NEW: An Italian parliament inquiry concluded that the Italian government used Paragon's spyware to hack activists working to rescue immigrants. The committee, however, said it did not find any evidence that Italy's intelligence agencies (nor anyone else) spied on journalist Francesco Cancellato. The peport leaves a this, and other, key questions unanswered.
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Italian lawmakers say Italy used spyware to target phones of immigration activists, but not against journalist | TechCrunch
A parliamentary investigation answered some β€” but not all β€” the questions related to a spyware scandal involving the use of the Israeli company...
We have finished going through the court docs and hearing transcripts from the WhatsApp v. NSO lawsuit. Here's everything we learned, from how NSO's customers use Pegasus, to the spyware's cost.
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Eight things we learned from WhatsApp vs. NSO Group spyware lawsuit | TechCrunch
The landmark trial between WhatsApp and NSO Group unearthed several new revelations.
NEW: Last week, WhatsApp won a huge court battle against spyware maker NSO, which now has to pay $167,000,000 in damages to the tech giant. As part of the lawsuit and trial, a lot of details have come out about NSO and the cyberattack underpinning the lawsuit. We are reading the hundreds of pages of court docs and hearing transcripts to recap the biggest revelations. Here they are:
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Eight things we learned from WhatsApp vs. NSO Group spyware lawsuit | TechCrunch
The landmark trial between WhatsApp and NSO Group unearthed several new revelations.
NEW: CrowdStrike announced that it will lay off around 500 workers as part of "a strategic plan" to "to evolve its operations to yield greater efficiencies." The cuts represent 5% of its global workforce.
TechCrunch
CrowdStrike says it will lay off 500 workers | TechCrunch
The cybersecurity company said it will lay off 5% of its global workforce.
Skype is getting shut down today. It was certainly one of the most revolutionaries chat apps in history. Skype was the first major chat app to implement end-to-end encryption, prompting authorities all over the world to freak out about it, and look at spyware as a solution. β€œSkype calls have excellent sound quality and are highly secure with end-to-end encryption,” Skype’s homepage read in 2004.Β 
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As Skype shuts down, its legacy is end-to-end encryption for the masses | TechCrunch
iMessage, Signal, and WhatsApp have made E2EE the default for messaging, but Skype paved the way decades ago.
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NEW: A court in India has ordered the block Proton Mail across the whole country as part of a case where a local design firm received obscene emails. As of this writing, Proton Mail is still working, based on our tests. Story by @Jagmeet Singh
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Indian court orders blocking of Proton Mail | TechCrunch
The ruling, which has yet to take effect, was ordered under India's online blocking laws.
NEW: Last year, there were 34 recorded zero-days being exploited in real-world attacks, which were attributed to specific groups. Of those, 23 were attributed to government-backed hackers, including spyware makers, which shows that governments are the main users of zero-days. And while those got caught, Google's [@_clem1](
bird.makeup - User
 ) told us that spyware makers β€œare investing more resources in operational security to prevent their capabilities being exposed and to not end up in the news.” Full story:
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Government hackers are leading the use of attributed zero-days, Google says | TechCrunch
Governments like China and North Korea, along with spyware makers, used the most recorded zero-days in 2024.
NEW: Citizen Lab found that hackers targeted Uyghurs in exile with Windows spyware disguised as a Uyghur language text editor. People were alerted by Google of potentially having been targeted by "government-backed attacks."
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Citizen Lab says exiled Uyghur leaders targeted with Windows spyware | TechCrunch
The researchers said the attackers behind the campaign had "deep understanding of the target community."
NEW: In a hearing last week, an NSO Group lawyer said that Mexico, Saudi Arabia, and Uzbekistan were among the governments responsible for a 2019 hacking campaign against WhatsApp users. This is the first time representatives of the spyware maker admit who its customers are, after years of refusing to do that.
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NSO lawyer names Mexico, Saudi Arabia, and Uzbekistan as spyware customers accused of 2019 WhatsApp hacks | TechCrunch
This is the first time representatives for the spyware maker have publicly named its government customers.
NEW: The notorious image board 4chan has been hacked. Site has been intermittently down for hours, and hackers have published screenshots of site's backend, alleged source code, and list of moderators and "janitors." One janitor told us they are "confident" data is "all real."
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Notorious image board 4chan hacked and internal data leaked | TechCrunch
The infamous website was taken down and working intermittently, while hackers leaked alleged data like moderators email addresses, and source code.