Pegasus Spyware - Massive surveillance of dissidents and political opponents.

[MAHak]

A huge scandal of extensive surveillance of journalists, activists, businessmen, politicians, among others, has been exposed. Apparently it has been going for years and has been conducted by various autocrats and authoritarian rulers, who used the Israel made software to spy on people they were afraid of.

https://www.theguardian.com/news/series/pegasus-project

It seems pretty big brother’ish to me and I hope the perpetrators will meet some kind of justice for their heinous act!

 

[Ripper]

Yep, the Guardian is properly on the warpath with this one. I think something like this is great news. Not that it's been happening, but that it's obvious things like this have been going on, and this will slap the public and the powers that be around the head with it.

 

[Carnifex]

Nod, I posted about this yesterday in another thread, no one seemed to notice. It's for certain this isn't anything new, things like this have been going on since the advent of bbs boards in the eighties, and now some of the offenders are being dragged out into the light. It'll be interesting to see what happens next, will people simply accept this as a potential hazard, or actually smarten up and make smarter choices?

 

[Ripper]

My GrapheneOS phone will remain safely under my tinfoil fedora.

 

[Alrik Fassbauer]

NSO ? I read about it. Awful.

Greed for power makes people do want to eliminate everyone who is standing in the way of their rise to power.

 

[Ripper]

Nod, I posted about this yesterday in another thread, no one seemed to notice.

Yes, I saw that, but I wanted to do more reading before responding to it. Then when I came back, there was a dedicated thread for it, which seemed like the best place to comment.

 

[Capt. Huggy Face]

There was a time when I used to get more worked about this stuff, but I just don't have the strength for it anymore. I doubt anyone cares much about my personal choices in pornography or rants about monkeys found here.

 

[Carnifex]

Yeah, it's one of those articles where you really have to read every single word, then have a massive think about it all. Or at least I did, and I'm already fairly paranoid about the interwebs, yet this took it to an almost obscene level, now.

 

[Ripper]

There was a time when I used to get more worked about this stuff, but I just don't have the strength for it anymore. I doubt anyone cares much about my personal choices in pornography or rants about monkeys found here.

Yeah, I completely understand that many folks are not going to be too concerned about being targets in themselves. And of course if things did go tyrannical, there's so much data about us out there that is not contained on our personal devices - our medical details, the books we read, the other media we consume, the linking of our email addresses to the various things we've signed up to, and on and on.

So, for me, it's not so much the details of this particular episode, but rather that anything that keeps the power and danger of the way information is abused in the public eye is a good thing. Certainly in Europe, some countries have been under dictatorships in fairly recent history, and if that happened again under these conditions, we'd be absolutely buggered.

 

[Capt. Huggy Face]

I do see the risk in all this, though. I'm not in favor of government and the like leaning on little folks to consolidate their power.

I'm just glad I'm not important enough for anyone to want to lean on me or to feel the need to pretend I'm something I'm not.

 

[Zloth]

What worries me most is the delivery: no clicks, it just gets sent in to a phone that isn't even in use at the time. Somehow. That sounds like a MASSIVE security breach to me! What's up with that!?

Nod, I posted about this yesterday in another thread, no one seemed to notice.

I noticed, but hadn't heard anything yet. Heard about it again the next day, and felt properly superior about how my sources had already alerted me to the issue.

 

[Carnifex]

Hahaha yeah, I got a link sent to me from a mate in Canada and the subject line was, "Dude, you were sooo right"!

People call me a luddite yet powerful creations like these, let free on the interwebs with absolutely no oversight at all....well, hello Orwell. And I'm not even sure how much actual oversight would help, tbh. Where indeed do I begin and you end? The next massive innovation might be the gaffer that comes up with something that can block or disarm insidious trackers such as these.

 

[Capt. Huggy Face]

I know this is the wrong place for this, but you guys talking about Orwell keeps bringing this photo back to mind. First off, the story is about China saber rattling to nuke Japan if it tries to defend Taiwan, just about the last thing this world needs right now. But take a look near the bottom at that photo of Xi addressing the 100th anniversary of the Chinese Communist Party a couple weeks ago. They couldn't have built a better set for a movie of 1984 if they tried.

Edit:
As part of my unending struggle to stay on topic, I will also offer this. You know, I'm not sure anyone gives much ink, outside of fiction like Orwell's, to what I see as one of the worst, though intangible, effects of this type of business.

And I'm not just talking about this Pegasus program but a host of tactics employed by advertisers, corporations, governments, employers and many more. This Big Brother way of conducting business has already led, from what I can see, to an identifiable change in people's behavior. They're more paranoid, less trusting, phonier and angrier. And there's reason for this. I don't blame them. But it's a crying damn shame. I fear for what this antagonistic, oppressive culture, which seems to only be taking firmer root, will continue to twist people into.

 

[Carnifex]

Capt. Huggy Face, you go right on posting your thoughts, mate. Even if they stray off topic at times, you generally wrap them up well, and contribute honestly to many of the discussions here. Sometimes I find that often one must look out and survey the field completely before understanding what's really happening, as well as any likely ramifications to the topic at hand.

 

[MAHak]

If I was living in a country where I was a likely target for government spying, I would regularly interject my communication with sentences like, “it’s only weak pathetic scum-people who fear their political opponents and deep down they know that their political views are worthless trash, and that’s why they have to resort to spying because they wouldn’t be able to win a fair election if they didn’t had these crutches”.

Well, provided that any critic of the government wouldn’t land you in prison, then I would probably worry my ass off, and likely avoid using my phone for any purpose that a phone tapper could use against me.

 

[Capt. Huggy Face]

Here's a guy who got outed by a so-called news outlet, and subsequently fired, after they bought information about him complied by advertisers. Have a Coke and a smile, gay church administrator.

 

[Pladio]

Yep, the Guardian is properly on the warpath with this one. I think something like this is great news. Not that it's been happening, but that it's obvious things like this have been going on, and this will slap the public and the powers that be around the head with it.

Doubt anything major will change. Around 2013 they found out the US was spying on all foreign heads of state including its closest allies. Everyone condemned it, then things went back to normal.

 

[Carnifex]

I applaud the Guardian for their efforts, and yup, they've exposed stuff like this before in the past. If nothing happens the onus is on the readers, not the Guardian. At least they're doing a fine job, reporting on items that are actually news-worthy and important.
Shame on us, perhaps.

 

[Ripper]

Doubt anything major will change. Around 2013 they found out the US was spying on all foreign heads of state including its closest allies. Everyone condemned it, then things went back to normal.

Well, like other topics we've been discussing, I think it's highly likely we will do nothing about the train barrelling towards us, and get to enjoy the consequences. But, I think though we might have a realistically grim assessment of the situation, defeatism is irrational - it guarantees failure where a non-zero chance might have existed. So I still look for the opportunities to wake up and act.

 

[Pladio]

I applaud the Guardian for their efforts, and yup, they've exposed stuff like this before in the past. If nothing happens the onus is on the readers, not the Guardian. At least they're doing a fine job, reporting on items that are actually news-worthy and important.
Shame on us, perhaps.

Well, like other topics we've been discussing, I think it's highly likely we will do nothing about the train barrelling towards us, and get to enjoy the consequences. But, I think though we might have a realistically grim assessment of the situation, defeatism is irrational - it guarantees failure where a non-zero chance might have existed. So I still look for the opportunities to wake up and act.

Oh I agree completely, especially with @Carnifex;. I think we should try, but I just am very pessimistic about it.