Hewlett-Packard (HPQ)

Tracer

·      In January 2006, the investigation team created an e-mail account with a fictitious name and used that e-mail account to send an e-mail containing a “tracer” to a journalist (a tracer can be used to obtain other information, such as IP addresses, of persons who download the tracer).  The objective of the investigation team was to determine whether the journalist would forward the e-mail to her source and ultimately to determine the source of the leaks of HP confidential information.

·      The investigation team prepared the e-mail account and message so that the message appeared to be coming from a disgruntled senior executive who was willing to share information with the journalist.  The e-mail to the journalist provided what appeared to be confidential information.

·      At this point in our investigation, we believe the evidence suggests that the investigation team never received any confirmation that the tracer was activated, even though it did receive e-mail messages from the journalist.

·      The concept of sending the misinformation to the reporter and the content of the misinformation to be contained in the message of the e-mail was approved by Mr. Hurd, but we do not believe that Mr. Hurd approved the use of the tracer.

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