2. Background: the already-notorious NSO Group makes mercenary spyware to silently & remotely hack iPhones & Androids.
Many of their government customers are authoritarians.
Most cannot resist the temptation to target their critics, reporters, human rights groups etc.
3. More about leaked numbers & targets in a sec, but first you need to know:
@AmnestyTech just released a report with technical analysis of NSO's infrastructure... & analysis validating w/forensics that some phones were infected with Pegasus.
Hungary's far-right PM Viktor Orbán is using Pegasus spyware to surveil & attack Hungary's independent media, like @direkt36, @panyiszabolcs, and many more.
9. #INDIA🇮🇳 Over 40 reporters, major opposition figures, serving ministers in the #Modi government, members of the security services and beyond are in the list.
- #PegasusProject reporting consistent w/targeting in #NSOGroup's 2019 attack on WhatsApp users.
- Points out: in *only* 2 weeks 1.4k numbers were confirmed targeted in 2019. Do the math.
36. BIG DEAL: today @WhatsApp CEO @wcathcart *publicly confirmed* that senior national security officials of US allies🇺🇸 were targeted with #Pegasus spyware in 2019.
Clear message: #NSOGroup spyware is a national security threat.
#Pegasus spyware was used to target people via WhatsApp in 2019. WhatsApp spotted it, quickly shut it down, notified all targets...and then *sued* NSO.
Friends don't let friends get their eyeballs scanned to buy a coffee.
Sam Altman's Orwellian "Tools for Humanity" says this dystopia machine could help distinguish between #AI agents & humans... or verify at Point of Sale..or..?
Looks to me like a big biometric data grab 1/
2/ Surely they didn't just start with the idea of invasively harvesting eyeball scans...and then look around for potential justifications.
And then add in some AI hype.
Right?
3/ Throwback to Tools for Humanity's previous (but non-portable, guys!) eye-scanning thing: WorldCoin.
Remember that? A global biometric data grab rife with documented exploitation in Africa & Latin America.
Still not clear what real value it delivered to the ppl who gave up their biometrics.
3/ We got a tip about a single bit of #Paragon infrastructure & my brilliant colleague @billmarczak developed a technique to fingerprint some of the mercenary spyware infrastructure (both victim-facing & customer side) globally.
#Paragon's carefully constructed image of being a clean mercenary spyware company that wasn't susceptible to abuses has been replaced by a more familiar tale of...
Abuses...
And #Italy is now saddled with an unfolding crisis around spyware abuse.