Senior research associate @kate-ro.bsky.social writes for @thewalrus.ca about the potential implications of Canada’s proposed Bill C-22 for future data-sharing agreements with foreign law enforcement agencies. thewalrus.ca/trump-wants-...

NEW today an essay from me in @thewalrus.ca on Bill C-22 (being rushed through committee in Canada this May), its implications for Can-US negotiations on data-sharing, and why the rule of law threats unfolding in the US may soon become Canada's problem too. thewalrus.ca/trump-wants-...

🧵Remember PAPERWALL, the sprawling disinfo network we @citizenlab.ca exposed in 2024 as run by a Chinese firm, Haimai? 2 full years later, it's still very active and expanding. In its quest to cover the whole globe, it is now focusing also on Australia, New Zealand, and India. Readers? Still zero.

NEW REPORT ➡️ In collaboration with @icij.org, we identified two distinct actors aligned with the People’s Republic of China that have been targeting and impersonating journalists and civil society. Full report: citizenlab.ca/research/how...

New @citizenlab.ca report highlights how surveillance vendors are exploiting SS7 and other telecom infrastructure to track targets' locations. Cases found by Citizen Lab are just two concrete examples of a pervasive problem, researcher says. @rondeibert.bsky.social therecord.media/surveillance...

NEW @citizenlab.ca report We uncover two sophisticated telecom surveillance campaigns. The findings expose how surveillance vendors exploit the global telecom ecosystem to conduct covert location tracking operations that can persist undetected for years. citizenlab.ca/research/unc...

NEW: At least two surveillance vendors are believed to be abusing access to at least three telecommunication companies in an effort to tap people's location data on behalf of their government customers. The phone companies include one in Israel, one in the U.K., and one in Jersey (Channel Island).

With a potential Alberta referendum ahead, we're releasing "Slopaganda," an incident response report documenting a network of inauthentic YouTube channels pushing coordinated, fake Albertan political commentary. 🧵#cdnpoli

💥Days after Viktor Orbán lost reelection, Hungary's data protection authority is investigating Webloc — an Israeli tool that harvests mobile ad data for mass surveillance, likely violating GDPR. We exposed its use by Hungary on @vsquare.bsky.social with @citizenlab.ca: vsquare.org/goulash-with...

The findings of our new report on the use of ad-based geolocation surveillance tech in Europe raise the question: Can surveillance vendors lawfully buy or otherwise obtain billions of location records tied to device identifiers from consumer apps installed on phones under the GDPR? I doubt it: 🧵

We publish a major @citizenlab.ca report on Webloc, an ad-based mass surveillance system that monitors the movements and personal characteristics of hundreds of millions people globally based on data obtained from mobile apps and digital advertising. Customers include ICE, El Salvador, and Hungary.

NEW REPORT: “Uncovering Webloc: An Analysis of Penlink’s Ad-based Geolocation Surveillance Tech” Our research confirms that ad-based surveillance tech Webloc is used by military, intelligence, and law enforcement agencies across the globe. citizenlab.ca/research/ana...

💥Orbán’s intelligence agencies have been secretly using Webloc — a mass surveillance tool that tracks hundreds of millions of people via smartphone advertising data — making Hungary the first confirmed EU country to deploy it, in likely violation of GDPR.

Iran's regime stopped hiding behind security justifications. They're telling us directly: connectivity exists to control the narrative. Will the world act on this, or just condemn it? I unpack Iran's war time information ecosystemm and the solutions needed for @carnegieendowment.org

1/ I spoke with The New York Times for their new story on the “liar’s dividend” in times of war — the ability not to trick audiences with AI-generated content, but to dismiss real one as AI-generated.

1/ I have a huge amount of respect for my former colleagues investigators at Meta who did the hard and smart work behind this new Adversarial Threat Report. And I find what’s in it really important and interesting. But I have questions for the company.

MARCH 10: Get practical safety tips from the Citizen Lab's Rebekah Brown at @accessnow.org's Digital Security Helpline webinar on preventing spear-phishing attacks against civil society. Register: www.accessnow.org/event/digita...

Our latest submission to the Committee on Enforced Disappearance and the Working Group on Enforced or Involuntary Disappearances is out now. We highlight the role of digital technologies; spyware & location-tracking technologies in facilitating enforced disappearances of exiled dissidents

Sarah McKune, @nateschenkkan.bsky.social, an anonymous @citizenlab.ca researcher, @yaqiu.bsky.social & I have co-authored a UN submission on the enforced disappearance of migrants in the context of transnational repression: citizenlab.ca/submissions-...

The Austrian Ministry of the Interior bought social media surveillance software 'Tangles' from Cobwebs/Penlink and refuses to tell parliament whether they also bought the intrusive Tangles add-on 'Webloc', which relies on the mass collection of personal data from digital advertising and mobile apps.

NEW: Last year, Cellebrite stopped Serbia from using its tools after allegations that local police had abused them to hack into the phone of a journalist. Now there are similar allegations in Kenya and Jordan, and Cellebrite is taking an entirely different approach.

Please read our latest on how Israel's Cellebrite is being used to break into the phone of a prominent pro-democracy activist. This time, in Kenya. Guess who else has access to this tool? (with Carlos Mureithi) cc @rondeibert.bsky.social www.theguardian.com/world/2026/f...

Great to see @nateschenkkan.bsky.social presenting our report “Perpetrators & methods of transnational repression and possible counter strategies” (co-authored w/ @emiledirks.bsky.social @zecsaky.bsky.social & me) in the @afet.europarl.europa.eu Full report: www.europarl.europa.eu/thinktank/en...

NEW REPORT ➡️ “From Protest to Peril: Cellebrite Used Against Jordanian Civil Society” Our investigation reveals that, since 2020, Jordanian authorities have deployed Cellebrite’s forensic extraction products against civil society targets in Jordan. Full report here: citizenlab.ca/research/fro...

The People's Consultation on AI launched today! Whether you have in-depth expertise in AI issues, or don't consider yourself an "expert" but have firsthand experience with AI or its impacts and want to have your say, this is for you. Participate by March 15, 2026: www.peoplesaiconsultation.ca

I wrote about Iran's protests for @theatlantic.com: how AI manipulation and the suspicion of it is being weaponised to dismiss real footage of protests. This piece draws on work from my stellar team at WITNESS and years of studying information controls in Iran and beyond.

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.

The Trump administration’s decision to shut down the U.S. Agency for International Development (USAID) has resulted in hundreds of thousands of deaths from infectious diseases and malnutrition, according to Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health’s Atul Gawande. hsph.harvard.edu/news/usaid-s...

Researchers tried plugging every possible phone number into WhatsApp's web app. They found they could collect 3.5 billion users' phone numbers, plus photos for half and profile text for more than a third, the biggest personal data exposure ever by some measures. www.wired.com/story/a-simp...

Law enforcement: we need to break encryption to get access to Signal to protect the children!! Also law enforcement: for years couldn’t catch a pedophile sex trafficker who used email to coordinate all of his pedophile sex trafficking

EFF teamed up with AV Comparatives to see how well anti-virus apps detect stalkerware on Android phones. www.eff.org/deeplinks/20...

Watch my BSidesPDX keynote where I spoke honestly and frankly about the terrifying reality that Americans are facing under Trump's fascist regime, alongside practical advise for communities to defend themselves micahflee.com/practical-de...

NEW REPORT: We uncovered a coordinated network of fake X profiles that is spreading AI-generated content to induce revolt in #Iran. We call this network “PRISONBREAK”. Read the report 👉 citizenlab.ca/2025/10/ai-e...

The group leveraged dozens of social media accounts and “routinely used” AI-generated imagery and video to stoke unrest among Iran’s population, according to Citizen Lab. via @derekbjohnson.bsky.social cyberscoop.com/citizen-lab-...

1/ NEW REPORT: “We Say You Want a Revolution” - An AI-Enabled Influence Operation Aimed at Overthrowing the Iranian Regime. We call it PRISONBREAK. Keep reading to find out why. THREAD 🧵

1/Citizen Lab’s new report on PRISONBREAK is a must-read. It exposes an AI-enabled influence operation targeting Iran with deceptive media, from the infamous Evin Prison gates video to deepfake music.

New today: my essay in @jodemocracy.bsky.social on The Golden Age of Transnational Repression: www.journalofdemocracy.org/articles/the...

A few (early) thoughts on digital transnational repression and extraterritorial human rights obligations over at @bindinghook.bsky.social. Thanks for the opportunity to share my research (again!).

To state the obvious, I was not paid by the Ford Foundation or Open Society to write the column, which is what Vance is alleging and he's saying he is going after those groups. Not the first time he's spouted conspiracy theories involving the Soroses to deflect criticism: apnews.com/article/jd-v...

Forensic researchers @citizenlab.ca today confirmed FlexiSPY spyware was found on 2 Kenyan filmmakers' phones. Victims helped produce a documentary about youth uprisings in the increasingly autocratic country. Spyware was installed while phones were in police custody. therecord.media/researchers-...

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

⚖️ 🔍 My new op-ed for @justsecurity.org + @atlanticcouncil.bsky.social about the opportunities & dangers of discovery in U.S. spyware litigation

They are also currently clean on opsec

Check out my #DEFCON33 talk about the Signalgate, full of unbelievable incompetence from the highest levels of the Trump administration www.youtube.com/watch?v=KFYy...

NEW: I spoke to @rondeibert.bsky.social ahead of his keynote at Black Hat today. Ron travelled to Vegas to warn the cybersec industry that perhaps it’s time to get political. “They should be aware of what’s going on and hopefully they can not contribute to it, if not help reverse it,” he said.

Canada 🇨🇦 makes many pledges re: regulating spyware, protecting victims of transnational repression, and protecting human rights. But words must be followed by actions. My latest @theglobeandmail.com on the G7 Leaders' Statement on Transnational Repression www.theglobeandmail.com/gift/3d51c5f...

I Was Hacked Because I Work on Russia foreignpolicy.com/2025/07/02/g...

Keir Giles has been targeted *again* by allegedly Russian hackers — this time using a clever new trick intended to bypass 2-factor authentication. Over the years I’ve written about Giles an unusual amount, and I have an idea about why. First, the coverage: www.reuters.com/technology/s...

NEW today from myself @citizenlab.ca, on the unspoken implications of Canada's Bill C-2 for data-sharing with the United States and other foreign countries: citizenlab.ca/2025/06/a-pr...