Gamma Group and The Hacking Team are without question the two most prestigious providers of network injection solutions, surveillance industry jargon for malware used to take over targets’ communications devices. Yet while their products are similar in many ways, the companies and their histories are completely unlike. One is an open book -- the other a dark hole on … [Read more...]
Surface Dive by Gamma Group, The Hacking Team and VUPEN
2015 has been a year of surprises for the market leaders of lawful malware and Zero Days -- Gamma Group, The Hacking Team and VUPEN -- and smaller players like Netragard. Not all surprises were of the pleasant variety. Start with the February rebuke of Gamma Group by the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD) for selling FinFisher to “repressive … [Read more...]
FBI Blows Its Cover on “Going Dark”
We’ve all heard about law enforcement “going dark” in the face of encryption and other technologies that render suspects’ communications services and devices impenetrable to evidence collection and surveillance. The current standard bearer is FBI Director James Comey. His plea: that tech companies should cooperate in providing “back doors” into their products to facilitate … [Read more...]
Perfectly Legal: What China’s ZTE Really Sold to Iran
Rumors continue to crop up about ZTE's alleged sale of U.S. surveillance products to Iran, a deal involving some of the biggest names in American technology -- Microsoft, Cisco, Juniper Networks, Oracle, Symantec and Hewlett Packard. The controversial sale hails all the way back to 2011 but was only disclosed this year when Reuters leaked word of an investigation by the FBI and … [Read more...]
ZERODIUM: Excelling in Zero Days for Cyber Security
C5IS examines ZERODIUM, a venture backed by VUPEN'S Chaouki Bekrar to enhance cyber security for corporate, defense and financial industry clients. For the commercial malware and Zero Day communities, this summer has held a mix of bad news (and worse reporting of good news). In early July hackers cracked The Hacking Team, releasing thousands of documents including emails, … [Read more...]