| ▲ | jack_tripper a day ago |
| It's always companies run by Unit 8200 ex-Israeli spies that are running these telemetry-/ad- surveillance dragnets, and there's never any retaliatory action against them. Like how about a call to Benny's office saying "hey buddy, reign your dogs in, our citizens are off limits"? |
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| ▲ | foundddit a day ago | parent | next [-] |
| It's really, truly strange just how intertwined the US is with Israeli spies at all levels. If people affiliated with The Netherlands or Rwanda had this much influence in the US, nobody would tolerate it. |
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| ▲ | coliveira a day ago | parent | next [-] | | [flagged] | |
| ▲ | jack_tripper a day ago | parent | prev [-] | | [flagged] | | |
| ▲ | mikkupikku 11 hours ago | parent [-] | | In case anybody is curious about this, archived correspondence between JFK and Israel tells the tale. Through the CIA/etc, JFK was aware that Israel was developing nuclear weapons at Dimona. He was also aware that neither Egypt nor any other regional power was doing the same, and believed that Israel doing so would destabilize the region. He was therefore calling for inspections of Dimona to stop Israel's bomb program. At the same time, the Israelis were playing dumb saying they weren't doing anything while simultaneously justifying their bomb program by accusing Egypt of having or developing nukes too. JFK did no believe this and was challenging Israel to prove it. Later that year, JFK got shot in the head, and then days later the supposed gunman was himself assassinated by a jewish gangster named Jacob Rubenstein. All of this is archived in their letters to and from each other and easily locatable online. |
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| ▲ | jdietrich a day ago | parent | prev | next [-] |
| Unit 8200 hand-picks the best and brightest young Israelis and trains them in computer science. You might as well say "It's always MIT" - of course an elite educational institution produces a lot of successful startups. If you're looking for a sinister plot, look no further than In-Q-Tel. |
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| ▲ | Fnoord a day ago | parent [-] | | MIT students have different loyalty than to a fascist government like Trump's administration. The political situation in USA is also not like the one in Israel (which country is a direct result of the outcome of WWII and hatred by nazi-Germany, who are in constant fight with their neighbors). It isn't a fair comparison. One should also take into account that Mossad's way of operating is aggressive. The English article doesn't mention this, but vulnerabilities were found in Zivver. See my comment elsewhere in the thread referring to the Dutch version of the article. | | |
| ▲ | flyinglizard a day ago | parent [-] | | There's something very visceral in being attacked by Jihadists, rockets and ballistic missiles which makes Israelis quite enthusiastic about taking on the fight. | | |
| ▲ | sa501428 a day ago | parent [-] | | There's something very visceral in being attacked by Zionists, rockets, and bombs (for 70+ years) which makes some folks quite enthusiastic about resisting ethnic cleansing and genocide in their homeland. | | |
| ▲ | flyinglizard a day ago | parent | next [-] | | The Palestinians have the right to fight just like the Israelis have the right to win. I don't see a non-violent solution to this conflict. Maybe you do. | |
| ▲ | zappb a day ago | parent | prev [-] | | [flagged] | | |
| ▲ | Hikikomori a day ago | parent [-] | | >>maybe they shouldn't be killing that many children >You are literally hitler |
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| ▲ | user_7832 a day ago | parent | prev | next [-] |
| Why would you assume the said counties wouldn't want their citizens surveilled? "But they will know what our citizens do..." yeah unfortunately 5 eyes proves otherwise. Govt surveillance is a big club, and you ain't in it. |
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| ▲ | user_7832 a day ago | parent [-] | | I am... really not sure why this comment is getting downvoted? It's not really a conspiracy theory so many years after Snowden now, is it? |
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| ▲ | ishi a day ago | parent | prev | next [-] |
| It isn't a "telemetry-/ad- surveillance dragnet". Kitenet's product is a "Private Data Network (PDN) to control, monitor, and secure data exchanged between people, machines, and systems across user collaboration, automated workflows, and enterprise AI". It stands to reason that ex-cryptographers from Unit 8200 would use the expertise they gained to launch legitimate companies that provide cybersecurity solutions. |
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| ▲ | diydsp a day ago | parent | next [-] | | It's not inevitable. It's up to us in a shared world to decide how to govern ourselves and live our lives. Not to be at the whims of a small group of powerful strangers. | |
| ▲ | stocksinsmocks a day ago | parent | prev [-] | | I think it’s much more likely they’re creating honeypots as contractors. There is a lot more money in surveillance than privacy | | |
| ▲ | ishi a day ago | parent [-] | | Is there any factual basis to this claim, or just your personal opinion?
It's like claiming Oracle's real business isn't a database, but rather stealing customers data which was stored in Oracle's databases. Or practically any other company that has access to customers data. | | |
| ▲ | Fnoord a day ago | parent | next [-] | | > Is there any factual basis to this claim Please feel free to translate and read the Dutch version of this article. On the bottom, several security researchers found vulnerabilities in Zivver [1] [1] https://www.ftm.nl/artikelen/vertrouwelijke-zaken-te-grabbel... | | |
| ▲ | ishi a day ago | parent [-] | | So Zivver created a product with security vulnerabilities, Kitenet bought Zivver (probably for their customer base), and it's all some sort of conspiracy to steal personal data? | | |
| ▲ | Fnoord a day ago | parent | next [-] | | We merely bought the honeypot, Your Honor! We didn't know what we were buying! Perfect cover story /slowclap Secret services use companies as cover all the time. Nothing new there. The conspiracy is that it is a dragnet for the data, and given the data is first send plaintext to Zivver (see the Dutch FTM article I already linked), it isn't far-fetched. Looking at the current geopolitical situation, it also isn't far-fetched. It even fits in the Israeli secret services' M.O. Actually, anyone who uses Zivver can find these vulnerabilities. I was worried about this, and reported it to my former employer (while still employed), but alas I did not have a PoC and they had a lot of other security related incidents so this was low priority. Also, this was at a time when the company was still privately owned by the Dutch founders. My hypothesis is that someone working for such an organization passed it to the Israeli secret service, who then got motivated to buy this honeypot. Chinese do something similar: release some piece of technology, never provide any meaningful updates to the product, and voila it is insecure as hell (yet 'we didn't know' provides plausible deniability). I saw this first-hand with KRACK vulnerability. Also... Kiteworks [1] is the name of the company. Not sure why you keep calling it Kitenet. [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kiteworks | |
| ▲ | chiefalchemist a day ago | parent | prev | next [-] | | To be fair, it’s not a conspiracy if it actually happens. It’s surprising how often this type of reasoning is still so common. | | |
| ▲ | dlubarov a day ago | parent [-] | | What are you saying actually happened? It sounds like the concern is that in a certain context, messages are cloud hosted instead of client-side e2e encrypted? Did anyone even claim otherwise? How is this different from suggesting Netflix was all a secret plot by Stanford to spy on Europeans' TV binging? | | |
| ▲ | Fnoord a day ago | parent [-] | | Two anonymous security researchers working at Dutch government found the data is send plaintext [1]. One independent security researcher was able to verify their claim. This should be a concern if the company is owned by Dutch people, but more so if it is owned by a company with questionable jurisdiction. Which unfortunately the USA and Israel are these days. [1] https://www.ftm.nl/artikelen/vertrouwelijke-zaken-te-grabbel... | | |
| ▲ | dlubarov a day ago | parent [-] | | Did they ever claim otherwise? They say "Zivver scans the content of every email" prominently on the front page. The flow seems to be TLS to Zivver first, scanning, then encryption. If all it takes to convince us that a communication product was created as a front for spying operations is not having a strict e2e design like Signal's, then do you think virtually all of them are fronts for spying operations? | | |
| ▲ | Fnoord 16 hours ago | parent [-] | | Listen, I am Dutch. I am loyal to the Dutch government, Dutch society, and therein lie my interests. This is also my potential bias. > Did they ever claim otherwise? They say "Zivver scans the content of every email" prominently on the front page. The flow seems to be TLS to Zivver first, scanning, then encryption. I worked at a government organization which used Zivver. This was around 2018. It was assumed to be E2E encrypted. I wrote about the issue in my security audit, but it had low priority for a myriad of reasons (they had worse issues at the time). Zivver is more akin to the Lavabit situation. Proton's OpenPGP.js is slightly more secure than this implementation (it encrypts client-side), but because Proton can decide (and be forced) to serve a different OpenPGP.js, it suffers from a similar issue. > If all it takes to convince us that a communication product was created as a front for spying operations is not having a strict e2e design like Signal's, then do you think virtually all of them are fronts for spying operations? I never wrote it was created as a front. I don't believe anyone asserted that. The company was founded by a couple of Dutch people in 2015, it was a Dutch company. So they fell under Dutch jurisdiction. I honestly haven't looked them up. Fast forward to June 2025 and this company got acquired by an American company where the higher echelons are ex-Israeli spies. This could be a front, I don't know. I very much question this sale should've been ACK'ed by the Dutch government. Because due to the CLOUD act, the data now falls under American jurisdiction. Around the time of the acquisition though, the Dutch government fell. responsible up to then was Dirk Beljaarts. Around that time (June 2025), Vincent Karremans took his place. Fast forward a couple of months later, we had the Nexperia crisis, where Karremans intervened. A fallout from a stopped acquisition due to national security is lower than Nexperia fallout though. I copied the title of the article verbatim. The Dutch article has a different title, and is IMO of better quality. The title of that article calls it a strategic blunder. I very much agree with that, but not because the top of Kiteworks is Israeli and ex-Unit 8200. That is just a cherry on top, worse case scenario a red herring. No, because of the current geopolitical situation with regards to Trump and the CLOUD act. Can you blame them for trying, given the situation and stakes? The acquisition occurred at a perfect timing. The TL;DR is not that a American or Israeli entity supposedly succeeded. It is that the Dutch government failed. And while Zivver is heavily in use in The Netherlands, it also is within EU. So we failed to serve the best interests of EU here as well. | | |
| ▲ | dlubarov 14 hours ago | parent [-] | | Thanks for the added context, that sounds reasonable to have wanted the product to continue under Dutch ownership. > I never wrote it was created as a front. I don't believe anyone asserted that. There seem to be vague insinuations of a conspiracy floating around, rather than an explicit conspiracy theory, so I may have mischaracterized it. But for example, you mentioned elsewhere that "Mossad's way of operating is aggressive". Could you clarify what you're insinuating, if anything? | | |
| ▲ | Fnoord 12 hours ago | parent [-] | | Hmm, from EU PoV, given many other EU countries rely on it, I believe NL is a reasonable host, but other EU countries could be as well. I'm no expert on that subject, just following Hubert's assessment that it falls in their M.O. (already linked), following Modderkolk's recent assessment on how Mossad operates [1]. Look at all the flak I get in this thread while I just went with HN rule of 1:1 using title. Problem is all these sources are in my native language. And finally, yes my suspicion is on high alert ever since the Maccabi riots in Amsterdam [2], to which Modderkolk also refers to. And yes, I am well aware every Israeli adult is ex-military [3]. If it were up to me, we'd restart this practice here in NL. [1] https://podcasts.apple.com/nl/podcast/hoe-de-mossad-overal-t... [2] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/November_2024_Amsterdam_riots [3] https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46036671 |
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| ▲ | SilverElfin a day ago | parent | prev [-] | | There’s really nothing concrete in this “article”. It’s basically vague insinuations and conjecture and conspiracy theory, all in support of putting out content with something nefarious implied about all Israelis. In other words, it’s propaganda. |
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| ▲ | nunobrito a day ago | parent | prev | next [-] | | It is an obvious and recurring phenomenon to anyone minimally following cybersecurity topics. This isn't the first time, nor the second, nor the third, nor the last. This is the same as claiming that water isn't wet until someone here on HN brings you 10 articles and news proving otherwise. This particular topic was never really denied, nor even by the authors themselves as you can read on the article. | |
| ▲ | coliveira a day ago | parent | prev | next [-] | | Do you understand that Oracle has real features used daily by clients other than "securing" their communications? | |
| ▲ | a day ago | parent | prev | next [-] | | [deleted] | |
| ▲ | cluckindan a day ago | parent | prev [-] | | Are you sure such claims about Oracle are completely unfounded? | | |
| ▲ | kasey_junk a day ago | parent | next [-] | | This framing is a cheap rhetorical trick. Restated this leads to the statement “all companies by default are in the business of capturing customer data, all other claims about their product and smoke screens to hide that.” Which is something you can believe but it falls into the extraordinary claims, extraordinary evidence category. But by claiming it about Oracle or Israeli cyber firms or whatever you swap the evidence burden to the person who has the not extraordinary claim, that most businesses are doing what it claims on the tin. | | |
| ▲ | coliveira a day ago | parent | next [-] | | It's not just a rhetorical trick. Amazon collects most of their data in Virginia, right at the doorsteps of a well known "intelligence" org in the USA. These companies that handle data all around the world are authorized to exist for some reason... | | |
| ▲ | kasey_junk a day ago | parent [-] | | Then the argument should be that. Not “hey commenter you must prove a never ending set of ‘now do Oracle’, ‘now do Amazon’”. Say the words “I believe all companies exist as an extension of the US intelligence apparatus” and claim the burden for yourself. | | |
| ▲ | cluckindan a day ago | parent [-] | | That is a strawman argument. Oracle gets its name from a codename of a 1977 project for the Central Intelligence Agency, Oracle's first customer. In 2004, then-United States Attorney General John Ashcroft sued Oracle Corporation to prevent it from acquiring a multibillion-dollar intelligence contract. After Ashcroft's resignation from government, he founded a lobbying firm, The Ashcroft Group, which Oracle hired in 2005. With the group's help, Oracle went on to acquire the contract. Following the beginning of the Gaza war in 2023, Oracle’s top executives, including Safra Catz and Larry Ellison, publicly aligned the company with Israel’s military operations. They issued statements of solidarity, paid double salaries to Israeli employees, and donated to organizations connected to Israel’s wartime response. | | |
| ▲ | kasey_junk a day ago | parent [-] | | See. Thats a good comment. “Your use of Oracle is a bad counter factual because…” Switching to that is commenting in good faith. It educates and argues the point and makes it clear that you aren’t in fact claiming that all companies are surveillance state apparatus. Note that other commenters ran with the “but they are actually argument” because the door was opened. |
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| ▲ | chiefalchemist a day ago | parent | prev [-] | | Books such as: “The Age of Surveillance Capitalism” and “Stand Out of Our Light” might not change your mind, but you’re likely to end up realizing customer data hovering is more of a driver of modern business decisions than you realize. To say nothing of the assets such activities provide the intelligence communities. This is happening. Please don’t dismiss it as conspiracy theory. |
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| ▲ | ishi a day ago | parent | prev [-] | | It's easy to make baseless accusations that are impossible to disprove, that's exactly my point. | | |
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| ▲ | mikkupikku a day ago | parent | prev | next [-] |
| Online scamming and malware are Israel's most cherished national industry, they've been specializing in this stuff for nearly 30 years: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Download_Valley > Download Valley is a cluster of software companies in Israel, producing and delivering adware to be installed alongside downloads of other software.[1] The primary purpose is to monetize shareware and downloads. These software items are commonly browser toolbars, adware, browser hijackers, spyware, and malware. Another group of products are download managers, possibly designed to induce or trick the user to install adware, when downloading a piece of desired software or mobile app from a certain source. > Although the term references Silicon Valley, it does not refer to a specific valley or any geographical area. Many of the companies are located in Tel Aviv and the surrounding region. It has been used by Israeli media[2] as well as in other reports related to IT business.[3] Getting an Israeli extradited is almost impossible, their in-group ethnic bias is so strong that they even fight the extradition of rapists. The Israeli government would rather see a jewish rapist escape justice in Israel than face justice in a gentile nation. Extraditing some businessmen who merely scam and destroy people's computers? Fat chance in hell. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Malka_Leifer_affair https://www.cbsnews.com/news/how-jewish-american-pedophiles-... |
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| ▲ | pricechild a day ago | parent | next [-] | | Could the same not be said about the US? I suspect it'd have a different spin put on it. | | |
| ▲ | ipaddr a day ago | parent | next [-] | | No the US has no issue with extradition. | | |
| ▲ | kakacik a day ago | parent [-] | | I am having extremely hard time believing this, I don't mean that on paper chance exists but out there in real world, especially with current government. Checking for 2024 the number can be counted on all fingers and toes and all were special high profile cases. US has a law that they will invade International court of justice if ever any US personnel is tried there (ie for war crimes, that one would be easy to pull on thousands of US citizens). That's the US mindset against other jurisdictions. Israel would be an exception of course. | | |
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| ▲ | wslh a day ago | parent | prev [-] | | [flagged] | | |
| ▲ | anonym29 a day ago | parent [-] | | You're kidding, right? Boca Raton, FL has been widely recognized as the spam capital of the world for decades, and has nothing to do with ethnicity or religion whatsoever. Eastern Europe is known for being a den of cybercrime groups, and Russia is known to turn a blind eye. China is widely known to cooperate with domestic cybercriminal actors. Non-jewish geographically concentrated threat actors are openly discussed all the time. The difference is that none of these places operate as legal safe havens for child sex predators. | | |
| ▲ | tonyhart7 a day ago | parent [-] | | also Russia,China,North korea is literal adversaries They dont act like "Allies" while doing the same thing adversaries do |
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| ▲ | anonym29 a day ago | parent | prev | next [-] | | I remember when the IDF guy did this right after getting arrested at DEFCON earlier this year! https://www.timesofisrael.com/senior-israeli-cyber-official-... https://www.jpost.com/israel-news/article-865532 https://www.aljazeera.com/news/2025/8/19/how-was-an-alleged-... | | |
| ▲ | tdeck a day ago | parent [-] | | Hey now. Isn't it more likely that the cops spent months preparing this sting, caught the suspect red handed and arrested him, got a confession from the suspect in an interview, and everyone involved just honestly completely forgot to take his passport or impose any sort of travel restrictions? |
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| ▲ | dmix a day ago | parent | prev | next [-] | | Based on your wiki almost all of those are from 2010 era and shut down long ago The US has always had a number of grey market scammy businesses like those too. Lots of countries do. | |
| ▲ | gosub100 a day ago | parent | prev | next [-] | | https://www.8newsnow.com/investigators/israeli-official-plea... this alleged sex offender just appears remotely for his court appearances lol. I wonder if he will attend prison remotely too? Maybe an RC robot will serve his sentence and he can look out the bars through a camera and VPN from Israel. | |
| ▲ | sumalamana a day ago | parent | prev [-] | | Israel is gonna have a really big PR problem as the boomer generation ages and dies. | | |
| ▲ | Cyph0n a day ago | parent | next [-] | | They already have a major PR problem and are scrambling to fix it. What they don’t - or don’t care enough to - realize is that given the enormity of the crimes they committed (heck, still are committing!), nothing short of accountability and justice will help cleanse their reputation. | |
| ▲ | jalapenog 7 hours ago | parent | prev | next [-] | | I think they really don’t care if you know they own all your politicians and elections. | |
| ▲ | 71bw 14 hours ago | parent | prev | next [-] | | They only do because the Arabs and Chinese weaponized social media quicker. | |
| ▲ | nunobrito a day ago | parent | prev | next [-] | | Yes. The newer generations are far more aware of what is happening. | |
| ▲ | gosub100 a day ago | parent | prev | next [-] | | and as the Epstein blackmail program gets unmasked | |
| ▲ | jack_tripper a day ago | parent | prev | next [-] | | [flagged] | | |
| ▲ | anonym29 a day ago | parent [-] | | The latter has always been true already of mainstream social platforms like Facebook, and the former isn't a patch, that's the old strategy. It's not working anymore. | | |
| ▲ | jack_tripper a day ago | parent | next [-] | | Not really. Elon was always open to let everyone post anything they want about Israel on X, that's why X resembles 4Chan. | |
| ▲ | ipaddr a day ago | parent | prev [-] | | The Larry Ellison purchase Tiktok, CBS and possible Warner Bros/CNN is still in play ensuring a media takeover. | | |
| ▲ | coliveira a day ago | parent | next [-] | | It's always so funny how these people use their money to buy all media companies (a "dying" and profitless industry) and still think nobody will even notice... | |
| ▲ | anonym29 a day ago | parent | prev [-] | | It's too late to matter. Try finding someone under 30 who isn't already a zionist that has anything positive to say about Israel. It's like pulling teeth. | | |
| ▲ | Nasrudith a day ago | parent [-] | | Given how loosely zionism is defined that is pretty much a tautology. There is no definition of zionist in use here, it is just vibes based 'reasoning'.
Zionist is rhetorically used to maintain their political bubble. They cannot say if for instance a moderate and nuanced opinion ("October 7th was legitimate causus beli -but blocking aid is a hard crossing of the lines.") is Zionist or not. Let alone statements like "Israel has a right to exist." qualify. There is plenty of motte and bailey to go around and the truth has already been buried in an unmarked grave. | | |
| ▲ | anonym29 a day ago | parent [-] | | On what planet is Zionism loosely defined? Go ask young people - Zionism is support for the existence of an Israeli state. Outside of Jewish and Zionist Christian circles (which make up a tiny minority), virtually everyone under 30 can be lumped into the "not a fan of Israel" camp. The only question is a matter of degree. A third of them think Israel was too heavy-handed in the response to 10/7. Another third are cheering for 10/7 and chanting "from the river to the sea". The final third are quiet about it in person, but behind pseudonyms online, are denying the holocaust while simultaneously asserting that jewish people deserved it. Seriously, go talk to people under 30. Jewish people are in for a very rude awakening as the loudest non-Jewish defenders of Israel and of Zionism, the boomers, die out. This is absolutely not an endorsement of antisemitism, or of violence or threats of violence being directed at anyone, which is always wrong, but if I were Jewish and living in the US or western Europe, I'd already have started making plans to flee/escape. Just because what is happening is morally wrong doesn't mean it isn't happening. | | |
| ▲ | mikkupikku 11 hours ago | parent [-] | | I do believe you're right. As the American babyboomers die out, Israel is going to find itself without any allies. Young people are through with them. |
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| ▲ | juggerlt a day ago | parent | prev | next [-] | | [flagged] | |
| ▲ | jijijijij a day ago | parent | prev [-] | | PR only matters in free democracies. |
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| ▲ | leoh a day ago | parent | prev | next [-] |
| It’s largely because military service is mandatory and 8200 is like the MIT or Stanford of Israel.. not some nefarious bullshit about intelligence |
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