Spy vs. Spy with the PenCam   It is amazing to watch the
evolution of surveillance gadgets that modern technology brings
us. Hidden cameras are now tucked away inconspicuously in smoke
detectors, motion detectors, stuffed animals, clocks, and
countless other innocuous products.  Today, it’s easy for
manufacturers to squeeze a great deal of functionality into a
tiny package. Integrated circuits have millions of transistors
packed onto tiny chips, wristwatches offer a thousand functions,
and cell phones can access the Internet and capture still and
video images. Of course, those tiny integrated circuits enable
the manufacture of most of these devices in the first place.
One ordinary looking but functional product is the Swann DVR-421
PenCam. It looks and writes like any ordinary writing utensil,
but it also records video and still images. Inside the thick,
but otherwise ordinary looking ballpoint pen, is a pinhole
camera and 2GB DVR that can record 640 x 480 color video with
sound, and still images with 1280 x