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Enough is enough

nsogroup.com

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Re: Enough is enough

#111

Post by cyberge99 »

PicassoCTs wrote: post #96
zpeti wrote: post #79

Earlier quoted context omitted.

While broadly I can agree with you, a corporation is still made up of people, and is lead by people. It’s perfectly possible for someone with a backbone to lead a corporation in a moral way.

The cells in the body of a murderer could have stopped him/her, if they had seized the moment. But they did not. Thus there are endless philosophical arguments about free will to be had, but for practicality, we assume the outermost shell with the most control, is responsible for the inner components. If we treat cooperation like persons, they should be judged and sentenced as person. Including restructuring of malfo…

Could you imagine the criminal reforms that would result from a world in which corporations could be sentenced to death?

Re: Enough is enough

#112

Post by dredmorbius »

Harold Lasswell has an interesting model of communications:

- Who?

- Says What?

- In Which Channel?

- To Whom?

- With What Effect?

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lasswell%27s_model_of_communic...

Lasswell, Harold (1948). Bryson, L. (ed.). The Structure and Function of Communication in Society. The Communication of Ideas. New York: Institute for Religious and Social Studies. p. 117.

All communication is performative art. The performances and audiences differ. Often for the same work.

Communications such as these have two principle audiences:

- The general public - The interests for which the speaker is operating.

The message to the public is pretty clearly "fuck you".

The message to organisations which may have used such services, and who may or may not have a history of acting with lethal force to protect their interests, is "we deny everything, we are the shield between you and the world, and we will not be talking further, and we can say this as bluntly as possible because we have major institutional, interest, and/or state backing."

That's not an uncommon message. It's generally not phrased quite so bluntly. That it is here may in fact be part of the signaling.

(All clearly conjecture, though it coheres.)

Re: Enough is enough

#113

Post by ManBlanket »

StreamBright wrote: post #25
Barrin92 wrote: post #7

> "NSO will thoroughly investigate any credible proof of misuse of its technologies, as we always had, and will shut down the system where necessary." From Wikipedia: "In October 2018 Citizen Lab reported on the use of NSO software to spy on the inner circle of Jamal Khashoggi just before his murder. Citizen Lab's October report[65] stated, with high confidence, that NSO's Pegasus had been placed on the iPhone of Sau…

Corporations do not have any moral at all. It is always virtue signaling when they pretend they do have.

Do no evil... Except when it's profitable.

Re: Enough is enough

#114

Post by Yoric »

cyberge99 wrote: post #111
PicassoCTs wrote: post #96

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The cells in the body of a murderer could have stopped him/her, if they had seized the moment. But they did not. Thus there are endless philosophical arguments about free will to be had, but for practicality, we assume the outermost shell with the most control, is responsible for the inner components. If we treat cooperation like persons, they should be judged and sentenced as person. Including restructuring of malfo…

Could you imagine the criminal reforms that would result from a world in which corporations could be sentenced to death?

That... actually sounds like a very interesting idea.

Re: Enough is enough

#115

Post by cbsmith »

gonehome wrote: post #105
cbsmith wrote: post #102

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I said they don't appear to be abdicating responsibility for the risk their software could be used for bad things to happen. If you look at the report, it's all about weighing that risk against the risks of not licensing their software. They are abdicating responsibility for the list, which doesn't seem unreasonable since the Pegasus Project has been pretty explicit that they don't know where the list came from, who…

Thanks for the details - given that, they could have written a real response to the allegations rather than this blog post they posted and it would have come across better. This blog post comes across very defensive somewhat clueless, doesn't inspire confidence. I get why they'd not want to engage with the media (media writers are often useless at best, if not actively/intentionally harmful with regard to this kind o…

The tough thing about being attacked in the press with misinformation is it is very difficult to respond in a way that comes across well. As you can see from the Post's publication of the correspondence from NSO (https://www.washingtonpost.com/investigations/2021/07/18/nso...), they did try to inform the media about the technical nuance, but it's hard to get between a journalist and what looks like a great story.

I think a skilled and experienced PR professional could have maybe navigated this successfully, but I've seen plenty of them fail in less difficult contexts than this.

Re: Enough is enough

#116

Post by bongcloud420 »

PicassoCTs wrote: post #96
zpeti wrote: post #79

Earlier quoted context omitted.

While broadly I can agree with you, a corporation is still made up of people, and is lead by people. It’s perfectly possible for someone with a backbone to lead a corporation in a moral way.

The cells in the body of a murderer could have stopped him/her, if they had seized the moment. But they did not. Thus there are endless philosophical arguments about free will to be had, but for practicality, we assume the outermost shell with the most control, is responsible for the inner components. If we treat cooperation like persons, they should be judged and sentenced as person. Including restructuring of malfo…

I don't understand this comparison. Corporations are not actually people, they're made up of people, that really do make decisions about things.

Re: Enough is enough

#118

Post by _eqet »

If you discover a 0-day, as as software developer, you have the moral responsibility to report it to the manufacturer, not to sell it and make money off of it.

Their argument of "we're trying to stop terrorists, pedophiles etc" is the same argument as all the government organizations that are cracking down on encryption, and how bad guys can benefit from it.

NSO knows that they've fuked up, and the tone of the article clearly indicates that. They just want to plead ignorance. Hopefully they get sued and bankrupt their butts, but again they're just going to rebrand and start doing the same thing over again

Re: Enough is enough

#119

Post by fmajid »

cyberge99 wrote: post #111
PicassoCTs wrote: post #96

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The cells in the body of a murderer could have stopped him/her, if they had seized the moment. But they did not. Thus there are endless philosophical arguments about free will to be had, but for practicality, we assume the outermost shell with the most control, is responsible for the inner components. If we treat cooperation like persons, they should be judged and sentenced as person. Including restructuring of malfo…

Could you imagine the criminal reforms that would result from a world in which corporations could be sentenced to death?

That’s what actually happened to accounting firm Arthur Andersen for its role in the Enron fraud and bankruptcy.

I’m all in favor of the corporate death penalty.

Originally corporations were chartered under authority of the king for a limited time, typically 20 to 30 years, so great was the mistrust in them.

Re: Enough is enough

#120

Post by fmajid »

soheil wrote: post #67
notafraudster wrote: post #22

Pretty embarrassing response, honestly. If you specifically work in an area that can be used for sensitive purposes, you have a moral responsibility as to who you choose to sell to and what you choose to enable them to do. Moreover, if you're going to engage in moral indignation -- we can't possibly be responsible for what our customers do!!! -- then you can't end with a paragraph about how you're a league of superhe…

> Kashoggi's widows Plural?

He had a religious marriage with Hatice, not a civil one, and in fact was reluctantly going to the Saudi consulate to finalize the divorce papers for his separated second wife, which they told him could only be done in person. Apparently MBS has assured him personally no harm would come to him.
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