{"id":45912,"date":"2014-08-11T12:00:25","date_gmt":"2014-08-11T11:00:25","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/?p=45912"},"modified":"2015-05-05T21:30:45","modified_gmt":"2015-05-05T20:30:45","slug":"leaked-files-german-spy-company-helped-bahrain-hack-arab-spring-protesters","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/2014\/08\/leaked-files-german-spy-company-helped-bahrain-hack-arab-spring-protesters\/","title":{"rendered":"Leaked Files: German Spy Company Helped Bahrain Hack Arab Spring Protesters"},"content":{"rendered":"
\"Photo<\/a>

Photo credit: AP<\/p><\/div>\n

7 Aug 2014 – <\/em>A notorious surveillance technology company that helps governments around the world spy on their citizens sold software to Bahrain during that country\u2019s brutal response to the Arab Spring movement, according to leaked internal documents posted this week on the internet.<\/p>\n

The documents show that FinFisher, a German surveillance company, helped Bahrain install spyware on 77 computers,\u00a0including those belonging to human rights lawyers and a now-jailed opposition leader, between 2010 and 2012\u2014a period that includes Bahrain\u2019s crackdown on pro-democracy protesters. FinFisher\u2019s software gives remote spies total access to compromised computers. Some of the computers that were spied on appear to have been located in the United States and United Kingdom, according to a report from Bahrain Watch<\/a>.<\/p>\n

\"A<\/a>

A screengrab from leaked FinFisher data appears to show surveillance targets of the Bahraini government.<\/p><\/div>\n

Earlier this week, an anonymous hacker released 40 gigabytes of what appears to be internal data from FinFisher on Twitter<\/a> and Reddit<\/a>, including messages\u00a0between people who appear to be Bahraini government officials and FinFisher customer service representatives.<\/p>\n

In those messages, Bahraini software administrators complained to FinFisher that they were \u201closing targets daily\u201d due to faults in its software. In one message employing the language of a frustrated consumer, a spy appeared to complain that he or she had to keep re-infecting a targeted computer, risking detection:\u00a0\u201c[W]e cant stay bugging and infecting the target every time since it is very sensitive. and we don\u2019t want the target to reach to know that someone is infecting his PC or spying on him\u201d one message reads.<\/p>\n

On its website, FinFisher says it sells surveillance technology \u201cexclusively to government law enforcement and intelligence agencies.\u201d The company has previously denied reports that it sold spyware to Bahrain, claiming<\/a> that examples researchers identified could have come from stolen or demonstration copies. The new documents, showing sustained correspondence between individuals in Bahrain and customer service, undercut that claim. FinFisher did not respond to requests for comment.<\/p>\n

\u201c[W]e have 30 target licenses, we are now using them all in which we have already 30 targets,\u201d says one message, dated November 2, 2011. On December 8th, the Bahrainis asked for an update on a previous issue: \u201cPlease investigate urgently and let us know the solution. As we are in a big lose of data now.\u201d<\/p>\n

FinFisher belonged to the U.K.-based Gamma Group during the time period the leaked documents cover (it was spun off last year.) \u00a0Researchers from Citizen Lab at the University of Toronto\u2019s Munk School of Global Affairs\u2013including a co-author of this post\u2014 first publicly identified the\u00a0the FinFisher software<\/a> in July 2012. At the time, members of the advocacy group Bahrain Watch in Washington, D.C., and London had been targeted via email by what appeared to be malware. The researchers analyzed the suspicious software and discovered that it was the FinSpy \u201clawful intercept\u201d software developed by FinFisher. Additional research<\/a> linked the use of this product to 36 countries worldwide.<\/p>\n

The most recent leak includes logs from Bahraini software administrators of the installations they\u2019d performed, which contained usernames and IP addresses, allowing Bahrain Watch researchers to identify some of the computers that had been targeted. Among them were Bahraini lawyers, U.K.-based activists and writers, and Hassan Mushaima, an opposition leader who is currently serving life in prison. He was sentenced in June 2011, months after the logs show spyware installed in his computer.<\/p>\n

Another targeted computer belonged to Mohamed Altajer, a prominent human rights lawyer who was blackmailed in 2011 with a video of him and his wife having sex. The video arrived via CD at his office on January 24, 2011, bearing instructions that he stop defending activists or the tape would be made public. On that same day, the leaked logs show, spyware was installed on his computer, suggesting that government officials used the blackmail gambit to install FinSpy.<\/p>\n

The video eventually became public<\/a>\u00a0in 2012, after Altajer participated in a UN human rights conference. \u201cThe 24th of January, 2011, was the most devastating day of my life,\u201d said Altajer, reached in Bahrain.<\/p>\n

\u201cI\u2019m happy that this is exposed,\u201d he said. \u201cThe regime should understand that it is not so wise and clever to keep penetrating into people\u2019s lives. These dirty people who videotaped me while I am naked, now they are naked, now they are exposed before the world.\u201d<\/p>\n

There\u2019s little regulation preventing companies like FinFisher from selling surveillance software to countries like Bahrain. And the secretive nature of the industry means that companies \u201chave been allowed to operate with impunity, selling intrusive surveillance equipment to states where there is no public scrutiny of surveillance or clear laws regulating its use,\u201d said Eric King, deputy director of Privacy International. The U.K.-based group has asked<\/a> the British government to investigate the Ethiopian government\u2019s use of FinFisher\u2019s tools to surveil a political refugee. And an Ethiopian-American is attempting to sue<\/a> the Ethiopian government in U.S. federal court for using FinSpy against him.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe should be putting international attention on these companies,\u201d said Ali Abdulemam, a human rights activist and member of Bahrain Watch. \u201cGamma is always claiming that their product is for human trafficking or drug trafficking, but its being used against human rights by countries like Bahrain.\u201d<\/p>\n

In 2011, Bloomberg reported<\/a> that Nokia Siemens was selling spy gear to Bahrain, and Bahraini interrogators were known at the time to show activists transcripts of their private text messages and phone conversations during torture sessions. The U.S. also continued arms sales<\/a> to Bahrain during that period.<\/p>\n

\u201cAs far as I am aware,\u201d said \u00a0Salman Aljalahma, the Bahraini government\u2019s media attach\u00e9 in Washington, \u201cthe Government of Bahrain does not use FinFisher.\u201d He added \u201cthis is a matter of national security and confidential intelligence that the public, nor I, is privy to.\u201d<\/p>\n

When shown the customer service correspondence and surveillance logs, Aljalahma said that \u201call evidence collated by the accusers still shows no link to the Bahraini Government.\u201d<\/p>\n

Go to Original \u2013 firstlook.org<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

7 Aug 2014 – A notorious surveillance technology company that helps governments around the world spy on their citizens sold software to Bahrain during that country\u2019s brutal response to the Arab Spring movement, according to leaked internal documents posted this week on the internet.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":4,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[60],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-45912","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-whistleblowing-surveillance"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/45912","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/4"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=45912"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/45912\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=45912"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=45912"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=45912"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}