Thank you, Tim
Apple sues NSO Group to curb the abuse of state-sponsored spyware
211–220 of 477 posts
Re: Apple sues NSO Group to curb the abuse of state-sponsored spyware
#212Earlier quoted context omitted.
One could interpret this as the software is "sponsored" by the governments that finance their operations and purchase their products. This would be countries like Saudi Arabia, Mexico, Germany, and Kazakhstan, not necessarily Israel. Though the fact the US has sanctioned an Israeli business does seem to have potential implications on Israeli policy. [1] [1] https://www.reuters.com/technology/us-blacklists-four-compan…
Beyond merely selling their products to Israel, the NSO Group itself is an Israeli firm, founded by ex-Israeli intelligence, and whose products are subject to Israeli national export controls. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/NSO_Group That's a level of sponsorship way beyond simply being a customer... that's state espionage served with a side of profit. It's evil when the USA does it, it's evil when the Russians do it,…
> Israeli national export controls
A crash course in Israeli national export control:
1. You can sell everything except for nuclear tech (and maybe even that, I don't know).
2. If the client is not officially an enemy of Israel then do whatever you want, we don't give an f'ing f'.
3. If the client _is_ officially an enemy of Israel, then all sales must be conducted through official (secret) state channels. Independent side-action will not be tolerated (see the cases of Nahum Manbar or Shim'on Sheves). This might be a hassle, but the upside is that the courts will uphold complete secrecy of your affairs and the military censorship (yes, Israel has that) will likely prevent any nasty exposes.
4. If the US throws a tantrum, then sections (1.) and (2.) are abrogated. But don't worry: There plenty of generals and other high-ranking retired officers are in key positions in politics, and a bunch of us are wanted for war crimes anyways with ICC cases pending, so... we're all friends here and we got your back.
Re: Apple sues NSO Group to curb the abuse of state-sponsored spyware
#213It is great to see this happen. It's also fascinating that the crux of the Apple's case against NSO hinges on NSO engineers that accepted iCloud's terms and conditions. From related NYT article: > The sample of Pegasus gave Apple a forensic understanding of how Pegasus worked. The company found that NSO’s engineers had created more than 100 fake Apple IDs to carry out their attacks. In the process of creating those a…
I guess they haven't done this, but isn't this trivially mitigated by hiring someone to create the accounts, outside of the US entirely, in a jurisdiction where T&C violation doesn't mean anything? Especially if the accounts are needed in bulk, where it makes sense not just to work around the legal arguments but simply economically.
Re: Apple sues NSO Group to curb the abuse of state-sponsored spyware
#214Earlier 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…
> 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? for commercial interactions in particular between two businesses? Yes, absolutely. How else are two entities supposed to come to legally binding terms without a contract? I'm all for a little bit of lenience when an end user didn't read the terms but you think NSO group doesn't h…
> How else are two entities supposed to come to legally binding terms without a contract?
The question is what's the threshold for the existence of a contract. You both go into a conference room with lawyers and negotiate over the terms and sign it in ink, that's some pretty good yes vibes. Somebody clicks a button on an un-negotiated text form in a piece of software, maybe it should take more than that.
> I'm all for a little bit of lenience when an end user didn't read the terms but you think NSO group doesn't have a lawyer and just scrolls down and clicks accept?
Tons of bureaucracies do exactly that. The boss says they need a way to do this thing, so some Danny from the IT department finds some software to do that thing, it's free or costs less than the amount he's authorized to spend from petty cash, so he clicks accept and installs it on the user's machine.
Re: Apple sues NSO Group to curb the abuse of state-sponsored spyware
#215Earlier quoted context omitted.
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 servic…
They'd have to prove that Apple was negligent to sell software with flaws, but that's gonna be tough considering that much software has flaws.
> They'd have to prove that Apple was negligent to sell software with flaws, but that's gonna be tough considering that much software has flaws.
It does carry a strange irony when Apple keep saying they have the best security after iOS has been very badly hacked by nation state actors, though. I'm not saying their security isn't good, but I would have rathered "we're fixing X things" than security hyperbole.
Re: Apple sues NSO Group to curb the abuse of state-sponsored spyware
#216Earlier quoted context omitted.
There are some practical problems with this. Suppose that Small Co sells the assets of a business unit to Big Co. Do you now have a contract with Small Co. or Big Co.? Small Co. no longer has the rights to the software. Big Co. may not agree to the terms of the old license. Suppose someone dies and their assets go to their heirs. Do you now have a contract with the heirs? What if there are no heirs, so the assets go…
I like how suddenly the intense legal minuate are the most important details of a system as if we're in a contract law class, as opposed to the obvious point that in general these agreements are fairly obvious
Making up rules without thinking about the consequences of those rules is a Bad Idea.
Re: Apple sues NSO Group to curb the abuse of state-sponsored spyware
#217Earlier 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…
They are just using the EULA as the basis for claiming jurisdiction. They are actually suing not to stop reverse engineering but rather to recover damages incurred by unlawful business practices. Basically their argument is that: 0) The defendant's can be sued under California law because they accepted the EULA. 1) California law makes businesses liable for damages incurred by their unlawful business practices. 2) Bu…
>0) The defendant's can be sued under California law because they accepted the EULA
The Court has personal jurisdiction over Defendants because, on information
and
belief, they created more than one hundred Apple IDs to carry out their
attacks and also agreed to
Apple’s iCloud Terms and Conditions (“iCloud Terms”), including a mandatory
and enforceable
forum selection and exclusive jurisdiction clause that constitutes express
consent to the jurisdiction
of this Court.7
Judge: did you, NSO agree to the Terms and conditions by pressing "I Agree"
NSO representative: No, Your honor.
Apple Lawyer: Then how did you gain access to my clients services?
NSO Rep: A totally unrelated third party gave us 100 unlocked iPhones as a free gift. We never saw the terms and conditions, nor agreed to them. We can fully prove our claims. [edit: (fully proves his claims)]
Apple Lawyer: (spluttering) but... but... but...
Judge: (bangs gavel) case dismissed!
This is assuming NSO were far- sighted enough to actually create such a paper trail. Also, since Apple is disputing more then 100 accounts, maybe such a defence would be ruled as improbable, or some other legal jargon. Maybe someone better informed can chip in.
Re: Apple sues NSO Group to curb the abuse of state-sponsored spyware
#218Earlier quoted context omitted.
This doesn't take into account recent events, e.g. the U.S. sanctioning NSO after their dealings in India and with American police departments was confirmed. In any case, this is a civil suit in federal courts. Even if State wanted to intervene, it would have to do so through informal channels.
Their website is still up, posting news, hosted on AWS on one of the us-west AZs. The US is going at them with less vigor than a whack-a-mole torrent site de jure. > In any case, this is a civil suit in federal courts. Even if State wanted to intervene, it would have to do so through informal channels. But didn't we just agree that the federal court system is pretty toothless here without the support of the state dep…
The federal court could only ever do what a federal court could do which is levy sanctions or judgments against NSO property.
Re: Apple sues NSO Group to curb the abuse of state-sponsored spyware
#219Earlier quoted context omitted.
They'd have to prove that Apple was negligent to sell software with flaws, but that's gonna be tough considering that much software has flaws.
> They'd have to prove that Apple was negligent to sell software with flaws, but that's gonna be tough considering that much software has flaws. It does carry a strange irony when Apple keep saying they have the best security after iOS has been very badly hacked by nation state actors, though. I'm not saying their security isn't good, but I would have rathered "we're fixing X things" than security hyperbole.
Thanks for sharing your marketing preferences.
Re: Apple sues NSO Group to curb the abuse of state-sponsored spyware
#220Earlier quoted context omitted.
> 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…
Replace "Apple" by any traditional car company and you should immediately become concerned. Shouldn't a car company have absolute, one-sided control over the cars they sell? Like should the car stop working if you agreed to obey the speed limit but then sped? Or stop working if you didn't use their branded fluids?
..Or the warranty becomes void if you open up the hood of your car and try to repair/replace parts..