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- Gordon corera
- Security Correspondent
published photo, Getty Images
Israel’s ONS Says Clients Under Strict Assessment
The news circulating that the Israeli electronic spy program “Pegasus” may have been used to monitor journalists, activists and even political leaders confirms that the monitoring programs are now on sale.
The Israeli company “NSO Group” which produces this program has denied this news. She said her clients are subject to rigorous evaluation.
It also indicates that advanced spy techniques, which were previously the preserve of only a few countries, are now more prevalent and go far beyond what we know about privacy and security in the online world.
In the recent past, if the security services wanted to know what certain people were doing, it would have taken a lot of effort to make that happen.
The security authorities may have had to get permission to bug your phone, implant a chip in your house, or send a team to monitor you.
Knowing who to contact and how you go about your daily life previously required patience and time.
Now pretty much everything they could want to know, like our conversations, where we’ve been, who we’ve met, and even our interests, are all contained in a device that we carry with us all the time.
Your phone can be accessed remotely without anyone touching it and without you realizing that your adorable digital assistant has become someone else’s spy.
Previously, having access to a phone remotely was something only a few countries could do. But sophisticated spy and surveillance capabilities are now in the hands of many countries and even individuals and small groups.
Former US security employee Edward Snowden revealed the capabilities of US and UK intelligence services to spy on global communications in 2013.
These agencies have always emphasized that their capacities are subject to the mandate and control of a democratic state. The terms were rather weak at the time, but they have grown stronger since.
Israel has always been a premier cyberpower with advanced surveillance capabilities. Its companies, such as the “NSO Group” founded by veterans of the intelligence world, are among the companies commercializing these technologies.
NSO Group claims that it only sells its spyware against dangerous criminals and terrorists. But the problem is how to define these categories.
The more authoritarian states often claim that journalists, dissidents and human rights activists are criminals or a threat to national security, making them targets of prosecution and surveillance by authorities.
In many of these countries, there is little or no responsibility and control over how these advanced technologies are used.
The spread of encryption has increased governments’ insistence on hacking personal phones.
When phone calls were the primary form of communication, a telecommunications company could be asked to eavesdrop on the conversation (which previously meant attaching wires to a phone line).
But now conversations are often encrypted, which means you have to access the device itself to find out what’s on it and what its owner is doing, and the devices provide an even more informative treasure trove.
Countries sometimes come up with smart ways to do this. A recent example is a joint operation between the United States and Australia in which criminal gangs received phones that they believed to be very secure but were hacked by security services in an attempt to collect information on the criminals. .
But the problems in this area are bigger than the phone spyware. There are other, more sophisticated spy capabilities that are spreading quickly, even internet disruptors are now easily accessible.
Previously, ransomware, in which hackers demanded money to stop hacking your electronic device, was the domain of criminal networks, now it is sold freely on the dark web.
An individual can simply agree to an agreement to give them a share of the profits and they will provide the software and even provide support and advice, including hotlines in the event of a problem.
Other technologies such as location tracking and development of activity and behavior profiles of people that previously required special hacking tools and authorization are now available for free.
Surveillance is no longer limited to governments but also to companies that follow us not necessarily by planting spyware, but through what is called economic espionage through which companies monitor what we like on social networks. to better market sellers what we are looking for.
Ultimately, a large amount of data is collected that businesses can use, but it can be stolen by electronic thieves (hackers) and countries may seek to profit from it as well.
Some of these technologies are freely offered for sale.
Spyware: what is it and how does it work?
There are other types of spyware that skeptics and skeptics who want to check where their family members are looking for.
Are we about to enter a world where we can all become spies, but we can all become spies at the same time?
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