5 ms·

"Guns don't kill people. People kill people." "Spyware doesn't spy on you. [Other] People spy on you." Guns are a much better analogy than cars.

AlexAndScripts 5y ago
"Traces of spyware on the phones of leaked targets is simply a coincidence"
- teekert 5y ago
  Insane right? If that statement were true imagine what that must mean, 37 out of "a random selection of" 67 phones infected... (because the statement implies the 67 are a random selection from all phones worldwide). They have more issues if the statement is true than if it is not!
- inglor 5y ago
  Think about this reasonably. I've worked with intelligence bodies before and they would never run something like pegasus on a cloud or connected to the internet. Products like Pegasus are almost always an on-prem enterprise-product it's simply the only model that makes sense security wise. If you were a client of NSO would you trust them to not look at the data? My guess is that the list is from one of NSO's other products or someone trying to gather business intelligence on NSO - for example: location tracking, check when user is online etc - anything that can reasonably justify the data not being sensitive enough for customers like security agencies to be OK with it being in the cloud. Consider if any of those dictators would want the US and Israeli governments to have access to whomever they're tapping on.
  - teknopaul 5y ago
    Consider if any of those dictators would want the US and Israeli governments to have access to whomever they're tapping. That's why they don't buy from the US or Israeli government: they buy from NSO who are a bunch of crooks.
  - imwillofficial 5y ago
    > would never run something like pegasus on a cloud or connected to the internet. Intel agencies use the cloud extensively for all sorts of use cases. This is 100% fact. Google “Amazon C2E”
guli 5y ago
"Once the rockets go up, who cares where they come down"
- nebulous1 5y ago
  "Zats not mein department!" says Werner von Braun
  - tut-urut-utut 5y ago
    After the London test was successful, gehen wir zum Mond
teknopaul 5y ago
Simple thought experiment for NSO... Has anyone successfully used your software to drive their kids to school? Has anyone successfully used your software to kill an enemy? I'm with the guns analogy, probably closer to illicit arms dealer in NSO's case.
dangerface 5y ago
This is why guns and spyware should be illegal.
JohnWhigham 5y ago
Putting aside whatever contracts governments have with gun manufacturers, the rest of the market is largely the average person that uses them for sporting or for self-defense. There's not that kind of benign market for Pegasus that the NSO Group can hide behind. The average person wouldn't be using Pegasus (if they could even afford it) to go after drug dealers/pedophiles/etc. Something like Pegasus can really only be used for nefarious purposes. I'm not buying their "People kill people!" argument.
- pjmlp 5y ago
  The benign market of people that use said self-defense weapons on schools and shopping malls?
  - imwillofficial 5y ago
    Would you agree, that of the total amount of guns sold, that a tiny percentage are used for mass shootings? A vanishingly small minority of users hurting society. Let’s compare that with the list we have. All the users are being spied on illegally. Some leading to deaths. 100% of use is society harming. Guns are a tool statistically not used often for crime. NSO’s software on the other hand is used for crime exclusively. (I do not want to get into a gun debate. I’m only using guns in my example because the GP alluded to mass shootings)
- wongarsu 5y ago
  > The average person wouldn't be using Pegasus (if they could even afford it) to go after drug dealers/pedophiles/etc. Vigilante justice certainly wouldn't be a benign market, even if someone did that with Pegasus (or guns)
  - goldenkey 5y ago
    I'm confused how you can paint individual violence in broad strikes and promote government violence as sanctioned? Tyranny happens when governments have a monopoly on force. Vigilantism is necessary when the government is corrupt or inefficient. To look past the need for individual retribution and justice is naive. I don't even have to search for 2 minutes before I can bring up countless articles about missing children, murders, thefts, and other immoral acts that the police or federal agencies do not care or have enough resources to address. These victims' only recourse is vigilantism. It's easy to sit in an ivory tower of bureaucracy when you haven't been affected by the corruption or incompetence of the nanny state. Read this for size: https://www.nytimes.com/2020/12/13/world/americas/miriam-rodriguez-san-fernando.html https://www.nytimes.com/2020/12/13/world/americas/miriam-rod...
bradleyjg 5y ago
Do you think US companies ought not sell guns to the Mexican government?
- gameswithgo 5y ago
  i think us companies ought not sell guns to anyone
  - bradleyjg 5y ago
    No police departments, no militaries. We’ll all just sing kumbaya and the world will be at peace? The flower children have returned apparently.
    - orwin 5y ago
      Don't worry, the trend is changing fast. Pre 2021, i had a lot of friend dismissing violence as a legitimate protection and worker empowerment, now some are buying guns. Like i said in a previous comment, i personally won't be able to draw a gun on another person, but doing the same as the BPP used to do do have some appeal to me. Walking the door of your company and saying "hi" to your factory manager with a gun on open carry must feel good.
gameswithgo 5y ago
over abundance of guns does kill people, though. that we could imagine that this shouldn’t be the case doesn’t really matter in the real world. the idea that we can scatter tools of enormous power around and just not worry about it is crazy
- TheAdamAndChe 5y ago
  The real worry from these tools is relative power. A man with a knife can kill a few people. A man with a rifle can kill a few dozen people. A man with a few zero days can cripple infrastructure around the country and cause hundreds if not thousands of deaths. Relative power asymmetries are why nuclear, chemical, and biological weapons are banned by international law.

AlexAndScripts 5y ago

"Traces of spyware on the phones of leaked targets is simply a coincidence"

teekert 5y ago
Insane right? If that statement were true imagine what that must mean, 37 out of "a random selection of" 67 phones infected... (because the statement implies the 67 are a random selection from all phones worldwide). They have more issues if the statement is true than if it is not!
inglor 5y ago
Think about this reasonably. I've worked with intelligence bodies before and they would never run something like pegasus on a cloud or connected to the internet. Products like Pegasus are almost always an on-prem enterprise-product it's simply the only model that makes sense security wise. If you were a client of NSO would you trust them to not look at the data? My guess is that the list is from one of NSO's other products or someone trying to gather business intelligence on NSO - for example: location tracking, check when user is online etc - anything that can reasonably justify the data not being sensitive enough for customers like security agencies to be OK with it being in the cloud. Consider if any of those dictators would want the US and Israeli governments to have access to whomever they're tapping on.
- teknopaul 5y ago
  Consider if any of those dictators would want the US and Israeli governments to have access to whomever they're tapping. That's why they don't buy from the US or Israeli government: they buy from NSO who are a bunch of crooks.
- imwillofficial 5y ago
  > would never run something like pegasus on a cloud or connected to the internet. Intel agencies use the cloud extensively for all sorts of use cases. This is 100% fact. Google “Amazon C2E”

guli 5y ago

"Once the rockets go up, who cares where they come down"

nebulous1 5y ago
"Zats not mein department!" says Werner von Braun
- tut-urut-utut 5y ago
  After the London test was successful, gehen wir zum Mond

teknopaul 5y ago

Simple thought experiment for NSO... Has anyone successfully used your software to drive their kids to school? Has anyone successfully used your software to kill an enemy? I'm with the guns analogy, probably closer to illicit arms dealer in NSO's case.

dangerface 5y ago

This is why guns and spyware should be illegal.

JohnWhigham 5y ago

Putting aside whatever contracts governments have with gun manufacturers, the rest of the market is largely the average person that uses them for sporting or for self-defense. There's not that kind of benign market for Pegasus that the NSO Group can hide behind. The average person wouldn't be using Pegasus (if they could even afford it) to go after drug dealers/pedophiles/etc. Something like Pegasus can really only be used for nefarious purposes. I'm not buying their "People kill people!" argument.

pjmlp 5y ago
The benign market of people that use said self-defense weapons on schools and shopping malls?
- imwillofficial 5y ago
  Would you agree, that of the total amount of guns sold, that a tiny percentage are used for mass shootings? A vanishingly small minority of users hurting society. Let’s compare that with the list we have. All the users are being spied on illegally. Some leading to deaths. 100% of use is society harming. Guns are a tool statistically not used often for crime. NSO’s software on the other hand is used for crime exclusively. (I do not want to get into a gun debate. I’m only using guns in my example because the GP alluded to mass shootings)
wongarsu 5y ago
> The average person wouldn't be using Pegasus (if they could even afford it) to go after drug dealers/pedophiles/etc. Vigilante justice certainly wouldn't be a benign market, even if someone did that with Pegasus (or guns)
- goldenkey 5y ago
  I'm confused how you can paint individual violence in broad strikes and promote government violence as sanctioned? Tyranny happens when governments have a monopoly on force. Vigilantism is necessary when the government is corrupt or inefficient. To look past the need for individual retribution and justice is naive. I don't even have to search for 2 minutes before I can bring up countless articles about missing children, murders, thefts, and other immoral acts that the police or federal agencies do not care or have enough resources to address. These victims' only recourse is vigilantism. It's easy to sit in an ivory tower of bureaucracy when you haven't been affected by the corruption or incompetence of the nanny state. Read this for size: https://www.nytimes.com/2020/12/13/world/americas/miriam-rodriguez-san-fernando.html https://www.nytimes.com/2020/12/13/world/americas/miriam-rod...

bradleyjg 5y ago

Do you think US companies ought not sell guns to the Mexican government?

gameswithgo 5y ago
i think us companies ought not sell guns to anyone
- bradleyjg 5y ago
  No police departments, no militaries. We’ll all just sing kumbaya and the world will be at peace? The flower children have returned apparently.
  - orwin 5y ago
    Don't worry, the trend is changing fast. Pre 2021, i had a lot of friend dismissing violence as a legitimate protection and worker empowerment, now some are buying guns. Like i said in a previous comment, i personally won't be able to draw a gun on another person, but doing the same as the BPP used to do do have some appeal to me. Walking the door of your company and saying "hi" to your factory manager with a gun on open carry must feel good.

gameswithgo 5y ago

over abundance of guns does kill people, though. that we could imagine that this shouldn’t be the case doesn’t really matter in the real world. the idea that we can scatter tools of enormous power around and just not worry about it is crazy

TheAdamAndChe 5y ago
The real worry from these tools is relative power. A man with a knife can kill a few people. A man with a rifle can kill a few dozen people. A man with a few zero days can cripple infrastructure around the country and cause hundreds if not thousands of deaths. Relative power asymmetries are why nuclear, chemical, and biological weapons are banned by international law.