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Facebook wanted NSO spyware to monitor users, NSO CEO claims
- georgespencer 7y agoNot much surprises me about Facebook any more. The leadership is tone deaf.
- dhosek 7y agoIt seems their corporate motto, instead of the old Google, "Don't be evil" is "Be as evil as possible."
- georgespencer 7y agoIt's weird isn't it? I went through a period (personally) where I felt super misunderstood by people around me, and after a while I realised it was me who was miscalibrated. I get the impression that FB feels the same, but without the capacity for self-reflection or desire to change. A shame because the Facebook platforms could be, if not a force for good, at the very least neutral. Instead it seems like every single thing they do is insidious.
- gowld 7y agoFacebook is creating a more Open and Connected World. This little privacy incursions are the tax that you pay, as part of the social contract, to help bring the greatness of Facebook to others. ^ This is what Mark Zuckerberg tells government and journalists. And you know what? If you are a Facebook user, he's right! Only non-users and people dragged onto the platform only to communicate with friends/family/partners who insist in Facebook-only communication, have a right to complain.
- ConsiderCrying 7y agoI'm baffled that, even with the horrible rep Facebook has, they somehow decided to put "from Facebook" splash screens into both WhatsApp and Instagram. Why? What possible benefit could it have? Most people already know who owns the services but now anybody who opens the app is faced with it. If anything, it should just make people reluctant to use the apps, surely.
- brenden2 7y agoMany people don't realize that WhatsApp and Instagram are the same thing as Facebook. Facebook's brand is somewhat tarnished, and they want to polish it up with Instagram and WhatsApp (which have been less impacted by the bad press).
- jacobush 7y agoI'd say most, at least not until the sticker appeared.
- reaperducer 7y agoWhat possible benefit could it have? Perhaps stock price/awareness? The same way that lots of companies put their ticker symbol in their advertising, or the way local television news programs will put its parent company's ticker symbol in the closing graphics.
- harumph 7y agoBeing tone-deaf would imply they're unable to understand other people's issues. Facebook actively seeks to track all of us for their financial gain, against the wishes of many of us. Facebook is actively malicious.
- tjpnz 7y agoIt's not only the leadership. The engineering side is also complicit in this to some degree.
- blakesterz 7y agoThe original report is from Vice: https://www.vice.com/en_us/article/pke9k9/facebook-wanted-nso-spyware-to-monitor-users https://www.vice.com/en_us/article/pke9k9/facebook-wanted-ns... "The Facebook representatives stated that Facebook was concerned that its method for gathering user data through Onavo Protect was less effective on Apple devices than on Android devices," the court filing reads. "The Facebook representatives also stated that Facebook wanted to use purported capabilities of Pegasus to monitor users on Apple devices and were willing to pay for the ability to monitor Onavo Protect users."
- packetslave 7y agoAnd here's the Facebook response from that same article that you neglected to include: "NSO is trying to distract from the facts Facebook and WhatsApp filed in court over six months ago. Their attempt to avoid responsibility includes inaccurate representations about both their spyware and a discussion with people who work at Facebook. Our lawsuit describes how NSO is responsible for attacking over 100 human rights activists and journalists around the world. NSO CEO Shalev Hulio has admitted his company can attack devices without a user knowing and he can see who has been targeted with Pegasus. We look forward to proving our case against NSO in court and seeking accountability for their actions," the statement from a Facebook spokesperson read.
- mfer 7y ago2 notes about the parent. 1) The parent is written by an employee at Facebook and 2) it does not deny the claim instead redirecting the readers attention. None of this makes the original claim true or false. I'll be curious to see what comes to light around that. I just like to notice these subtle things.
- ksk 7y agoI work for neither, and the claim itself is vague, as it lacks any technical facts. "purported capabilities to monitor users" can mean anything from full on CIA spy-mode with pema-enabling audio and video and 24/7 recording to logging their IP address when they visit a website.
- notRobot 7y agoI wish I could stop using WhatsApp. It's the only FB service I use, and I because everyone else in my life relies on it, I can't just uninstall it and get away with it :(
- chrononaut 7y agoYou just have to start small, and eventually you might get there. It was like that for me with Signal. I was able to get a couple of my more willing close contacts to begin using it. After a couple months, another began using it, and eventually after two to three years the vast majority, most whom I never tried convincing, are using the application actively.
- reaperducer 7y agoDrop it and just go with e-mail, postal mail, phone calls, and SMS. I did, and found out who my real "friends" really are.
- RileyJames 7y agoJust keep trying! It took a long time, but I managed to move my whole direct family to signal. You will probably have to install it for them. Make a group chat. Use it regularly. But as it’s basically the same functionality, you won’t have to train them to use it. It’s worth it.
- gowld 7y agoPlay dumb, say WA is broken on your phone, ask then to install Signal to work around. Use Signal with whoever agrees
- deleted 7y ago[deleted]
- chance_state 7y agoTalented engineers that spend their limited working years figuring out how to extract every last cent from every person on Earth should feel some shame. I wonder how harshly history will judge them (many of whom are on HN).
- thowayheyhey 7y agoWhen FB news appears on HN I can't help but feel there's a curated tone/narrative. A mixture of "everyone's doing it" and "they clicked agree on the ToS" to "you should've known it would happen". Anyone want to take bets if FB runs sock-puppet accounts across the web? It'll be plausibly deniable and run thru a third party but still. Would anyone be surprised?
- fxtentacle 7y agoOf course they do. I don't question the if, but I'm curious about the number...
- mirimir 7y agoMaybe so. But doesn't HN scan for concerted behavior?
- dang 7y agoPlease read the site guidelines and keep insinuations of astroturfing off HN unless you have specific evidence. https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html Lots of past explanation here: https://hn.algolia.com/?sort=byDate&dateRange=all&type=comment&storyText=false&prefix=true&page=0&query=by:dang%20astroturf https://hn.algolia.com/?sort=byDate&dateRange=all&type=comme...
- thowayheyhey 7y agoSpecific evidence of astroturfing would involve combing through IP and moderation logs. I don't understand why insinuating the integrity of this forum is compromised - as if that's personally offensive to you. Do you not know what sock puppets are? Do you realize there's a market for it, and FB isn't above bidding? This story is from 2017. By 2023 I promise you news will leak of FB using sock puppets. Sorry if that's offensive Dang.
- cantrevealname 7y agoI’d like to suggest a fun project for Apple that might allow them to kill off this NSO malware: Apple should devote a few engineers to create honeypot iPhones that they could get into the hands of a few carefully chosen journalists and dissidents who would then “lose” their phones or allow the phones to be confiscated by governments or organizations who use NSO software. The objective is to get a copy of the NSO malware and figure out the exploit(s) they use. The honeypot phones would behave exactly like normal phones but save all incoming data at the lowest protocol layer (whether by wifi, cellular, Lightning connector, and maybe even in-circuit attempts to reflash firmware) to hidden internal terabyte microSD storage, which it would later exfiltrate back to Apple at some point —- perhaps by even having a second hidden cellular connection. I’m assuming that Apple has all the talent it needs to reverse engineer and plug the NSO malware once it has an actual copy of the malware.
- jacobush 7y agoThat would be a very offensive move. I like it. How will that kill off this malware though? Just by making incrementally harder (might work!) or through something more fundamental I'm missing?
- cantrevealname 7y ago> How will that kill off this malware though? I wouldn’t be surprised if everything that NSO does depends on just one or two extremely good exploits. Once Apple rolls out an update to patch the one or two critical bugs, it’ll stop NSO for a nice long time until they spend hundreds of man years or millions of dollars to find another exploit that’s just as good.
- saagarjha 7y agoI don't actually think it costs hundreds of man years to find these bugs at the moment.
- georgespencer 7y ago> governments I'm sure you know this, but deliberately committing an act of espionage to directly or indirectly subvert the activities of government agencies would be a silly thing for Apple to try to do. Their dollars are better spent on lobbying (make shit like this illegal), and engineering (make shit like this literally not work because iPhone is as secure as it can be).
- Lammy 7y agoYou can see how important Onavo was to Facebook by the lengths they were willing to go to protect it, including the whole "distributing it to teens via enterprise cert" thing Apple slapped them down for. The data from Onavo is how they knew what up-and-coming competitors were popular, and allowed Facebook to buy them out before they could become fully established.
- MR4D 7y agoFacebook should buy Zoom. Then we only need to hate one company.
- deleted 7y ago[deleted]
- phendrenad2 7y agoThe good news is this NSO thing appears to only work if it's not everywhere. If every FB app comes bundled with it, it'll be easy to figure out how it works in aggregate, and then NSO gets to move into the league of the common spyware/antivirus cat-and-mouse games.