How Spyware Reaches Oppressive Governments

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How Spyware Reaches Oppressive Governments

Posted by timothy on Sunday September 9, 2012 @03:53PM from the appointment-and-business-card dept.

New submitter blando writes "Between February and March of 2011, at the height of Egypt's tumultuous revolution, protesters stormed the offices of their feared State Security Investigations Service in Alexandria and Sixth of October city, on the edge of Cairo. It was there, amongst evidence of detentions, torture and surveillance at SSIS's headquarters, that information first came to light regarding a sales pitch by UK-based Gamma Group to Egypt's security agency for their FinFisher spyware."

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Stalin once said ... by Taco+Cowboy · 2012-09-09 16:07 · Score: 5, Insightful

I dunno if Stalin did said the following or not, nevertheless, it does sound valid for this case
Stalin once said: " A Capitalist will sell you the rope to hang him with. "
The creation of spyware and the selling that spyware to governments will only end up with all people in all countries being denied their basic human rights - including England, where the maker of the spyware, the Gamma Group, originated from

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1. Re:Stalin once said ... by rohan972 · 2012-09-09 21:54 · Score: 5, Informative
  
  isn't "putting profit over all else" the very foundation of the free market capitalism?
  No, at least not according to Adam Smith. As with all ideologies practice can vary considerably from the theory. I would guess that not many people who read The Wealth of Nations take the time to first read The Theory of Moral Sentiments, and presumably can not then understand the context it was written in.
  
  http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Theory_of_Moral_Sentiments
  The Theory of Moral Sentiments is a 1759 book by Adam Smith. It provided the ethical, philosophical, psychological, and methodological underpinnings to Smith's later works, including The Wealth of Nations (1776)
  
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Re:if you are capitalist in a western nation by girlintraining · 2012-09-09 17:20 · Score: 5, Insightful

how about what the british actually think today, and their actual policy today? how about judging them on that?
For the same reason I never forget anything you've ever screwed up: It comes in handy when there's a fight and you need to lose. Granted, it's a dysfunctional way of doing things, but it's popularity remains unchallenged. If the British pipe up and say "Oi there, over there in the colonies, you sure ronnied that bit up!" we can just shout back "yeah, how's Palestine working out for you?" See? No different than a couple arguing... each side loads up on ammo, and blasts at the other until nobody, not even the participants has a clue what's going on. It's a convenient way of maintaining the status quo -- neither side loses face, and anyone with an emotional interest in the outcome will bury themselves in the rhetoric until exhausted. Problem solved.

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Re:IBM and Nazi Germany by Anonymous Coward · 2012-09-09 17:37 · Score: 5, Informative

Just vague recollection here, but I seem to recall the german subsidiary solely designed it for this task.
I think the opposite is true. The technology in question was developed for the US Census. Germany wanted such equipment for its own census. A census is a quite legitimate thing for a government to undertake. That this census information was useful in locating jews was tragic, but it seems a misuse of the data.
From the wiki article the GP cites: "Richard Bernstein, writing for The New York Times Book Review, wrote that Black's case "is long and heavily documented, and yet he does not demonstrate that IBM bears some unique or decisive responsibility for the evil that was done."