Aug 22, 2014 university of torontobased research group citizen lab released a report last year identifying two finfisher command and control servers on the network of the pakistan telecommunications company ptcl, the countrys leading internet service provider. Torrent suite software for sequencing data analysis thermo. Flaw in adobe flash player used to install finfisher spyware. Growing number of governments using finfisher spyware. Finfisher targets android, iphone, blackberry, symbian. It also contains all the software that the company sells as well as the accompanying documentation and release material. The data shown in citizen lab s analysis for the eyes only reported that pakistan telecommunication company ltd ptcl owns the network where finfisher server was found in the country. Finfisher spyware become quite a hit with governments for. The citizen lab research linked the malware sent to prodemocracy activists to finspy, part of the finfisher spyware tool kit. Marquisboire, marschalek, guarnieril internet archive. The data shown in citizen labs analysis for the eyes only reported that pakistan telecommunication company ltd ptcl owns the network where finfisher server was found in the country.
Finfisher is a suite of remote intrusion and surveillance software developed by munich based gamma international gmbh and marketed and sold exclusively to law enforcement and intelligence agencies by the ukbased gamma. The citizen lab team devised a way to unravel and query finfisher proxies to track the true location of the spywares master servers despite the use of decoy website pages and redirections. Government spyware exposed after massive data breach. Earlier this year, bahraini human rights activists were targeted by an email campaign that delivered a sophisticated trojan. The scheme, called adhose, would either redirect users en masse to ads for short periods of time, or would target some javascript resources and defunct websites for ad. Finfisher hack shows our digital life under the eyes of states. This backs up data from citizen lab, a torontobased nonprofit that focuses on protecting activists online, which last year released details on apparent use of finfisher in 25 countries. The show is also broadcast on sirius satellite radio 159 and, since january 9, 2010, on vermont public radios network of stations in the united. Citizen lab also found that middleboxes at a telecom egypt demarcation point redirected users across dozens of isps to affiliate ads and browser cryptocurrency mining scripts. Citizen lab research from 2012 showed how the sneaky finfisher surveillance had gone mobile. Ethiopian authorities use arbitrary arrests to silence journalists, and detainees. Citizen lab munk school of global affairs, university of toronto and lookout have uncovered an active threat using three critical ios zeroday vulnerabilities that, when exploited, form an attack chain that subverts even apples strong security environment. It is sold exclusively to governments and is criticised by civil rights groups across the globe.
The citizen lab conducts groundbreaking research on the global proliferation of targeted surveillance software and toolkits, including finfisher, hacking team and nso group. Wikileaks is also publishing previously unreleased copies of the finfisher finspy pc spyware for windows. Founded and directed by professor ronald deibert, the citizen lab studies information controlssuch as network surveillance and content filteringthat impact the openness and security of the internet and that pose threats to human rights. He is the director of security for first look media and a contributing writer for the intercept. This software is designed to be covertly installed on a windows computer and silently intercept files and communications, such as skype calls, emails, video and audio through the webcam and microphone you can find more details on finspy in the first spyfiles release. Wikileaks releases finfisher files to highlight government. Finfisher, also known as finspy, is surveillance software marketed by lench it solutions plc, which markets the spyware through law enforcement channels. The 40gb torrent contains the entire finfisher support portal including the correspondence between customers and the company staff. Jul 07, 2015 here are the major revelations from the hacking teams leak of over 400 gb of emails, passwords, source code, and internal documents. The commercialization of digital spying, in which researchers identified finfisher servers on a network operated by suburban. A hacker has come forward to take responsibility for the explosive hacking team data breach. Aug 22, 2014 pakistan is a finfisher customer, leak confirms in the first week of this month, someone hacked into the servers of finfisher, the notorious surveillance software maker, which was reported to have two command and control servers inside pakistan last year.
The citizen lab report says it has also been used to target malay language speakers by masquerading as a document discussing malaysias upcoming. The 40gb torrent contains the entire finfisher support portal including correspondence between customers and the company staff. After this session the audience will have a better understanding of what happened behind the scenes when the next big apt report surfaces. In april 20, citizen lab released for their eyes only. The citizen lab announces the publication of a detailed post analyzing several pieces of malware targeting bahraini dissidents, shared with us by bloomberg news. The fact that finfisher spyware was being used in south africa was first alluded to in april 20 when citizen lab released a report saying that command and. Between 2010 and 2012, bahrains government used finfisher to monitor some of the countrys top law firms, journalists, activists, and opposition political leaders.
The report, released thursday, found 33 likely government users of finfisher a wellknown spyware program in 32 countries, including ethiopia. Finfisher spyware becomes more popular among government. Finfisher control nodes have been found in several countries. Jul 07, 2015 hacking team data theft culprit exposed. Finfisher, the spyware loved by cruel dictators, stomps all. See more ideas about computer security, antivirus software and norton internet security. Bitfisher design graphics, web, media, marketing and. A new research conducted by citizen lab revealed that the number of governments using the finfisher surveillance software has increased.
Malware researchers and human rights activists welcome the publication, g. Ion torrent uses semiconductor technology to deliver the fastest benchtop next gen sequencing. University of torontobased research group citizen lab released a report last year identifying two finfisher command and control servers on the network of the pakistan telecommunications company ptcl, the countrys leading internet service provider. Citizen lab published research showing how finspy variants, from the gamma groups finfisher surveillance toolkit, target smartphones including windows mobile, apples iphone and ipad tablets. Finfisher, which was part of ukbased gamma group international until late 20 before relocating to germany, develops and sells computer intrusion.
In january 20, citizen lab researchers found installations of blue coat systems packetshaper device on netblocks associated with ipnx isp and cobranet. Quantum technology sold by cyberweapons arms manufacturers. But this recent leak gives us a more complete and conclusive picture. The master servers are deployed on the customers premises so identifying their location exposes governments that use finfisher. Charlie chaplin played him in the great dictator 1940, long before look whos back 2015, inglourious basterds 2009, mein fuhrer. Hackback founder phineas fisher speaks on camera first time. Our two organizations have worked directly with apples security team, which was very. The citizen lab is an interdisciplinary laboratory based at the munk school of global affairs at the university of toronto, canada. An expansive and ongoing computer espionage campaign spread across egypt, turkey and syria has been powered by technology developed by a canadianamerican networking company, sandvine, and an infamous spyware maker known as gammagroup or lench it solutions, security researchers say. Updated global scan click image to enlarge figure 1. A hacker claims to have hacked a network of the surveillance technology company gamma international and has published 40 gigabytes of internal data. The company has been criticized by human rights organizations for selling these capabilities to.
Internet provider redirects users in turkey to spyware. Countries with finfisher spying software business insider. Isps inside turkey and egypt spread finfisher spyware in massive espionage campaign by chris bing 2 years ago new research by human rights advocacy organization citizen lab shows how products made by two western technology contractors facilitated nationwide surveillance in multiple developing countries under authoritarian rule. As the sole providers for marketing and design, they have produced incredible videos capturing what it like to charter our boat. One of the worlds most notorious surveillance software maker gamma internationals finfisher spyware has been hacked resulting in a 40gb file torrent on the interwebs.
The use of such expensive tools against mansoor shows the lengths that governments are willing to go to target activists. Morgan marquisboire is a senior researcher at the citizen lab, university of toronto. It also contains all the software that the company sells, as well as the accompanying documentation and release material. Finfisher surveillance software used to spy on people around the world according to report a new report from citizen lab, a canadian research center, shows surveillance software sold by finfisher, a governmental it intrusion company owned by the ukregistered internet providers possibly involved in finfisher surveillance operations.
Oct 20, 2015 according to citizen lab, which is a laboratory based at the university of toronto, and has dug deep into global security and human rights issues, the following has been stated about finfisher. Nearly 32 countries are suspected to be using finspy spyware as per the year 2015 report from university of torontos citizen lab. The report covers the mobile component of finfisher dubbed finspy mobile which supports ios, android, windows, blackberry, and. However, according to bill marczak, security research at citizen lab, a human rights securityoriented, a laboratory in toronto, indonesia seems to be among the largest customers of finfisher spyware. Aug 11, 2014 govt finfisher spyware exposed after data breach. Worse is the fact that some relay servers from various countries were located in. Last week, morgan marquisboire and bill marczak from the citizen lab published a fascinating glance at realworld mobile espionage tool created by gamma international under its finfisher product line. Several malicious emails we found were sent to multiple receipients, according to their headers. Despite the 2014 finfisher breach, and subsequent disclosure of sensitive customer data, our scanning has detected more servers in more countries.
The really truest truth about adolf hitler 2007, and the countless memes that subtitled hitlers bunker tirade in downfall 2004. Researchers at citizen lab have been monitoring the use of surveillance tools like finfisher over the past years reporting its use by totalitarian governments. A twitter account has published release notes, price lists and source code. A scan conducted by citizen lab using the zmap tool revealed the existence of 5 servers, which includes both finspy masters and relays. There have been various reports of attacks ngos and political dissidents involving finfisher software. Some examples of groups that may be targeted with finfisher malware include political dissidents in. The use of the comic sans font is due to the attackers font selection.
Finfisher is marketed and developed by gamma international and has seen use in military and government surveillance operations. Torrent suite software and hardware provide customizable, automated data analysis and storage solutions. The experts at the citizen lab used the zmap tool to reveal the existence of 5 servers finspy masters and relays. Citizen lab surveillance research on hacking team and finfisher highlighted in articles on motherboard, the varsity, and the new york times. Message received by citizen lab senior research fellow bill marczak. Whats even worse is that the relay servers of different countries are located in other countries, which can allow one countrys agency to look into anothers. Evidence confirms that many other government users are relying upon finfisher in indonesia apart from the national encryption body. It is worth noting that finfisher, which is also called finspy, is notorious surveillance software that is commonly used by law enforcement agencies and governments across the globe. I want whoever wants to try their hand at forensics to be able to look through it and find what they can about gammas customers.
Citizen lab was able to identify 5 ip addresses tied to a spyware suite developed by the munichbased firm finfisher, which is marketed to governments and law. Finfisher is advertised as a lawful interception solution built by germanybased finfisher gmbh. Personal genome machine and proton are affordable, accurate, longread solutions. Servers stopped responding to our fingerprint, which had exploited a quirk in the distinctive finspy wire protocol. Govt finfisher spyware exposed after data breach security. Spark is a canadian radio talk show about technology and culture. Finfisher offers a strategic widescale interception and monitoring solution that is device independent. Hosted by nora young, the program made its cbc radio one debut on september 5, 2007.
As explained by the experts the master servers are usually deployed on the customers meanwhile proxy servers could be located elsewhere. Sophisticated, persistent mobile attack against highvalue. Jul 09, 2015 the citizen lab research in question found ethiopias insa using hacking teams malware to target journalists. I want the researchers at citizen lab and elsewhere who have been researching finfisher attacks to use this data in whatever way itll help them. Citizen lab, a digital research unit at the university of toronto, says that servers running notorious finfisher software have been found in eleven new countries over the past year, bringing the total number of states where servers have been detected to 36. Torrent suite software and torrent server whether you are new to nextgeneration sequencing or an expert user, torrent suite software makes it easy to get started sequencing on the ion genestudio s5 systems, ion pgm, and ion proton. Contribute to finfisher finflyweb development by creating an account on github. An alarming number of governments are using finfisher. Aug 09, 2014 earlier last year, university of torontos citizen lab published an important report revealing that finfisher had its command and control servers installed in around 36 countries. In this report citizen lab security researcher morgan marquisboire and bill marczak provide analysis of several pieces of malware targeting bahraini dissidents, shared with us by bloomberg news. Gamma international uks finfisher suite is an it intrusion and remote monitoring system whose principal market is stateoperated surveillance.
How spyware peddler hacking team was publicly dismantled. Feb 26, 2015 finfisher, the spyware loved by cruel dictators, stomps all over human rights, says uk govt bahraini sales were dodgy, please dont do it again by iain thomson in san francisco 26 feb 2015 at 20. A new report from citizen lab shows that cyberweapons arms manufacturers are selling this type of technology to governments around the world. New research by human rights advocacy organization citizen lab shows how. Spyware used by governments poses as firefox, and mozilla. Jan 01, 2017 i just read the citizen lab reports on finfisher and hacking team and thought thats fucked up. The analysis suggests that the malware used is finspy, part of the commercial intrusion kit, finfisher, distributed by the united. We found 39 additional email addresses of targets using this method. In april of 20, citizen lab identified 36 countries in which they found traces of finfisher s digital infrastructure and technology. Finfisher is a controversial suite of it surveillance software. An article by the verge on the persecution of bahraini activists moosa abdali ali, jaffar al hasabi, and saeed alshehabi features the citizen lab s extensive analysis into finfisher, a line of remote intrusion and surveillance software developed by munichbased gamma international gmbh, conducted by senior security researcher morgan marquisboire and research fellow bill marzcak.
Citizen lab finfisher also offers a mobile version of its spying system so that authorities can spy on data and communications from mobile phones, even when encrypted. Since then, the hacker, who goes by the moniker phineas fisher, has kept mostly quiet, except for some tweets on his own twitter account, and a writeup on how he broke into hacking team, which also served as a manifesto of his hack. Multiple mobile trojans for the android, ios, blackberry, symbian, and windows mobile platforms have been discovered as. Spyware sold to governments still spreading despite hacks. A new report from citizen lab shows 36 countries actively using finfisher aka finspy, a sophisticated malware that infiltrates computers to grab screenshots, record chat conversations, log. The analysis suggests that the malware used is finspy, part of the commercial intrusion kit, finfisher, distributed by the united kingdombased company, gamma international. Aug 25, 2016 previous citizen lab research found that in 2011 he was targeted with finfisher spyware, and in 2012 with hacking team spyware.
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