Israeli security firm used to surveil Britney Spears by father
Britney Spears' father James Spears allegedly hired
Israeli-owned security firm Black Box Security (BBX) to put his daughter under
intrusive surveillance, according to a former BBX employee in The New York
Times' upcoming documentary titled Controlling Britney Spears.
The documentary relies on evidence brought to light by a
former employee, 30-year-old Alex Vlasov, who served as BBX's operations and
cybersecurity manager and executive assistant to the CEO and founder, Edan
Yemeni, for nine years.
Edan Yemeni was born in Israel and is described on the
firm's website as having a background in the Israeli Special Forces.
Vlasov began working for BBX in 2012 and revealed through
text messages, audio recordings, and emails the extent of the surveillance that
the pop singer was subjected to under her conservatorship, facilitated by the
firm.
Spears has been under conservatorship since a series of
public mental breakdowns in 2008, which means that her father has had almost
full control of her life for 13 years, including full financial control over
her almost $60 million-worth estate.
He revealed that the firm would monitor digital
communications by mirroring her iCloud account to a separate iPod (and later an
iPad), where Yemeni would tell Vlasov to encrypt private information such as
texts, FaceTime calls, browser history, and photographs and forward it to Jamie
Spears.
“Her own phone and her own private conversations were used
so often to control her,” Vlasov said in the documentary.
Vlasov also shared how he was asked to delete over 180
hours' worth of recordings from a listening device that was planted in Spears'
bedroom from a portable USB drive by Yemeni and another employee. Instead, he
made a copy to preserve the evidence.
Asked why he continued working for BBX and did not come
forward despite the abuse, Vlasov expressed fear over the power Yemeni and
other executives have in the industry, and if it would hurt future job
prospects. In April, he left the firm saying coming forward is the right thing
to do.
Addressing a Los Angeles court in June, Spears described the
conservatorship as "abusive" and wanted it to end without additional
psychiatric evaluations. In August, James Spears filed a petition to end the
conservatorship.
The next hearing in the case is scheduled for September 29.
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