Ontario police may have secretly used controversial Israeli spyware, report finds
Citizen Lab researcher says government use of spyware is 'turning cybersecurity on its head'
Citizen Lab, which investigates digital espionage against civil society, released a report Wednesday identifying "possible links" between the OPP and Paragon Solutions, a company that sells military-grade spyware called Graphite to government clients.
Graphite can be used to hack into phones, and was recently found to have been used against an Italian journalist and activists who supported migrants, after Meta-owned messaging app WhatsApp reported to nearly 100 users in January that their cellphones may have been compromised.
Paragon was founded in Israel in 2019 and is now U.S.-owned. Its founders include former Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Barak, as well as Ehud Schneorson, the former commander of Israel's Unit 8200, a secretive cyber warfare unit that was tied to last year's pager attacks in Lebanon that killed more than 30 people and wounded thousands.
https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/opp-paragon-solutions-spyware-1.7488027