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Would you have said the same about HackingTeam [0] and the Italian Government? They were featured on citizen lab a LOT a few of years ago [1]. These guys still

Would you have said the same about HackingTeam [0] and the Italian Government? They were featured on citizen lab a LOT a few of years ago [1]. These guys still operate under the name "Memento Labs". There's obviously money to be made from selling offensive cybersecurity tools to governments. And you can hardly blame governments for buying these services in the age of end-to-end encryption in the hands of every criminal and terrorist. While I definitely don't condone spying on human rights activists, journalists, or even regular citizens for that matter, pegasus really is a weapon and as such should definitely be heavily regulated. But as with other types of weapons, the responsibility for its use (or rather misuse) should lie with the weapon's user first and foremost, not the manufacturer. If NSO/HackingTeam were in the business of selling physical weapons to foreign governments, would they have been responsible for a government killing journalists with said weapons? If they were selling to North Korea, sure. But what about the legitimate governments of stable countries not under sanctions? [0]: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hacking_Team https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hacking_Team [1]: https://citizenlab.ca/tag/hacking-team/ https://citizenlab.ca/tag/hacking-team/

maybeOneDay 5y ago
I think you hand wave away the responsibility born by the Governments who regulate, control, and subsidise the arms trade. Of course it is the fault of the user of the weapons as well - but UK and USA (to just name a couple more egregious examples) governments quite literally give money to foreign governments in order for them to funnel it directly back into arms deals. These weapons can then be used to destroy hospitals and schools in Yemen. Our governments are financing this loss of life in order to further propel the revolving door. I see this kind of cyber weaponry as a simple subset of the above complex.
- maltalex 5y ago
  > I see this kind of cyber weaponry as a simple subset of the above complex. This is exactly my point. I think that NSO should be just as responsible for the outcomes as any other arms manufacturer. And I'm not waving away the government's responsibilities. Just the opposite - cyber weaponry is equivalent to other types of weaponry and should be treated as such. This is why I feel that the discussion around NSO itself misses the point. It's like discussing Colt's responsibility whenever a government uses an M-16 to shoot a human rights activists. Colt may be responsible in some cases, but the important question is who bought the weapon and why did they use them against that specific target. Also, should the buyer be sanctioned and forbidden from purchasing such weapons in the future.
  - srean 5y ago
    I agree with your larger claim but possibly differ in how to oppose these forces. Opposition in the abstract does nothing, apart from stoking ivory tower feel good emotions. Going after one perpetrator, building a precedence, seems to have had more lasting effect than going for the abstract.
user-the-name 5y ago
> If NSO/HackingTeam were in the business of selling physical weapons to foreign governments, would they have been responsible for a government killing journalists with said weapons? Yes.
- maltalex 5y ago
  Can you explain your position? Should Colt be blamed if a foreign government uses an M-16 to shoot a journalist?
  - user-the-name 5y ago
    Yes. My position is that I don't think we should be making tools designed for killing people.
    - gowld 5y ago
      So only criminals should have weapons? Who will stop the criminals, without weapons?
      - JabavuAdams 5y ago
        Why do we have violent criminals? Also, there actually aren't that many versus say gun sales. Can we push the number of violent criminals to 0? Maybe not, but we could greatly reduce the numbers with more intelligent social policies (in the US or Canada, say). The wild-west mentally and the fact that it has been co-opted by certain political groups actually leads to more crime and more fear (which sells guns and regressive politics). What if no one lived in a state or neighbourhood so shitty that they felt the need to arm up? What if they had not been indoctrinated since birth with a wild-west mentality that linked gun-ownership to freedom? The "only criminals will have weapons" argument is a really low-quality surface-level distraction from getting to grips with problems we could actually solve.
      - user-the-name 5y ago
        Where would the criminals get them, if they are not made?
foolmeonce 5y ago
> If NSO/HackingTeam were in the business of selling physical weapons to foreign governments, would they have been responsible for a government killing journalists with said weapons? If they were in the businesses of selling weapons of war and caught instead selling covert weapons with no legitimate use in open warfare to countries that disclose illegal acts of war to them, I think they belong in the Hague being tried for war crimes. (After that, I suppose they can be referred to human rights courts as a defacto part of each government that had violations. Since they were active participants in the use of the weapon as shown by the phone list, they have no argument that they were not active members of every conspiracy involving their service.)
- maltalex 5y ago
  > If they were in the businesses of selling weapons of war and caught instead selling covert weapons with no legitimate use in open warfare to countries that disclose illegal acts of war to them, I think they belong in the Hague being tried for war crimes. If they were doing that, I agree. But these weapons have legitimate uses in law enforcement and why do you think that the client government disclose their illegal acts to NSO?
Intermernet 5y ago
You seem to be giving these companies a pass to sell software that can be used to create absolute surveillance states. If this sort of software is available, it needs regulations. The people responsible for the regulation are the exact states that would love to acquire the software. Do you not see the conflict of interest here? (Yes, it's the same for other weapons sales. That's a quagmire of corruption and double standards as well.) Don't make the mistake of conflating North Korea with any other state. The people in charge of the intelligence organisations have very similar opinions on the efficacy of these tools no matter where they come from. It's been shown many times that the heads of the relevant agencies in the 5 eyes, let alone the rest of the international intelligence community, aren't very concerned about the legality of their activities. Two ways to prevent the misuse of this software are 1: ban it and convict those who peddle it, and 2: have independent oversight and transparency over every use of this software. Who it's sold to, who it's used on, what it's capabilities are. Unfortunately, I don't see either of these as realistic, so basically we're up shit creek without a paddle.

maybeOneDay 5y ago

I think you hand wave away the responsibility born by the Governments who regulate, control, and subsidise the arms trade. Of course it is the fault of the user of the weapons as well - but UK and USA (to just name a couple more egregious examples) governments quite literally give money to foreign governments in order for them to funnel it directly back into arms deals. These weapons can then be used to destroy hospitals and schools in Yemen. Our governments are financing this loss of life in order to further propel the revolving door. I see this kind of cyber weaponry as a simple subset of the above complex.

maltalex 5y ago
> I see this kind of cyber weaponry as a simple subset of the above complex. This is exactly my point. I think that NSO should be just as responsible for the outcomes as any other arms manufacturer. And I'm not waving away the government's responsibilities. Just the opposite - cyber weaponry is equivalent to other types of weaponry and should be treated as such. This is why I feel that the discussion around NSO itself misses the point. It's like discussing Colt's responsibility whenever a government uses an M-16 to shoot a human rights activists. Colt may be responsible in some cases, but the important question is who bought the weapon and why did they use them against that specific target. Also, should the buyer be sanctioned and forbidden from purchasing such weapons in the future.
- srean 5y ago
  I agree with your larger claim but possibly differ in how to oppose these forces. Opposition in the abstract does nothing, apart from stoking ivory tower feel good emotions. Going after one perpetrator, building a precedence, seems to have had more lasting effect than going for the abstract.

user-the-name 5y ago

> If NSO/HackingTeam were in the business of selling physical weapons to foreign governments, would they have been responsible for a government killing journalists with said weapons? Yes.

maltalex 5y ago
Can you explain your position? Should Colt be blamed if a foreign government uses an M-16 to shoot a journalist?
- user-the-name 5y ago
  Yes. My position is that I don't think we should be making tools designed for killing people.
  - gowld 5y ago
    So only criminals should have weapons? Who will stop the criminals, without weapons?
    - JabavuAdams 5y ago
      Why do we have violent criminals? Also, there actually aren't that many versus say gun sales. Can we push the number of violent criminals to 0? Maybe not, but we could greatly reduce the numbers with more intelligent social policies (in the US or Canada, say). The wild-west mentally and the fact that it has been co-opted by certain political groups actually leads to more crime and more fear (which sells guns and regressive politics). What if no one lived in a state or neighbourhood so shitty that they felt the need to arm up? What if they had not been indoctrinated since birth with a wild-west mentality that linked gun-ownership to freedom? The "only criminals will have weapons" argument is a really low-quality surface-level distraction from getting to grips with problems we could actually solve.
    - user-the-name 5y ago
      Where would the criminals get them, if they are not made?

foolmeonce 5y ago

> If NSO/HackingTeam were in the business of selling physical weapons to foreign governments, would they have been responsible for a government killing journalists with said weapons? If they were in the businesses of selling weapons of war and caught instead selling covert weapons with no legitimate use in open warfare to countries that disclose illegal acts of war to them, I think they belong in the Hague being tried for war crimes. (After that, I suppose they can be referred to human rights courts as a defacto part of each government that had violations. Since they were active participants in the use of the weapon as shown by the phone list, they have no argument that they were not active members of every conspiracy involving their service.)

maltalex 5y ago
> If they were in the businesses of selling weapons of war and caught instead selling covert weapons with no legitimate use in open warfare to countries that disclose illegal acts of war to them, I think they belong in the Hague being tried for war crimes. If they were doing that, I agree. But these weapons have legitimate uses in law enforcement and why do you think that the client government disclose their illegal acts to NSO?

Intermernet 5y ago

You seem to be giving these companies a pass to sell software that can be used to create absolute surveillance states. If this sort of software is available, it needs regulations. The people responsible for the regulation are the exact states that would love to acquire the software. Do you not see the conflict of interest here? (Yes, it's the same for other weapons sales. That's a quagmire of corruption and double standards as well.) Don't make the mistake of conflating North Korea with any other state. The people in charge of the intelligence organisations have very similar opinions on the efficacy of these tools no matter where they come from. It's been shown many times that the heads of the relevant agencies in the 5 eyes, let alone the rest of the international intelligence community, aren't very concerned about the legality of their activities. Two ways to prevent the misuse of this software are 1: ban it and convict those who peddle it, and 2: have independent oversight and transparency over every use of this software. Who it's sold to, who it's used on, what it's capabilities are. Unfortunately, I don't see either of these as realistic, so basically we're up shit creek without a paddle.