In a study released Thursday, Facebook owner Meta Platforms Inc (FB.O) accused a half-dozen private surveillance companies of hacking or other crimes, alleging that they together targeted around 50,000 people across its platforms.
The company’s fight with the spy firms is part of a broader push by American tech companies, lawmakers, and President Joe Biden’s administration to blacklist purveyors of digital espionage services, including the Israeli spyware firm NSO Group, which was blacklisted earlier this month after weeks of revelations about how its technology was being used against civil society.
WASHINGTON, Dec 16 (Reuters) – Facebook owner Meta Platforms Inc (FB.O) is calling out half a dozen private surveillance companies for hacking or other abuses, accusing them in a report published Thursday of collectively targeting about 50,000 people across its platforms.
The company’s fight with the spy firms comes amid a wider move by American tech companies, U.S. lawmakers, and President Joe Biden’s administration against purveyors of digital espionage services, notably the Israeli spyware company NSO Group, which was blacklisted earlier this month following weeks of revelations about how its technology was being deployed against civil society.
Meta is already suing NSO in a U.S. court. Nathaniel Gleicher, Meta’s head of security policy, told Reuters that Thursday’s crackdown was meant to signal that “the surveillance-for-hire industry is much broader than one company.”
Meta’s report said it was suspending roughly 1,500, mostly fake accounts run by seven organizations across Facebook, Instagram, and WhatsApp. Meta said the entities targeted people in more than 100 countries.
Meta did not provide a full explanation of how it found the monitoring corporations, but it runs some of the world’s largest social and communications networks and boasts about its capacity to identify and remove harmful actors from its platforms.
Israel’s Black Cube is one of them, having made a name for itself by deploying spies on behalf of Hollywood rapist Harvey Weinstein. “Likely for later phishing assaults,” Meta said the intelligence firm was using phantom personas to chat up its targets online and acquire their emails.
Black Cube said in a statement that it “does not engage in any phishing or hacking,” and that it regularly ensures that “all our agents’ activities are totally compatible with local laws.”
BellTroX, an Indian cyber mercenary firm uncovered by Reuters and the internet watchdog Citizen Lab last year, an Israeli firm called Bluehawk CI, and a European firm called Cytrox – all of whom Meta accused of hacking – are among those mentioned by Meta.
Cognyte (CGNT.O), which was spun off from security giant Verint Systems Inc (VRNT.O) in February, and Israeli startup Cobwebs Technologies was accused of utilizing phoney personas to deceive users into disclosing personal information rather than hacking.
