A honeypot is a trap set to attract (or detect) some manner of interaction with an information system.
FBI posts fake hyperlinks to snare child porn suspects
The FBI has recently adopted a novel investigative technique: posting hyperlinks that purport to be illegal videos of minors having sex, and then raiding the homes of anyone willing to click on them.
Undercover FBI agents used this hyperlink-enticement technique, which directed Internet users to a clandestine government server, to stage armed raids of homes in Pennsylvania, New York, and Nevada last year. The supposed video files actually were gibberish and contained no illegal images…
The implications of the FBI’s hyperlink-enticement technique are sweeping. Using the same logic and legal arguments, federal agents could send unsolicited e-mail messages to millions of Americans advertising illegal narcotics or child pornography–and raid people who click on the links embedded in the spam messages…
Civil libertarians warn that anyone who clicks on a hyperlink advertising something illegal–perhaps found while Web browsing or received through e-mail–could face the same fate.
When asked what would stop the FBI from expanding its hyperlink sting operation, Harvey Silverglate, a longtime criminal defense lawyer in Cambridge, Mass. and author of a forthcoming book on the Justice Department, replied: “Because the courts have been so narrow in their definition of ‘entrapment,’ and so expansive in their definition of ‘probable cause,’ there is nothing to stop the Feds from acting as you posit.”
Iranian HoneyPots
The Iranian authorities are creating a different type of honeypot to catch people who may object to the re-election of Ahmedinejad and his crowd.
Marked for Death by Twitter
But in recent days people believed to be members of the Iranian security apparatus have set up apparent decoy Web sites about the demonstrations to gather IP addresses that will allow them to locate the computer of anyone tricked into clicking on them. Others—again believed to be government agents—have begun what appears to be an active campaign to mis- and dis-inform through Twitter postings.
For me this kind of entrapment reveals only on thing: complete amateurism of investigators that are not able to build a real case. As if there are no real criminals i.e. those that make and distribute real child pornography. That’s where they should focus their energy!