Dear LibTech

The Citizen Lab is pleased to announce the release of our latest report.  
Details are below:

For Their Eyes Only: The Commercialization of Digital Spying
https://citizenlab.org/2013/04/for-their-eyes-only-2/

April 30, 2013

by: Morgan Marquis-Boire,  Bill Marczak, Claudio Guarnieri & John Scott-Railton

Citizen Lab is pleased to announce the release of “For Their Eyes Only: The 
Commercialization of Digital Spying.”

Read the Report [PDF] 
https://citizenlab.org/storage/finfisher/final/fortheireyesonly.pdf

The report features new findings, as well as consolidating a year of our 
research on the commercial market for offensive computer network intrusion 
capabilities developed by Western companies.

Our new findings include:

        • We have identified FinFisher Command & Control servers in 11 new 
Countries. Hungary, Turkey, Romania, Panama, Lithuania, Macedonia, South 
Africa, Pakistan, Nigeria, Bulgaria, Austria.
        • Taken together with our previous research, we can now assert that 
FinFisher Command & Control servers are currently active, or have been present, 
in 36 countries.
        * Locations of FinFisher Command & Control Servers Found To Date:  
Australia, Austria, Bahrain, Bangladesh, Brunei, Bulgaria, Canada, Czech 
Republic, Estonia, Ethiopia, Germany, Hungary, India, Indonesia, Japan, Latvia, 
Lithuania, Macedonia, Malaysia, Mexico, Mongolia, Netherlands, Nigeria, 
Pakistan, Panama, Qatar, Romania, Serbia, Singapore, South Africa, Turkey, 
Turkmenistan, United Arab Emirates, United Kingdom, United States, Vietnam.

        • We have also identified a FinSpy sample that appears to be 
specifically targeting Malay language speakers, masquerading as a document 
discussing Malaysia’s upcoming 2013 General Elections.
        • We identify instances where FinSpy makes use of Mozilla’s Trademark 
and Code. The latest Malay-language sample masquerades as Mozilla Firefox in 
both file properties and in manifest. This behavior is similar to samples 
discussed in some of our previous reports, including a demo copy of the 
product, and samples targeting Bahraini activists.
        *Our previous research uncovered evidence that FinFisher (commercial 
network intrusion malware) developed by UK-based company Gamma International 
was targeting activists in Bahrain. It analyzed mobile variants of the 
FinFisher suite.  It also exposed the use of commercial surveillance malware 
developed by Italy-based company Hacking Team to target a dissident in the 
United Arab Emirates.  Most recently, we documented the global proliferation of 
FinFisher command and control servers.

This research is one of the first extended projects to attempt to map out the 
operation and prevalence of commercial surveillance software.  Our work opens a 
window into this space, but it remains crucial that the nature and impact of 
the commercial surveillance market be better understood. Technical research in 
this field has only just begun, but it is already clear that the stakes are 
high. We hope this report will contribute to discussions on this issue in 
technical, civil society, and policy making communities.

This research represents the joint work of Morgan Marquis-Boire, Bill Marczak, 
Claudio Guarnieri, and John Scott-Railton.

Also, see Mozilla's blog for details of their cease and desist letter here:
http://blog.mozilla.org/blog/2013/04/30/protecting-our-brand-from-a-global-spyware-provider/

Ronald Deibert
Director, the Citizen Lab 
and the Canada Centre for Global Security Studies
Munk School of Global Affairs
University of Toronto
(416) 946-8916
PGP: http://deibert.citizenlab.org/pubkey.txt
http://deibert.citizenlab.org/
twitter.com/citizenlab
[email protected]



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