[HN Gopher] Facebook bans 7 'surveillance-for-hire' companies th...
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       Facebook bans 7 'surveillance-for-hire' companies that spied on 50k
       users
        
       Author : authed
       Score  : 51 points
       Date   : 2021-12-16 21:30 UTC (1 hours ago)
        
 (HTM) web link (www.npr.org)
 (TXT) w3m dump (www.npr.org)
        
       | walrus01 wrote:
       | More on Black Cube, NSO group, and Citizen Lab:
       | 
       | https://darknetdiaries.com/episode/99/
       | 
       | https://darknetdiaries.com/episode/100/
       | 
       | https://www.nytimes.com/2019/01/28/world/black-cube-nso-citi...
       | 
       | https://www.nytimes.com/2021/10/24/insider/hacking-nso-surve...
       | 
       | https://citizenlab.ca/2021/09/forcedentry-nso-group-imessage...
        
         | kerneloftruth wrote:
         | To be honest, it sounds like an extraordinarily interesting
         | field to work in:
         | 
         | "This is a one-of-a-kind opportunity for someone who lives and
         | breathes spying and espionage to become part of a world where
         | wild fantasies of undercover operations become reality. If you
         | think you have what it takes, we want to hear from you."
         | 
         | Unfortunately their opportunity is out of reach, as I'm not in
         | the UK nor Israel -- and they're not specifically seeking
         | technical skills, per se.
        
           | JumpCrisscross wrote:
           | Drug dealing involves all the same risks without the moral
           | detritus.
        
             | willcipriano wrote:
             | Sorta depends on the drug, the drugs that you can make real
             | money selling tend to ruin peoples lives.
        
             | GhettoComputers wrote:
             | Not really, heroin has been laced with fentanyl analogs and
             | even things it doesn't synergize like in cocaine causing
             | random deaths by knowingly selling (pre)cut chemicals isn't
             | morally neutral.
        
           | walrus01 wrote:
           | Are you quite certain you don't work in public relations for
           | NSO or a similar firm? This is suspicious and weird.
        
             | GhettoComputers wrote:
             | "Hacking is cool" in longform isn't eyebrow raising to me.
        
       | CursedUrn wrote:
       | Ironic given Facebook's business model is to spy on users.
        
         | dmitriid wrote:
         | They don't want any competition
        
         | [deleted]
        
       | authed wrote:
       | Only 7 forgot to pay their dues?
        
       | GhettoComputers wrote:
       | There's a lot of info about mostly Israeli ones, but a vague
       | description of one Chinese one. I see parallels of the
       | traditional usage of Jews as scapegoats. Christians aren't
       | allowed to lend for interests so they used Jews. When the king or
       | other Christian ruler needed money, a pogrom was initiated, the
       | assets of Jews were taken, and the cycle was repeated.
       | 
       | The US uses a lot of Israeli intelligence, as if the CIA and 5
       | eyes (yes there's more but it's just the term used) wasn't
       | enough. It's easy to blame the Israelis, and the foreign country
       | of Israel but the US funds them. It's similarly easy to blame
       | China for taking American jobs, but it's often ignored who gave
       | them those jobs in the first place?
       | 
       | Banning intelligence operations is nothing but virtue signaling,
       | I'm sure they'll give up, there's no way to figure out how to
       | beat Facebook's ban, especially since intelligence isn't very
       | good at bypassing bans or regrouping as other companies.
        
         | najqh wrote:
         | "Only" four for them are Israeli.
        
           | GhettoComputers wrote:
           | Thanks, I think the page didn't load completely for me, and
           | it had lots of info on the Israeli firms.
           | 
           | 4/7 is a lot and there's a lot of focus on it in the first
           | parts. One is Chinese and there's very little focus on it or
           | info. I doubt this will have any significance, I'm not sure
           | what spying means from the article. Are they just scrapers of
           | public info or have friend requests that you'd share your
           | info with publicly like the first image? Spying is ok when FB
           | gets all the info, but it's not ok if their ad revenue can be
           | threatened or data they get on their own.
           | 
           | If you're sharing info on Facebook it's hard to take the
           | words "spying" seriously unless you say Facebook is a spy
           | too.
        
       | DoctorNick wrote:
       | "Yeah, that's our racket!"
        
       | nimos wrote:
       | In other news 7 'surveillance-for-hire` companies create arms
       | length shell companies.
        
       | beervirus wrote:
       | https://frinkiac.com/meme/S05E12/1100532.jpg?b64lines=T05MWS...
        
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       (page generated 2021-12-16 23:00 UTC)