Cellphone stalking victims www.IDTheftSecurity.com 1of3

Now on Tyra.

We know you're home alone.

They threatened to kill me.

This is a brand new crime that's freaking me out.

Cellular phones can be hacked and it can be used to spy on you.

They call and they say what we're wearing, where we are.

The crime you're witnessing is called upskirting. It was lowered all the way down to the ground, pointed up my skirt. How to protect yourself from a phone invasion. You never know who is watching you. An all-new Tyra starts now. Okay. Check me out, you know what I'm doing. I'm filming myself with this camera phone. It's something that we all do all the time. Most phones these days have cameras in them. You can take actual motion footage or you can take snaps and stills of yourselves, of you and your family. But imagine if somebody was tracking my every single move. If they had some kind of weird connection through this thing, or somewhere far off, they can know exactly what I was doing. Where they could stalk me through my cell phone. Today you're going to find out how to protect yourself from this because this is a brand new crime that's freaking me out. And what's super crazy is that there is a family that is going through this type of stalking. They don't know what's going on, but there are some people that are preying on them and it is so scary.

Next message. I'm going to kill you. I know where you are. I know where you live. I am going to kill you.

How would you feel if you got this message on your cell phone? The Kuykendall family feel like they've been living in a nightmare ever since they started being terrorized on their cell phones.

Yeah, I never in a million years would have dreamed that something like this could have happened to our family. We live in a really small town.

According to family and friends, the first phone hacked belonged to 16-year-old Courtney Kuykendall.

One night I sent that at my friend's house and I started getting all these text messages from like 25 of my friends saying, "Why did you just say gay?" And I said, "My phone never sent that." 'Yeah, you did.' When it first started to happen, everyone thought they were just harmless pranks, kids having fun, until their lives became threatened.

Next message. There will be a shooting at Curtis and Whittier today. If you don't send the kids, they will be dead.

Even Courtney's best friend Whitley received some calls from the stalkers.

It sounded like a guy most of the time, but a couple times it sounds like a girl. It sounds like a low raspy voice, kind of like they're trying to disguise We hate you guys so much.

Hate. Hate.

To stop this torture, everyone changed their cell phones and their cell phone numbers. But that did not stop the terror. The death threats, the calls, the texts kept happening. Heather's sister Darcy, another target, thinks their stalkers can be both serious and lighthearted.

They even made threats to our family pets, Ike and Plumpy.

The worst part, they have no idea who could possibly be making these threats.

It feels as if It's as though we're living in a scary movie. They know they're terrorizing us and they love it.

They thrive on it.

I just don't see how, I mean, our lives will ever be the same.

All right, so with me now are 16-year-old Courtney and her mother Heather. Also joining us are Courtney's aunt Darcy and Courcie's good friend Whitley. And they've all felt harassed by the cell phone stalker as we just saw. I want to start with you, Courtney, because you were the first person that was stall, right?

Yes.

And why do you think you were first?

I have no idea why someone would ever do this to me and my family. We've all sat and talked about it, see who would ever do this, who would take the time out of their lives to threaten me and my family, and we can't figure out why or who it is.

You can't figure out one person? Maybe you had a fight with somebody at school, or somebody might be jealous.

We were thinking like an ex-boyfriend or friend, but— or a girl that's jealous, but we have no idea who it is.

I have no idea. Have you ever thought of any certain leads and tried to track certain people, maybe?

Mm-hmm. Well, not really in particular. Well, there was one person in particular, but I don't think it could be him. Yeah.

And how has your life been since this has started?

Well, I can't even be home by myself anymore, and I think that home is like the safest place you should feel.

Mm-hmm.

And I can't even be by myself at home. I don't feel safe at all.

And what about going to and from school? Do you feel scared, like, going to and from school?

Oh, I don't feel safe at school. School at all. They said that they'd know my schedule, and one time I was in my child psych class and they called and they said, we know you're in your child psych class, I don't think we can't see you. And it's just really scary. So I had to get an early release from school, so I didn't go to school the last 2 weeks of school because they're saying stuff in school.

That would make me think, okay, it's somebody in my classroom.

Yeah, I don't— it doesn't sound like a high schooler. It sounds like— because it's a low raspy voice and it sounds really scary, like an old man. Yeah, so it sounds like— but sometimes it sounds like a girl. So it's really confusing.

We don't know.

So maybe it's like a ring of people.

Yeah.

Mom, did you ever think it could—

It's a group. We feel like it's people in their late teens, early 20s, and a girl and a couple guys. We're not sure.

And there's also all this technology now, and we see it in the movies. Come on, you know, I'm gonna— you know, and they can change the voices, and it doesn't even necessarily sound like a computer, but it can really change somebody's voice. How does it feel being her mother, and you can't protect the family? Because mom, dad, you're supposed to be the protectors of the family, and it's like a helpless place for you.

Right.

We've tried to remain strong, and it's— I have to admit, um, try not to live in fear, but there's been times when we've been very fearful. And it's hard as a mom to see your kids be scared like that. My kids don't sleep in their own beds, my younger two. For 5 months they haven't slept in their own beds. But it's empowered me to be stronger as a family, and we're tighter because of it.

And you think, okay, it's going to attack mom and daughter. Have you guys ever just closed all the windows and then stayed You still get stuff? Yeah, of course. So all the windows are closed and they're still saying you—

It happens when we're not even home. We'll be out on a hike in the middle of the woods and they call and they say what we're wearing, where we are. They tell us to get out of the woods 'cause we're gonna kill you in the woods. They describe the color of the hat we're wearing. Everything. So it doesn't just happen at home.

One thing, you're saying, or you believe that through the camera they can like turn on your phone and can look at what you're doing through the eyepiece of your camera, right? We know for sure they can listen through the microphone on the phone.

They can— they activate it somehow and they could record us talking right now, and then in a minute they'll play it back as a voicemail.

Almost like a bug, like a—

yeah, like a virus type of thing. We feel like they're using some sort of computer program. Um, they can call multiple people at similar times.

Have you ever tried to cover the eyepiece on the camera?

Yes, I actually I have covered it. I have my phone. I always cover the camera with— I tried like a thin piece of paper and you can still see through it, so I put like a business card over it. I, I know.

Do they still say stuff after you've covered it? No, not as much.

No.

Okay.

I know a lot of people are watching right now and thinking it's inside, it's in-house. Like if you guys are going hiking and if things are happening in the house, they're saying somebody in the family is doing this. Have you been accused of it?

Oh yeah, I've been accused by the FBI.

So this has gotten big enough to go to the FBI?

Yes, because they use my number to make it look like I'm the one calling, but it's easy just to like put a random number to make it look like someone's calling you.

As a mom, did you ever doubt your daughter for one moment?

You know what, I never in my heart believed that it was ever her, but we had to ask if it was her. And because, you know, some kids can get involved in certain things, so we asked her, you know, if you are involved If you were involved or you know who's involved, please come forward, and at the beginning, and then we did it later on again. We questioned her, but, um, we know it's not her.

What does it make you feel like to— that your parents are asking you this and people that are close to you?

Makes me feel just really upset because who would ever do that to their own family and friends? But people do. Yeah.

But people do do that to their family.

Do you know what I mean?

People do. Yeah.

Okay, we'll be right back. Joining us now is Robert Siciliano. Robert Siciliano, and he's a security expert who specializes in high-tech crime. So, can somebody really hack into these phones like that? 'Cause it makes me scared, like I need to put a little piece of tape on my cell phone too so people can't see me.

Tyra, yes, unfortunately the technology is there to hack into remotely control somebody's cellular phone. And, you know, obviously, and I really feel for you, you've gone through a significant traumatic emotional event. And really, you know, I don't even know how you sleep at night knowing what you're going through and that there are people paying unwanted attention to you like this. But really, you know, getting control of this and shutting those phones off and putting the security systems in place like Tyra mentioned, you know, putting cameras so that you can actually see who's doing this may actually stop this from happening.

Mm-hmm.

And do you think the person knows Courtney?

There's a very good chance that this is somebody who you're really close to. You know, the old adage where they say, you know, keep your friends close and keep your enemies closer. It really is true. There's somebody in your life, obviously, that's paying unwanted attention to you, that wants a bigger piece of you, and they're doing this to get your attention.

Yes.

And somehow—

It's like they want to scare you. They're saying certain things. The only reason you would really tell somebody you have on a yellow top, a gray top, a brown top, a red top is to scare you.

Yes.

Because if somebody wants to hurt you, they will just hurt you.

Right. And it's somebody that you very well may know, like, or even trust that's close to you that could be doing this to you.

Could it be somebody that has a psychosis? That might not be necessarily like, "I'm mad at you and I'm going after you, but I'm just a little off." See, psychosis, right?

Mental illness. 50% of all people suffer some form of mental illness. Now think of everybody you know. Half of them are crazy, right?

You know?

So there really is some truth to that. So it's somebody that very well very well may be close to you that just might not be right in the head.

Mm-hmm.

Gosh. Okay, well, if there's someone out there that has any information about this crime, there is a very lucrative reward.