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Saudis Gained Access to Amazon CEO's Phone, Says Bezos' Security Chief (thedailybeast.com)
"The security chief for Amazon chief executive Jeff Bezos said on Saturday that the Saudi government had access to Bezos' phone and gained private information from it," Reuters reports.
But in addition, the National Enquirer's lawyer "tried to get me to say there was no hacking," writes security specialist Gavin de Becker. I've recently seen things that have surprised even me, such as National Enquirer's parent company, AMI, being in league with a foreign nation that's been actively trying to harm American citizens and companies, including the owner of the Washington Post. You know him as Jeff Bezos; I know him as my client of 22 years... Why did AMI's people work so hard to identify a source, and insist to the New York Times and others that he was their sole source for everything? My best answer is contained in what happened next: AMI threatened to publish embarrassing photos of Jeff Bezos unless certain conditions were met. (These were photos that, for some reason, they had held back and not published in their first story on the Bezos affair, or any subsequent story.) While a brief summary of those terms has been made public before, others that I'm sharing are new -- and they reveal a great deal about what was motivating AMI.
An eight-page contract AMI sent for me and Bezos to sign would have required that I make a public statement, composed by them and then widely disseminated, saying that my investigation had concluded they hadn't relied upon "any form of electronic eavesdropping or hacking in their news-gathering process." Note here that I'd never publicly said anything about electronic eavesdropping or hacking -- and they wanted to be sure I couldn't.... An earlier set of their proposed terms included AMI making a statement "affirming that it undertook no electronic eavesdropping in connection with its reporting and has no knowledge of such conduct" -- but now they wanted me to say that for them. The contract further held that if Bezos or I were ever in our lives to "state, suggest or allude to" anything contrary to what AMI wanted said about electronic eavesdropping and hacking, then they could publish the embarrassing photos.
I'm writing this today because it's exactly what the Enquirer scheme was intended to prevent me from doing. Their contract also contained terms that would have inhibited both me and Bezos from initiating a report to law enforcement.
Things didn't work out as they hoped.
De Becker instead turned over his investigation's results to U.S. federal officials, then published today's essay warning the National Enquirer and its chairman have "evolved into trying to strong-arm an American citizen whom that country's leadership wanted harmed, compromised, and silenced." He also suggests it's in response to the "relentless" coverage by the Washington Post (which Bezos owns) of the murder of Saudi Arabian journalist and dissident Jamal Khashoggi.
"Experts with whom we consulted confirmed New York Times reports on the Saudi capability to 'collect vast amounts of previously inaccessible data from smartphones in the air without leaving a trace -- including phone calls, texts, emails.'"
But in addition, the National Enquirer's lawyer "tried to get me to say there was no hacking," writes security specialist Gavin de Becker. I've recently seen things that have surprised even me, such as National Enquirer's parent company, AMI, being in league with a foreign nation that's been actively trying to harm American citizens and companies, including the owner of the Washington Post. You know him as Jeff Bezos; I know him as my client of 22 years... Why did AMI's people work so hard to identify a source, and insist to the New York Times and others that he was their sole source for everything? My best answer is contained in what happened next: AMI threatened to publish embarrassing photos of Jeff Bezos unless certain conditions were met. (These were photos that, for some reason, they had held back and not published in their first story on the Bezos affair, or any subsequent story.) While a brief summary of those terms has been made public before, others that I'm sharing are new -- and they reveal a great deal about what was motivating AMI.
An eight-page contract AMI sent for me and Bezos to sign would have required that I make a public statement, composed by them and then widely disseminated, saying that my investigation had concluded they hadn't relied upon "any form of electronic eavesdropping or hacking in their news-gathering process." Note here that I'd never publicly said anything about electronic eavesdropping or hacking -- and they wanted to be sure I couldn't.... An earlier set of their proposed terms included AMI making a statement "affirming that it undertook no electronic eavesdropping in connection with its reporting and has no knowledge of such conduct" -- but now they wanted me to say that for them. The contract further held that if Bezos or I were ever in our lives to "state, suggest or allude to" anything contrary to what AMI wanted said about electronic eavesdropping and hacking, then they could publish the embarrassing photos.
I'm writing this today because it's exactly what the Enquirer scheme was intended to prevent me from doing. Their contract also contained terms that would have inhibited both me and Bezos from initiating a report to law enforcement.
Things didn't work out as they hoped.
De Becker instead turned over his investigation's results to U.S. federal officials, then published today's essay warning the National Enquirer and its chairman have "evolved into trying to strong-arm an American citizen whom that country's leadership wanted harmed, compromised, and silenced." He also suggests it's in response to the "relentless" coverage by the Washington Post (which Bezos owns) of the murder of Saudi Arabian journalist and dissident Jamal Khashoggi.
"Experts with whom we consulted confirmed New York Times reports on the Saudi capability to 'collect vast amounts of previously inaccessible data from smartphones in the air without leaving a trace -- including phone calls, texts, emails.'"
Sounds like AMI/National Enquirer broke laws. Lock them up and throw away the keys.
The contract further held that if Bezos or I were ever in our lives to "state, suggest or allude to" anything contrary to what AMI wanted said about electronic eavesdropping and hacking, then they could publish the embarrassing photos.
I Can't Believe It's Not Blackmail(TM)!
Corruption is convincing someone that the selfless ideal is the same as their selfish ideal.
Sounds like they were decrypting communications at the base station. So a MITM attack.
"First they came for the slanderers and i said nothing."
It doesn't make a difference if the signal came from an Android or an iPhone. Your lack of technical knowledge is showing.
"First they came for the slanderers and i said nothing."
We love them because they used to be relatively well controlled compared to Iran and because they keep the Death to Israel chanting unofficial.
At certain levels the Saudi's are very close with the Israeli's who in turn are among the best building this type of espionage stuff.
Do't forget they have the same enemies, Iran and the Palestinians.
"The likes of Facebook and WhatsApp are free to those whose privacy is of zero value."
To understand the relationship between the United States and Saudi Arabia, one must understand there are two governments in Saudi Arabia. There's the House of Saud, which is the royal family. They are responsible for international relations and members of the family hold many posts in government.
There is also the Ulama, the Islamic religious establishment. The Ulama runs a lot of the internal government, including schools. All royal proclamations (laws) have to be approved by the Ulama to take effect. The royal family nominates a new king, subject to the approval of the Ulama.
So over all the royal family *exercises* power, does things, but always subject to the authority of the Islamic religious authorities. The House of Saud is focused on day-to-day administration, the Ulama on the big picture. The official constitution of the country is the Qur'an.
Throughout the Middle East, including in Saudi Arabia, some of the Islamic leadership does things that the US doesn't like, including how they treat Christians and jews. Within that context of a region unfriendly to US values, the royal families of Saudi Arabia and Jordan have been relatively friendly to the United States and Western Europe.
So in short, the US tends to be friendly with part of the Saudi government - the royal family, while being very displeased by the actions of a separate part, the Ulama.
Bin Laden had been kicked out of Saudi Arabia nine years earlier, precisely for anti-US, anti-Western rhetoric. He was forced to leave in 1992 and officially stripped of Saudi citizenship in 1994. So no, he wasn't a Saudi in 2011.
Bin Laden had helped kick the Soviet Union out of Afghanistan, ending in 1989. That made him a hero to many Arabs.
A few years later, Iraq invaded Kuwait. Saudi Arabia borders Iraq and Kuwait, so with Iraq invading its neighbors, Saudi Arabia was a next logical target for invasion. Bin Laden offered to mass a defensive army on the border to protect Saudi Arabia from invasion by Iraq. The Saudis turned him down, instead requesting help from the United States in this role. Note, this is the Saudis choosing the US over bin Laden a decade before 9-11.
Based on his experience in Soviet-occupied Afghanistan, bin Laden very much did not like the idea of non-muslim military forces in Saudi Arabia. He spoke up about the Saudi royal family getting help from the outsiders (the US), saying some rather nasty things about the "infidels" and that got him kicked out of the country.
Had bin Laden been allowed to bring in the calvary to save the day in Saudi Arabia, he would be even more of a hero, he probably thought. He probably saw it as the US stealing his glory. On top of that, the royal family publicly chose the US over him, which would have been insulting. See why he was pretty pissed at the US?
Osama wanted revenge on the US partly because the Saudis rejected him, choosing to partner with the US instead.
It is fascism such as this. When a gov works with businesses
Where was big business in the "McCarthy" era?
Where was big business in the run-up to the Iraq War? Oh, yeah, NYT carrying water for war propaganda.
Where was big business in the "Trump is a Russian Agent" era? Oh, right, Deep State and big-media partnership.
Truth be told, it was Hearst who sponsored Reefer Madness and turned Anslinger from some kook into the Godfather of the Drug War.
When people say, "you can't trust the media anymore," remember that's something people have been saying since 1793. Nobody ever seems to learn - must be the media influence.
My God, it's Full of Source!
OUTSIDE_IP=$(dig +short my.ip @outsideip.net)
I thought the brother already admitted selling this stuff to the Enquirerer for $200K.
A stingray is a subverted mobile tower that collects information?
Not really subverted equipment. It's a portable cell transceiver that can be located close enough to the target phone to force that phone to force that phone to negotiate with itself as the closest cellular base station.
There are no Saudi Arabia mobile phone spies here.
Lots of private investigators. And some moonlighting cops that can borrow equipment. All for hire. If you think only the Feds and law enforcement have Stingrays, I have a bridge to sell you.
Have gnu, will travel.