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Journalists Hacked with Suspected NSO Group iMessage ‘Zero-Click’ Exploit

citizenlab.ca

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Re: Journalists Hacked with Suspected NSO Group iMessage ‘Zero-Click’ Exploit

#141
post #41

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You seem to assume “America” values the lives of all journalists, including ones outside their sphere of influence. That has never been true, and likely never will be. As long as US and Israel are fundamentally aligned on long-term foreign policy objectives, aid will continue to be provided no matter what. Dirty work has to be done by someone .

America has no qualms killing journalists in their sphere of influence, and they even prosecute journalists for reporting on their killings. See "Collateral Murder."

You better watch and read up on collateral murder again, because it sure as shit wasn’t an example of America having no qualms about killing journalists.

Re: Journalists Hacked with Suspected NSO Group iMessage ‘Zero-Click’ Exploit

#142

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I’ve seen too many of these comments over the years. They always come from the same hateful place. Once comments like that bubble up, it’s no longer a dialogue and the person writing them is not debating in good faith.

The guidelines tell you to assume good faith, and I think the commenter you’re replying to gave a fairly reasonable explanation of the intention behind what was written. For the most part, people don’t have a vendetta against Israel in particular: they are just unaware of other cases, or aren’t going to bring them up in an article about the NSO group, which is Israeli.

A quick search of “BDS” and “occupation” will quickly demonstrate otherwise.

Re: Journalists Hacked with Suspected NSO Group iMessage ‘Zero-Click’ Exploit

#143

America should stop giving aid to Israel as long as Israeli companies are going to assist in getting journalists arrested/murdered/dismembered.

The "aid" money must be use to buy weapons from America, a thing that highly support it's industry and give jobs to tens of thousands of americans.

Re: Journalists Hacked with Suspected NSO Group iMessage ‘Zero-Click’ Exploit

#144

Earlier quoted context omitted.

But it’s perfectly ok for European or American companies to do the same. Bull of France in Libya. Bluecoat in Syria. Siemens in iraq and Iran. Nokia in Bahrain. Cisco in China. ... The list is literally endless. Yet only Israeli companies are culpable in your mind and to such an extent that the entire state must be sanctioned. No less. Your hypocrisy is leaking.

NSO is owned by a UK based VC group.

Can you please stop doing this? Multiple people (including myself) have told you directly and repeatedly that your comments are not helpful. Israel, Apple security, Rust, I couldn’t care less: the point is you show up and repeatedly post borderline flamebait and drag the conversation down. Your comments outside of those topics seem completely reasonable and productive so I am unsure why you keep at this particular thing.

Re: Journalists Hacked with Suspected NSO Group iMessage ‘Zero-Click’ Exploit

#145

America should stop giving aid to Israel as long as Israeli companies are going to assist in getting journalists arrested/murdered/dismembered.

The "aid" money must be use to buy weapons from America, a thing that highly support it's industry and give jobs to tens of thousands of americans.

Blood money for a highly corrupt industry.

Re: Journalists Hacked with Suspected NSO Group iMessage ‘Zero-Click’ Exploit

#146
post #132

America should stop giving aid to Israel as long as Israeli companies are going to assist in getting journalists arrested/murdered/dismembered.

If America wanted NSO to avoid dealing with particular countries, all it would take is a single phonecall to the Israeli government. It can do that, because one country is a superpower and a different country is the client. I suspect the reason that does not happen is because NSO does the US's dirty work for it, otherwise the US would have stopped it already. After all, the US directly supports those same governments…

> because one country is a superpower and a different country is the client.

If you have really been paying attention to the US-Israel relationship you know that this is not true.

Re: Journalists Hacked with Suspected NSO Group iMessage ‘Zero-Click’ Exploit

#147

As someone that isn't a developer, I wonder how many zero days come from people inside the software team. To simply have knowledge of a difficult bug that hasn't been resolved would seem to be valuable commodity in a closed source system.

Most likely none, but it’s a common conspiracy theory.

Re: Journalists Hacked with Suspected NSO Group iMessage ‘Zero-Click’ Exploit

#148
post #53

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Why punish Israel? The whole "assist[ing] in getting journalists arrested/murdered/dismembered" thing still seems like pretty good justification to me. I'm not sure "but everyone else is doing it!" makes that acceptable. Requiring that we deal with every single one of those problems simultaneously else we shouldn't bother with any of them doesn't seem productive. I'm also not sure I'd describe the refusal to active…

>Requiring that we deal with every single one of those problems simultaneously else we shouldn't bother with any of them doesn't seem productive. Then deal with the domestic ones first, the ones we have the most control over. People only care about these issues when the solution is "punish the country," a solution that likely causes more suffering than it stops.

Oh yea, NSO is totally not causing suffering. It's a benefit to the world, right?

Re: Journalists Hacked with Suspected NSO Group iMessage ‘Zero-Click’ Exploit

#149
post #61

More generally, is there a known correlation between kernel panics and exploits, especially on macOS? > Almisshal’s device shows what appears to be an unusual number of kernel panics (phone crashes) between January and July 2020. While some of the panics may be benign, they may also indicate earlier attempts to exploit vulnerabilities against his device.

I doubt it's macOS only, if you remember EternalBlue, that was called that way because it kept bluescreening on machines the NSA tested it on ...

Do you have a source on the blue screening?. Usually code names are random but can be less random within a group of exploits/projects (such as eternalblue, eternalromance, eternalsyngery, eternalchampion)

Re: Journalists Hacked with Suspected NSO Group iMessage ‘Zero-Click’ Exploit

#150
post #132

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If America wanted NSO to avoid dealing with particular countries, all it would take is a single phonecall to the Israeli government. It can do that, because one country is a superpower and a different country is the client. I suspect the reason that does not happen is because NSO does the US's dirty work for it, otherwise the US would have stopped it already. After all, the US directly supports those same governments…

> because one country is a superpower and a different country is the client. If you have really been paying attention to the US-Israel relationship you know that this is not true.

I say that precisely because I have been paying attention. The opposite impression is useful for both sides, but in reality America calls the shots. Israel would go against America's position only on issues it considers existential or close to such. I doubt NSO even registers.
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