Microsoft and Google Join Facebook's Legal Battle Against Hacking Company NSO (venturebeat.com) 22
Tech giants, including Microsoft and Google, have joined Facebook's legal battle against hacking company NSO, filing an amicus brief in federal court that warned the Israeli firm's tools were "powerful, and dangerous." From a report: The brief, filed before the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit, opens up a new front in Facebook's lawsuit against NSO, which it filed last year after it was revealed that the cyber surveillance firm had exploited a bug in Facebook-owned instant messaging program WhatsApp to help surveil more than 1,400 people worldwide. NSO has argued that because it sells digital break-in tools to police and spy agencies, it should benefit from "sovereign immunity" -- a legal doctrine that generally insulates foreign governments from lawsuits. NSO lost that argument in the Northern District of California in July and has since appealed to the Ninth Circuit to have the ruling overturned. Microsoft, Alphabet-owned Google, Cisco, Dell Technologies-owned VMWare, and the Washington-based Internet Association joined forces with Facebook to argue against that, saying that awarding sovereign immunity to NSO would lead to a proliferation of hacking technology and "more foreign governments with powerful and dangerous cyber surveillance tools."
Tough call... (Score:2)
Tool is beneficial to authoritarian regimes.
Law is beneficial for white-hats.
If we allow the laws revolving around this use to be considered illegal, there go a bunch of white-hat safe-harbor provisions.
If we allow NSO to win, we help murderous despots stay in power.
Yikes.
Re: (Score:1)
Right, this will have a chilling effect on whitehat tools. Facebook, Microsoft, Google, Apple, all the manufactures of rapidly abandon Android phones, etc here just need to own up the fact that their products had serious issues, and their own behavior is really the problem.
They release products that have serious flaws and than duck liability for any of it via EULAs. Their planned obsolescence model leaves a lot of users with products that remain broken through a large portion of what is really its useful l
Guns are legal to sell and manufacture (Score:2)
I don't disagree with your argument, but I'd like to point out:
Tool is beneficial to authoritarian regimes.
Guns are even more beneficial to authoritarian regimes.
If we allow NSO to win, we help murderous despots stay in power.
If a murderous despot had to choose between NSO tools and guns, what do you think their choice will be? Which one does more to enable the "murderous" part?
NSO's chosen line line of defense is baffling.
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And many bad players prefer to act in a hidden way. NSO makes them able to do that.
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Everything which NSO provides, Google, Microsoft, etc can provide too. The sole difference is that they do it on an exclusive basis to Uncle Sam.
The only difference between the facilities which Google, Facebook, etc provide under a FISA order and what NSO provides is that instead of this being a privileged relationship for the 5 eyes, anyone and their dog can buy it. It is a fair purchase for a market price.
So, this smacks more of "eliminating a competito
What a defense (Score:3)
Basically they're never going to get sovereign immunity unless Israel admits that they're effectively part of their government. But if they do that, then Israel is admitting that they are attacking other governments with their tools, which some may argue constitutes an act of war.
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In concept thought it really should extend to them. Otherwise how do separate any other manufacturer for responsibility for what governments or LEOs use their stuff for?
Should someone in middle easy be able to bring a suit against Microsoft because the US Government flew an airstrike damaging their property from a carrier running "Windows for Warships?"
If a police offer shoots someone is the gun manufacturer at fault?
Is General Motors responsible for a school bus accident because immunity prevents me from f
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If Microsoft would do such an airstrike for the US government, then for sure, sue them.
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Why are you a troll?
Why does Slashdot support anonymous commenting when it is used to troll 99% of the time?
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Israel already attacked the U.S. [wikipedia.org] and got away with it. Then there are all those stingray devices placed around the White House [intelnews.org]. And this doesn't even take into consideration the near daily attacks on its neighbors while claiming it's the victim.
Israel has already declared war on other countries, it just hasn't announced it. It's too busy using
Re: (Score:2)
Israel has already declared war on other countries, it just hasn't announced it.
Um.
It's too busy using this tool to perpetrate its apartheid on Palestine.
You mean our apartheid on Palestine. I mean, we're helping to pay for it...
NOBODY except governments... (Score:3, Informative)
Sovereign immunity is for governments.
NSO provides a product/service/PaaS that in many ways is harmful. That's their right, and of course their shareholders must love it. HOWEVER they do not get sovereign immunity and must be held liable if their conduct violates laws.
That having been said, and thinking of CDA 230, just because they provide the tool does not make them the culprit. If someone sells a crowbar they are not responsible for car windows being smashed. If someone sells a lockpick set they are not responsible for theft from your house. Still, depending on the tool's possible uses, and to whom they sell it, they will have not-fun days in court.
This should go to court for sure.
Ehud (Yes, I'm from Israel, but NSO sells to Israel's enemies, the USA's enemies, etc... and that's BAD)
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Everything you wrote is true. The problem is that the crowbar is expressly designed to do only one thing which violates the law. And the US made it illegal to manufacture, own, or sell such tools.
The belief was that governments and other entities that can legally posses such tools would manufacture them themselves. In part because they would want them as national secrets, not something other countries would buy.
But the US decided to buy them from other people. Which now opens up the foreign companies
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The problem is that the crowbar is expressly designed to do only one thing which violates the law. And the US made it illegal to manufacture, own, or sell such tools.
Clearly, a crowbar has many legal uses, and the manufacture, ownership, and selling of crowbars is perfectly legal. I'm not sure what point you were trying to make, but you should try a different approach.
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That having been said, and thinking of CDA 230, just because they provide the tool does not make them the culprit.
Sec.230 is irrelevant here because it's specific. It's not about providing tools, it's about providing facilities.
If someone sells a lockpick set they are not responsible for theft from your house. Still, depending on the tool's possible uses, and to whom they sell it, they will have not-fun days in court.
Anyone can own or sell a lockpicking set in most cases*, and there is no requirement to verify that you're selling it to a locksmith. And that's the same with these tools as well. The only requirement is that if someone leads you to believe that they're going to use it to commit a crime, you not sell it to them. And that's just a blanket requirement that applies to everything, it's not special f
I suppose... (Score:1, Troll)
It must be cheaper to hire lawyers to waste everyone's time in court than it is to actually get off your *ss and write code that doesn't have enough zero days to allow a foreign company to first create a market to find and then peddle access to those zero-days AND then flourish in that market.
The ONLY reason that NSOs tools are "powerful, and dangerous" is because the products of the plaintiffs are not fit for use. You can't build a bank vault out of balsa wood then sue because someone invents a chain saw t