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WashingtonCNN –
The Biden administration on Tuesday imposed sanctions on several software providers accused of aiding repressive governments in spying on everyone from U.S. officials to journalists to human rights activists — reinforcing the U.S. crackdown on the shadow industry that behind the so-called “commercial spyware”.
The Treasury Department said that under the measure it targeted two people who help lead a coalition of companies called the Intellexa Consortium, as well as several corporate members of that group.
“The Intellexa Consortium’s activities pose a counterintelligence threat to the U.S. government and, as investigative journalists, civil society groups and technology companies have widely reported, have enabled human rights abuses around the world,” a senior administration official told reporters Tuesday morning.
The sanctions prohibit US companies and citizens from doing business with the named individuals and companies. This list includes Tal Jonathan Dilian, founder of Intellexa, and Sara Aleksandra Fayssal Hamou, one of Intellexa's managing directors.
The penalties mark the U.S. government's first use of sanctions against sellers of commercial spyware, a technology whose secret ability to collect geolocation data, microphone recordings, contact lists and communication records from hacked smartphones without the knowledge of its targets has drawn criticism is .
According to a report from Google last month, Intellexa's Predator spyware was sold to the governments of Egypt, Armenia, Greece, Madagascar, Ivory Coast, Serbia, Spain and Indonesia. The Intellexa consortium, described as a competitor to the better-known NSO Group and its Pegasus software, charges its customers millions of dollars for its technology, according to business documents obtained and published by Amnesty International in 2022.
Bad actors have used commercial spyware to target at least 50 U.S. government officials, the Biden administration said last year as it unveiled an executive order banning federal agencies from using the technology. In 2021, the US government announced that NSO Group spyware was used against about a dozen State Department employees working in Africa.
Several of the companies sanctioned this week had previously been placed on a Commerce Department blacklist that requires U.S. companies to obtain a license before trading with them.
The U.S. government has sought to rally international support to curb the use of commercial spyware, announcing last month visa restrictions on anyone seeking to enter the U.S. who works in the commercial spyware industry.
The use of commercial spyware “has been linked to arbitrary arrests, enforced disappearances and extrajudicial killings in the worst cases,” the State Department said at the time.
On Tuesday, the Biden administration vowed to watch closely for signs that Intellexa might be trying to circumvent the sanctions.
“Together,” the senior U.S. official said, “these actions send a clear message to commercial spyware vendors and those who enable them that there will be clear consequences for their irresponsible business practices that result in the targeting of Americans and global human rights abuses.” will have.” ”
The sanctions follow a 2021 letter from Oregon Democratic Senator Ron Wyden calling for the imposition of financial sanctions on companies that enable technology-enabled surveillance.