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Someone who has access to Pegasus is not going after finances. I had modest amount of ethereum on my PC, was hacked, but I still had control over my wallet. If

Someone who has access to Pegasus is not going after finances. I had modest amount of ethereum on my PC, was hacked, but I still had control over my wallet. If you have $1M+ it should not be tied to your sim card, GMail account etc... If you use the same device to access your bank accounts, and to browse internet or receive messages, you are like an idiot who does not do backups!

markdown 5y ago
> If you use the same device to access your bank accounts, and to browse internet or receive messages, you are like an idiot who does not do backups! Using ones phone for banking, internet, and sms is completely normal. Saying that 99.9999999999999999% of the world population that owns smartphones is an idiot isn't helpful. The idiots are the governments of the world that haven't sanctioned Israel for allowing the continued trade of these cyberweapons by their citizens.
- arghwhat 5y ago
  "99.9999999999999999%" of the world are not high-value targets with > $1M USD in assets. > The idiots are the governments of the world that haven't sanctioned Israel Sanctions against Israel are not going to make vulnerabilities and risks go away. It will just make life harder for a single provider.
- throw8932894 5y ago
  - Epa095 5y ago
    >And your comment is just antisemitic. It's dangerous tossing that term around. There is enough real antisemitism in the world, and it's a real problem, we don't need to make-pretend extra. Critisism of the state of Israel does not equate antisemitism.
    - skinkestek 5y ago
      - skinkestek 5y ago
        ok, I'll expand on this quickly: 1. The state of Israel is the only state in the area where both Jews and Arabs are welcome and have a place in government and legislative bodies. Much of the "legitimate criticism" of Israel isn't directed at the Arabs in Israel it seems to I claim thinly veiled hate against the Jewish part of the population. 2. If one argues that it is against the Jewish part of the population because they dominate then one cannot say it is against the state of Israel only because then the difference doesn't mean anything.
        KittenInABox 5y ago
        Genuinely asking, my understanding is that Israel the government considers itself a primarily Jewish ethnostate with policies in place to evict Arabs from their lands in order to put Jewish people in there. My understanding is that this is where a lot of criticism and advocacy for Palestine comes from. In that case, in order to criticize the treatment of Palestinians, one would be criticizing a policy that benefits primarily the Jews of Israel. By this logic, it is antisimetic to point out human rights abuses that benefit Israeli Jewish citizens? (I'm a layperson who isn't highly educated on this, and I'm aware that this conversation is complex and filled with nuance. I'm primarily asking to be educated about the matter based on the priors I have been told in the past.)
        skinkestek 5y ago
        Remember that while I feel sorry for both parts I'm heavily biased so don't accept anything I write at face value but check it. On the other hand, unlike mainstream media and many who "support the Palestinian[1] cause" I'll be up front about it and ask you to verify yourself without referring you to more heavily biased sources. > with policies in place to evict Arabs from their lands in order to put Jewish people in there. I cannot defend everything Israel does but the last time I can remember there was a lot of fuzz on HN about evicting Arabs to give land to Israelis it was about giving back land to the families whos property was stolen and given to Arabs in the brief time where Jordan occupied it. Also remember that there used to be a whole lot of Jews in the lands surrounding Israel. These partially moved voluntarily, partially where driven out harshly. Meanwhile Arabs got to stay in Israel[2]. In fact more Jews were moved into Israel from surrounding countries than Arabs expelled from Israel so theoretically, if Arabs wanted, they could have given the properties of the Jews that fled from their countries to the Arabs that came from Israel. That didn't happen as the Arabs never accepted UNs plan. So the neighbouring countries put their relatives in camps while waiting to "shove the Jews into the sea", Israel welcomed their own people and got them integrated with homes and a place to work. As time went by I think it became convenient to keep them there as a chess pawn. [1]: I consequently use the word Arabs except here. There has never been a country named Palestine, just a Roman administrative province and later a fiction fueled by crafty journalists that saw that the story about small Israel against the Arab world would put Israel in a good light while "big" Israel (it is the size of a small county in Norway) against the poor "Palestinians"[3] in the camps. [2]: Part of this seems to be a cynical plot by the Israelis. They asked them to stay I understand because if they all left, all the neighbouring countries could just walk in and shoot everything that lived. [3]: Actually Arabs, just living inside the borders of the small part that UN/UK gave to the Jewish part of the population. PS: Again, I'm heavily biased. I write to make you see it from my side. I have been caught in factual errors before. When that happen and I can verify it I have apologized and I try to not repeat those mistakes, again unlike mainstream journalists.
  - strzzz 5y ago
    Govt of Israel has sure power over NSO operations. >A yearlong Times investigation, including dozens of interviews with government officials, leaders of intelligence and law-enforcement agencies, cyberweapons experts, business executives and privacy activists in a dozen countries, shows how Israel’s ability to approve or deny access to NSO’s cyberweapons has become entangled with its diplomacy. Countries like Mexico and Panama have shifted their positions toward Israel in key votes at the United Nations after winning access to Pegasus. [1] [1] https://www.nytimes.com/2022/01/28/magazine/nso-group-israel-spyware.html https://www.nytimes.com/2022/01/28/magazine/nso-group-israel...
  - baybal2 5y ago
    > Israel government is not responsible for Pegasus. Every sale of Pegasus was cleared by the cabinet.
closewith 5y ago
In that case, the majority of the people in the world with more than $1MM are idiots.
- solarkraft 5y ago
  The advantage of centralized services tied to your clear identity is that they do some diligence to ensure the person accessing your account is actually you. You (often) even have a reasonable recourse to undo things that have been done fraudulently.
supernova87a 5y ago
So you mean for example, you keep your Authenticator app on a device completely separate from your phone / disconnected from the internet?
- solarkraft 5y ago
  2FA is a good option for securing your centralized accounts. But unfortunately, if you're logged in on your phone and your phone is hacked, well, it's still game over. For crypto currencies it may help to store them on a hardware wallet, since accessing your money will require explicit interaction. But, as far as I understand (please correct me, not up to date with the security mechanisms of hardware wallets), if your computer is compromised while doing it, you can still lose it.
  - ajkdhcb2 5y ago
    > if your computer is compromised while doing it, you can still lose it. The hardware wallet itself has a screen, and requires you to confirm your transactions, so generally not true
    - Semaphor 5y ago
      Just for people who don’t know, it’s shows relevant data regarding the transaction: Sum, currency, target address. Now, if you verify that data, you are safe… if the original address was correct. But as we are talking about a sophisticated targeted attack, where did you get the original address from? Because if it was your phone or your computer, we are back to step one, as that might already be manipulated.
      - deleted 5y ago
        [deleted]
rosndo 5y ago
Haha. It’s regular government employees who get access to Pegasus. I’d be shocked if it had never been used in an unauthorized manner for straight up financial crimes.

markdown 5y ago

> If you use the same device to access your bank accounts, and to browse internet or receive messages, you are like an idiot who does not do backups! Using ones phone for banking, internet, and sms is completely normal. Saying that 99.9999999999999999% of the world population that owns smartphones is an idiot isn't helpful. The idiots are the governments of the world that haven't sanctioned Israel for allowing the continued trade of these cyberweapons by their citizens.

arghwhat 5y ago
"99.9999999999999999%" of the world are not high-value targets with > $1M USD in assets. > The idiots are the governments of the world that haven't sanctioned Israel Sanctions against Israel are not going to make vulnerabilities and risks go away. It will just make life harder for a single provider.
throw8932894 5y ago
- Epa095 5y ago
  >And your comment is just antisemitic. It's dangerous tossing that term around. There is enough real antisemitism in the world, and it's a real problem, we don't need to make-pretend extra. Critisism of the state of Israel does not equate antisemitism.
  - skinkestek 5y ago
    - skinkestek 5y ago
      ok, I'll expand on this quickly: 1. The state of Israel is the only state in the area where both Jews and Arabs are welcome and have a place in government and legislative bodies. Much of the "legitimate criticism" of Israel isn't directed at the Arabs in Israel it seems to I claim thinly veiled hate against the Jewish part of the population. 2. If one argues that it is against the Jewish part of the population because they dominate then one cannot say it is against the state of Israel only because then the difference doesn't mean anything.
      - KittenInABox 5y ago
        Genuinely asking, my understanding is that Israel the government considers itself a primarily Jewish ethnostate with policies in place to evict Arabs from their lands in order to put Jewish people in there. My understanding is that this is where a lot of criticism and advocacy for Palestine comes from. In that case, in order to criticize the treatment of Palestinians, one would be criticizing a policy that benefits primarily the Jews of Israel. By this logic, it is antisimetic to point out human rights abuses that benefit Israeli Jewish citizens? (I'm a layperson who isn't highly educated on this, and I'm aware that this conversation is complex and filled with nuance. I'm primarily asking to be educated about the matter based on the priors I have been told in the past.)
        skinkestek 5y ago
        Remember that while I feel sorry for both parts I'm heavily biased so don't accept anything I write at face value but check it. On the other hand, unlike mainstream media and many who "support the Palestinian[1] cause" I'll be up front about it and ask you to verify yourself without referring you to more heavily biased sources. > with policies in place to evict Arabs from their lands in order to put Jewish people in there. I cannot defend everything Israel does but the last time I can remember there was a lot of fuzz on HN about evicting Arabs to give land to Israelis it was about giving back land to the families whos property was stolen and given to Arabs in the brief time where Jordan occupied it. Also remember that there used to be a whole lot of Jews in the lands surrounding Israel. These partially moved voluntarily, partially where driven out harshly. Meanwhile Arabs got to stay in Israel[2]. In fact more Jews were moved into Israel from surrounding countries than Arabs expelled from Israel so theoretically, if Arabs wanted, they could have given the properties of the Jews that fled from their countries to the Arabs that came from Israel. That didn't happen as the Arabs never accepted UNs plan. So the neighbouring countries put their relatives in camps while waiting to "shove the Jews into the sea", Israel welcomed their own people and got them integrated with homes and a place to work. As time went by I think it became convenient to keep them there as a chess pawn. [1]: I consequently use the word Arabs except here. There has never been a country named Palestine, just a Roman administrative province and later a fiction fueled by crafty journalists that saw that the story about small Israel against the Arab world would put Israel in a good light while "big" Israel (it is the size of a small county in Norway) against the poor "Palestinians"[3] in the camps. [2]: Part of this seems to be a cynical plot by the Israelis. They asked them to stay I understand because if they all left, all the neighbouring countries could just walk in and shoot everything that lived. [3]: Actually Arabs, just living inside the borders of the small part that UN/UK gave to the Jewish part of the population. PS: Again, I'm heavily biased. I write to make you see it from my side. I have been caught in factual errors before. When that happen and I can verify it I have apologized and I try to not repeat those mistakes, again unlike mainstream journalists.
- strzzz 5y ago
  Govt of Israel has sure power over NSO operations. >A yearlong Times investigation, including dozens of interviews with government officials, leaders of intelligence and law-enforcement agencies, cyberweapons experts, business executives and privacy activists in a dozen countries, shows how Israel’s ability to approve or deny access to NSO’s cyberweapons has become entangled with its diplomacy. Countries like Mexico and Panama have shifted their positions toward Israel in key votes at the United Nations after winning access to Pegasus. [1] [1] https://www.nytimes.com/2022/01/28/magazine/nso-group-israel-spyware.html https://www.nytimes.com/2022/01/28/magazine/nso-group-israel...
- baybal2 5y ago
  > Israel government is not responsible for Pegasus. Every sale of Pegasus was cleared by the cabinet.

closewith 5y ago

In that case, the majority of the people in the world with more than $1MM are idiots.

solarkraft 5y ago
The advantage of centralized services tied to your clear identity is that they do some diligence to ensure the person accessing your account is actually you. You (often) even have a reasonable recourse to undo things that have been done fraudulently.

supernova87a 5y ago

So you mean for example, you keep your Authenticator app on a device completely separate from your phone / disconnected from the internet?

solarkraft 5y ago
2FA is a good option for securing your centralized accounts. But unfortunately, if you're logged in on your phone and your phone is hacked, well, it's still game over. For crypto currencies it may help to store them on a hardware wallet, since accessing your money will require explicit interaction. But, as far as I understand (please correct me, not up to date with the security mechanisms of hardware wallets), if your computer is compromised while doing it, you can still lose it.
- ajkdhcb2 5y ago
  > if your computer is compromised while doing it, you can still lose it. The hardware wallet itself has a screen, and requires you to confirm your transactions, so generally not true
  - Semaphor 5y ago
    Just for people who don’t know, it’s shows relevant data regarding the transaction: Sum, currency, target address. Now, if you verify that data, you are safe… if the original address was correct. But as we are talking about a sophisticated targeted attack, where did you get the original address from? Because if it was your phone or your computer, we are back to step one, as that might already be manipulated.
    - deleted 5y ago
      [deleted]

rosndo 5y ago

Haha. It’s regular government employees who get access to Pegasus. I’d be shocked if it had never been used in an unauthorized manner for straight up financial crimes.