Philip Becnel appeared in an article in The Washington Post called, “Was your spouse on Ashley Madison? A new breed of private eye is ready to help.” The article was about plans by a company called Trustify to capitalize on the hack of a company that offered dating services for married people seeking affairs.
Philip was selectively quoted in the article:
“In a case like Ashley Madison or Target or Wal-Mart, the hacking’s done by a syndicate,” said Philip Becnel, a partner at the D.C. investigative firm Dinolt Becnel & Wells [Investigative Group]. “It’s all done on the ‘dark Web;’ it’s all paid for in bitcoin. It’s virtually untraceable. At least it’s not within the capabilities of any private investigation firm I’m aware of.”
In a follow-up email to the reporters who wrote the story, Philip was critical of the story and told them that there was no way Trustify could legitimately capitalize on the hacked data. Soon after the article, however, Trustify came under heavy criticism for its unethical use of the data at issue, something that was also reported in The Washington Post in an article called, “Digital ‘ambulance chasers’ are profiting off the misery of the Ashley Madison hack.”