18 ms·

US puts NSO Group on trade blacklist

419 points by FDSGSG 5y ago

FDSGSG 5y ago
Does this kill NSO? It seems like they might be too big and interconnected to be able to reasonably survive this.
- bberenberg 5y ago
  From the article: > NSO and a smaller Tel Aviv-based company, Candiru, were among four companies added by the US commerce department on Wednesday to its so-called entity list, which would restrict exports of US technology to the companies. From https://www.commerce.gov/news/press-releases/2021/11/commerce-adds-nso-group-and-other-foreign-companies-entity-list https://www.commerce.gov/news/press-releases/2021/11/commerc... > The Entity List is a tool utilized by BIS to restrict the export, reexport, and in-country transfer of items subject to the EAR to persons (individuals, organizations, companies) reasonably believed to be involved, have been involved, or pose a significant risk of being or becoming involved, in activities contrary to the national security or foreign policy interests of the United States. For the four entities added to the Entity List in this final rule, BIS imposes a license requirement that applies to all items subject to the EAR. In addition, no license exceptions are available for exports, reexports, or transfers (in-country) to the entities being added to the Entity List in this rule. BIS imposes a license review policy of a presumption of denial for these entities. General Entity List descriptions are available at https://www.bis.doc.gov/index.php/policy-guidance/lists-of-parties-of-concern/entity-list https://www.bis.doc.gov/index.php/policy-guidance/lists-of-p... It seems like it mostly restricts them from using US made tech and punishes US companies that supply them.
  - ryanlol 5y ago
    > It seems like it mostly restricts them from using US made tech and punishes US companies that supply them. It’s also not super easy to find banks willing to work with companies publicly blacklisted by the US government.
  - samat 5y ago
    I got down the rabbit hole (20 open tabs at 1AM local time, you know) and it seems most of the 'normal' software like Operating Systems & Devtools are classified as 'mass market' and are subject only to 'Anti-Terrorism enforcement', meaning you cannot sell them only to Iran and couple other countries. Meaning NSO Group could not buy tech to build nuclear warheads in their backyard, but otherwise they are good to use any 'usual' US-made software. Other commenters say it is significantly harder for companies in that list to banks because of that list. Is that true?
- ldiracdelta 5y ago
  Of course not. They liquidate and form another company under assumed aliases.
  - deleted 5y ago
    [deleted]
  - alwayseasy 5y ago
    The favorite game of North Koreans. Doesn't work well though.
  - ryanlol 5y ago
    Yeaah, good luck hiring top talent like this.
frankfrankfrank 5y ago
If this were not just an utterly meaningless exercise, every single person that has ever worked at or with the NSO group should be blacklisted and untouchable to send an actual signal and make the consequences of participating in such activities actually meaningful and consequential.
- FDSGSG 5y ago
  This has some meaningful consequences. It makes NSO and any money that has touched NSO poisonous. It's not illegal to touch, but few banks will want to work with you. If you're an employee receiving salary payments from NSO, expect your bank to be unhappy with you.
  - lordofgibbons 5y ago
    I think you might be mixing up trade imbargo with a sanction.
    - FDSGSG 5y ago
      Of course not, I'm simply pointing out that this certainly places you in the "super high risk" category as far as any KYC procedures go.
    - tyingq 5y ago
      Perhaps confusing it with the OFAC list, which is directly about banking and blocking transactions for named entities and individuals.
      - FDSGSG 5y ago
        Not confusing with the OFAC list. Being on any list makes you a toxic customer. Yes, there are other designations which would carry even worse repercussions.
    - JumpCrisscross 5y ago
      > I think you might be mixing up trade imbargo with a sanction Being employed, or even having been employed, by an entity on the BIS's Entity List will make doing business in U.S. and in U.S. dollars expensive and tedious. At the very least, you will impose ongoing additional costs for every financial institution you interact with.
DisjointedHunt 5y ago
The programmers who i've read about getting hit with penalties as a consequence of working with companies such as NSO or with governments such as the UAE seem to be exposing a significant gap in the US' treatment of their most prized minds. The NSA and other government agencies seem to not be attractive from the point of view of a great place to work and the money to be made in the private sector in the US alone is thin. . . economic forces dictate that supply will meet demand especially when the demand is rich middle eastern wealth. There is no obvious "red team" or similar career for these people in the US to help defend the nations systems for a fee. All government contracts for cybersecurity go out in tenders that prioritize entities that can navigate the complex logistics of filing a response with the Government and working their way. That's the biggest concern for me seeing this pattern emerge. On the specific entity here, the NSO group being blacklisted, that will change little. There is a systemic risk of us continuing to lose great talent to more attractive ventures.
- shmatt 5y ago
  These are the same people (ex 8200 - Israeli NSA) who sell security startups for 9 figures within a year of opening them. Then the next year open another one The same people are playing both sides It's not like the government doesn't purchase private sector cyber security. It's just 1 group of very smart people doing all the work for both sides
  - DisjointedHunt 5y ago
    I'm not speaking about the founders. I should have been more specific. The talent in the NSA that leaves and ends up working for the UAE, as an example[1] [1]https://darknetdiaries.com/episode/47/ https://darknetdiaries.com/episode/47/
    - deleted 5y ago
      [deleted]
    - gad0lin 5y ago
      Episode 100 of darknetdiaries is devoted to NSO and talks about usage of Pegasus in Mexico and other countries https://darknetdiaries.com/episode/100/ https://darknetdiaries.com/episode/100/ I think there might have been pressure on NSO as part of trial of Google|Fb.. against them. https://www.theverge.com/2020/12/22/22194930/microsoft-google-cisco-vmware-internet-association-amicus-brief-nso-group-spyware-whatsapp-facebook https://www.theverge.com/2020/12/22/22194930/microsoft-googl...
throwaway781a 5y ago
Controversial statement but this reminds me of Jews as moneylenders. Government lets them do an unpopular thing the benefits it, and if anyone throws a stink they throw them out and wash their hands and act like they were shocked. This seems like the government outsourcing controversial activities to Israel.
- greatjack613 5y ago
  huh, that sounds like the nazis saying the jews were the rich ones taking advantage of everyone.
  - GhettoComputers 5y ago
    Historically in Germany kings would use Jews for their business skills and when they needed money they’d kill/banish them and steal their accumulations. Nazis just perpetuated that cycle but instead made it more racist and eugenics based rather than pragmatic as their ancestors did. They did not understand the cycle of history.
- GhettoComputers 5y ago
  The US does this with the military industrial complex and uses private companies like this constantly in the U.S. and all around the world. Israel just has huge human capital and is a source for educated intelligent workers for this work.
  - devmunchies 5y ago
    lots of R&D for AI and chips/hardware is done in Israel as well. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_multinational_companies_with_research_and_development_centres_in_Israel https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_multinational_companie...
boomboomsubban 5y ago
As I doubt the US needed the recent stories to know what the NSO Group was up to, this will cause similar groups to treat any potential leak source with even more hostility. The US is making it clear that targeting dissidents, journalists or activists is fine but getting caught is a problem.
- more_corn 5y ago
  As long as attackers are sending their exploits to their targets they're going to have trouble remaining in the shadows. Perhaps if we continue unmasking the attackers they'll think twice about operating so brazenly.
- fishtacos 5y ago
  > The US is making it clear that targeting dissidents, journalists or activists is fine but getting caught is a problem. What's that saying? "Better late than never."? Or how about "Never let perfect be the enemy of good."? Obviously the US intelligence agencies knew about this well before the public did... and while I'm not quite ready to put this all on the goodwill of the Biden administration, it's also a reminder that civilian leadership changes do effect change, despite all the "Deep State" nonsense going on these days.
  - Hikikomori 5y ago
    You can always count on the Americans to do the right thing, after they've exhausted all other options.
    - mc32 5y ago
      What about everyone else, goody two shoes?
      - psadauskas 5y ago
        Its a quote, usually incorrectly attributed to Winston Churchill. https://quoteinvestigator.com/2012/11/11/exhaust-alternatives/ https://quoteinvestigator.com/2012/11/11/exhaust-alternative...
WaitWaitWha 5y ago
This will impact Title 28. Will it impact Title 50?
boardwaalk 5y ago
Considering how powerful politically Israel is in the US and how seemingly the NSO Group was government-sanctioned, this seems crazy to me. I would not be silly enough to think this means less unconditional support for Israel in general, though. NSO Group just specifically got too toxic.
- goboronshka 5y ago
  Israel is hardly powerful in the US. US foreign policy is overall pretty antisemitic. Israel would own half of Egypt at least if the US didn't drive them out in the Yom Kippur War.
  - GhettoComputers 5y ago
    Says whom? Israelis themselves prided themselves on invading but with every intention to not take Egyptian land. Israelis weren’t driven out, they beat Egypt to show their power and created a good relationship with them. No Israeli I have ever talked to says half of Egypt should have been theirs or the US drove them out, they always make a point they bargain and prefer peace. I'd like you to define how US policy is "antisemitic". Why are these horrible US antisemites giving Israel military aid and money?
    - wolverine876 5y ago
      Also, I cannot imagine Israel would want to conduct an occupation of half of Egypt. Look at the difficulty of occupying the Palestinian territories. Look at US occupations recently, and the US has far more resources and Egypt would be far more hostile to Israel than Iraq and Afghanistan were to the US.
      - GhettoComputers 5y ago
        I have never heard such crazy ideas before from anyone. Its completely ridiculous, not even the most fringe right wing Yigal Amir supporting Israeli would say what he did.
  - 5y ago
COGlory 5y ago
There's a dead comment from a throwaway that I mostly disagree with. Except for this last line: >This seems like the government outsourcing controversial activities to Israel. It certainly feels that way to me, as well. The US is in a sticky situation. This just feels like a standard burn. You're caught, now you're out. NSO made too much noise and got cut loose. Obviously the NSA and others are going to continue this kind of work.
- colinmhayes 5y ago
  It makes perfect sense for the US to outsource controversial work to the Israeli military industrial complex, just like it makes perfect sense for fortune 500 corporations to outsource controversial work to mckinsey. Plausible deniability for the party that cares about their image, money for the party that has embraced the destruction of theirs. I guess the US could use domestic contractors instead, but then they'd have to admit the contractors were sanctioned when they don't bring criminal charges. I'd be much more worried if US government was found to be hacking/assassinating Saudi dissidents, because that would mean the leaders of the US government are completely incompetent. That's not to say it's not happening, just that it would be idiotic for the government to do that themselves when they can use foreign contractors instead.
- sol_invictus 5y ago
  Yep. Also see: Wuhan lab, and the US ties to it.
- slg 5y ago
  Here is the formerly dead comment[1]. I just vouched for it so it is no longer dead. I'm not sure why you would agree with the quoted portion and disagree with the rest. The rest is documented historical fact.[2] [1] - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=29095907 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=29095907 [2] - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Edict_of_Expulsion https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Edict_of_Expulsion
  - COGlory 5y ago
    'Jews as moneylenders' has a strong religious context I don't see in this story. That's all. Thanks for vouching for the comment.
_wldu 5y ago
It seems there is no safe cell phone. They all run closed source software, written in unsafe languages (C and C++) and can be abused by cyber criminals and governments to spy on and track people at will. Why do we carry these things in our pockets? And I'm not convinced Signal or any other privacy protecting app is really useful. If we assume all cell phones are owned (or can be at any time) then the criminals own all the private keys on the phones as well. It's impossible to have private communications with a cell phone.
- GhettoComputers 5y ago
  >It seems there is no safe cell phone. They all run closed source software, written in unsafe languages (C and C++) and can be abused by cyber criminals and governments to spy on and track people at will. Why should we have any expectation of privacy when we use a cell phone at all? It is triangualating your location 24/7 even if its not a smartphone. When/why did we expect them to be private in any way? How can you expect privacy when your location data is being broadcast and you're carrying a tracking device? >Why do we carry these things in our pockets? Its worth it for the tradeoffs.
  - deleted 5y ago
    [deleted]
- LogonType10 5y ago
  GrapheneOS runs all open source software (no closed source Google code), doesn't phone home to Google, doesn't allow for targeted updates based on IMEI, has strong app memory isolation, and isn't vulnerable to run of the mill NSO zero days. Buy a Mint Mobile SIM card with cash and boom, anonymous phone not tied to your name.
  - GhettoComputers 5y ago
    Yet you're connecting to T-mobile towers and having your location tracked 24/7. How is that in any way private?
cblconfederate 5y ago
The fact that "spyware firm" is a thing is comical. Don't let the world know
golemiprague 5y ago
Basically the US didn't like the competition, they are going to do the same things only with American companies. They don't really mind when Google are spying their users and has the power to control information so suddenly they care about some spying software? This is not the first time the US is clipping the wings of the Israeli security industry, it is part of the dance between the too nations, if Israel wants the support they need to stop compete. In general Israel doesn't need the American money and considering the racism against Israelis among the progressives and the extreme right maybe it is about time that Israel should reconsider their alliance with the deteriorating American empire.
DerekL 5y ago
TIL there's a spyware company called Candiru. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Candiru_(spyware_company) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Candiru_(spyware_company) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Candiru_(fish) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Candiru_(fish)
m0zg 5y ago
Somehow I doubt this will prevent US Government itself from being a customer. They always exempt themselves from restrictions they put on others. That said, I still welcome the move. NSO is scum, that much we've established years ago.
catlikesshrimp 5y ago
Being a software company, what prevents N, S and O from founding another company? OSN, for instance? There is no need to transfer any wealth from NSO and the code is both illegal and secret, anyways. Edit: it should not be that obvious, but I don't think NSO will close shop because the trademark was flagged. Rename to meta, or something like that.
- deleted 5y ago
  [deleted]
- tibyat 5y ago
  I came here hoping someone would be able to answer this question. Unfortunately it's just the usual Israel bit you get on /r/politics.
bogomipz 5y ago
>"NSO and a competitor, Tel Aviv-based Candiru, were among four companies added by the commerce department on Wednesday to its so-called entity list, which would restrict exports of US hardware and software to the companies." What is going on in Israel where there are this many companies engaging spyware for sale to any customer who simply has enough funds to buy them? What's the commonality here? Is these NSO stories in in Israeli media? Lastly what is meant by "military grade spyware." That sounds like marketing fluff.

419 points by FDSGSG 5y ago

FDSGSG 5y ago

Does this kill NSO? It seems like they might be too big and interconnected to be able to reasonably survive this.

bberenberg 5y ago
From the article: > NSO and a smaller Tel Aviv-based company, Candiru, were among four companies added by the US commerce department on Wednesday to its so-called entity list, which would restrict exports of US technology to the companies. From https://www.commerce.gov/news/press-releases/2021/11/commerce-adds-nso-group-and-other-foreign-companies-entity-list https://www.commerce.gov/news/press-releases/2021/11/commerc... > The Entity List is a tool utilized by BIS to restrict the export, reexport, and in-country transfer of items subject to the EAR to persons (individuals, organizations, companies) reasonably believed to be involved, have been involved, or pose a significant risk of being or becoming involved, in activities contrary to the national security or foreign policy interests of the United States. For the four entities added to the Entity List in this final rule, BIS imposes a license requirement that applies to all items subject to the EAR. In addition, no license exceptions are available for exports, reexports, or transfers (in-country) to the entities being added to the Entity List in this rule. BIS imposes a license review policy of a presumption of denial for these entities. General Entity List descriptions are available at https://www.bis.doc.gov/index.php/policy-guidance/lists-of-parties-of-concern/entity-list https://www.bis.doc.gov/index.php/policy-guidance/lists-of-p... It seems like it mostly restricts them from using US made tech and punishes US companies that supply them.
- ryanlol 5y ago
  > It seems like it mostly restricts them from using US made tech and punishes US companies that supply them. It’s also not super easy to find banks willing to work with companies publicly blacklisted by the US government.
- samat 5y ago
  I got down the rabbit hole (20 open tabs at 1AM local time, you know) and it seems most of the 'normal' software like Operating Systems & Devtools are classified as 'mass market' and are subject only to 'Anti-Terrorism enforcement', meaning you cannot sell them only to Iran and couple other countries. Meaning NSO Group could not buy tech to build nuclear warheads in their backyard, but otherwise they are good to use any 'usual' US-made software. Other commenters say it is significantly harder for companies in that list to banks because of that list. Is that true?
ldiracdelta 5y ago
Of course not. They liquidate and form another company under assumed aliases.
- deleted 5y ago
  [deleted]
- alwayseasy 5y ago
  The favorite game of North Koreans. Doesn't work well though.
- ryanlol 5y ago
  Yeaah, good luck hiring top talent like this.

frankfrankfrank 5y ago

If this were not just an utterly meaningless exercise, every single person that has ever worked at or with the NSO group should be blacklisted and untouchable to send an actual signal and make the consequences of participating in such activities actually meaningful and consequential.

FDSGSG 5y ago
This has some meaningful consequences. It makes NSO and any money that has touched NSO poisonous. It's not illegal to touch, but few banks will want to work with you. If you're an employee receiving salary payments from NSO, expect your bank to be unhappy with you.
- lordofgibbons 5y ago
  I think you might be mixing up trade imbargo with a sanction.
  - FDSGSG 5y ago
    Of course not, I'm simply pointing out that this certainly places you in the "super high risk" category as far as any KYC procedures go.
  - tyingq 5y ago
    Perhaps confusing it with the OFAC list, which is directly about banking and blocking transactions for named entities and individuals.
    - FDSGSG 5y ago
      Not confusing with the OFAC list. Being on any list makes you a toxic customer. Yes, there are other designations which would carry even worse repercussions.
  - JumpCrisscross 5y ago
    > I think you might be mixing up trade imbargo with a sanction Being employed, or even having been employed, by an entity on the BIS's Entity List will make doing business in U.S. and in U.S. dollars expensive and tedious. At the very least, you will impose ongoing additional costs for every financial institution you interact with.

DisjointedHunt 5y ago

The programmers who i've read about getting hit with penalties as a consequence of working with companies such as NSO or with governments such as the UAE seem to be exposing a significant gap in the US' treatment of their most prized minds. The NSA and other government agencies seem to not be attractive from the point of view of a great place to work and the money to be made in the private sector in the US alone is thin. . . economic forces dictate that supply will meet demand especially when the demand is rich middle eastern wealth. There is no obvious "red team" or similar career for these people in the US to help defend the nations systems for a fee. All government contracts for cybersecurity go out in tenders that prioritize entities that can navigate the complex logistics of filing a response with the Government and working their way. That's the biggest concern for me seeing this pattern emerge. On the specific entity here, the NSO group being blacklisted, that will change little. There is a systemic risk of us continuing to lose great talent to more attractive ventures.

shmatt 5y ago
These are the same people (ex 8200 - Israeli NSA) who sell security startups for 9 figures within a year of opening them. Then the next year open another one The same people are playing both sides It's not like the government doesn't purchase private sector cyber security. It's just 1 group of very smart people doing all the work for both sides
- DisjointedHunt 5y ago
  I'm not speaking about the founders. I should have been more specific. The talent in the NSA that leaves and ends up working for the UAE, as an example[1] [1]https://darknetdiaries.com/episode/47/ https://darknetdiaries.com/episode/47/
  - deleted 5y ago
    [deleted]
  - gad0lin 5y ago
    Episode 100 of darknetdiaries is devoted to NSO and talks about usage of Pegasus in Mexico and other countries https://darknetdiaries.com/episode/100/ https://darknetdiaries.com/episode/100/ I think there might have been pressure on NSO as part of trial of Google|Fb.. against them. https://www.theverge.com/2020/12/22/22194930/microsoft-google-cisco-vmware-internet-association-amicus-brief-nso-group-spyware-whatsapp-facebook https://www.theverge.com/2020/12/22/22194930/microsoft-googl...

throwaway781a 5y ago

Controversial statement but this reminds me of Jews as moneylenders. Government lets them do an unpopular thing the benefits it, and if anyone throws a stink they throw them out and wash their hands and act like they were shocked. This seems like the government outsourcing controversial activities to Israel.

greatjack613 5y ago
huh, that sounds like the nazis saying the jews were the rich ones taking advantage of everyone.
- GhettoComputers 5y ago
  Historically in Germany kings would use Jews for their business skills and when they needed money they’d kill/banish them and steal their accumulations. Nazis just perpetuated that cycle but instead made it more racist and eugenics based rather than pragmatic as their ancestors did. They did not understand the cycle of history.
GhettoComputers 5y ago
The US does this with the military industrial complex and uses private companies like this constantly in the U.S. and all around the world. Israel just has huge human capital and is a source for educated intelligent workers for this work.
- devmunchies 5y ago
  lots of R&D for AI and chips/hardware is done in Israel as well. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_multinational_companies_with_research_and_development_centres_in_Israel https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_multinational_companie...

boomboomsubban 5y ago

As I doubt the US needed the recent stories to know what the NSO Group was up to, this will cause similar groups to treat any potential leak source with even more hostility. The US is making it clear that targeting dissidents, journalists or activists is fine but getting caught is a problem.

more_corn 5y ago
As long as attackers are sending their exploits to their targets they're going to have trouble remaining in the shadows. Perhaps if we continue unmasking the attackers they'll think twice about operating so brazenly.
fishtacos 5y ago
> The US is making it clear that targeting dissidents, journalists or activists is fine but getting caught is a problem. What's that saying? "Better late than never."? Or how about "Never let perfect be the enemy of good."? Obviously the US intelligence agencies knew about this well before the public did... and while I'm not quite ready to put this all on the goodwill of the Biden administration, it's also a reminder that civilian leadership changes do effect change, despite all the "Deep State" nonsense going on these days.
- Hikikomori 5y ago
  You can always count on the Americans to do the right thing, after they've exhausted all other options.
  - mc32 5y ago
    What about everyone else, goody two shoes?
    - psadauskas 5y ago
      Its a quote, usually incorrectly attributed to Winston Churchill. https://quoteinvestigator.com/2012/11/11/exhaust-alternatives/ https://quoteinvestigator.com/2012/11/11/exhaust-alternative...

WaitWaitWha 5y ago

This will impact Title 28. Will it impact Title 50?

boardwaalk 5y ago

Considering how powerful politically Israel is in the US and how seemingly the NSO Group was government-sanctioned, this seems crazy to me. I would not be silly enough to think this means less unconditional support for Israel in general, though. NSO Group just specifically got too toxic.

goboronshka 5y ago
Israel is hardly powerful in the US. US foreign policy is overall pretty antisemitic. Israel would own half of Egypt at least if the US didn't drive them out in the Yom Kippur War.
- GhettoComputers 5y ago
  Says whom? Israelis themselves prided themselves on invading but with every intention to not take Egyptian land. Israelis weren’t driven out, they beat Egypt to show their power and created a good relationship with them. No Israeli I have ever talked to says half of Egypt should have been theirs or the US drove them out, they always make a point they bargain and prefer peace. I'd like you to define how US policy is "antisemitic". Why are these horrible US antisemites giving Israel military aid and money?
  - wolverine876 5y ago
    Also, I cannot imagine Israel would want to conduct an occupation of half of Egypt. Look at the difficulty of occupying the Palestinian territories. Look at US occupations recently, and the US has far more resources and Egypt would be far more hostile to Israel than Iraq and Afghanistan were to the US.
    - GhettoComputers 5y ago
      I have never heard such crazy ideas before from anyone. Its completely ridiculous, not even the most fringe right wing Yigal Amir supporting Israeli would say what he did.
- 5y ago

COGlory 5y ago

There's a dead comment from a throwaway that I mostly disagree with. Except for this last line: >This seems like the government outsourcing controversial activities to Israel. It certainly feels that way to me, as well. The US is in a sticky situation. This just feels like a standard burn. You're caught, now you're out. NSO made too much noise and got cut loose. Obviously the NSA and others are going to continue this kind of work.

colinmhayes 5y ago
It makes perfect sense for the US to outsource controversial work to the Israeli military industrial complex, just like it makes perfect sense for fortune 500 corporations to outsource controversial work to mckinsey. Plausible deniability for the party that cares about their image, money for the party that has embraced the destruction of theirs. I guess the US could use domestic contractors instead, but then they'd have to admit the contractors were sanctioned when they don't bring criminal charges. I'd be much more worried if US government was found to be hacking/assassinating Saudi dissidents, because that would mean the leaders of the US government are completely incompetent. That's not to say it's not happening, just that it would be idiotic for the government to do that themselves when they can use foreign contractors instead.
sol_invictus 5y ago
Yep. Also see: Wuhan lab, and the US ties to it.
slg 5y ago
Here is the formerly dead comment[1]. I just vouched for it so it is no longer dead. I'm not sure why you would agree with the quoted portion and disagree with the rest. The rest is documented historical fact.[2] [1] - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=29095907 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=29095907 [2] - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Edict_of_Expulsion https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Edict_of_Expulsion
- COGlory 5y ago
  'Jews as moneylenders' has a strong religious context I don't see in this story. That's all. Thanks for vouching for the comment.

_wldu 5y ago

It seems there is no safe cell phone. They all run closed source software, written in unsafe languages (C and C++) and can be abused by cyber criminals and governments to spy on and track people at will. Why do we carry these things in our pockets? And I'm not convinced Signal or any other privacy protecting app is really useful. If we assume all cell phones are owned (or can be at any time) then the criminals own all the private keys on the phones as well. It's impossible to have private communications with a cell phone.

GhettoComputers 5y ago
>It seems there is no safe cell phone. They all run closed source software, written in unsafe languages (C and C++) and can be abused by cyber criminals and governments to spy on and track people at will. Why should we have any expectation of privacy when we use a cell phone at all? It is triangualating your location 24/7 even if its not a smartphone. When/why did we expect them to be private in any way? How can you expect privacy when your location data is being broadcast and you're carrying a tracking device? >Why do we carry these things in our pockets? Its worth it for the tradeoffs.
- deleted 5y ago
  [deleted]
LogonType10 5y ago
GrapheneOS runs all open source software (no closed source Google code), doesn't phone home to Google, doesn't allow for targeted updates based on IMEI, has strong app memory isolation, and isn't vulnerable to run of the mill NSO zero days. Buy a Mint Mobile SIM card with cash and boom, anonymous phone not tied to your name.
- GhettoComputers 5y ago
  Yet you're connecting to T-mobile towers and having your location tracked 24/7. How is that in any way private?

cblconfederate 5y ago

The fact that "spyware firm" is a thing is comical. Don't let the world know

golemiprague 5y ago

Basically the US didn't like the competition, they are going to do the same things only with American companies. They don't really mind when Google are spying their users and has the power to control information so suddenly they care about some spying software? This is not the first time the US is clipping the wings of the Israeli security industry, it is part of the dance between the too nations, if Israel wants the support they need to stop compete. In general Israel doesn't need the American money and considering the racism against Israelis among the progressives and the extreme right maybe it is about time that Israel should reconsider their alliance with the deteriorating American empire.

DerekL 5y ago

TIL there's a spyware company called Candiru. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Candiru_(spyware_company) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Candiru_(spyware_company) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Candiru_(fish) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Candiru_(fish)

m0zg 5y ago

Somehow I doubt this will prevent US Government itself from being a customer. They always exempt themselves from restrictions they put on others. That said, I still welcome the move. NSO is scum, that much we've established years ago.

catlikesshrimp 5y ago

Being a software company, what prevents N, S and O from founding another company? OSN, for instance? There is no need to transfer any wealth from NSO and the code is both illegal and secret, anyways. Edit: it should not be that obvious, but I don't think NSO will close shop because the trademark was flagged. Rename to meta, or something like that.

deleted 5y ago
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tibyat 5y ago
I came here hoping someone would be able to answer this question. Unfortunately it's just the usual Israel bit you get on /r/politics.

bogomipz 5y ago

>"NSO and a competitor, Tel Aviv-based Candiru, were among four companies added by the commerce department on Wednesday to its so-called entity list, which would restrict exports of US hardware and software to the companies." What is going on in Israel where there are this many companies engaging spyware for sale to any customer who simply has enough funds to buy them? What's the commonality here? Is these NSO stories in in Israeli media? Lastly what is meant by "military grade spyware." That sounds like marketing fluff.