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Jonathan Cook<\/strong><\/p>\n Middle East Eye \u2013 11 November 2019<\/p>\n Digital age weapons developed by Israel to oppress Palestinians are rapidly being repurposed for much wider applications \u2013 against Western populations who have long taken their freedoms for granted.<\/p>\n Israel\u2019s status as a \u201cstartup nation\u201d was established decades ago. But its reputation for hi-tech innovation always depended on a dark side, one that is becoming ever harder to ignore.<\/p>\n A few years ago, Israeli analyst Jeff Halper\u00a0warned<\/a>\u00a0that Israel had achieved a pivotal role globally in merging new digital technologies with the homeland security industry. The danger was that gradually we would all become Palestinians.<\/p>\n Israel, he noted, treated the millions of Palestinians under its unaccountable, military rule effectively as guinea pigs in open-air laboratories. They were the test bed for developing not only new conventional weapons systems, but also new tools for mass surveillance and control.<\/p>\n As a recent\u00a0report<\/a>\u00a0in Haaretz observed, Israel\u2019s surveillance operation against Palestinians is \u201camong the largest of its kind in the world. It includes monitoring the media, social media and the population as a whole\u201d.<\/p>\n But what began in the occupied territories was never going to stay in the West Bank, East Jerusalem and Gaza. There was simply too much money and influence to be gained from a trade in these new hybrid forms of offensive digital technology.<\/p>\n Tiny though it may be in size, Israel has long been a world leader in an extremely lucrative\u00a0arms trade<\/a>, selling to authoritarian regimes around the world its weapons systems as \u201cbattlefield-tested\u201d on Palestinians.<\/p>\n This trade in military hardware is increasingly being overshadowed by a market for belligerent software: tools for waging cyber warfare.<\/p>\n Such new-age weapons are in high demand from states for use not only against external enemies, but against internal dissent from citizens and human rights monitors.<\/p>\n Israel can rightly claim to be a world authority here, controlling and oppressing populations under its rule. But it has been keen to keep its fingerprints off much of this new Big Brother technology, by outsourcing the further development of these cyber tools to graduates of its infamous security and military intelligence units.<\/p>\n Nonetheless, Israel implicitly sanctions such activities by providing these firms with export licences \u2013 and the country\u2019s most senior security officials are often closely involved in their work.<\/p>\n Once out of uniform, Israelis can cash in on years of experience gained from spying on Palestinians by setting up companies developing similar software for more general applications.<\/p>\n Apps using sophisticated surveillance technology originating in Israel are increasingly common in our digital lives. Some have been put to relatively benign use. Waze, which tracks traffic congestion, allows drivers to reach destinations faster, while Gett pairs customers up with nearby taxis through their phone.<\/p>\n But some of the more covert technology produced by Israeli developers sticks much closer to its original military format.<\/p>\n This offensive software is being sold both to nations wishing to spy on their own citizens or rival states, and to private corporations hoping to gain an edge on competitors or better commercially exploit and manipulate their customers.<\/p>\n Once incorporated into social media platforms with billions of users, such spyware offers state security agencies a potential near-global reach. That explains the sometimes fraught relationship between Israeli tech firms and Silicon Valley, as the latter struggles to take control of this malware \u2013 as two contrasting, recent examples highlight.<\/p>\n In a sign of the tensions, WhatsApp, a social media platform owned by Facebook, initiated the\u00a0first lawsuit<\/a>\u00a0of its kind in a California court last week against NSO, Israel\u2019s largest surveillance company.<\/p>\n WhatsApp accuses NSO of cyber attacks. In just a two-week period ending in early May examined by WhatsApp, NSO is\u00a0reported<\/a>\u00a0to have targeted the mobile phones of more than 1,400 users in 20 countries.<\/p>\n NSO\u2019s spyware, known as Pegasus, has been used against human rights activists, lawyers, religious leaders, journalists and aid workers. Reuters revealed last week that senior officials of US allies had also been\u00a0targeted<\/a>\u00a0by NSO.<\/p>\n After taking charge of the user\u2019s phone without their knowledge, Pegasus copies data and turns on the microphone for surveillance. Forbes magazine has\u00a0described<\/a>\u00a0it as the \u201cworld\u2019s most invasive mobile spy kit\u201d.<\/p>\n NSO has licensed the software to dozens of governments, including prominent human\u00a0rights-abusing regimes<\/a>\u00a0such as Saudi Arabia, Bahrain, the United Arab Emirates, Kazakhstan, Mexico and Morocco.<\/p>\n Amnesty International has complained that its staff are among those targeted by NSO spyware. It is currently supporting a\u00a0legal action<\/a>\u00a0against the Israeli government for issuing the company with an export licence.<\/p>\n NSO was founded in 2010 by Omri Lavie and Shalev Hulio, both\u00a0reported<\/a>\u00a0to be graduates of Israel\u2019s vaunted military intelligence Unit 8200.<\/p>\n In 2014, whistleblowers\u00a0revealed<\/a>\u00a0that the unit routinely spied on Palestinians, trawling through their phones and computers for evidence of sexual improprieties, health problems or financial difficulties that could be used to pressure them into\u00a0collaborating<\/a>\u00a0with Israel\u2019s military authorities.<\/p>\n The soldiers wrote that Palestinians were \u201ccompletely exposed to espionage and surveillance by Israeli intelligence. It is used for political persecution and to create divisions within Palestinian society by recruiting collaborators and driving parts of Palestinian society against itself.\u201d<\/p>\n Despite officials issuing export licences to NSO, Israeli government minister Zeev Elkin denied last week \u201cIsraeli government involvement\u201d in the hacking of WhatsApp. He\u00a0told<\/a>\u00a0Israeli radio: \u201cEveryone understands that this is not about the state of Israel.\u201d<\/p>\n In the same week that WhatsApp launched its legal action, US television channel NBC\u00a0revealed<\/a>\u00a0that Silicon Valley is nonetheless keen to reach out to Israeli startups deeply implicated in abuses associated with the occupation.<\/p>\n Microsoft has invested heavily in AnyVision to further develop sophisticated facial recognition technology that already helps the Israeli military oppress Palestinians.<\/p>\n The connections between AnyVision and the Israeli security services are\u00a0barely hidden<\/a>. Its advisory board includes Tamir Pardo, former head of Israel\u2019s Mossad spy agency. The company\u2019s president, Amir Kain, previously served as head of Malmab, the defence ministry\u2019s security department.<\/p>\n AnyVision\u2019s main software, Better Tomorrow, has been nicknamed \u201cOccupation Google\u201d because the firm\u00a0claims<\/a>\u00a0it can identify and track any Palestinian by searching footage from the Israeli army\u2019s extensive network of surveillance cameras in the occupied territories.<\/p>\n Despite obvious ethical problems, Microsoft\u2019s investment suggests it may be aiming to incorporate the software into its own programmes. That has caused grave concern among human rights groups.<\/p>\n Shankar Narayan of the American Civil Liberties Union warned of a future all too familiar to Palestinians living under Israeli rule: \u201cThe widespread use of face surveillance flips the premise of freedom on its head and you start becoming a society where everyone is tracked, no matter what they do, all the time\u201d, Narayan told NBC.<\/p>\n \u201cFace recognition is possibly the most perfect tool for complete government control in public spaces.\u201d<\/p>\n According to Yael Berda, a researcher at Harvard University, Israel\u00a0maintains a list<\/a>\u00a0of some 200,000 Palestinians in the West Bank it wants under surveillance around the clock. Technologies such as AnyVision\u2019s are seen as vital to keeping this vast group under constant monitoring.<\/p>\n A former AnyVision employee told NBC that the Palestinians were treated as a testing ground. \u201cThe technology was field-tested in one of the world\u2019s most demanding security environments and we were now rolling it out to the rest of the market,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n The Israeli government itself has a growing interest in using these spying technologies in the US and Europe, as its occupation has become the focus of controversy and scrutiny in mainstream political discourse.<\/p>\n In the UK, the shift in the political climate has been highlighted by the election of Jeremy Corbyn, a long-time Palestinian rights activist, to head the opposition Labour Party. In the US, a small group of lawmakers visibly supportive of the Palestinian cause have recently entered Congress, including Rashida Tlaib, the first Palestinian-American woman to hold the post.<\/p>\n More generally, Israel fears the flourishing international solidarity movement BDS (boycott, divestment and sanctions), which calls for a boycott of Israel \u2013 modelled on the one against apartheid South Africa \u2013 until it stops oppressing Palestinians. The BDS movement has grown strongly on many US campuses.<\/p>\n As a result, Israeli cyber firms have been drawn ever more deeply into efforts to manipulate public discourse about Israel, apparently including by\u00a0meddling<\/a>\u00a0in foreign elections.<\/p>\n Two notorious examples of such firms have briefly made headlines. Psy-Group, which marketed itself as a \u201cprivate Mossad for hire<\/a>\u201c, was\u00a0shut down<\/a>\u00a0last year after the FBI began investigating it for interfering in the 2016 US presidential election. Its \u201cProject Butterfly\u201d, according to the New Yorker, aimed to \u201cdestabilize and disrupt anti-Israel movements from within\u201d.<\/p>\n Black Cube, meanwhile, was\u00a0exposed<\/a>\u00a0last year to have been carrying out hostile surveillance of leading members of the previous US administration, under Barack Obama. It appears closely linked to Israel\u2019s security services, and was a for a time located on an Israeli military base.<\/p>\n There are other Israeli firms seeking to blur the distinction between private and public space.<\/p>\n Onavo, an Israeli data collection company\u00a0established<\/a>\u00a0by two veterans of Unit 8200, was acquired by Facebook in 2013. Apple\u00a0banned<\/a>\u00a0its VPN app last year over revelations that it was providing unlimited access to users\u2019 data.<\/p>\n Israel\u2019s strategic affairs minister, Gilad Erdan, who heads a secretive campaign to demonise overseas BDS activists, had regular meetings with another firm, Concert, last year, according to a\u00a0report<\/a>\u00a0in Haaretz. This covert group, which is exempt from Israel\u2019s Freedom of Information laws, has received around $36m in funding from the Israeli government. Its directors and shareholders are a \u201cwho\u2019s who\u201d of Israel\u2019s security and intelligence elite.<\/p>\nBig Brother trade<\/h3>\n
Tensions with Silicon Valley<\/h3>\n
Mobile phone \u2018spy kit\u2019<\/h3>\n
Ties to Israeli security services<\/h3>\n
Tracked by cameras<\/h3>\n
Grave concern<\/h3>\n
Meddling in elections<\/h3>\n
Private \u2018Mossad for hire\u2019<\/h3>\n
Banned by Apple<\/h3>\n