooking it up to another computer to read all the files," Abbott said.
http://www.apbnews.com/newscenter/breakingnews/2000/09/18/qualcomm0918_01.html
