US Immigration Agency Contract with Spyware Company Poses Risk to Rights
Systems Needed to Hold Industry, Governments to International Standards
https://www.hrw.org/news/2024/10/17/us-immigration-agency-contract-spyware-company-poses-risk-rights
United States Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE), a US government agency linked to human rights abuses, has contracted services from the Israeli spyware company Paragon, according to a government contracting website. Wired magazine first reported on the US$2 million contract, which the agency signed with Paragon in September.\
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The contract summary doesn't name a specific product, but Paragon is best known for Graphite, a spyware tool that, like its competitor Pegasus, can bypass the encryption of many smartphones and give access to the data inside. In 2022, the New York Times reported that the US Drug Enforcement Agency was also using Paragon’s software. That same year, the Federal Bureau of Investigations sought to deploy Pegasus, developed and sold by NSO Group, but backed out in response to public pressure. One week after the Wired article was published, the contract summary was updated with a stop work order, but the current state of Paragon’s work for ICE is unclear.
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