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Six Palestinian organizations hacked with NSO Group’s Pegasus Spyware

541 points by bjourne 5y ago

fortran77 5y ago
If these claims are true, this intelligence gathering might save lives by preventing terrorist attacks.
throughaway1388 5y ago
This topic always needs to be view with a cautious respect towards history. Anti-semitism is the worst when it rears its ugly head through passive aggressive implications.
crakenzak 5y ago
I hope the Pegasus Spyware source code leaks sometime soon.
DeathArrow 5y ago
Can someone explain the strong ties between US and Israel, and why US stands behind Israel, no matter what?
- bawolff 5y ago
  Geopolitically they both hate iran. Culturally both are fairly similar - both are "western"-style democracies (e.g. representative democracies with constitutions that value rule of law, independent judiciary, etc) And, the following might be controversial - but many of americas strategic allies do much worse shit than israel, they just get called out on it less. Hell, Saudi arabia is literally murdering people in embasies and still seems to have a good relationship with the usa somehow.
  - Quanttek 5y ago
    it'd also be good to mention that there exists a strong, largely right-wing and evangelical, pro-Israeli lobby in the US that make it politically very costly to not demonstrate unequivocal support
    - swiley 5y ago
      [flagged]
    - Banana699 5y ago
      I'm not the brightest bulb in American politics, but the trope of right wing evangelicals single-handedly being responsible for America-Israel bizarre parasitic relationship is tired and false IMO. If it were true, progressives and their allies would drop into this new fertile frontier of the culture war, and if that was true, we would see a lot more struggle and conflict than the meek 'meh' and shoulder shrug that the congress does every time an Israel-related issue is being discussed. Look at abortion for example, do right wing evangelicals value this issue less than their support for a 10-thousand+-kilometer-away country? did they manage to make it controversial and costly to not adopt their position on it? Right wing evangelicals do performatively praise Israel more often, but actual lobbying is strongly bipartisan and cuts across the conservative-progressive divide.
      - 1shooner 5y ago
        >Look at abortion for example, do right wing evangelicals value this issue less than their support for a 10-thousand+-kilometer-away country? did they manage to make it controversial and costly to not adopt their position on it? Being anti-abortion is a political litmus test in many parts of the US.
        Banana699 5y ago
        It's vastly different scale. Yes it's costly and contraversial to say you're pro-abortion in _parts_ of the US, but not all of US. And not the congress, not the white house. Look at the sheer amount of flak the supreme court got when it decided to let the Texas law slide temporarily, even though they cited standard legal procedure. Contrast that with majorities that pro-Israel laws always get in congress. Trump even recently complained outright that "Israel used to control the congress" and he didn't even mean it in a bad way, the ADL shat its pants and quickly tore into him saying that it's AntiSemitic (^TM) to say that. Nobody in the Democrats is willing to approach criticising Israel with an INT_MAX foot pole except possibly old-school anti-imperialism marxists, and they are fringe.
  - joelbluminator 5y ago
    Israel would have had zero issues with Iran if Iran wasn't on a quest to destroy Israel. In fact the two had normal relations until the Iranian Islamic revolution.
    - bawolff 5y ago
      Ultimately the reasons why israel and iran are at odds don't matter much. Both are competiting to be regional powers in the middle east, and its the lines which alliances are being drawn around.
      - joelbluminator 5y ago
        Don't matter to you maybe ... to many people finding reason is important.
        JumpCrisscross 5y ago
        > Don't matter to you maybe The point is swap out the people in those geographies, rerun the timeline, and you’ll find them in conflict. The reasons they each come up with in this iteration is dressing.
        joelbluminator 5y ago
        > The reasons they each come up with in this iteration is dressing What reasons do you think Israel "has come up with"? To me it's quite clear there's one side that's bent on destroying the other, there is no symmetry.
- deleted 5y ago
  [deleted]
- redwood 5y ago
  Nuanced question with answers more appropriate to long form articles or books, but some reasons: deep cultural links on the left (Jewish Americans plus a history of socialism and kibbutz culture that captured the imagination of many boomers) and the right (religious Christians in particular), foreign policy geo political alignment during the cold War, deep economic ties "startup nation", personal ties for many Americans, the fact that many simply love the idea that there could be an ultra liberal "Berlin by the beach" in the heart of ultra conservative middle east.. the list goes on.
- encryptluks2 5y ago
  I think it is a fair question, but asking questions and hypothesizing reasons will get you labeled as antisemitic. My guess is at some point Israel infiltrated high levels of government and got compromising information, and used that to continue to exert influence and control in American politics with access to confidential national security information and technology.
  - noufalibrahim 5y ago
    I believe there was an explicit project by the Israeli government to do this called the Hasbara project. There is a wikipedia page about it which goes into some detail about the (successful) implementation in the United States https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Public_diplomacy_of_Israel https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Public_diplomacy_of_Israel
    - jonyt 5y ago
      Where in the linked article does it say "Israel infiltrated high levels of government and got compromising information"?
  - raxxorrax 5y ago
    I think this is quite a reach and of course completely unsubstantiated.
  - stef25 5y ago
    Israel is just better friends with the US than Middle Eastern states are. Nothing antisemitic or sinister. No need to get all conspiratorial about it.
  - yyyk 5y ago
    If getting compromising material was enough to set US policy, USSR/Russia would have been controlled American politics by now.
- vadfa 5y ago
  I could tell you, but I would get banned.
  - raxxorrax 5y ago
    I don't think you would if you don't rely on vulgarism, so please shoot.
    - deleted 5y ago
      [deleted]
    - Leparamour 5y ago
      > I don't think you would if you don't rely on vulgarism, so please shoot. Define vulgarism in this context? The non-PC answer would be ethnic nepotism and corrupting influence through AIPAC and ADL. Jews are heavily overrepresented throughout every circle of power and influence (media, academia, business, politics) and trying to reign in Israel would mean going against that entrenched jewish power block which any prospective US presidential candidate relies upon. Call it a 'deep state' if you will. https://www.timesofisrael.com/all-the-jews-biden-has-tapped-for-top-roles-in-his-new-administration/ https://www.timesofisrael.com/all-the-jews-biden-has-tapped-...
      - vadfa 5y ago
        Thanks. This is what I meant. I didn't make my point because, at least to me, this is clear and well known, so I dismiss anybody who says not to know it as disingeniuous.
        raxxorrax 5y ago
        I always wondered who nibbled off the foreskins of Americans... But seriously, I somehow expected such an answer and I believe it to be heavily misinformed. It is the old formula, Jews are somehow responsible for it all. Can you give an example for a policy or public influence that was made in favor of Jews? I find them often very disagreeable. 2 Jews in a room can net you 5 different opinions. That is just a stereotype of course, but of what should this influence consist off? Israel? A large part of diaspora is often quite blunt with its criticism of Israel in a way that many Israeli don't hold back criticism themselves. Doesn't sound like effective collusion to be honest.
- ktownsend 5y ago
  Historically, this hasn't always been the case, and the US were actively opposed to Israel's covert Nuclear program, for example, which was built with French support against the wishes of the US government at the time. The world has change significantly since then, including the French and American governments alignment of interests and weighing to pros and cons. I'm sure other people here can provide more nuance than I'm able to on the 'why', although there is a lot of emotional nonsense and baggage that comes with this particular topic, so you need to take it with a healthy dose of skepticism that there are NO blanket right and wrong people here and there is blood on everyone's hands. Essentially, though, ignoring conspiracy theories and set in stone agendas, Israel simple represented a palatable partner in an incredibly complex, hostile part of the world and there is simple more in common between the two countries, despite their own at times competing interests. But US interests align far more with Israel, or politically moderate countries like Jordan than some others in the region. I'm sure there is an element of playing to your electoral base TODAY, but honestly, I think it's just pragmatism at the end of the day in a region where the math can be brutal and bloody, and there are no easy choices of solutions, and real partnerships are fleeting in the region since the powerbrokers in one country or region today maybe be out of the picture tomorrow. Despite internal politics in Israel looking like a bloodsport from outside, they are at least a consistent voice in a highly turbulent region. That's just my relatively uninformed, I'm sure biased opinion, but I don't have a fixed opinion on who the good and bad people here are, and thing there's a lot of blame in every direction, and no real will to change that on any side.
  - rob74 5y ago
    > But US interests align far more with Israel, or politically moderate countries like Jordan than some others in the region. funny though that Saudi Arabia, which I would definitely not describe as "moderate", is also a very close US ally...
    - yonixw 5y ago
      The enemy of my enemy (Iran), is my friend.
  - pmyteh 5y ago
- rStar 5y ago
  that’s one you’re gonna have to figure out for yourself.
- stef25 5y ago
  FWIW, didn't the US just blacklist Pegasus?
  - josh_fyi 5y ago
    And at the same time, blacklisted a Russian and a Singaporean company -- which are treated as far less newsworthy. https://www.reuters.com/technology/us-blacklists-four-companies-israel-russia-singapore-citing-spyware-2021-11-03/ https://www.reuters.com/technology/us-blacklists-four-compan...
- guerrilla 5y ago
  Less true today, but historically: “Israel is the largest American aircraft carrier in the world that cannot be sunk, does not carry even one American soldier, and is located in a critical region for American national security.” — Alexander Haig (former Secretary of State under Reagan and four-star general.) Today they have a lot of common economic interests and trade, similar to a European country.
  - justin66 5y ago
    > “Israel is the largest American aircraft carrier in the world Alexander "I am in control here" Haig made that statement prior to witnessing Desert Storm and the three decades of conflict to follow. The thing that makes that statement ironic is that we can't really fly much from there, and at times had to actively lobby Israel not to fly attack missions in their own self-defense, because doing so would alienate our other allies in the region.
    - guerrilla 5y ago
      I believe the point he was making was that they were/are the US's proxy wrt. foreign policy. Not being able to fly there is congruent with "does not carry even one American soldier." The thing about proxies is that you're not always in complete control of them but the benefits often far outweigh the costs. You can confirm both of those conditions by looking at a lot of parts of the Syrian Civil War.
    - deleted 5y ago
      [deleted]
- skinkestek 5y ago
  A more instructive question might be (warning: this is meant to get people thinking, but at least I'll be straight forward about it): Why does nobody else follow up on the UN resolution from 1948? (Just like in the case of India / Pakistan UN decided to divide the area into two parts, one for Jews, one for Arabs.) I can also ask: why does so few other support the single somewhat functioning democracy in the region? Then, on to your question: After initially being supportive of Israel, USSR took the other side early on and propped up the surrounding nations with weapons so US was kind of forced to do it. Later on it has turned out to be a beneficial although controversial deal for both parts.
  - rob74 5y ago
    Er... you mean the UN resolution which produced this map: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_Nations_Partition_Plan_for_Palestine#/media/File:UN_Palestine_Partition_Versions_1947.jpg https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_Nations_Partition_Plan_... ? Well, today Israel opposes the current "two state solution" proposal which would give the Palestinians a much smaller territory than on that map, so I kind of understand why the proposal from 1948 is not on the table anymore...
    - skinkestek 5y ago
      Yes, that map which the Arabs never accepted. Please also keep in mind that Israel have occupied far more land - and promptly given it back as soon as a lasting peace agreement with the country in question was signed (more or less the entire Sinai. And the country who signed a lasting peace treaty and never had trouble with Israel again is Egypt). Also, please keep in mind that significant more Jews has been chased out of surrounding Arab countries than Arabs from Israel so anyone asking if UN really divided it in a fair way should also have a good case if they weren't up against almost the entire western world, especially academia and journalists who by now have a deep and vested interest in keeping such facts of the table. Edit: my point in the second paragraph is that I don't think it is fair to demand that Israel retreat from hard-to-attack positions that gives enemies significant advantages (especially Golan) without a lasting peace agreement. Edit 2: as for Judea and Samaria which constitute a large part of the remaining "occupied territories" they were first captured by Jordan (which was supposed to be the Arab part of the British mandate from the start and which got 70% of the land before the UN resolution which cut the remaining 30% into a Jewish and an Arab part.) Israel then took it from Jordan in the 1967 war and has been administering it since then.
- iddan 5y ago
  Israel and the US have deep strategic and economic relations.c Tel Aviv is one of the hottest startup hubs in the world targeting mainly the US. The US sells military technology to Israel and vice versa. Most of Israel's enemies are hostile to the US as well: Iran, Hezbollah, Hamas to name a few. Not sure it is relevant but historically the Jewish-American community was pro Israel and lobbied for Israel in the US and in Israel there is a significant amount of American-Israeli citizens in diplomacy and power positions (e.g. prime ministers, ministers of foreign affairs). Culturally, Israel is the closest state to the US and Europe. Also, most people in Israel's big cities have a good grasp of the English language.
- LogonType10 5y ago
  Because if Israel loses a war they will use nukes. When they ask "please help us" we support them... because of the implication.
- cutler 5y ago
  Large US Jewish population eg. Lubavitch Jews.
- yyyk 5y ago
  >Can someone explain the strong ties between US and Israel, and why US stands behind Israel, no matter what? Others have tried to explain this, but I want to note that this impression is a tiny bit exaggerated. The US has a strong relationship with Israel, but there are countries which have better ties with the US, or at least get more from the US - South Korea has a direct defence alliance, Pakistan gets (read: extorts) more money, Britain has the 'special relationship', Australia just got nuke subs, etc. Also, can you think of any US President which did not have a public fight with Israel since Carter? Excepting maybe Trump, all of them had some nasty public spat with an Israeli government. I suspect the main source of this impression is that it's useful for both Israel and its enemies.
- luaybs 5y ago
  AIPAC (https://www.aipac.org/ https://www.aipac.org/)
- deleted 5y ago
  [deleted]
- alignItems 5y ago
  There are biases on all sides, and it’s often hard to extricate oneself from them to see the facts as they are. You could flip the question and ask why is so much of the world anti-Israel, no matter what? The data on this is that in 2020 the UN adopted 17 resolutions condemning Israel and 6 for the rest of the world. Now it’s possible that Israel is so much worse than the rest of the world, and the US is biased. Or perhaps there’s a lot of anti-Israel bias globally and the USA is actually closer to neutral.
  - VictorPath 5y ago
    > The data on this is that in 2020 the UN adopted 17 resolutions condemning Israel and 6 for the rest of the world. > Now it’s possible that Israel is so much worse than the rest of the world According to Israel itself, it launched 50 bombing raids in Syria in 2020. Many of the UN resolutions condemning Israel were due to those bombings and other actions Israel has taken vis-a-vis Syria. Including Israel's occupation and settlement of Syrian territory since 1967, which the UN condemned then, and upheld in 2020 along with the other resolutions. The reason the UN condemned Israel in 2020 and not Bhutan, is Israel decided to bomb Syria many times in 2020, and Bhutan did not.
    - alignItems 5y ago
      This isn’t a comparison of Israel vs Bhutan with regards to Syria. The is comparing Israel with the rest of the world combined, across all global conflicts and human rights violations.
- deleted 5y ago
  [deleted]
qwerty456127 5y ago
I dunno anything about these particular organizations so can't judge who is right here but the fact any country government can declare anybody they don't like a terrorist or another kind of criminal and have them cancelled or hunted in the whole world has long baffled me.
- koheripbal 5y ago
  One major function of a government is the monopoly on "cancelling" or really the use of force. The nice thing about western countries is that they require due process of law. ...which was followed in this case.
  - whimsicalism 5y ago
    > The nice thing about western countries is that they require due process of law. ...which was followed in this case. Israel routinely skirts "routine operation of law" assassinating innocent civilians abroad and refusing to apologize.
    - vxNsr 5y ago
      > assassinating innocent civilians abroad care to provide a source or evidence for this allegation?
      - whimsicalism 5y ago
        https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lillehammer_affair https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lillehammer_affair Not to include the 4 innocent bystanders on the street killed by a Mossad car bombing (they're only terrorist attacks when they're not perpetrated by state security services I guess) when they actually found the right guy. And to include civilian nuclear scientists are also that: civilians.
        vxNsr 5y ago
        lillehammer I didn't know about, but that looks like a case of mistaken identity. The actual target wasn't by any means innocent. which innoncent civilian nuclear scientists have the israelis killed?
encryptluks2 5y ago
Is there a tool to scan your devices for Pegasus?
- ledoge 5y ago
  Yes, see here: https://github.com/AmnestyTech/investigations/tree/master/2021-07-18_nso https://github.com/AmnestyTech/investigations/tree/master/20...
- LogonType10 5y ago
  Probably no effective ones, but you can packet sniff and look for traffic to known C2 servers.
- jonathanstrange 5y ago
  Such a tool would be outdated very soon after it's published because these companies check their hacks against known antivirus and detection tools before they deploy them.
  - crhutchins 5y ago
    Yes, this makes sense. It will become outdated soon, technologies are evolving rapidly.
- upofadown 5y ago
  You can look at Mobile Verification Toolkit (MVT): * https://github.com/mvt-project/mvt https://github.com/mvt-project/mvt
deleted 5y ago
[deleted]
Vervious 5y ago
To be fair, it is quite murky to what extent groups like Al-Haq are associated with the PFLP (which, with its history of aircraft hijackings and suicide bombings, is undoubtedly a terrorist group). There is plenty of purported evidence of financial and personnel links out there, and I really doubt HN is the right forum to decide either way (unless someone is an expert).
- deleted 5y ago
  [deleted]
- rhizome 5y ago
  >There is plenty of purported evidence The name for this is "allegations," specifically "unconfirmed allegations," AKA "random BS."
- zouhair 5y ago
  Wait until you learn what was said about Mandela.
  - whimsicalism 5y ago
    Seriously. Do people forget the rhetoric around Mandela and the ANC during apartheid South Africa? He was only taken off the terrorist watch list in '08.
    - WaitWaitWha 5y ago
      Seeing necklacing with your own eyes is something to forget, but cannot.
    - BeetleB 5y ago
      Mandela was offered an early release if he renounced violence. He did not take that offer. I don't know about after his release, but for most of his life he believed in achieving his aims with violence, if need be. As for the violence the ANC perpetrated: It would definitely be considered terrorism today.
stef25 5y ago
Slightly OT - Isn't it obvious that NSO must be able to control every "copy" of Pegasus it sells? They wouldn't sell it unless they were absolutely sure it wouldn't be used against its own people and they have no problem selling to their arch enemies. NSO's defense has always been "we just sell the tech and can't be held responsible for what our clients do with it" (this was clear from the Darknet Diaries episode). If you consider they must be able to control it, and are therefore perfectly capable of monitoring it, then they become much more complicit in what's being done with it. Same story if somehow 1 license = 1 target. This is something that I don't think was explored enough in DD.
- codetrotter 5y ago
  > They wouldn't sell it unless they were absolutely sure it wouldn't be used against its own people Why not? NSO Group is willing to sacrifice the lives of others for profit, so who’s to say that NSO Group would shy away from that?
  - supercheetah 5y ago
    Does Israel even have laws against spying on its own citizens? If not, or very weak one, it's hard to imagine it wouldn't want to spy on them, especially any political opposition.
  - michaelt 5y ago
    Ransomware will often leave computers untouched if they have a Cyrillic keyboard layout, because aggravating authorities in your own country is orders of magnitude more dangerous than aggravating foreign authorities. Theoretically, the NSO group might feel the same way.
  - stef25 5y ago
    If I remember correctly every sale of Pegasus requires an export license and is therefore subject to approval by the Israeli govt. They don't seem to care much for human rights activists and journalists but assuming every unpatched smartphone is vulnerable, it's very unlikely they're going to allow sales if it could just be pointed at any member of the Israeli govt or military.
2rsf 5y ago
Something is changing in the US though. > The US Commerce Department is unequivocal that the new sanctions against NSO Group and Candiru is connected to their software being used to government officials, journalists, activists and business people. [0] https://twitter.com/AlexMartin/status/1455892710586519553 https://twitter.com/AlexMartin/status/1455892710586519553
- boomboomsubban 5y ago
  Putting them on the entity list just limits what US exports can go directly to them. Basically I can't sell a zero day to the NSO group, but I can buy one from them. This can hardly be considered a sign something is changing, it's the bare minimum that can be done for PR purposes.
  - JumpCrisscross 5y ago
    > it's the bare minimum that can be done for PR purposes This is an edgy dismissal from an armchair, but it’s wrong. Functionally, this designation cuts the company and its employees off from the American financial system.
    - boomboomsubban 5y ago
      How? There's no restriction on buying from the NSO Group, I'm unaware of there being any restriction on using US banks. The Entity List just bars exports of certain items to that company. What US good are they dependent on?
      - JumpCrisscross 5y ago
        > I'm unaware of there being any restriction on using US banks Most institutions won’t open an account for someone with an OFAC hit. They legally can. But it involves a lot of extra legal, compliance and other costs. As a result, most don’t.
        5y ago
bogwog 5y ago
> Front Line Defenders investigated 75 iPhones and found that 6 devices were hacked with NSO Group's Pegasus spyware Hacked iPhones?! I bet they were side loading apps! /s (relevant: https://techcrunch.com/2021/11/03/apple-craig-federighi-side-loading-apps-web-summit-keynote/ https://techcrunch.com/2021/11/03/apple-craig-federighi-side...)
- zibzab 5y ago
  I think "the fappening", xghost and NSO have already clearly demonstrated that mobile security is just PR.
  - friehe 5y ago
    According to Wikipedia "the fappening" was a phishing attack. I don't think that is a mobile specific problem.
    - zibzab 5y ago
      That is not correct. It was actually a distributed campaign with multiple hackers with different methods but the main leaks were due to the following problems: 1. Bug in some Apple services allowed unlimited login attempts 2. Bug in Apple backup restoration function allowed bypassing multi-factor authentication (or was it confirmation email?) This is all from memory, I might be wrong about the details. Anyway, that Apple initially blamed this on weak passwords and now phisihing clearly demonstrates what kind of PR circus this field is. Just think about this: when Apple closed these holes (silently), attacks had been going on for 1-2 years. Towards the end there were fairly cheap and reliable hack-my-exs-iphone services on the darknet.
      - stef25 5y ago
        According to the link below it clearly was phishing https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2014_celebrity_nude_photo_leak#Procurement_and_distribution https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2014_celebrity_nude_photo_leak...
aritmo 5y ago
Which nation would benefit from those infections?
- boomboomsubban 5y ago
  Israel most likely.
  - bawolff 5y ago
    This type of analysis is kind of hard, because you could also say that Israel's enemies would benefit a lot from this sort of thing being discovered.
    - boomboomsubban 5y ago
      If your goal is to hurt Israel, I doubt you would give money to the NSO Group to spy on Palestinian human rights defenders in the hopes that some day their targets list becomes public. As if that violation of Palestinian rights would suddenly turn people against Israel. And if it's their enemies are behind the hack and then are adding false information to hurt Israel, there are so many better targets. Any US journalist critical of Israel for example.
      - bawolff 5y ago
        I was thinking more if you had access to some leaked nso exploits somehow, not paying them. And i do think israel is vulnerable to bad PR, especially right now when there has been a lot of it recently - at least that seems to be its weakest point right now. Its not like anyone is going to win a straight up military conflict with them. > Any US journalist critical of Israel for example. But if you do that, NSA becomes involved, much easier to get discovered. It also fits with the narrative a bit better to make the target a Palestinian human rights activist. On the whole though, i do think its more likely that Israel is behind this, i'm just exploring this from the perspective of who could potentially benefit.
        5y ago
paulcarroty 5y ago
Seriously, every Pegasus-related news slightly killing the Apple "privacy" myth. And this is good 'cause we deserve better mobile solutions than the strange duopoly, where one company pays $9B to another for the right to mining private data.
- raxxorrax 5y ago
  People have warned against paternalistic OS from the start. It might be too late for now. You have an advertising ID on your phone and it scans your images because you are a suspect with limited control over you device. To be honest, on bad days I just think people don't deserve anything better. The amount of free work people have put into alternatives is incredible, but there certainly was a refusal to think ahead.
- deleted 5y ago
  [deleted]
- nyuszika7h 5y ago
  You may be right, but I don't see how this is relevant here. I hate shady tracking practices too, but we're talking about human rights violations, which is a far bigger issue and has nothing to do with how much Apple tracks you. Even if it didn't track you, nothing stops malware with arbitrary kernel privileges from tracking you anyway. Security vulnerabilities will always exist. It happens on Android too, it just doesn't make headlines that often because iOS is (or at least claims to be) more secure.
AHappyCamper 5y ago
Does this really matter? Australia passed the "Identify and Disrupt" Law, which allows them as well as any government in the The Five Eyes (FVEY) international security pact to access and modify all digital communications - so why would this story even be important? This is our new world, where any government can access and modify any digital information.
- pyronik19 5y ago
  1984 looking more and more like an instruction manual everyday.
neurobot123 5y ago
s/defenders/terrorists
FridayoLeary 5y ago
This is the perfect example of such technology being used for the good. Despite the misleading title, these organisation are probably terrorist groups. The wonderful thing about palestinian terrorist is that they can rely on well meaning fools to white wash their image for them. In this case it's the presumptously named "front line defenders". There are no shortage of such people who will twist facts and ignore evidence and mislead the public in order to create the image of Israeli opression and palestinian victimhood. Their goal of course is to help the palestinian people but their methods are reprehensible. Ironically it's the palestinians who lose out the most by being kept in a state of perpetual victimhood. It's curious to note that the average life expectancy in the West Bank and Gaza improved dramatically during periods of Israeli occupation. Calling out human right abuses is all well and good, but to do so selectively is in fact abuse itself. I have rather generously described such people as useful idiots, and i honestly think this is true for most of them. But the obsession of so many organisations like this one on Israel, the only Jewish country in the world, to me hints at anti semitism in their upper ranks.
FridayoLeary 5y ago
calling them "defenders" of human right implies that there is a war being fought (by Israel) against human rights. I don't believe that this has been adequately demonstrated, therefore i think the title is inflammatory and misleading. Please can you change it, Dang
- djanogo 5y ago
  Disagree, I think title is correct, Israel's forced displacement is human rights issue.
- cultofmetatron 5y ago
  Palestinians live in an apartheid state so I'd argue very much that this is a human rights issue. (I know I'll get lots of downvotes for this and I accept that)
  - jjcon 5y ago
    > Palestinians live in an apartheid state I’m not sure that means what you think it does
    - cultofmetatron 5y ago
      they can't leave their tiny allocated stretch of land. their economic opportunities are completely restricted by a foreign government that they have no representation in. They live under a constant threat of violence from an occupying force. What am I missing here?
      - jjcon 5y ago
        > they can't leave their tiny allocated stretch of land That is how country boundaries work - there are lots of disputed territories in Israel - pretending it is as simple as 'allocated land' is completely disingenuous >their economic opportunities are completely restricted by a foreign government that they have no representation in. They live under a constant threat of violence from an occupying force. You mean Hamas? They elected Hamas and all that came with it, and I agree it has lead to a very sad state of affairs. (Unless you are referring to Israel in which case again, that is just how country boundaries work. I don't get to vote in the French elections when I reside in the UK.)
asadlionpk 5y ago
I feel like many pro-Israel commentators here are a coordinated low quality effort to derail conversation using “tactics”. I feel this happens on the daily bases online. I remember reading about it; Israel’s strategy to train their online citizens to do this.
- jjcon 5y ago
  Not everything is a conspiracy, some people might just disagree with you
  - White_Wolf 5y ago
    Here's some research(2018) on the topic that involved a lot of countries. While this place is pretty tame is comparison with others, I wouldn't be suprised if that would actually be true. https://demtech.oii.ox.ac.uk/wp-content/uploads/sites/93/2018/07/ct_appendix.pdf https://demtech.oii.ox.ac.uk/wp-content/uploads/sites/93/201...
  - asadlionpk 5y ago
    Being online for decades, I think I can differentiate when a comment disagrees or just low-effort derails.
- pthread_t 5y ago
  There's an app for that: https://apps.apple.com/us/app/act-il/id1141853455 https://apps.apple.com/us/app/act-il/id1141853455
  - asadlionpk 5y ago
    Insane that Apple allows this!
    - jjcon 5y ago
      Do you really want Apple to ban more apps based on political actions? The HN can be really regressive sometimes =/
throwaway879080 5y ago
that's awesome, hunt the terrorists down via software
lacker 5y ago
This title is quite editorialized. The whole controversy is over whether these are human rights organizations as this website claims, or terrorist groups as the Israeli government claims. It should not be a surprise that the NSO group, as an Israeli company, is working against groups that the Israeli government considers to be terrorists.
- VictorPath 5y ago
  > human rights organizations as this website claims, or terrorist groups as the Israeli government claims. These NGOs get funding from the European Union, and Amnesty International and Human Rights Watch condemned Israel outlawing these human rights NGOs - so it Israel against not just this magazine, but the EU, Amnesty International, Human Rights Watch etc.
  - jjcon 5y ago
    The EU and US etc are also bankrolling these israeli operations so im not really sure the funding argument holds up well here
  - throwawaylinux 5y ago
    The EU being that terrorist organization whose member states orchestrated and funded the destruction of Libya, among other atrocities? Not sure that lends much credibility to the proxy organizations they fund and influence. This is not some benevolent group dedicated to improving and protecting life around the globe. It is a corrupt, morally bankrupt hive of war criminals and arms profiteers. If ever they pretend to care for someone who is not rich, it is obviously with ulterior motive.
- hanniabu 5y ago
  > against groups that the Israeli government considers to be terrorists Basically any Palestinian is a terrorist in the eyes of the Israeli government because it allows them to justify their oppression, theft, and murders.
  - 5y ago
kryptozinc 5y ago
ITT: Israeli shills in full force.
- deleted 5y ago
  [deleted]
  - jedimind 5y ago
    Low karma doesn't make him or anyone a shill (+ it's a old account from 2019, NOT a newly created account just for this thread), some people just don't like commenting on political stuff with their main accounts. You have been heavily brigading this thread tho and your higher karma doesn't give you immunity to the shilling classification.
- starik36 5y ago
  From reading this thread, you could have easily put "ITT: Anti-Semites out in full force" as well.
lr4444lr 5y ago
What is this group? Front Line Defenders was founded in Dublin in 2001 with the specific aim of protecting human rights defenders at risk (HRDs), people who work, non-violently, for any or all of the rights enshrined in the Universal Declaration of Human Rights (UDHR). Front Line Defenders addresses the protection needs identified by HRDs themselves. How do they identify and vet a qualifying "Human Rights Defender"? Do they have a membership roster?
oytis 5y ago
Kind of OT, but are there Palestinian human rights organizations that are focused, or at least cover human rights violations by Palestinian government?
- bhouston 5y ago
  There is a bunch of Palestinian HR groups that do that, for example: http://www.mezan.org/en/post/21740/Al+Mezan+Calls+for:+Solution+to+Electricity+Crisis,+End+to+Detention+for+Peaceful+Assembly+and+Immediate+Release+of+Detainees http://www.mezan.org/en/post/21740/Al+Mezan+Calls+for:+Solut... http://www.mezan.org/en/post/24069/Press+Release%3A+Al+Mezan+expresses+grave+concern+at+incessant+issuance+of+death+sentences+in+Gaza http://www.mezan.org/en/post/24069/Press+Release%3A+Al+Mezan... http://www.mezan.org/en/post/24043/Position+Paper%3A+Human+Rights+and+Civil+Society+Organizations+Hold+Head+of+the+Executive+Authority+and+Government+Responsible+for+Rights+and+Freedoms’+Violations+and+the+Collapse+of+Official+Institutions http://www.mezan.org/en/post/24043/Position+Paper%3A+Human+R...
truthwhisperer 5y ago
ok, seems like a positive development if that protects the live s of Israel people against the terror attacks

541 points by bjourne 5y ago

If these claims are true, this intelligence gathering might save lives by preventing terrorist attacks.

This topic always needs to be view with a cautious respect towards history. Anti-semitism is the worst when it rears its ugly head through passive aggressive implications.

crakenzak 5y ago

I hope the Pegasus Spyware source code leaks sometime soon.

DeathArrow 5y ago

Can someone explain the strong ties between US and Israel, and why US stands behind Israel, no matter what?

bawolff 5y ago
Geopolitically they both hate iran. Culturally both are fairly similar - both are "western"-style democracies (e.g. representative democracies with constitutions that value rule of law, independent judiciary, etc) And, the following might be controversial - but many of americas strategic allies do much worse shit than israel, they just get called out on it less. Hell, Saudi arabia is literally murdering people in embasies and still seems to have a good relationship with the usa somehow.
- Quanttek 5y ago
  it'd also be good to mention that there exists a strong, largely right-wing and evangelical, pro-Israeli lobby in the US that make it politically very costly to not demonstrate unequivocal support
  - swiley 5y ago
    [flagged]
  - Banana699 5y ago
    I'm not the brightest bulb in American politics, but the trope of right wing evangelicals single-handedly being responsible for America-Israel bizarre parasitic relationship is tired and false IMO. If it were true, progressives and their allies would drop into this new fertile frontier of the culture war, and if that was true, we would see a lot more struggle and conflict than the meek 'meh' and shoulder shrug that the congress does every time an Israel-related issue is being discussed. Look at abortion for example, do right wing evangelicals value this issue less than their support for a 10-thousand+-kilometer-away country? did they manage to make it controversial and costly to not adopt their position on it? Right wing evangelicals do performatively praise Israel more often, but actual lobbying is strongly bipartisan and cuts across the conservative-progressive divide.
    - 1shooner 5y ago
      >Look at abortion for example, do right wing evangelicals value this issue less than their support for a 10-thousand+-kilometer-away country? did they manage to make it controversial and costly to not adopt their position on it? Being anti-abortion is a political litmus test in many parts of the US.
      - Banana699 5y ago
        It's vastly different scale. Yes it's costly and contraversial to say you're pro-abortion in _parts_ of the US, but not all of US. And not the congress, not the white house. Look at the sheer amount of flak the supreme court got when it decided to let the Texas law slide temporarily, even though they cited standard legal procedure. Contrast that with majorities that pro-Israel laws always get in congress. Trump even recently complained outright that "Israel used to control the congress" and he didn't even mean it in a bad way, the ADL shat its pants and quickly tore into him saying that it's AntiSemitic (^TM) to say that. Nobody in the Democrats is willing to approach criticising Israel with an INT_MAX foot pole except possibly old-school anti-imperialism marxists, and they are fringe.
- joelbluminator 5y ago
  Israel would have had zero issues with Iran if Iran wasn't on a quest to destroy Israel. In fact the two had normal relations until the Iranian Islamic revolution.
  - bawolff 5y ago
    Ultimately the reasons why israel and iran are at odds don't matter much. Both are competiting to be regional powers in the middle east, and its the lines which alliances are being drawn around.
    - joelbluminator 5y ago
      Don't matter to you maybe ... to many people finding reason is important.
      - JumpCrisscross 5y ago
        > Don't matter to you maybe The point is swap out the people in those geographies, rerun the timeline, and you’ll find them in conflict. The reasons they each come up with in this iteration is dressing.
        joelbluminator 5y ago
        > The reasons they each come up with in this iteration is dressing What reasons do you think Israel "has come up with"? To me it's quite clear there's one side that's bent on destroying the other, there is no symmetry.
deleted 5y ago
[deleted]
redwood 5y ago
Nuanced question with answers more appropriate to long form articles or books, but some reasons: deep cultural links on the left (Jewish Americans plus a history of socialism and kibbutz culture that captured the imagination of many boomers) and the right (religious Christians in particular), foreign policy geo political alignment during the cold War, deep economic ties "startup nation", personal ties for many Americans, the fact that many simply love the idea that there could be an ultra liberal "Berlin by the beach" in the heart of ultra conservative middle east.. the list goes on.
encryptluks2 5y ago
I think it is a fair question, but asking questions and hypothesizing reasons will get you labeled as antisemitic. My guess is at some point Israel infiltrated high levels of government and got compromising information, and used that to continue to exert influence and control in American politics with access to confidential national security information and technology.
- noufalibrahim 5y ago
  I believe there was an explicit project by the Israeli government to do this called the Hasbara project. There is a wikipedia page about it which goes into some detail about the (successful) implementation in the United States https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Public_diplomacy_of_Israel https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Public_diplomacy_of_Israel
  - jonyt 5y ago
    Where in the linked article does it say "Israel infiltrated high levels of government and got compromising information"?
- raxxorrax 5y ago
  I think this is quite a reach and of course completely unsubstantiated.
- stef25 5y ago
  Israel is just better friends with the US than Middle Eastern states are. Nothing antisemitic or sinister. No need to get all conspiratorial about it.
- yyyk 5y ago
  If getting compromising material was enough to set US policy, USSR/Russia would have been controlled American politics by now.
vadfa 5y ago
I could tell you, but I would get banned.
- raxxorrax 5y ago
  I don't think you would if you don't rely on vulgarism, so please shoot.
  - deleted 5y ago
    [deleted]
  - Leparamour 5y ago
    > I don't think you would if you don't rely on vulgarism, so please shoot. Define vulgarism in this context? The non-PC answer would be ethnic nepotism and corrupting influence through AIPAC and ADL. Jews are heavily overrepresented throughout every circle of power and influence (media, academia, business, politics) and trying to reign in Israel would mean going against that entrenched jewish power block which any prospective US presidential candidate relies upon. Call it a 'deep state' if you will. https://www.timesofisrael.com/all-the-jews-biden-has-tapped-for-top-roles-in-his-new-administration/ https://www.timesofisrael.com/all-the-jews-biden-has-tapped-...
    - vadfa 5y ago
      Thanks. This is what I meant. I didn't make my point because, at least to me, this is clear and well known, so I dismiss anybody who says not to know it as disingeniuous.
      - raxxorrax 5y ago
        I always wondered who nibbled off the foreskins of Americans... But seriously, I somehow expected such an answer and I believe it to be heavily misinformed. It is the old formula, Jews are somehow responsible for it all. Can you give an example for a policy or public influence that was made in favor of Jews? I find them often very disagreeable. 2 Jews in a room can net you 5 different opinions. That is just a stereotype of course, but of what should this influence consist off? Israel? A large part of diaspora is often quite blunt with its criticism of Israel in a way that many Israeli don't hold back criticism themselves. Doesn't sound like effective collusion to be honest.
ktownsend 5y ago
Historically, this hasn't always been the case, and the US were actively opposed to Israel's covert Nuclear program, for example, which was built with French support against the wishes of the US government at the time. The world has change significantly since then, including the French and American governments alignment of interests and weighing to pros and cons. I'm sure other people here can provide more nuance than I'm able to on the 'why', although there is a lot of emotional nonsense and baggage that comes with this particular topic, so you need to take it with a healthy dose of skepticism that there are NO blanket right and wrong people here and there is blood on everyone's hands. Essentially, though, ignoring conspiracy theories and set in stone agendas, Israel simple represented a palatable partner in an incredibly complex, hostile part of the world and there is simple more in common between the two countries, despite their own at times competing interests. But US interests align far more with Israel, or politically moderate countries like Jordan than some others in the region. I'm sure there is an element of playing to your electoral base TODAY, but honestly, I think it's just pragmatism at the end of the day in a region where the math can be brutal and bloody, and there are no easy choices of solutions, and real partnerships are fleeting in the region since the powerbrokers in one country or region today maybe be out of the picture tomorrow. Despite internal politics in Israel looking like a bloodsport from outside, they are at least a consistent voice in a highly turbulent region. That's just my relatively uninformed, I'm sure biased opinion, but I don't have a fixed opinion on who the good and bad people here are, and thing there's a lot of blame in every direction, and no real will to change that on any side.
- rob74 5y ago
  > But US interests align far more with Israel, or politically moderate countries like Jordan than some others in the region. funny though that Saudi Arabia, which I would definitely not describe as "moderate", is also a very close US ally...
  - yonixw 5y ago
    The enemy of my enemy (Iran), is my friend.
- pmyteh 5y ago
rStar 5y ago
that’s one you’re gonna have to figure out for yourself.
stef25 5y ago
FWIW, didn't the US just blacklist Pegasus?
- josh_fyi 5y ago
  And at the same time, blacklisted a Russian and a Singaporean company -- which are treated as far less newsworthy. https://www.reuters.com/technology/us-blacklists-four-companies-israel-russia-singapore-citing-spyware-2021-11-03/ https://www.reuters.com/technology/us-blacklists-four-compan...
guerrilla 5y ago
Less true today, but historically: “Israel is the largest American aircraft carrier in the world that cannot be sunk, does not carry even one American soldier, and is located in a critical region for American national security.” — Alexander Haig (former Secretary of State under Reagan and four-star general.) Today they have a lot of common economic interests and trade, similar to a European country.
- justin66 5y ago
  > “Israel is the largest American aircraft carrier in the world Alexander "I am in control here" Haig made that statement prior to witnessing Desert Storm and the three decades of conflict to follow. The thing that makes that statement ironic is that we can't really fly much from there, and at times had to actively lobby Israel not to fly attack missions in their own self-defense, because doing so would alienate our other allies in the region.
  - guerrilla 5y ago
    I believe the point he was making was that they were/are the US's proxy wrt. foreign policy. Not being able to fly there is congruent with "does not carry even one American soldier." The thing about proxies is that you're not always in complete control of them but the benefits often far outweigh the costs. You can confirm both of those conditions by looking at a lot of parts of the Syrian Civil War.
  - deleted 5y ago
    [deleted]
skinkestek 5y ago
A more instructive question might be (warning: this is meant to get people thinking, but at least I'll be straight forward about it): Why does nobody else follow up on the UN resolution from 1948? (Just like in the case of India / Pakistan UN decided to divide the area into two parts, one for Jews, one for Arabs.) I can also ask: why does so few other support the single somewhat functioning democracy in the region? Then, on to your question: After initially being supportive of Israel, USSR took the other side early on and propped up the surrounding nations with weapons so US was kind of forced to do it. Later on it has turned out to be a beneficial although controversial deal for both parts.
- rob74 5y ago
  Er... you mean the UN resolution which produced this map: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_Nations_Partition_Plan_for_Palestine#/media/File:UN_Palestine_Partition_Versions_1947.jpg https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_Nations_Partition_Plan_... ? Well, today Israel opposes the current "two state solution" proposal which would give the Palestinians a much smaller territory than on that map, so I kind of understand why the proposal from 1948 is not on the table anymore...
  - skinkestek 5y ago
    Yes, that map which the Arabs never accepted. Please also keep in mind that Israel have occupied far more land - and promptly given it back as soon as a lasting peace agreement with the country in question was signed (more or less the entire Sinai. And the country who signed a lasting peace treaty and never had trouble with Israel again is Egypt). Also, please keep in mind that significant more Jews has been chased out of surrounding Arab countries than Arabs from Israel so anyone asking if UN really divided it in a fair way should also have a good case if they weren't up against almost the entire western world, especially academia and journalists who by now have a deep and vested interest in keeping such facts of the table. Edit: my point in the second paragraph is that I don't think it is fair to demand that Israel retreat from hard-to-attack positions that gives enemies significant advantages (especially Golan) without a lasting peace agreement. Edit 2: as for Judea and Samaria which constitute a large part of the remaining "occupied territories" they were first captured by Jordan (which was supposed to be the Arab part of the British mandate from the start and which got 70% of the land before the UN resolution which cut the remaining 30% into a Jewish and an Arab part.) Israel then took it from Jordan in the 1967 war and has been administering it since then.
iddan 5y ago
Israel and the US have deep strategic and economic relations.c Tel Aviv is one of the hottest startup hubs in the world targeting mainly the US. The US sells military technology to Israel and vice versa. Most of Israel's enemies are hostile to the US as well: Iran, Hezbollah, Hamas to name a few. Not sure it is relevant but historically the Jewish-American community was pro Israel and lobbied for Israel in the US and in Israel there is a significant amount of American-Israeli citizens in diplomacy and power positions (e.g. prime ministers, ministers of foreign affairs). Culturally, Israel is the closest state to the US and Europe. Also, most people in Israel's big cities have a good grasp of the English language.
LogonType10 5y ago
Because if Israel loses a war they will use nukes. When they ask "please help us" we support them... because of the implication.
cutler 5y ago
Large US Jewish population eg. Lubavitch Jews.
yyyk 5y ago
>Can someone explain the strong ties between US and Israel, and why US stands behind Israel, no matter what? Others have tried to explain this, but I want to note that this impression is a tiny bit exaggerated. The US has a strong relationship with Israel, but there are countries which have better ties with the US, or at least get more from the US - South Korea has a direct defence alliance, Pakistan gets (read: extorts) more money, Britain has the 'special relationship', Australia just got nuke subs, etc. Also, can you think of any US President which did not have a public fight with Israel since Carter? Excepting maybe Trump, all of them had some nasty public spat with an Israeli government. I suspect the main source of this impression is that it's useful for both Israel and its enemies.
luaybs 5y ago
AIPAC (https://www.aipac.org/ https://www.aipac.org/)
deleted 5y ago
[deleted]
alignItems 5y ago
There are biases on all sides, and it’s often hard to extricate oneself from them to see the facts as they are. You could flip the question and ask why is so much of the world anti-Israel, no matter what? The data on this is that in 2020 the UN adopted 17 resolutions condemning Israel and 6 for the rest of the world. Now it’s possible that Israel is so much worse than the rest of the world, and the US is biased. Or perhaps there’s a lot of anti-Israel bias globally and the USA is actually closer to neutral.
- VictorPath 5y ago
  > The data on this is that in 2020 the UN adopted 17 resolutions condemning Israel and 6 for the rest of the world. > Now it’s possible that Israel is so much worse than the rest of the world According to Israel itself, it launched 50 bombing raids in Syria in 2020. Many of the UN resolutions condemning Israel were due to those bombings and other actions Israel has taken vis-a-vis Syria. Including Israel's occupation and settlement of Syrian territory since 1967, which the UN condemned then, and upheld in 2020 along with the other resolutions. The reason the UN condemned Israel in 2020 and not Bhutan, is Israel decided to bomb Syria many times in 2020, and Bhutan did not.
  - alignItems 5y ago
    This isn’t a comparison of Israel vs Bhutan with regards to Syria. The is comparing Israel with the rest of the world combined, across all global conflicts and human rights violations.
deleted 5y ago
[deleted]

qwerty456127 5y ago

I dunno anything about these particular organizations so can't judge who is right here but the fact any country government can declare anybody they don't like a terrorist or another kind of criminal and have them cancelled or hunted in the whole world has long baffled me.

koheripbal 5y ago
One major function of a government is the monopoly on "cancelling" or really the use of force. The nice thing about western countries is that they require due process of law. ...which was followed in this case.
- whimsicalism 5y ago
  > The nice thing about western countries is that they require due process of law. ...which was followed in this case. Israel routinely skirts "routine operation of law" assassinating innocent civilians abroad and refusing to apologize.
  - vxNsr 5y ago
    > assassinating innocent civilians abroad care to provide a source or evidence for this allegation?
    - whimsicalism 5y ago
      https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lillehammer_affair https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lillehammer_affair Not to include the 4 innocent bystanders on the street killed by a Mossad car bombing (they're only terrorist attacks when they're not perpetrated by state security services I guess) when they actually found the right guy. And to include civilian nuclear scientists are also that: civilians.
      - vxNsr 5y ago
        lillehammer I didn't know about, but that looks like a case of mistaken identity. The actual target wasn't by any means innocent. which innoncent civilian nuclear scientists have the israelis killed?

encryptluks2 5y ago

Is there a tool to scan your devices for Pegasus?

ledoge 5y ago
Yes, see here: https://github.com/AmnestyTech/investigations/tree/master/2021-07-18_nso https://github.com/AmnestyTech/investigations/tree/master/20...
LogonType10 5y ago
Probably no effective ones, but you can packet sniff and look for traffic to known C2 servers.
jonathanstrange 5y ago
Such a tool would be outdated very soon after it's published because these companies check their hacks against known antivirus and detection tools before they deploy them.
- crhutchins 5y ago
  Yes, this makes sense. It will become outdated soon, technologies are evolving rapidly.
upofadown 5y ago
You can look at Mobile Verification Toolkit (MVT): * https://github.com/mvt-project/mvt https://github.com/mvt-project/mvt

deleted 5y ago

[deleted]

Vervious 5y ago

To be fair, it is quite murky to what extent groups like Al-Haq are associated with the PFLP (which, with its history of aircraft hijackings and suicide bombings, is undoubtedly a terrorist group). There is plenty of purported evidence of financial and personnel links out there, and I really doubt HN is the right forum to decide either way (unless someone is an expert).

deleted 5y ago
[deleted]
rhizome 5y ago
>There is plenty of purported evidence The name for this is "allegations," specifically "unconfirmed allegations," AKA "random BS."
zouhair 5y ago
Wait until you learn what was said about Mandela.
- whimsicalism 5y ago
  Seriously. Do people forget the rhetoric around Mandela and the ANC during apartheid South Africa? He was only taken off the terrorist watch list in '08.
  - WaitWaitWha 5y ago
    Seeing necklacing with your own eyes is something to forget, but cannot.
  - BeetleB 5y ago
    Mandela was offered an early release if he renounced violence. He did not take that offer. I don't know about after his release, but for most of his life he believed in achieving his aims with violence, if need be. As for the violence the ANC perpetrated: It would definitely be considered terrorism today.

stef25 5y ago

Slightly OT - Isn't it obvious that NSO must be able to control every "copy" of Pegasus it sells? They wouldn't sell it unless they were absolutely sure it wouldn't be used against its own people and they have no problem selling to their arch enemies. NSO's defense has always been "we just sell the tech and can't be held responsible for what our clients do with it" (this was clear from the Darknet Diaries episode). If you consider they must be able to control it, and are therefore perfectly capable of monitoring it, then they become much more complicit in what's being done with it. Same story if somehow 1 license = 1 target. This is something that I don't think was explored enough in DD.

codetrotter 5y ago
> They wouldn't sell it unless they were absolutely sure it wouldn't be used against its own people Why not? NSO Group is willing to sacrifice the lives of others for profit, so who’s to say that NSO Group would shy away from that?
- supercheetah 5y ago
  Does Israel even have laws against spying on its own citizens? If not, or very weak one, it's hard to imagine it wouldn't want to spy on them, especially any political opposition.
- michaelt 5y ago
  Ransomware will often leave computers untouched if they have a Cyrillic keyboard layout, because aggravating authorities in your own country is orders of magnitude more dangerous than aggravating foreign authorities. Theoretically, the NSO group might feel the same way.
- stef25 5y ago
  If I remember correctly every sale of Pegasus requires an export license and is therefore subject to approval by the Israeli govt. They don't seem to care much for human rights activists and journalists but assuming every unpatched smartphone is vulnerable, it's very unlikely they're going to allow sales if it could just be pointed at any member of the Israeli govt or military.

2rsf 5y ago

Something is changing in the US though. > The US Commerce Department is unequivocal that the new sanctions against NSO Group and Candiru is connected to their software being used to government officials, journalists, activists and business people. [0] https://twitter.com/AlexMartin/status/1455892710586519553 https://twitter.com/AlexMartin/status/1455892710586519553

boomboomsubban 5y ago
Putting them on the entity list just limits what US exports can go directly to them. Basically I can't sell a zero day to the NSO group, but I can buy one from them. This can hardly be considered a sign something is changing, it's the bare minimum that can be done for PR purposes.
- JumpCrisscross 5y ago
  > it's the bare minimum that can be done for PR purposes This is an edgy dismissal from an armchair, but it’s wrong. Functionally, this designation cuts the company and its employees off from the American financial system.
  - boomboomsubban 5y ago
    How? There's no restriction on buying from the NSO Group, I'm unaware of there being any restriction on using US banks. The Entity List just bars exports of certain items to that company. What US good are they dependent on?
    - JumpCrisscross 5y ago
      > I'm unaware of there being any restriction on using US banks Most institutions won’t open an account for someone with an OFAC hit. They legally can. But it involves a lot of extra legal, compliance and other costs. As a result, most don’t.
      - 5y ago

bogwog 5y ago

> Front Line Defenders investigated 75 iPhones and found that 6 devices were hacked with NSO Group's Pegasus spyware Hacked iPhones?! I bet they were side loading apps! /s (relevant: https://techcrunch.com/2021/11/03/apple-craig-federighi-side-loading-apps-web-summit-keynote/ https://techcrunch.com/2021/11/03/apple-craig-federighi-side...)

zibzab 5y ago
I think "the fappening", xghost and NSO have already clearly demonstrated that mobile security is just PR.
- friehe 5y ago
  According to Wikipedia "the fappening" was a phishing attack. I don't think that is a mobile specific problem.
  - zibzab 5y ago
    That is not correct. It was actually a distributed campaign with multiple hackers with different methods but the main leaks were due to the following problems: 1. Bug in some Apple services allowed unlimited login attempts 2. Bug in Apple backup restoration function allowed bypassing multi-factor authentication (or was it confirmation email?) This is all from memory, I might be wrong about the details. Anyway, that Apple initially blamed this on weak passwords and now phisihing clearly demonstrates what kind of PR circus this field is. Just think about this: when Apple closed these holes (silently), attacks had been going on for 1-2 years. Towards the end there were fairly cheap and reliable hack-my-exs-iphone services on the darknet.
    - stef25 5y ago
      According to the link below it clearly was phishing https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2014_celebrity_nude_photo_leak#Procurement_and_distribution https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2014_celebrity_nude_photo_leak...

aritmo 5y ago

Which nation would benefit from those infections?

boomboomsubban 5y ago
Israel most likely.
- bawolff 5y ago
  This type of analysis is kind of hard, because you could also say that Israel's enemies would benefit a lot from this sort of thing being discovered.
  - boomboomsubban 5y ago
    If your goal is to hurt Israel, I doubt you would give money to the NSO Group to spy on Palestinian human rights defenders in the hopes that some day their targets list becomes public. As if that violation of Palestinian rights would suddenly turn people against Israel. And if it's their enemies are behind the hack and then are adding false information to hurt Israel, there are so many better targets. Any US journalist critical of Israel for example.
    - bawolff 5y ago
      I was thinking more if you had access to some leaked nso exploits somehow, not paying them. And i do think israel is vulnerable to bad PR, especially right now when there has been a lot of it recently - at least that seems to be its weakest point right now. Its not like anyone is going to win a straight up military conflict with them. > Any US journalist critical of Israel for example. But if you do that, NSA becomes involved, much easier to get discovered. It also fits with the narrative a bit better to make the target a Palestinian human rights activist. On the whole though, i do think its more likely that Israel is behind this, i'm just exploring this from the perspective of who could potentially benefit.
      - 5y ago

paulcarroty 5y ago

Seriously, every Pegasus-related news slightly killing the Apple "privacy" myth. And this is good 'cause we deserve better mobile solutions than the strange duopoly, where one company pays $9B to another for the right to mining private data.

raxxorrax 5y ago
People have warned against paternalistic OS from the start. It might be too late for now. You have an advertising ID on your phone and it scans your images because you are a suspect with limited control over you device. To be honest, on bad days I just think people don't deserve anything better. The amount of free work people have put into alternatives is incredible, but there certainly was a refusal to think ahead.
deleted 5y ago
[deleted]
nyuszika7h 5y ago
You may be right, but I don't see how this is relevant here. I hate shady tracking practices too, but we're talking about human rights violations, which is a far bigger issue and has nothing to do with how much Apple tracks you. Even if it didn't track you, nothing stops malware with arbitrary kernel privileges from tracking you anyway. Security vulnerabilities will always exist. It happens on Android too, it just doesn't make headlines that often because iOS is (or at least claims to be) more secure.

AHappyCamper 5y ago

Does this really matter? Australia passed the "Identify and Disrupt" Law, which allows them as well as any government in the The Five Eyes (FVEY) international security pact to access and modify all digital communications - so why would this story even be important? This is our new world, where any government can access and modify any digital information.

pyronik19 5y ago
1984 looking more and more like an instruction manual everyday.

neurobot123 5y ago

s/defenders/terrorists

FridayoLeary 5y ago

This is the perfect example of such technology being used for the good. Despite the misleading title, these organisation are probably terrorist groups. The wonderful thing about palestinian terrorist is that they can rely on well meaning fools to white wash their image for them. In this case it's the presumptously named "front line defenders". There are no shortage of such people who will twist facts and ignore evidence and mislead the public in order to create the image of Israeli opression and palestinian victimhood. Their goal of course is to help the palestinian people but their methods are reprehensible. Ironically it's the palestinians who lose out the most by being kept in a state of perpetual victimhood. It's curious to note that the average life expectancy in the West Bank and Gaza improved dramatically during periods of Israeli occupation. Calling out human right abuses is all well and good, but to do so selectively is in fact abuse itself. I have rather generously described such people as useful idiots, and i honestly think this is true for most of them. But the obsession of so many organisations like this one on Israel, the only Jewish country in the world, to me hints at anti semitism in their upper ranks.

FridayoLeary 5y ago

calling them "defenders" of human right implies that there is a war being fought (by Israel) against human rights. I don't believe that this has been adequately demonstrated, therefore i think the title is inflammatory and misleading. Please can you change it, Dang

djanogo 5y ago
Disagree, I think title is correct, Israel's forced displacement is human rights issue.
cultofmetatron 5y ago
Palestinians live in an apartheid state so I'd argue very much that this is a human rights issue. (I know I'll get lots of downvotes for this and I accept that)
- jjcon 5y ago
  > Palestinians live in an apartheid state I’m not sure that means what you think it does
  - cultofmetatron 5y ago
    they can't leave their tiny allocated stretch of land. their economic opportunities are completely restricted by a foreign government that they have no representation in. They live under a constant threat of violence from an occupying force. What am I missing here?
    - jjcon 5y ago
      > they can't leave their tiny allocated stretch of land That is how country boundaries work - there are lots of disputed territories in Israel - pretending it is as simple as 'allocated land' is completely disingenuous >their economic opportunities are completely restricted by a foreign government that they have no representation in. They live under a constant threat of violence from an occupying force. You mean Hamas? They elected Hamas and all that came with it, and I agree it has lead to a very sad state of affairs. (Unless you are referring to Israel in which case again, that is just how country boundaries work. I don't get to vote in the French elections when I reside in the UK.)

asadlionpk 5y ago

I feel like many pro-Israel commentators here are a coordinated low quality effort to derail conversation using “tactics”. I feel this happens on the daily bases online. I remember reading about it; Israel’s strategy to train their online citizens to do this.

jjcon 5y ago
Not everything is a conspiracy, some people might just disagree with you
- White_Wolf 5y ago
  Here's some research(2018) on the topic that involved a lot of countries. While this place is pretty tame is comparison with others, I wouldn't be suprised if that would actually be true. https://demtech.oii.ox.ac.uk/wp-content/uploads/sites/93/2018/07/ct_appendix.pdf https://demtech.oii.ox.ac.uk/wp-content/uploads/sites/93/201...
- asadlionpk 5y ago
  Being online for decades, I think I can differentiate when a comment disagrees or just low-effort derails.
pthread_t 5y ago
There's an app for that: https://apps.apple.com/us/app/act-il/id1141853455 https://apps.apple.com/us/app/act-il/id1141853455
- asadlionpk 5y ago
  Insane that Apple allows this!
  - jjcon 5y ago
    Do you really want Apple to ban more apps based on political actions? The HN can be really regressive sometimes =/

throwaway879080 5y ago

that's awesome, hunt the terrorists down via software

lacker 5y ago

This title is quite editorialized. The whole controversy is over whether these are human rights organizations as this website claims, or terrorist groups as the Israeli government claims. It should not be a surprise that the NSO group, as an Israeli company, is working against groups that the Israeli government considers to be terrorists.

VictorPath 5y ago
> human rights organizations as this website claims, or terrorist groups as the Israeli government claims. These NGOs get funding from the European Union, and Amnesty International and Human Rights Watch condemned Israel outlawing these human rights NGOs - so it Israel against not just this magazine, but the EU, Amnesty International, Human Rights Watch etc.
- jjcon 5y ago
  The EU and US etc are also bankrolling these israeli operations so im not really sure the funding argument holds up well here
- throwawaylinux 5y ago
  The EU being that terrorist organization whose member states orchestrated and funded the destruction of Libya, among other atrocities? Not sure that lends much credibility to the proxy organizations they fund and influence. This is not some benevolent group dedicated to improving and protecting life around the globe. It is a corrupt, morally bankrupt hive of war criminals and arms profiteers. If ever they pretend to care for someone who is not rich, it is obviously with ulterior motive.
hanniabu 5y ago
> against groups that the Israeli government considers to be terrorists Basically any Palestinian is a terrorist in the eyes of the Israeli government because it allows them to justify their oppression, theft, and murders.
- 5y ago

kryptozinc 5y ago

ITT: Israeli shills in full force.

deleted 5y ago
[deleted]
- jedimind 5y ago
  Low karma doesn't make him or anyone a shill (+ it's a old account from 2019, NOT a newly created account just for this thread), some people just don't like commenting on political stuff with their main accounts. You have been heavily brigading this thread tho and your higher karma doesn't give you immunity to the shilling classification.
starik36 5y ago
From reading this thread, you could have easily put "ITT: Anti-Semites out in full force" as well.

lr4444lr 5y ago

What is this group? Front Line Defenders was founded in Dublin in 2001 with the specific aim of protecting human rights defenders at risk (HRDs), people who work, non-violently, for any or all of the rights enshrined in the Universal Declaration of Human Rights (UDHR). Front Line Defenders addresses the protection needs identified by HRDs themselves. How do they identify and vet a qualifying "Human Rights Defender"? Do they have a membership roster?

oytis 5y ago

Kind of OT, but are there Palestinian human rights organizations that are focused, or at least cover human rights violations by Palestinian government?

bhouston 5y ago
There is a bunch of Palestinian HR groups that do that, for example: http://www.mezan.org/en/post/21740/Al+Mezan+Calls+for:+Solution+to+Electricity+Crisis,+End+to+Detention+for+Peaceful+Assembly+and+Immediate+Release+of+Detainees http://www.mezan.org/en/post/21740/Al+Mezan+Calls+for:+Solut... http://www.mezan.org/en/post/24069/Press+Release%3A+Al+Mezan+expresses+grave+concern+at+incessant+issuance+of+death+sentences+in+Gaza http://www.mezan.org/en/post/24069/Press+Release%3A+Al+Mezan... http://www.mezan.org/en/post/24043/Position+Paper%3A+Human+Rights+and+Civil+Society+Organizations+Hold+Head+of+the+Executive+Authority+and+Government+Responsible+for+Rights+and+Freedoms’+Violations+and+the+Collapse+of+Official+Institutions http://www.mezan.org/en/post/24043/Position+Paper%3A+Human+R...

truthwhisperer 5y ago

ok, seems like a positive development if that protects the live s of Israel people against the terror attacks