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Journalists Hacked with Suspected NSO Group iMessage ‘Zero-Click’ Exploit

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Re: Journalists Hacked with Suspected NSO Group iMessage ‘Zero-Click’ Exploit

#301

"The phones were compromised using an exploit chain that we call KISMET, which appears to involve an invisible zero-click exploit in iMessage" Why aren't there a hardware switch on the phones that renders the OS read-only during normal use?

I found the most HN comment in this thread.

Re: Journalists Hacked with Suspected NSO Group iMessage ‘Zero-Click’ Exploit

#302

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Nothing in my post pretends that, and "how should we know the media card carrying unarmed civilians we shot were journalists" doesn't help their case as much as you think.

It helps it exactly as much as I think. Obviously the only one who said anything like that is you though. And now you’re falsely claiming that they intentionally targeted unarmed civilians.

I might be able to agree with your extremely forgiving view of the military's actions if they didn't cover the incident up for years. Instead, they intentionally shot unarmed civilians who had done nothing wrong merely for being close to people carrying weapons and reported killing insurgents.

Re: Journalists Hacked with Suspected NSO Group iMessage ‘Zero-Click’ Exploit

#303

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Utter crap. The overwhelming majority of NSO's hiring pool -- i.e. army tech "graduates" -- are firmly against them. Another chunk doesn't care and is swayed by their 2-4x salaries, luxurious company vacations, gifts, all things to "make it up for" what you do. They're known to be "the bad guys". The tech courses we took in the army had plenty of emphasis on ethics, both the moral kind and conflict-of-interest kind.…

>tech courses we took in the army had plenty of emphasis on ethics, both the moral kind and conflict-of-interest kind All the things done to all citizens of Israel (for example, indiscriminate movement and contact tracing) and residents of occupied territories are made possible by graduates of these courses. Main emphasis of "emphasis on ethics" is explanation to soldiers how each choice made during a chain of events…

What I meant is "don't go black hat", along with things that, upon writing this reply, might be too revealing to put online.

I've written and rewritten this reply maybe four times, but there's really no way to phrase it in a way you won't twist it to fit your "you're personally responsible for civilian murder" narrative. But I know what we did (my dept. at least), and that was not it.

Re: Journalists Hacked with Suspected NSO Group iMessage ‘Zero-Click’ Exploit

#304

How come when we hear about this stuff it is always Israeli companies involved? Is ethics not taught in Israeli Computer Science curricula? Those who wrote this exploit are clearly "brilliant" and at least some of them are bound to be reading Hacker News. Is other countries' spyware firms just better at hiding their malware than Israel's is?

> Is ethics not taught in Israeli Computer Science curricula? ...Is ethis taught in any CS curriculum? It sure wasn't in mine (but to be fair, that was in Switzerland).

I think every legitimate University makes their students take at least one philosophy course?

Philosophy 101 (and every equivalent) heavily focuses on the classical and modern teachings on morals and ethics.

Re: Journalists Hacked with Suspected NSO Group iMessage ‘Zero-Click’ Exploit

#305

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yet they somehow roll out some crazy new memoji or drawing feature every year Their priorities are just in the wrong place

Of course, the people writing the Memoji code and the people doing security work on the app are frequently different people…

Any developer must take care security at some level.

Re: Journalists Hacked with Suspected NSO Group iMessage ‘Zero-Click’ Exploit

#306

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Hating on Israel specifically is a very cool and woke thing to do. Has been for decades. Well Israeli has been treating palestinians pretty badly so it's not like it isn't justified. At least critising Israel for genuine reasons isn't deemed anti-semitic in the latest international standard of the definition, oh wait!

Depending on when your justifiability timeline begins, Palestine is occupying the area illegally.

Illegally living in slums and being killed by those they oppress and occupy? Oh please.

Re: Journalists Hacked with Suspected NSO Group iMessage ‘Zero-Click’ Exploit

#307
post #69

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I forgot to add on my hypothetical that the Somalian government was protecting me. In which case it would be valid for people to be calling for sanctions let alone revocation of state aid. Iirc, hacking team dissolved or greatly downsized after their leak. I do not recall any cases against them for their export license to be revoked. I'm sure if the Italian courts rejected the case baselessly then there would be cons…

>The difference with Italy is that it does not receive state aid from the Americans. I'm sure if they were then people would be calling for cuts in a similar situation. This isn't true. On top of the general disaster aid, including $10 million for COVID, we have seven US military bases in the country which accounts for millions a year in aid.

The US is by far the worst aid giver in the western world. Most so-called aid is "you can have this gift if you use it to buy X, Y or Z from businesses in the US".

Look to Scandinavia and you'll see actual aid instead of (poorly) hidden state sponsoring of defense contractors. They even give more per capita than the US without those strings attached. US aid is embarrassing.

Besides, US bases are not aid to the host country but aid by the host country to the US.

Re: Journalists Hacked with Suspected NSO Group iMessage ‘Zero-Click’ Exploit

#308

How come when we hear about this stuff it is always Israeli companies involved? Is ethics not taught in Israeli Computer Science curricula? Those who wrote this exploit are clearly "brilliant" and at least some of them are bound to be reading Hacker News. Is other countries' spyware firms just better at hiding their malware than Israel's is?

> Is ethics not taught in Israeli Computer Science curricula? ...Is ethis taught in any CS curriculum? It sure wasn't in mine (but to be fair, that was in Switzerland).

I took it as an extracurricular course during CS (in the Netherlands).

It remains to this day the one course whose lessons I apply every day in my life, moreso than any of the computer related courses.

Re: Journalists Hacked with Suspected NSO Group iMessage ‘Zero-Click’ Exploit

#309
post #134

Earlier quoted context omitted.

When HackingTeam was exposed, no one was asking to sanction Italy. Hating on Israel specifically is a very cool and woke thing to do. Has been for decades.

Who was the last agent of the Italian state to infiltrate a foreign country and bomb and assassinate civilians in broad daylight? Israel did this last month. I also don't remember Italy bulldozing people's homes while the occupants watch and then turning that land over to their preferred ethnic group, but you know my history isn't so great.

> Who was the last agent of the Italian state to infiltrate a foreign country and bomb and assassinate civilians in broad daylight?

That'd probably be Super Mario.

Re: Journalists Hacked with Suspected NSO Group iMessage ‘Zero-Click’ Exploit

#310

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It helps it exactly as much as I think. Obviously the only one who said anything like that is you though. And now you’re falsely claiming that they intentionally targeted unarmed civilians.

I might be able to agree with your extremely forgiving view of the military's actions if they didn't cover the incident up for years. Instead, they intentionally shot unarmed civilians who had done nothing wrong merely for being close to people carrying weapons and reported killing insurgents.

I’m not “forgiving” anything, just accurately recalling the events. You seem to be intent on lying about what happened, even though it’s all in video.
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