The secret Uganda deal that has brought NSO to the brink of collapse • Hacker News Board

Re: The secret Uganda deal that has brought NSO to the brink of collapse

#21

Post by shmatt » Wed, Dec 22, 2021, 4:24 PM UTC

yardie wrote: post #4

Which is odd because NSO made many assurances to the US govt they were in control of the tech and that US nationals were not to be included. Looks like they weren't in as much control as they stated they were.

US nationals have never been protected. If you make an international phone call the government can track it[1]. If its internal they can't without a warrant

NSO built in a complete block of +1 phone numbers. But those US diplomats were not using +1. Which itself is a security issue that i'm sure is already being discussed at the state department

[1]https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/2015/04/07/dea-bulk-tele...

Re: The secret Uganda deal that has brought NSO to the brink of collapse

#22

Post by not2b » Wed, Dec 22, 2021, 4:29 PM UTC

pc86 wrote: post #12

yardie wrote: post #11

Earlier quoted context omitted.

A bit of both. I assume they can spy on the US through 5-eyes, 9-eyes, 27eyes, etc. But to allow Uganda to do it was a bridge too far. If NSO had been in almost any other country there wouldn't be a building left standing. The US regards cyberattacks as an act of war.

If the US really regarded cyberattacks as an act of war, it would be actively shooting missiles and bullets at China right now . The US regards cyberattacks as acts of war when convenient, nothing more.

Nuclear powers can't make full-scale war on each other. If they ever do, the death toll would make WW2 look like a skirmish. So any attacks are at the edges (respond in kind, or proportionately, rather than escalate to a shooting war).

Re: The secret Uganda deal that has brought NSO to the brink of collapse

#23

Post by qnsi » Wed, Dec 22, 2021, 4:31 PM UTC

mzs wrote: post #18

profstasiak wrote: post #14

Right now we have mini crisis in Poland connected with this US/NSO war. One prosecutor, who is fighting for indepenend judiciary and against her political boss, head prosecutor Minister of Justice, smaller party Coalition member, got notification her iPhone has been hacked multiple time by Pegasus. She angried the rulling coalition, after she wanted to investigate illegal vote by mail election, that didnt take place…

Could you please name: > One prosecutor, who is fighting for > The other person that was hacked more than ten times, is famous attorney edit: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=29648072

as mentioned by a sibling. You can read about it here https://www.politico.eu/article/polish-spyware-scandal-stoke...

Re: The secret Uganda deal that has brought NSO to the brink of collapse

#24

Post by bestouff » Wed, Dec 22, 2021, 4:31 PM UTC

So hacking phones for the US governement is ok, but hacking phones for Uganda is not ?

Re: The secret Uganda deal that has brought NSO to the brink of collapse

#25

Post by optimalsolver » Wed, Dec 22, 2021, 4:44 PM UTC

Were the US officials that Uganda was spying on diplomats, or "diplomats"?

Re: The secret Uganda deal that has brought NSO to the brink of collapse

#26

Post by Terry_Roll » Wed, Dec 22, 2021, 4:45 PM UTC

yardie wrote: post #4

Which is odd because NSO made many assurances to the US govt they were in control of the tech and that US nationals were not to be included. Looks like they weren't in as much control as they stated they were.

I think NSO are scapegoats, because how hard is it for a country to setup up a honeypot device to analyse NSO'a attack vectors and then copy it for their own use whilst being able to blame it on NSO?

I say this because I've had stuff done to my phones in the past, one strange incident with a "hacked" phone was selecting an AirBnB, which I believe directed me to a few of their "safe" houses. Other examples, include batteries going flat over night when asleep despite phone being switched off, not charging but was fully charged before it was switched off. The phone signal is weak when that took place so it would have burned through the battery amplifying the signal, but listening in to people sleeping can elucidate what might be on their mind!

Re: The secret Uganda deal that has brought NSO to the brink of collapse

#27

Post by 1cvmask » Wed, Dec 22, 2021, 4:54 PM UTC

There is a unclear reference to Intel in the article. Was Intel working with NSO?

"In recent weeks, for instance, Intel asked all its employees to cease any ongoing business relationships with NSO, one person familiar with the matter said. Intel said in a statement that it “complies with all applicable US laws, including US export control regulations”."

Re: The secret Uganda deal that has brought NSO to the brink of collapse

#28

Post by wayoutthere » Wed, Dec 22, 2021, 4:55 PM UTC

bawolff wrote: post #13

hermes8329 wrote: post #9

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Is that sarcasm? The Israelis spying on the us is hardly anything new

There's a pretty big difference between israel, the country spying on somebody out of national interest, and israel allowing what is essentially an arms-dealer based in israel to help random other people spy on countries they are allied with. I highly doubt that israel the country wanted this turn of events, for the simple reason they are not stupid and the cost-benefit ratio of this seems bad for them.

The state of Israel is already one of the most prolific arms dealers in the world. Something like 10% of weapons (everything from rifles and ammo to tanks and precision guided missiles) sold every year globally are made in Israel. They will sell to anyone (through intermediaries if the political optics don’t align), and have ample opportunity to combat test weapons thanks to the low-grade civil war they’ve been waging against the Arabs for the last 70 years.

They won’t want to be seen as reining in Israeli military overreach because there’s a feeder pipeline from the Israeli military into both politics and the weapons industry. It’s the same people running the country that are selling these weapons.

Re: The secret Uganda deal that has brought NSO to the brink of collapse

#29

Post by rmah » Wed, Dec 22, 2021, 5:20 PM UTC

bestouff wrote: post #24

So hacking phones for the US governement is ok, but hacking phones for Uganda is not ?

Yes, according to the US gov. I imagine that according to the Ugandan gov, it's ok to hack phones of foreign govs but not of the Ugandan gov. In fact, I strongly suspect that for any nation X, it's ok to hack non-X gov phones but not X gov phones. I don't understand why this surprises anyone.

Re: The secret Uganda deal that has brought NSO to the brink of collapse

#30

Post by KKKKkkkk1 » Wed, Dec 22, 2021, 5:25 PM UTC

cjfd wrote: post #8

pm90 wrote: post #3

This is an interesting industry. > “We always knew this thing had an expiration date,” he told the friend, complaining that some clients had asked to shift their contracts to lesser-known rivals, according to a person familiar with the conversation. I guess if you have this perspective, you want to maximize revenues and IPO before your product gets misused and invites US sanctions. I wonder what the reaction would be…

What would happen if it was a US company? Probably they would be forbidden from selling anything outside of the US. Remember what the US did with crypto exports for decades? Next, if you tried to investigate anything that it was doing, you would be persecuted relentlessly by the US government. Note what happened to Julian Assange. It really is not like the US government is a nice organization or anything.

> What would happen if it was a US company? Probably they would be forbidden from selling anything outside of the US.

That's just false. The NSA bought the Swiss company Crypto AG and has been selling backdoored crypto devices all over the world for decades before being found out.