Spyware found on Belarusian journalist's phone shortly after interrogation by security services. Reporters w/o Borders: Spyware likely installed while the journalist was detained. The same infection method recently used in Kenya + Serbia. H/t @jsrailton.bsky.social therecord.media/spyware-bela...

Belarusian KGB put spyware on phones of detained journalist. Growing list of cases where authoritarian regimes use detention to implant spyware on phones: 🦠Belarus 🦠Kenya 🦠Serbia And likely plenty more. Important investigation & reminder that dictators don't always need zero-days.

1/ Yesterday’s Q2-Q3 Adversarial Threat Report by Meta was interesting in many ways. For us @citizenlab.ca, it was a blast from the past. For the first time, Meta’s investigators attributed what in 2019 we had named Endless Mayfly - a relentless, sophisticated influence op targeting Iran’s enemies.

In 2019, we @citizenlab.ca published an investigation into a disinfo / influence operation we called "Endless Mayfly", and which we attributed at the time to an "Iran-aligned entity" citizenlab.ca/2019/05/burn... Now, Meta's latest adversarial threat report showing we were spot on 👇

Hotel toilet privacy is disappearing. Glass doors. Or no door. Or a big window into the room. Or frosted glass so that the light spills out. Who is asking for this?

Massive global issue with Cloudflare. App not working? Can't login? Probably why. SO much of the internet depends on Cloudflare to stay online. But what happens when Cloudflare itself goes down? Well, you're watching it.

CRUSHING BLOW TO NSO: 🇺🇸Court permanently bans Pegasus spyware-maker from targeting WhatsApp 🚫Must destroy tools exploiting WhatsApp 🚫Stop future development of WA targeting Foreign gov customers exempt from data deletion but... 🚫NSO is barred from helping them hack WA. 1/

What used to be bugs and informants is now #spyware. Bringing together victims of #Stasi surveillance and #spyware to discuss: How can we protect #freedom in the digital age? 🗓️ November 12, 18:30 #BerlinFreedomWeek Register here 👇 www.berlin-freedom-week.com/en/event/sta...

A firm that sells extraordinarily powerful phone hacking technology that has been demonstrably connected to widespread harms worldwide, including gruesome murder, and was properly sanctioned and held liable because of it ....is now in the hands of these people. That's Bad News, everyone.

Bringing NSO Group out of the cold would signal to the rest of the spyware industry that even the most notorious mercenary spyware company.. ...with a history of harming the US. ...and a mountain of abuses.. Can get a free pass. It would defang US efforts to curb proliferation & bad behavior.

UPDATE: NSO just hired former Trump ambassador to Israel. They're trying to push Pegasus spyware to 🇺🇸America. Your rights and freedoms are in danger. NSO Group is no friend to the US & has spent years undermining our security & values 1/

YIKES: NSO floats Pegasus spyware used in hypothetical "time of domestic crisis" in 🇺🇸America. I believe they won't stop lobbying until they get Pegasus into USA. To hack Americans. 1/

NEW: Paragon spyware hit a key Italian campaign manager / political strategist. Super concerning case & a reminder that Italy has a growing pile of unexplained infections with Paragon's Graphite spyware.

Outages are impromptu seminars on where the internet actually lives. On the syllabus: your favorite app's resilience & trust model. Good thread from @signal.org's CEO.

I'm getting a lot of LLM-generated inbound. Someone pushed a button forcing me to spend more time reading the message than they spent creating it. Please, give me your authenticity, typos & bad grammar.

POV: you can't sleep because Amazon is down. Design thinking that inserts brittle dependence into our lives. While extracting fees for life. Don't be these guys.

Today's Amazon outage should be a wakeup call. We've put too many internet eggs into a single basket.

Your favorite thing is down because DynamoDB at Amazon's AWS US-EAST-1 Regionwoke up with Main Character Syndrome. This is the default /legacy backbone for a ton of things. Including Amazon's own stuff. Massive outages. Here's what's going on & what we know 1/

NEW: 🇰🇵DPRK has begun hiding malware on blockchain. Result, decentralized, immutable malware. Nearly impossible to remove. Report cloud.google.com/blog/topics/...

EW: 🇰🇵DPRK has begun hiding malware on blockchain. Result, decentralized, immutable malware. Nearly impossible to remove. cloud.google.com/blog/topics/...

NOW: US court permanently bans Pegasus spyware maker from hacking WhatsApp. NSO Group can't help their customers hack WhatsApp etc. ether. Must delete exploits & R&D. Bad news for NSO. Huge competitive disadvantage for the notorious company. Big additional win for WhatsApp 1 /

Now we're seeing confirmation of the NSO acquisition. Mark my words, this is the path through which Pegasus gets put on Americans iPhones & Androids. This dictatorship-in-a-box belongs nowhere near our constitutional rights.

NEW: fresh trouble for mercenary spyware companies like NSO. #Apple is launching fat bounties on the zero-click exploits that feed the supply chain behind products like Pegasus & Paragon's Graphite. With bonuses, exploit developers can land $5 million payouts. security.apple.com/blog/apple-s...

NEW: Pegasus spyware coming to America? An ex-Adam Sandler producer with ties to China is trying to acquire NSO Group. Again. Simonds fronted this before in 2023 & failed. But the backers haven't given up. Why? Where is the money coming from? 1/ www.globes.co.il/news/article...

NEW: cost to 'poison' an LLM and insert backdoors is relatively constant. Even as models grow. Implication: security doesn't scale with LLMs. Super interesting: Prior work had suggested that as model sizes grew, it would make them cost-prohibitive to poison. 1/ arxiv.org/pdf/2510.07192

NEW: Germany opposes mass scanning of private messages. "must be taboo in a constitutional state" "even the worst crimes don't justify giving up basic civil rights" Well said Minister Stefanie Hubig! Leadership we need from Europe's democracies. www.bmjv.de/SharedDocs/Z...

You don't even need to read the article to know this is a durian.

NEW: breach of Discord age verification data. Including some users passports & DLs Age verification is a badly implemented data grab wrapped in a moral panic. Mark my words, as age verification mandates expand, we'll end up more surveilled and less secure. 1/

NEW: UK asked Apple to backdoor iCloud encryption. Backdoors create a massive target for hackers & criminal groups. Dictators will inevitably demand that Apple do the same for them. 1/ www.ft.com/content/d101...

NEW: turns out the EU helped finance a bunch of spyware companies with..public money. Extremely bad look. Group of MEPs calls for action.👇 apache.be/2025/10/01/e...

Friend, Does scrolling leave you hollowed? Is anger frictionless...but thinking like swimming against the current? You're in an algorithmic rip tide. Your mental clarity is the target. Take a beat and step out Connect with your own thoughts. It's what designers of these algorithms fear most.

NEW: Spyware installed on Kenyan filmmakers' phones in police custody @citizenlab.ca confirms cpj.org?p=516177

Powerful interests are trying to change the internet. It's worse than you know. Your safety and freedoms are on the line. Thank you for your attention to this matter. www.youtube.com/watch?v=iz_8...

NEW: Mercenary spyware is coming to the US. ICE just quietly unsuspended their contract with spyware maker #Paragon. Remember them? Caught earlier this year being used to hack Italian journalists. This is bad, let's talk about how we got here 1/ jackpoulson.substack.com/p/exclusive-...

NEW: Analysis finds UK's age verification rollout is producing exactly the opposite of the desired effect: Driving traffic non-compliant adult sites. Which punishes compliant ones. Entirely predictable. That's not the worst part 1/ By @drewharwell.com www.washingtonpost.com/technology/2...

NEW: WhatsApp caught & fixed a sophisticated zero click attack... Now they've published an advisory about it. Say attackers combined the exploit with an Apple vulnerability to hack a specific group of targets (i.e. this wasn't pointed at everybody) Quick thoughts 1/

WATCH LIVE: mercenary spyware abuse is evil. But how do we bring accountability to spyware suppliers & their customers? Ft @nadinefj.bsky.social @lindsaysfreeman.bsky.social & @natynettle.bsky.social By @slpjustice.bsky.social & @cyberstatecraft.bsky.social www.youtube.com/watch?v=Hy_I...

Misguided age-verification laws are a universal mute button for free speech.

This might be the slickest free advertising the VPN industry has ever received.

UK government asks everybody to stop using VPNs. "everybody who's out there thinking of using VPNs...verifying your age keeps a child safe...So let's just not try and find a way around. Just prove your age." - UK government

WHOA: megapublisher Axel Springer asks German court to ban an ad-blocker. They claim HTML/ CSS code of websites are protected computer programs. And influencing how they are displayed (e.g by removing ads) violates copyright. Endless security, privacy and technical downside & absurdity 1/

Logo designer deletes Lorem & calls it a day.

Post images & videos of the inside your house at your peril. This new tool uses pictures taken inside your house to identify your exact location. As a service. It will be abused to target people. For theft. Stalking. And worse.

X: we are actively fighting bots Also X: here's an ad for reply bots.

Neuroticism? Ripping. Conscientiousness & agreeableness? Dipping. Via FT: www.ft.com/content/5cd7...

NEW: 🇩🇪#Germany's top court says spyware severely violates fundamental rights. Bans spyware in cases with <3year sentences. Imposes tough proportionality tests. Restricts #spyware to serious cases. Very interesting 1/ www.bundesverfassungsgericht.de/SharedDocs/P...

Parents know that the UK's verification rules won't really protect their kids. But they are still worried about their children's safety. They just aren't being offered non-dystopian alternatives.

Least shocking news ever. www.politico.com/news/2025/08...

What is "own goal" in Spanish? 🇨🇳China penetrated 🇺🇸American lawful intercept systems. Turbocharging espionage against the US. Puzzled wonderment that any government would bring Huawei tech into wiretapping systems.

Age verification laws are coming fast. And, from my perspective, opponents are struggling to find impactful messaging for the general public to frame damage they are about to do to freedom. Or to propose alternate futures that address the underlying anxieties. 1/