Geek Squad is Peek Squad

[Dreamcast18]

I always tell my friends to avoid BestBuy's Geeksquad:


Overpriced
Invades your privacy by copying your files/data
Clueless techies

Dell techie came by today and told me of this incident...might be old news for some:

'I Felt ... Dirty Because He Did This When I Was Naked'



LOS ANGELES -- A woman and her daughter filed a lawsuit Wednesday against Best Buy's Geek Squad in connection with a computer technician accused of videotaping the daughter while she was in the shower.

The mother said she hired the tech, who faces criminal charges, March 2 at the Best Buy in Industry.

Natalie Fornaciari said the technician used her daughter's bathroom and positioned a cell phone camera in the room to capture video of the 22-year-old woman while she showered."I was shocked and felt angry and upset for my daughters when I learned what was on the video," Fornaciari said. "I felt disgusted because he was in my girls' home and in their bedrooms. I worried about what he might do. Was he going to put the video on the Internet and expose my daughters?"

The 22-year-old's younger sister found the camera. She removed the memory chip from the phone and the family viewed the recorded video.Fornaciari said the images showed the 22-year-old woman in the shower."I was very happy that I was able to help police with this evidence," said Kelly Rocha, the woman's younger sister.The family called police and the technician was arrested."I couldn't believe this was happening to me," said Sarah Vasquez.

"I felt embarrassed and dirty because he did this when I was naked."Best Buy provided this statement: "Best Buy was not informed of this action prior to being contacted by the media today. Obviously, we intend to cooperate fully with any investigation."The technician was charged with two counts of invasion of privacy.The family's lawsuit alleges fraud, negligent misrepresentation, negligent hiring, invasion of privacy and intentional infliction of emotional distress.

http://i35.tinypic.com/slsk1x.jpg

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http://www.knbc.com/news/11651854/detail.html

[Snoman]

Shit They charge something like $150 just to hook up a DVD to a TV you bought from them?????? That's just the tip of the ice berg!

[JustAKid]

wow , un real

[Dreamcast18]

And this is how much these bunch of "techies-for-hire" charge:

http://www.geeksquad.com/services/computer/category.aspx?id=231

http://www.geeksquad.com/services/computer/category.aspx?id=491

http://www.geeksquad.com/services/computer/category.aspx?id=203

http://www.geeksquad.com/services/computer/detail.aspx?id=1533

http://i38.tinypic.com/nzhy5f.jpg

http://i33.tinypic.com/wt9mxe.jpg

http://i35.tinypic.com/25pr8no.jpg

http://i33.tinypic.com/2hweduc.jpg

[Dreamcast18]

More reasons NOT TO use GeekSquad:

Geek Squad lawsuit opens up with employee confession

Minneapolis (MN) - As a high-profile lawsuit against Best Buy's Geek Squad technical support service gets ready for court, a new employee confession has come through detailing one of the company's more questionable policies.

The lawsuit, filed in Hennepin County, Minnesota, claims that when a computer comes into a Geek Squad center, the employees comb through personal files and sometimes copy lewd or other content over to their own personal flash drive.

According to Minneapolis newspaper The Star Tribune, the lawsuit was filed quickly after an anonymous employee sent a letter to online consumer advocate site The Consumerist. In the letter, the employee wrote, "If you have any interesting pictures of yourself or others on your computer, then they -- will -- be -- found."

Geek Squad says it takes "reasonable precautions to protect against the loss, misuse and unauthorized access of your personal information."

Geek Squad, which is the self-claimed largest computer support company in the country, downplayed the event by saying it was an isolated incident. However, a new employee has come forward confessing a similar action.

William Giffels came forward and said he sought out revealing pictures of a customer who brought in a computer for repairs. He copied the pictures to his flash drive, and then were copied to multiple CDs used in the Geek Squad department of the store.

"It was dumb, and I regret that lapse in judgment. I have placed Best Buy in a precarious position, both legally and 'reputationally,'" said Giffels. Several other people claiming to be Geek Squad employees have quietly admitted to doing the same kind of thing.

Best Buy says it has increased the number of audits it conducts at its Geek Squad locations, but advocates suggest the store needs to completely overhaul its operation. "No matter what investigative protocol Best Buy uses, someone is going to find a way around it," said Consumerist editor Ben Popken to the Star Tribune.

With regard to controversy, though, Best Buy remains defensive. "Our agents only see the data they need to," said Best Buy spokesperson Paula Baldwin.



http://www.tgdaily.com/content/view/37269/118/

[Dreamcast18]

Victim: $54 million Best Buy lawsuit stupid, but necessary

$54 million is what Raelyn Campbell wants out of Best Buy for her missing laptop, personal data, and her time. The Washington, DC, resident filed a lawsuit against the company after Best Buy allegedly lied to her for months at a time about the status of her machine, then offered her an insultingly low compensation once it acknowledged the loss.

Campbell even says that she knows $54 million is outrageous, but it's apparently the only way to get media attention and put enough pressure on Best Buy to do the right thing.

"It shouldn't take a $54 million lawsuit to motivate Best Buy to address these issues," Campbell told (http://redtape.msnbc.com/2008/02/a-lost-laptop-a.html#posts) MSNBC. In fact, she doesn't even expect to win that much—all she wants is appropriate compensation, an explanation of what happened, and a promise that employees will receive training on preventing the loss or theft of items from secure areas of the store.

The story of how the lawsuit came about is convoluted. Campbell bought the laptop from Best Buy in 2006 and was "talked into" paying an extra $300 for the extended warranty. A year later, in May of 2007, the power switch on the computer broke, so she took it in for repairs and was told it would take between two and six weeks.

Two months later, she began making phone calls to Best Buy to find out the status of her repairs, but continually got the runaround.

"On July 11, I contacted the (store's) helpline and was instructed by 'Agent David Goodfellow' that it would be 'ready within days,'" Campbell wrote in her complaint letter to the company in late August. She called again on July 19, when someone told her that the machine was in Louisville for repairs. On July 25, she was told that a part had been ordered and it would be leaving Louisville "soon."

On August 9, Campbell managed to get an answer out of another Best Buy employee, who told her that the computer never actually went anywhere. In fact, he told her several days later that the computer was missing, and that Campbell would be compensated. That compensation amounted to a $900 gift card several weeks and a number of phone calls later—an amount that Campbell found to be ridiculously low. She says that her laptop and warranty alone cost over $1,100, not counting her purchased software, time, and all of her lost data. Campbell demanded $2,100 in cash, but was met with silence.

After Campbell contacted the Washington, DC, attorney general's office in November, Best Buy offered her a $1,100 refund to her credit card and a $500 gift card. Finally, when Campbell filed her $54 million attention-getting lawsuit later that month, the company upped its offer: $2,500 in cash, plus all of the above. But Campbell withdrew her original demand for $2,100 because of the added costs of filing police reports, consulting lawyers, and taking measures to deal with identity theft.

That's right: Campbell's tax returns were on her laptop, and Best Buy apparently violated Washington, DC's security breach notification laws by not telling her about the potential data loss. And the potential for data theft as a result of missing equipment is no laughing matter: the state of Ohio (http://arstechnica.com/news.ars/post/20070712-ohio-bumps-data-theft-estimate-to-1-million.html), TSA (http://arstechnica.com/news.ars/post/20070507-tsa-removes-shoes-belt-still-cant-find-hard-drive-with-air-marshal-data.html), IRS (http://arstechnica.com/news.ars/post/20070406-inspectors-irs-lost-490-laptops-many-with-unencrypted-data.html), US Department of Transportation (http://arstechnica.com/news.ars/post/20060811-7477.html), and the Veterans Administration (http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2006/05/22/AR2006052200690.html) have all lost equipment (often laptops) that have forced them to alert millions of citizens to watch out for identity theft. Campbell says that she still hasn't heard from Best Buy on that particular issue, and has been forced to incur extra costs to monitor all of her accounts for suspicious activity.

Best Buy did not respond to our requests for comment by publication time.

http://arstechnica.com/news.ars/post/20080212-victim-54-million-best-buy-lawsuit-stupid-but-necessary.html

[MM84]

WHAT A JOKE those prices are nuts for the kind of work that is being done.

Now, I will say this... you can't really run a business charging nickles and dimes either.....

However, even a no brains fool can install a cd and follow the prompts or call tech support not to mention there is a thing out there called THE INTERNET.... yeah bet you did not know about that....believe it or not there is other information on there other than naked girls....:eek2: