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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

#221

Post by PedroBatista »

diebeforei485 wrote: post #51
darksaints wrote: post #45

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Most likely the malware is using SSL so packet sniffing from an external device isn't gonna work. And it's apple, so at best you might find a firewall among their tightly locked down app store. Don't worry, apple knows what's good for you far better than you ever could ::eye roll::

A lot of the teams inside Apple who create first-party apps like iMessage are understaffed compared to their competitors. They should really hire more security folks. A lot of Apple's product security work seems to be outsourced to Google Project Zero.

Poor Apple, they are so busy protecting our privacy and telling us about it they forgot to hire people.

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

#222

Post by TruthHurts44 »

bjourne wrote: post #104

How come when we hear about this stuff it is always Israeli companies involved? Is ethics not taught in Israeli Computer Science curricula? Those who wrote this exploit are clearly "brilliant" and at least some of them are bound to be reading Hacker News. Is other countries' spyware firms just better at hiding their malware than Israel's is?

No,they do not. Israelis are also big in the Forex "trading", Binary options, porn websites, etc

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

#223

Post by baybal2 »

yyyk wrote: post #216
baybal2 wrote: post #215

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Israel is the only country in the world where the judiciary appoints itself No. Judges who serve on the Supreme Court, as well as the district and magistrate courts, are appointed by the Judicial Selection Committee, which consists of nine members: the Minister of Justice, another cabinet member, two Knesset members (in practice one is from the coalition and the other is from the opposition), two members of the Isr…

In short, Judges and people who are dependent on them have an absolute majority. They also have a direct veto power over any Supreme Court appointment (7 of 9 and they have 3 votes).

No

The establishment already has 3 votes by default, and needs only 2 yes votes — an easy thing to do, and almost certain if supreme court is already stuffed by pro-establishment judges for a few government terms.

And candidates for supreme court appointment almost always come from seniormost district court judges, which were simple majority appointed.

And if supreme court appointment keeps getting vetoed, they can simply do nothing, and wait for appointment by default of seniormost district court judge.

And all of this does not matter at all when IDF intervenes.

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

#224

Post by yyyk »

baybal2 wrote: post #223
yyyk wrote: post #216

Earlier quoted context omitted.

In short, Judges and people who are dependent on them have an absolute majority. They also have a direct veto power over any Supreme Court appointment (7 of 9 and they have 3 votes).

No The establishment already has 3 votes by default, and needs only 2 yes votes — an easy thing to do, and almost certain if supreme court is already stuffed by pro-establishment judges for a few government terms. And candidates for supreme court appointment almost always come from seniormost district court judges, which were simple majority appointed. And if supreme court appointment keeps getting vetoed, they can s…

"The establishment already has 3 votes by default, and needs only 2 yes votes"

Except the 'only 2 votes' are dependent on the other 3 vote block for a living. Also, the Supreme Court has retained its option for interfering with the composition of Knesset block, and putting an opposition member in it, which would make it an effective 1 member block.

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

#225

Post by baybal2 »

quetzthecoatl wrote: post #218
yyyk wrote: post #212

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>Israel has no genuinely independent judiciary, nor genuinely free press. Israel is the only country in the world where the judiciary appoints itself and a newspaper like "Ha'artez" can exist. >Any normal nation would be completely horrified at the prospect of a private company effectively intervening into its foreign relations That would make most of the West "not normal nations".

India too (which is actually unconstitutional, but somehow that's ignored and judges select their friends and kin as next gen judges)

Keeping jokes to myself, but Pakistan also has quite a number of jokes how words "judicial fraternity" apply in the most literal sense.

18th amendment tried to fix the issue, but paradoxically just made it worse. The Chaudhry train wreck was a complete tragicomedy.

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

#226

Post by PedroBatista »

computerex wrote: post #193
marcan_42 wrote: post #187

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Apple's security architecture is leagues ahead of Android's. They have bespoke innovative protections at the hardware and hypervisor level, as well as an actual security CPU (as opposed to TrustZone on Androids, which is always swiss cheese in one way or another). This is largely possible because Apple are building their own silicon (none of the other silicon vendors are anywhere near as competent in this field). I s…

Android dominates the mobile OS market share though. Seems like targeting it would yield a higher ROI. Much like how malware writers target Windows, because it dominates the desktop OS market share.

Hope the HN crowd doesn’t take this the wrong way but, an Apple user tends to be a more valuable target. Think government brass, corporate elites and all their soft bellies, ie daddy’s teenage daughter or run of the mill mistress.

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

#227

Post by rmrfstar »

saagarjha wrote: post #72

> We were unable to retrieve these binaries from flash memory, as we did not have access to a jailbreak for iPhone 11 running iOS 13.5.1. It’s ironic that the exploit is able to plant arbitrary code on an up-to-date device and yet the owner of the phone can’t introspect their phone to see it themselves because they don’t know how to bypass the protections :/

These attacks would be a lot less dangerous if they couldn't get on-disk persistence. Just reboot your phone, and you're good to go. Only creeps like NSO who spy on normal people need that degree of persistence. Everyone else can just hang out in ram on some always-on server.

Vendors need to make it easier to verify the integrity of persistent firmware, in an offline fashion. It will dramatically increase the cost of persistence, which is the best way to put these thugs out of business.

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

#228

Post by bzb6 »

saagarjha wrote: post #72

> We were unable to retrieve these binaries from flash memory, as we did not have access to a jailbreak for iPhone 11 running iOS 13.5.1. It’s ironic that the exploit is able to plant arbitrary code on an up-to-date device and yet the owner of the phone can’t introspect their phone to see it themselves because they don’t know how to bypass the protections :/

They should’ve sent the phones to Apple to investigate.

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

#229

Post by doctorbaum »

baybal2 wrote: post #201
slavak wrote: post #178

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The Israeli government has absolutely no say in how any of this plays out, that is the entire point of an independent judiciary. The lawsuit and sanctions are decided by the courts based on existing laws and precedent, and for them Facebook's size or position in the Israeli market does not (and should not) hold any weight whatsoever. The most the legislative can do is amend the relevant laws to make what Facebook tri…

> The Israeli government has absolutely no say in how any of this plays out, that is the entire point of an independent judiciary. Israel has no genuinely independent judiciary, nor genuinely free press. IDF regularly intervenes in both, that's a very poorly held secret. Any normal nation would be completely horrified at the prospect of a private company effectively intervening into its foreign relations, but Israel…

You have no idea what you're talking about, and comments like "that's a very poorly held secret." don't deserve the effort of trying to find a reference to refute them.

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

#230

Post by bzb6 »

bjourne wrote: post #104

How come when we hear about this stuff it is always Israeli companies involved? Is ethics not taught in Israeli Computer Science curricula? Those who wrote this exploit are clearly "brilliant" and at least some of them are bound to be reading Hacker News. Is other countries' spyware firms just better at hiding their malware than Israel's is?

I would tell you why, but I would get banned.
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