رَنْد Hammoud

Domestically produced, installed via an Israeli company's forensic tools donated by Norway🧐 In a truly global affair, Serbian authorities infected the phones of journalists, activists and protesters with their homegrown spyware NoviSpy using Cellebrite. What does this mean?🧵

Happy to announce I’ve jouned the Centre for Democracy and Technology Europe as the Director of the Security, Surveillance and Human Rights Programme and Regional Encryption Lead. Grateful for my time @accessnow and excited for the future!

@DrWhax interesting marketing strategy💀

The general counsel of Paragon, uploaded a picture on Linkedin today showing the Paragon spyware control panel. The panel shows a phone number in Czechia, Apps, Accounts, media on the phone, the interception status and numbers extracted from various apps.

🚨NEW INVESTIGATION: We just forensically unmasked #Paragon's Apple spyware. Zero-click targets: Journalists. In 🇪🇺Europe. Like 🇮🇹Italian reporter @ciropellegrino. Reopen's #Italy's spyware scandal. Follows our @citizenlab investigation of their Android spyware. 1/

Yesterday, the Italian parliamentary intel oversight committee published its findings into the Paragon scandal in the country. The report admits the use of spyware against human rights and migration activists. But it falls short on other fronts. Read more👇

NEW: Cocospy, Spyic and Spyzie, the stalkerware apps that were breached earlier this year and caught spying on millions of people's phones, now appear to have shut down. The apps not working, their websites gone, and Amazon-hosted cloud storage deleted. techcrunch.com/2025/05/19/coc…

NEW: We found a sneaky Android phone stalkerware app that requires a password to deactivate or uninstall. Worse, the password is set by whoever planted the app. The good news is there's a way to uninstall the spyware without knowing the password. techcrunch.com/2025/04/03/thi…

NEW: Apple's new iOS 18.3 fixes a zero-day bug that “may have been actively exploited” — meaning hackers were using it to compromise devices. Not details on who was behind it, or who they were targeting. It's the first iPhone in the wild bug of 2025. techcrunch.com/2025/01/28/app…

It's time governments work together to secure people against spyware! Today from 3-6 PM EST, join us as we follow members of the UN Security Council as they discuss the harmful impact of commercial spyware on international peace + security. Tune in: ⬇️ webtv.un.org/en/asset/k1j/k…

BREAKING: NSO Group liable for #Pegasus hacking of @WhatsApp users. Big win for spyware victims. Big loss for NSO. Bad time to be a spyware company. Landmark case. Huge implications. 1/ 🧵

Serbian authorities are building a “digital prison” against dissenting voices — this must be dismantled! Abusing spyware and forensic tools to silence, target, and harass civil society is unacceptable, and Serbian agencies must be held to account.

Here’s a new year’s resolution for Poland: end spyware abuse during your upcoming EU Presidency! Along with civil society orgs in the EU, we ask Poland to live up to its international commitments in 2025.

The problem isn’t just spyware—it’s the supply chain and the entire surveillance ecosystem. Companies providing “forensic” tools have an obligation to prevent misuse. State and other actors providing foreign assistance in the form of such tools must enforce strict controls.

6/Sinister. Stakeholders worldwide have worked for years to ensure security improvements are put in place to ensure high risk individuals are protected from surveillance. Take Apple’s lockdown mode as a successful example. But state over-reach continues. support.apple.com/en-us/105120

Domestically produced, installed via an Israeli company's forensic tools donated by Norway🧐 In a truly global affair, Serbian authorities infected the phones of journalists, activists and protesters with their homegrown spyware NoviSpy using Cellebrite. What does this mean?🧵

NEW: U.S. private equity firm AE Industrial has acquired Israeli spyware maker Paragon, which has been making inroads in the U.S. market, for ~$500 million. The acquisition shows the spyware market is in flux after all the scandals involving NSO Group. techcrunch.com/2024/12/16/isr…