NSO Group – whose technology is reported to have been used against dozens of targets including Pakistani intelligence officials, Indian journalists and exiled Rwandan political activists – also claimed in legal documents that the lawsuit brought against the company by WhatsApp threatened to infringe on its clients’ “national security and foreign policy concerns”. Source: NSO...
Tag: private intelligence
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Biden Briefer Defended Israeli Spyware Firm Implicated in Abuses
After last night’s Democratic presidential debate, Anita Dunn, senior adviser to the Biden campaign, spun reporters on the Vice President’s performance. Last years, Dunn, who served as communications director in Barack Obama’s White House, did similar duty for NSO, the spyware firm founded by former Israeli intelligence officers. NSO created the infamous Pegasus intrusion tool,...
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Can a Cold War Treaty Curb the Spyware Industry?
From Yossi Melman at Haaretz.com The change tightens oversight of “intrusion software” designed to break into smartphones and decipher encryption on digital devices. Companies specializing in forensic cybertechnology will be affected most. That’s the field dealing with the development of software that helps law enforcement agencies collect evidence and reconstruct cellphone data in criminal investigations....
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Ex-Obama Official and Washington Post Columnist Quits Israeli Spyware Firm
NSO, the Israeli private intelligence firm is becoming notorious. Known for spyware that Saudi Arabia and Mexican drug cartels have used to spy on journalists and dissidents, NSO has sought respectability by hiring Americans like Juliette Kayyem, a Harvard professor and Washington Post columnist. I noted last last year that Kayyem’s dual positions as a...
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Former Bush Adviser Sells Repression in the Middle East
As counterterrorism adviser to President George W. Bush, Richard Clarke advocated vastly expanded spying powers for the U.S. government. As a private citizen, he sold the same idea to a Persian Gulf oil monarchy. The Reuters investigated, and the resulting story, Made in America shows how and why private intelligence firms are flourishing. Undemocratic governments...