Slashdot Mirror
The Fight To Uncover Spyware Exports To Repressive Regimes
Daniel_Stuckey (2647775) writes with news that we may soon learn which countries were sold the FinFisher malware package to spy on their own citizens. "The UK's High Court ruled yesterday that HM Revenue and Customs acted 'unlawfully' when it declined to detail how it was investigating the export of digital spy tools created by a British company. Human rights group Privacy International is celebrating the decision of Mr. Justice Green, which means HMRC now has to reconsider releasing information on its investigation into controls surrounding the export of malware known as FinFisher, created by British supplier Gamma International. The widespread FinFisher malware family, also known as FinSpy, can carry out a range of surveillance operations, from snooping on Skype and Facebook conversations to siphoning off emails or files sitting on a device. It is supposed to benefit law enforcement in their investigations, but has allegedly been found in various nations with poor human rights records, including Bahrain and Ethiopia."
It is supposed to benefit law enforcement in their investigations, but has allegedly been found in various nations with poor human rights records, including Bahrain and Ethiopia.
So is it only a problem when repressive regimes use surveillance software to oppress their population? When first world nations use such software, they're also violating the rights of their citizens. Just because it "benefits law enforcement" doesn't excuse its existence. Parallel construction also benefits law enforcement.
"From the depths of my skeptical and rationalist soul, I ask the Lord to protect me from California touchie-feeliedom."
You should be subject to criminal and civil penalties, forfeiture of assets, and having your own ass dragged off in the night to be tortured. Because you've clearly decided to enable to same things to happen to others.
And now you're trying to have someone hauled off to be tortured, so you should be too. Oh shit, I'm doing the same thing!
Tic-Tac-Toe, Global Thermonuclear War, and relationships all have the same winning move.
Many here consider the UK an oppressive regime
You're also saying that two wrongs make a right, which is where you go off the rails and destroy your argument.
Britain and to a larger extent the United States both work hard to prop up repressive regimes they find benefitial to their interests. Somalia, Libya, hell even North Korea has received funds from the british taxpayer since 2012. To think that anyone in parliament gives two shits about some spyware is sadly wrong.
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/new...
Good people go to bed earlier.
Spyware such as FinFisher is a weapon and should be treated as such under the same export restrictions most western countries apply to guns, warplanes, ships, etc. The trick would be in differentiating the covert tracking, surveillance and reporting that something like FinFisher does for nefarious purposes from the "normal" covert tracking, surveillance and reporting that many smart phone apps do for commercial purposes.
Cheers,
Dave
They that can give up essential liberty to obtain a little temporary safety deserve neither safety nor liberty.
Ben
If you directly assist someone in kidnapping, you are guilty. If you directly assist someone in murder, you are guilty.
If you directly assist someone in the spying and eventual torture or death of someone at the hands of a government you knew would do that ... by your reasoning your magically excused?
I'm simply saying that if you assist someone in the commission of something which would be a crime where your business is based, assisting them to do the same thing in another country doesn't change a damned thing.
Companies who knowingly sell these things to countries they know will abuse it are not suddenly absolved of being culpable for the things their products have been designed for.
Selling this stuff to these regimes is little different than being an art dealer for the Nazis, or selling munitions to Iran -- you know it's causing harm, but you're profiting off it. As a result, you should be subject to legal recourse.
And if your name is similar to someone who *might* do something the government doesn't like, you're guilty.
No, no, you're not thinking; you're just being logical. --Niels Bohr
None of this "I was just following orders/trying to make money" shit. You knowingly sold stuff to a government who is going to use it for things which are likely illegal in your own country.
So you argue that companies like say Ericsson or NSN should not sell mobile network equipment to e.g. the USA, as that government consistently uses the legal intercept possibilities of the equipment for the purpose of tracking down criminals they eventually kill (here in the civilized world, the death penalty is considered a human rights violation). While at the same time, it is completely OK for Huawei or Motorola to sell similar stuff, also to the USA?
If you really meant that, then I do salute your moral backbone. But I do hope you notced the slippery slope in your fanatic-sounding argumentation.
What does selling something to a potential (or probable) victim of a crime have to do with it?
Selling the hardware needed to perpetrate the crime to the U.S. government would be wrong though.
Did I say anyone was excused?
No.
I said you were a piece of shit for saying people should be tortured. We're trying to be better than those we condemn. Don't fuck that up.
Why don't Facebook and Skype (Microsoft) take these companies to court? Why won't the UK government?
These companies are making money off of a tool specifically made to break the law and most likely used to spy on some British citizens (abroad).
The crime victim [sic] is not in this loop at all...
Any operator in the USA is required by law to yield lawful intercept requests from the government (i.e. police). Arguing here that the networks are not sold to the government, but independent busineses is just the sort of white-washing/denialism that GP was supposedly opposed to. Look e.g. at what happened with the NSN equipment in Iran a few yeas back... http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nokia_Solutions_and_Networks#Lawful_interception_controversy