Financial advisor Jim Grant installs spyware on his customers' computers

Via Spamroll, The Boston Herald reports that Wall Street financial advisor Jim Grant has been installing spyware on the computers of the subscribers to his investment letters in order to determine if they're being illegally copied. This information came out when he sued one of his readers for sharing the newsletter around the office. In turn, Grant has been accused of computer fraud and trespass.

This is similar to the Sony case, in which Sony installed a virus on some of its music CDs which installed rootkits on users' computers for the purpose of enforcing Sony copyrights.

The Herald article speculates that this is common practice among authors of high-priced newsletters.