Tech giants Microsoft, Google, Cisco and VMWare have filed an amicus brief in support of Facebook’s legal battle against the NSO Group. Whatsapp – a Facebook-owned app, sued the spyware vendor last year claiming that the software hacked about 1,400 devices via a vulnerability in the messaging service.
The NSO Group has responded to the lawsuit saying that the company should benefit “sovereign immunity” because of the fact that it sells its tools to other foreign governments. In July, to no surprise, a judge had denied its request to dismiss the lawsuit. To this very day, NSO Group is still making appeals to overturn the ruling which is why Microsoft and other companies have banded to push this back.
In a recent blog post made by Microsoft entitled “Cyber Mercenaries Don’t Deserve Immunity,” the tech giant has outlined three reasons why it believes that NSO Group’s actions are unsettling and why the public deserves to know that it does not deserve the so-called immunity it is so desperately seeking.
“We believe that NSO Group’s business model is dangerous and that such immunity would enable it and other private-sector offensive actors to continue their dangerous business without legal rules, responsibilities or repercussions.” As Microsoft has written.
First, the company argues that the opposing party’s “weapons” could be tremendously damaging were it to fall into the wrong hands. Second, the tools used by NSO Group are not subject to the same limitations when they’re made by private companies rather than government security agencies. Third and last point, Microsoft claims that the tools are a threat to human rights after reports were released that they have been used on journalists and human rights defenders.
NSO Group did not respond to a request for comment right away. They have claimed in the past that the software is being used by governmental law enforcement agencies to take on organized crime and terrorism and will investigate any and every allegation of the misuse of its products.
Over the years, the company is also no stranger to reports being that their spyware has been used against targets that range from journalists to political dissidents. And just recently, Citizen Lab has reported that the software was also used to hack into the phones of a great number of Al Jazeera employees.