Microsoft sells AI tech to Israel’s army, then ‘silences’ staff who speak up 17:27 Min. by MEE, April 8, 2025
Microsoft celebrated their 50th anniversary – but what was meant to be a flashy and jovial moment for the tech giant instead became a spotlight on its complicity in Israel’s war on Gaza.
Two junior engineers staged walkouts during key events, one involving the company’s founder Bill Gates.
Is that why Gates announced he plans to give some of his billions away? Trying to buy clean up of his genocidal reputation?
BREAKING: jury awards massive $167 million in punitive damages against spyware company NSO Group by John Scott-Railton, May 6, 2025
Precedent-setting win against the notorious #Pegasus spyware maker.
Congratulations to @WhatsApp on sticking this case through since 2019. Some thoughts 1/
2/ After years of every trick & delay tactic it only took a California jury one days deliberation to the heart of the matter:
NSO makes millions hacking mostly-American tech companies… so that dictators can hack dissidents.
Their conduct deserved to be punished.
3/ NSO Group emerges from the trial severely damaged.
The verdict ($167,256,000 punitive, $440K+ compensatory) is big enough to make your eyes water.
The case is ALSO a huge blow to NSO’s secrecy, with their business splashed all over a courtroom.
This will scare customers…
4/ Rewind to 2019.
About this time (April-May) @WhatsApp catches NSO Group hacking its users with #Pegasus across the messenger.
They investigated.
We @citizenlab also helped to investigate the victims get in touch with the many activists journalists etc.
There were many.
5/ Prior to @WhatsApp engaging, NSO acted the playground bully.
Targeting victims that dared speak up & researchers like us.
Suddenly, the bully met their match.
To the eternal credit of leadership at Meta & WhatsApp, they stuck this fight out & carried this case across the finish line.
6/ Back in 2019 no country had sanctioned NSO Group…
There had been no parliamentary hearings, no hearings in congress, no serious investigations.Does Israel/NSO spy on world leaders to blackmail/threaten them into obedient silence and to force them to give billions of dollars the public’s money to finance Israel’s mass slaughter of innocents? Is Pegasus and other spy ware why the western world helps Israel’s genocide of Palestinians and crimes against humanity elsewhere? Humans are in general cowards, it doesn’t take much to silence the greedy selfish masses.
WhatsApp’s lawsuit helped carry momentum at a critical time, and showed governments that their tech sectors were in the crosshairs from mercenary spyware too…
7/ WhatsApp’s choice to notify was also hugely consequential.
A LOT of cases were first surfaced from these notifications.
With dissidents around the world suddenly learning that dictators were snooping in their phones…with NSO Group’s help.
They also set the tone for notifications that followed…
8/ Transparency: Note that I made a slight typo in Tweet #3: correct punitive damages are: $167,254,000 (not $167,256,000).
9/ A sidebar to this verdict for us @citizenlab.
One of NSO’s many tactics was to leverage the case badger us researchers for months to try and extract information.
It never worked, but it is a reminder of the kinds of tactics that these firms prefer…instead of coming clean.
theintercept.com/2024/05/06/peg…
They Exposed an Israeli Spyware Firm. Now the Company Is Badgering Them in Court. NSO Group, which makes Pegasus spyware, keeps trying to extract sensitive information from Citizen Lab — and a judge keeps swatting it down. https://theintercept.com/2024/05/06/pegasus-nso-group-israeli-spyware-citizen-lab/
10/ For a long time there a handful of us doing mercenary spyware research.
Having @WhatsApp independently do serious investigating & publicly attribute hacking to NSO Group was huge for helping the rest of the world see the severity of the issue.
Thankfully, today this has changed.
11/ Ultimately, we wouldn’t be here without civil society investigations of mercenary spyware… and alarm raising.
Thankfully today there’s a whole accountability ecosystem growing around this work.
Dozens of orgs engaging.
Numbers are growing.
Pictured: just some of us
@WhatsApp @citizenlab 13/ For me personally, watching a jury of regular citizens see right through NSO’s mendacity & hypocrisy and to the need to protect privacy… amazing.
14/ OH WOW, @WhatsApp is publishing the transcribed NSO Group Depositions.
This is an unprecedented view for investigators into NSO’s business, exploit development, operations & financials.
Nothing like this has ever been made public about any spyware company.
about.fb.com/wp-content/upl…
@WhatsApp @citizenlab 15/ WHOA: @whatsapp states intention to donate to support digital rights groups working to support targets of spyware attacks.
about.fb.com/news/2025/05/w…
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@CityBlueCitizen:
You forgot an important part… it’s an Israeli company
@typocatCAv2:
Pegasus: Israeli spyware company
@CristinGoodwin:
It’s thrilling to see. Now to watch this verdict get collected!Or, will they bankrupt themselves, enabled by compromised Zionist judges, and start under a new name to avoid payment like the raping catholic church does to its hundreds of thousands of rape victims and oil companies do to avoid clean up?
@Rayperez88:
167 million fine to a israel spy company
@JMcneill88324:
I’m in uk and it’s on my phone
@2talkon:
Sadly, The Indian Supreme Court is sitting on the fence, since Pegasus was used by the State to spy on Journalists and others who did not agree to “narratives”
@lvlalvlo:
NSO is a stain in humanity. Don’t let them rewrite their history.
@aishaf786:
NSO GROUP founded by 3 Israelis & its HQ is in israel- “Almost all of NSO’s research team is made up of former Israeli military intelligence personnel, most of them having served in Israel’s Military Intelligence Directorate, and many of these in its Unit 8200.”
@empathyisdivine:
Meta doesn’t want middlemen. Meta wants to sell the services of Pegasus directly.
@Badbitcoinorg:
You have that Israeli modified Signal App now to contend with. Seems Cogress has been inadvertently BCC’ing all messages to Tel Aviv
@moribito2:
This is a joke, everyone knows Zuckerberg is a massive zionist who deletes palestinian pages. I don’t believe NSO hacked but was rather given access to backdoors
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