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Here is evidence that agents of the Saudi government were in good standing with at least one significant member of the global community: https://www.whitehouse.

Here is evidence that agents of the Saudi government were in good standing with at least one significant member of the global community: https://www.whitehouse.gov/briefings-statements/statement-president-donald-j-trump-standing-saudi-arabia/ https://www.whitehouse.gov/briefings-statements/statement-pr... Here is evidence that they used Pegasus to find and kill a dissident: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jamal_Khashoggi https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jamal_Khashoggi

meowface 7y ago
Right, by "in good standing" I mean a rigorous definition far beyond and far wider than an endorsement from the US.
- radu_floricica 7y ago
  The right move here is to update on evidence, not move the goalposts.
  - meowface 7y ago
    What do you mean? As I said, I consider NSO to not remotely be "in good standing with the global community", and clearly many countries and people strongly share that view. I maintain that even in light of two particular governments supporting them. It'd only be moving the goalposts if I had said "with some fraction of the global community". I clearly meant the entire global community, not just one or a few countries. Obviously at least some countries support this, else NSO would get no business and would not exist; some governments supporting and procuring them is the whole problem in the first place. So pointing to a few countries supporting NSO doesn't really provide any counter-argument: it emphasizes my point that there needs to be globe-level coordination here. Perhaps you could remove certain rogue countries like North Korea from the consensus list, but it would otherwise need to be a global consensus. UN officials have also expressed their concern with their ethics, and the UN is probably as close as you can get to representatives of the global community (even if it's not at all perfect). Facebook could look to the UN's positions as a starting point, for example (and perhaps that's exactly what they did here and maybe is part of their legal grounds for why they consider NSO to be a bad actor). If it were the case that every country and regulatory body in the world collectively decided that this kind of thing is ok, then yes, I'd need to change my criteria. I was just saying if an intelligence contractor (in the same domain as NSO) is universally in good standing with the global community and a court order is sent, I think it's ok. I am not aware of any currently existing ones which are in good universal global standing, so this will probably only ever apply in many years or decades.

meowface 7y ago

Right, by "in good standing" I mean a rigorous definition far beyond and far wider than an endorsement from the US.

radu_floricica 7y ago
The right move here is to update on evidence, not move the goalposts.
- meowface 7y ago
  What do you mean? As I said, I consider NSO to not remotely be "in good standing with the global community", and clearly many countries and people strongly share that view. I maintain that even in light of two particular governments supporting them. It'd only be moving the goalposts if I had said "with some fraction of the global community". I clearly meant the entire global community, not just one or a few countries. Obviously at least some countries support this, else NSO would get no business and would not exist; some governments supporting and procuring them is the whole problem in the first place. So pointing to a few countries supporting NSO doesn't really provide any counter-argument: it emphasizes my point that there needs to be globe-level coordination here. Perhaps you could remove certain rogue countries like North Korea from the consensus list, but it would otherwise need to be a global consensus. UN officials have also expressed their concern with their ethics, and the UN is probably as close as you can get to representatives of the global community (even if it's not at all perfect). Facebook could look to the UN's positions as a starting point, for example (and perhaps that's exactly what they did here and maybe is part of their legal grounds for why they consider NSO to be a bad actor). If it were the case that every country and regulatory body in the world collectively decided that this kind of thing is ok, then yes, I'd need to change my criteria. I was just saying if an intelligence contractor (in the same domain as NSO) is universally in good standing with the global community and a court order is sent, I think it's ok. I am not aware of any currently existing ones which are in good universal global standing, so this will probably only ever apply in many years or decades.