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back to article NSO Group bloke charged with $50m theft of government malware

A former worker at NSO Group – the Israeli biz infamous for selling zero-day exploits to governments nice and nasty – has been charged with stealing his employer's spyware, and trying to sell it for $50m on the black market. The 38-year-old former bod was reportedly told he was going to be fired by his bosses at NSO, and …

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  1. onefang

    "The accused committed these crimes out of greed, despite knowing, even if he shut his eyes from seeing it, that his crimes might damage state security and lead to the collapse of a firm employing 500 workers,"

    And that's our job, dammit!

    15 0 Reply
  2. Blockchain commentard

    And have NSO Group changed their firing policies so when they fire someone they show them the door straight away? I mean, that's IT Security 101.

    14 1 Reply
  3. MiguelC Silver badge

    Charged with alleged theft?

    It's been alleged that he committed theft and he's been charged with theft, but there's no crime called "alleged theft"

    You might even allege that the alleged employee has now been allegedly charged with alleged theft. Allegedly.

    5 0 Reply
  4. Nick Kew

    Should've released it all for the public

    Ideally open source where applicable.

    Wouldn't have been a big payday, but AIUI Snowden-in-exile has at least a job?

    2 0 Reply
  5. JassMan
    WTF?

    Worth $90m - I think not

    Israel's State Attorney's Office claims he took software nasties and vulnerability information worth an estimated $90m and tried to sell it on the dark web for $50m in crypto-currencies.

    This exploited what were zero-day holes in iOS and OS X, until the code was identified by Canadian non-profit Citizen Lab and the flaws fixed by Apple

    Unless they were planning on using the software to rip-off private citizens, I think their claim of its value is highly inflated. If it was to fight a cyber war, it has no value at all since everyone loses in a war - some just moe than others.

    I any case, now Apple had fixed it, it is effectively valueless. Their only case against him is trying to make money from their own illegal activities.

    5 0 Reply
  6. Sproggit

    If you run a company that found ways to defeat, say the encryption on a DVD or BluRay, you will be prosecuted by music and movie studios and bankrupted.

    If you run a company that finds ways to defeat the security and integrity of computer operating systems, including the way that those systems protect encryption systems, you can make a lot of money from selling your exploits around the world to the highest bidder.

    And governments wonder why the general public doesn't trust them.

    3 1 Reply

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