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WhatsApp forces Pegasus spyware maker to share its secret code

arstechnica.com

161–170 of 170 posts

Re: WhatsApp forces Pegasus spyware maker to share its secret code

#161

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If I bring a suitcase full of dollars home with me from a trip to the US (assuming I make it through border control with that much cash), I don't see what kind of jurisdiction the USA would have over me for simply owning dollars. These are just pieces of paper, they don't provide any kind of jurisdiction. The American banking system may refuse to serve me perhaps, but it's not the dollars that give the American gover…

> These are just pieces of paper I let you have one guess which entity gives those pieces of paper their value.

> which entity gives those pieces of paper their value

The USA can print and lend dollars to control the value of the currency on the global marketplace. When trading outside of the USA, people give the bills their value.

You can substitute a suitcase with a million dollars for a suitcase full of gold or a suitcase full of diamonds, or a suitcase full of Pokémon cards. Outside the official banking system, the value of paper money is whatever the people trading perceive it to be. In some cases, that value can be larger than a million dollars (i.e. in countries where their own currency is in a free-fall, where the government is trying to limit the supply of foreign currency, but people want to exchange their local currency for something more stable; people in Argentina, Lebanon, Sri Lanka, and Turkey might want to do that).

If, for whatever reason, Russia pays for North Korean drones to murder Ukrainians, there's absolutely nothing the American government can do about that.

Re: WhatsApp forces Pegasus spyware maker to share its secret code

#162

Can anyone explain this case? Why would a US court have any jurisdiction over a foreign Israeli spyware vendor that has already been blacklisted by the US government? And why would Israel send their spyware source code to WhatsApp even if they lose the case?

This is called extraterritoriality. Crazy stories happened here in France. USA basically sent Alstom, a huge French company, to bankruptcy, then bought it for pennies, and then they tried to destroy Airbus. In both cases they used this right they gave themselves they call extraterritoriality. The stories I mentioned are documented in this reportage: https://www.arte.tv/fr/videos/093798-000-A/la-bataille-d-air... The…

Thanks, interesting documentary!

Re: WhatsApp forces Pegasus spyware maker to share its secret code

#165

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Not really. If you want to end up with money you can actually use for things other than paying ransomware, you have to end up with a bank account somewhere. And as banks wants to transact in USD, they play nice with the US government.

Or sell it for cash at a slight discount. People go through worse things when their local fiat goes out of wack.

Cash use is very limited. Once you go over a certain amount, you have to get banked. That's why money laundering is such a successful business.

Re: WhatsApp forces Pegasus spyware maker to share its secret code

#166
post #109

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Who exactly was punished by that EO? You are proving my point, even the most "push back" IAs have seen in terms of concrete actions against them led to... a directive that forbid them from murdering people in foreign countries. No actual consequences for anyone involved, no one got even a slap on the wrist in terms of actual consequences. And that's after the church committee, which revealed some super damning stuff.…

Are you really asking me to cite classified operations? And the fact that subsequent Executive Orders explicitly loosened the reigns on intelligence collection (and assassination with respect to "terrorists") indicates that yes, the original orders did restrict intelligence operations.

You make a good point. While people may have an issue with FISA being opaque they do not consider that maybe it being opaque is good for reasons that cannot be explained. With an explanation like that, how could anyone have a problem with such a thing?

Re: WhatsApp forces Pegasus spyware maker to share its secret code

#167
post #134

Earlier quoted context omitted.

How?

They almost certainly know the exploits being used by Pegasus. It's in their best interest to turn a blind eye. Bookmark this post.

At least some of exploits that were used to install Pegasus have been patched.

You can find details here

>https://citizenlab.ca/2023/09/blastpass-nso-group-iphone-zer...

Vulnerabilities in third party apps that are used to install Pegasus Apple has less control over.

Re: WhatsApp forces Pegasus spyware maker to share its secret code

#168
post #73
post #44

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Because you knew what they meant and trying to correct them only serves to make you feel good about your own knowledge. You aren't helping anyone when you correct them on this.

It costs everyone time and effort to try to decode nonsensical input. It's a crime against humanity to not correct grammar.

Grammar nitpick derails like this one have wasted far more time than anyone saying "I could care less" ever has

Re: WhatsApp forces Pegasus spyware maker to share its secret code

#169
post #68
post #62

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> than to scrape the floor for peanuts in hope that mega corps will reward their discoveries. Security researchers capable of finding these exploits aren't exactly starving for food. They could easily land a $500k+ job at any big tech company or make a similar amount bug bounty hunting.

Ah yes, the lambos come out in force at the bsides conferences.

You have to be very financially irresponsible to buy a Lambo on just 500k HHI

Re: WhatsApp forces Pegasus spyware maker to share its secret code

#170
post #160

Just so you know: https://grapheneos.org/ and https://signal.org/ do exist!

Isn't this a red herring though? If some spyware has ring0 level access on device, security properties of apps like Signal don't really matter since the spyware can trivially access them(?)
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