HACK ATTACK

The days of meeting an informant in a darkened parking garage may be over. The tip that led federal investigators to about $1 million worth of hidden assets from a failed S&L; recently came from a less romantic source--a computer bulletin board.

“An informant gave us information about where the principal of the S&L; was concealing assets,” says Mark Finley, systems operator of the Whistle Blower Bulletin Board System. “There were houses owned under other names that investigators would have been unlikely to discover.”

Finley, a 39-year-old deputy sheriff with the San Bernardino Sheriff’s Department, started Whistle Blower three years ago. He runs it in his spare time and with his own money. The system allows any Deep Throat with a computer, a modem and a hot tip to report crimes anonymously; Finley forwards the information to the proper authorities. “I was expecting this to be an entirely white-collar-crime type of thing,” Finley says, “but the mix has been really bizarre.” Reports of drug labs, dope dealers, prostitution rings, child abuse and people fencing stolen goods pulse in from all over the country, resulting in several hundred arrests and convictions thus far, Finley says. Occasionally, an informant will leave details about someone’s infidelities. But straying spouses need not panic. “We don’t pass those on,” he says.

Finley is raising money to get an 800 number and a multiline capability. To access the Whistle Blower Bulletin Board, call (714) 875-9547.