The advocacy group Privacy International has published a comprehensive report on the powerful surveillance technologies being sold by private companies. Their findings, they call “horrifying,” show that private companies are able to acquire spying tools that are just as capable as those used by the NSA and GCHQ. All the details they discovered have been compiled into a database they call the Surveillance Industry Index. There, they list over 300 companies from around the world and their spying activities. One of the technologies being sold is a trojan that can turn into a camera and take photos. The shopping list also includes eavesdropping software, or tools that can intercept data from undersea cables.
The problem that Privacy International cites is that all these technologies often end up in the hands of oppressive regimes.
“Typically, these are governments that have the will, but not the know-how, to monitor their communications infrastructure,” says Matt Rice, research consultant at Privacy International.
While global online spying has ceased to be surprising since the Snowden revelations, Privacy International suggests that the issue could be much bigger than it seems.
The article was first published on TheVerge
