The Spyware Business Is Booming Despite Government Crackdowns
The Register, Wednesday, February 7th, 2024
'Almost zero data being shared across the industry on this particular threat,' we're told
The commercial spyware economy - despite government and big tech's efforts to crack down - appears to be booming.
In addition to the major players like Pegasus developer NSO Group, and Predator maker Intellexa, Google's Threat Analysis Group (TAG) has found "dozens of smaller" commercial surveillance vendors and tracks around 40 such organizations.
Other exploitation supply chain orgs also make money from these nefarious tools - from the initial exploit developers and suppliers on through to the spyware vendors that charge varying amounts depending on what capabilities the customer requests.
In 2023, TAG reports it uncovered 25 zero-days under active exploitation, and 20 of these were abused by commercial surveillance vendors.