Wow you have to be on HN to see Pegasus portrayed by some people as ‘the little guy’ fighting ‘evil’ Apple.
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Apple sues NSO Group to curb the abuse of state-sponsored spyware
151–160 of 477 posts
Re: Apple sues NSO Group to curb the abuse of state-sponsored spyware
#152Legal methods are a crutch at best. Apple would be wise to put forth the same budget into their security team's research and development and properly address these weaknesses.
Ok normally I’d just let something like this go but I just have to pull my hair out when I see a comment like this. The attack surface of software as complicated as a modern operating system (iOS or MacOS, etc.) is simply too large to lockdown without dramatically hurting the user experience (assuming you could actually achieve a lockdown in the first place!!). Let’s, just for a second, propose that apple went full M…
Apple will advance the security of their platform more by suing NSO and lobbying the US gov to position the official view of the US gov regarding nation-state sponsorship for malicious software as reprehensible efforts which harm everyone (eg like biological/chemical weapons). If the US sanctioned Israel and critiqued them as reckless maybe less countries will support organizations like the NSO group.
Re: Apple sues NSO Group to curb the abuse of state-sponsored spyware
#153If you think that israel is doing anything not sanctioned by the US government you are mistaken. In Israel NSO cant make a move without 7 agencies regulating it. This is considered a weapon sale. The same weapons the US are sponsoring israel and buy them from israeli industry. There is no way NSO will fail from this. So eula or whatever these are matters between states for national security interests.
Wait until you out about five eyes and the run around the 4th amendment.
Re: Apple sues NSO Group to curb the abuse of state-sponsored spyware
#154Re: Apple sues NSO Group to curb the abuse of state-sponsored spyware
#155Earlier quoted context omitted.
Isn't NSO Group an Israeli firm with close ties to government? I strongly doubt anything will come of this.
Can an upset judge decide to put the NSO leaders and employees on a terrorist list? They could argue it was an attack on national security if they can show some important person from US would have been hacked by a foreign government. Then if EU could put the same guys also on the list maybe there would be some effects.
At least one of the founders can be found from American homesoil NYC but we know very well nothing will come out of it because of the Israeli love story Americans have.
Re: Apple sues NSO Group to curb the abuse of state-sponsored spyware
#156Earlier quoted context omitted.
"What if Facebook never filed? Would Apple never be able to act on this?" If there wasn't precedent that Apple's TOS venue clause was binding, then the case would have been thrown out as I just previously explained. "If they would have acted, why didn't they do it before Facebook?" Because the case would have been dismissed as I just explained.
Before Facebook filed, was there precedent for their TOS?
No, but Apple probably didn't want to spend 4 years litigating the TOS issue prior to ever reaching the merits. There's also the risk that they lose the TOS issue.
Re: Apple sues NSO Group to curb the abuse of state-sponsored spyware
#157Earlier quoted context omitted.
Is it great? The lawsuit is Apple trying to enforce the iCloud EULA to stop reverse engineering. While NSO Group created hacking tools, and then did some questionable things with them, do we really want those inane licenses no one reads, and everyone scrolls down to hit [agree]; do we really want them to legally binding? Put another way, if it was someone HN liked , would we still say this is actually good? Because c…
What is great is it could bring some much needed clarity on the subject. A ruling against the EULA might bring some clarity to the limits of powers tech companies have over us. A ruling for the EULA might shine a light the power these companies DO have and force governments to bring in laws to curb them. It is not a good situation, where Apple / Microsoft could turn around and say to someone who broke the EULA or per…
What normal people probably want is the state of affairs that historically existed:
Government (legislative) mandates via law what rights consumers are entitled to, that cannot be stripped from them.
Companies are free to request waiving or agreeing to anything not enumerated in the above.
What's broken down recently is that legislatures aren't doing their job of proactively mandating consumer rights, and consequently companies are requiring whatever they think they can get away with: forced arbitration, lease-not-own, arbitrary right to revoke usage grants, prohibiting user / independent repairs, etc.
Re: Apple sues NSO Group to curb the abuse of state-sponsored spyware
#158Anyone have a sense of the odds that the state secrets privilege gets invoked, and if so how damaging it's likely to be to Apple's case? Most examples involve a government entity being a party to the case, but the privilege did shut down a patent infringement suit between private entities not too long ago (Crater v. Lucent) [1].
[1] https://www.wired.com/2005/09/secrecy-power-sinks-patent-cas...
Re: Apple sues NSO Group to curb the abuse of state-sponsored spyware
#159Earlier quoted context omitted.
It's not just the iCloud terms of service, though — they're using that to strengthen the case that NSO agreed to the jurisdiction of California courts but they're relying on the CFAA and especially the claim that the access to the users' device was not authorized by that user. It would be really interesting to see what precedent comes out of this case and especially how that would affect a future case where Apple cla…
>they're relying on the CFAA and especially the claim that the access to the users' device was not authorized by that user. What's their theory of standing to sue over damage to their customers? Edit: the main point is this (from the CFAA count): Defendants’ actions caused Apple to incur a loss as defined by 18 U.S.C. § 1030(e)(11), in an amount in excess of $5,000 during a one-year period, including the expenditure…
18 U.S.C. § 1030(e)(11) https://www.law.cornell.edu/uscode/text/18/1030
"(11) the term “loss” means any reasonable cost to any victim, including the cost of responding to an offense, conducting a damage assessment, and restoring the data, program, system, or information to its condition prior to the offense, and any revenue lost, cost incurred, or other consequential damages incurred because of interruption of service;"
18 U.S.C. § 1030(g) "
"(g) Any person who suffers damage or loss by reason of a violation of this section may maintain a civil action against the violator to obtain compensatory damages and injunctive relief or other equitable relief. A civil action for a violation of this section may be brought only if the conduct involves 1 of the factors set forth in subclauses [5] (I), (II), (III), (IV), or (V) of subsection (c)(4)(A)(i). Damages for a violation involving only conduct described in subsection (c)(4)(A)(i)(I) are limited to economic damages. No action may be brought under this subsection unless such action is begun within 2 years of the date of the act complained of or the date of the discovery of the damage. No action may be brought under this subsection for the negligent design or manufacture of computer hardware, computer software, or firmware."
I assume "negligent" is used in the legal sense? But it'll be curious if NSO claims they're not liable for selling flaws that already existed in Apple *ware.
Re: Apple sues NSO Group to curb the abuse of state-sponsored spyware
#160Earlier quoted context omitted.
(Not a lawyer, but this is the correct answer) As much as people might look at this and think Apple is being heavy-handed, it comes down to the fact that iCloud, iOS, and the App Store are their IP and they can (within legal limits) set whatever terms they please. Especially for these sorts of arrangements, it seems like a problem to me if the platform/IP owner doesn't have absolute, final discretion over what happen…
This sits so unwell with me, gives such limitless tyrannical & dictatorial control to a company. > As much as people might look at this and think Apple is being heavy-handed, it comes down to the fact that iCloud, iOS, and the App Store are their IP and they can (within legal limits) set whatever terms they please. Agreed. That's exactly what it seems like. And that sounds like immoral, unjustifiable, sickening hell.…
>Agreed. That's exactly what it seems like. And that sounds like immoral, unjustifiable, sickening hell. That Apple gets to hold all the cards, no one else on the planet gets any say in how a device might be used.
I'm not a big proponent of IP, but you're basically saying it is immoral, unjustifiable, and sickening as hell that Apple enforces the rules that Apple wants on Apple products/services, which were created and offered by Apple? Who should be making the rules if not the creator and maintainer of the product/service? Why is using another product/service not an acceptable alternative?
I agree with the general direction of your comment, but certainly not with the same voracity that wouldn't allow my own company to create the rules for my own service offerings (within the confines of state/national law).