By Chris Menahan – Information Liberation
Hollywood producer Robert Simonds has purchased the Israeli spyware maker NSO Group to bring it under “American” control and hired Trump’s former Ambassador to Israel, David Friedman, to lobby the president to remove sanctions on the firm so they can sell their hacking tools to US law enforcement.
Though the company was sold to a consortium of alleged “Americans” led by Simonds, the NSO Group “said Sunday that it would continue to operate from Israel under the full regulatory authority of the Defense Ministry, as it expands its global footprint and seeks to resume operations in the US,” the Times of Israel reports.
TEL AVIV—NSO Group, the Israeli company behind Pegasus spyware, says a group of investors led by Hollywood producer Robert Simonds has acquired a controlling stake in the firm, which has named a former Trump official to lead an effort to restore its battered reputation.
The company, which has faced lawsuits and U.S. government sanctions since revelations that its technology was used to spy on political dissidents, human-rights advocates, journalists and American officials, declined to disclose the purchase price.
NSO’s new executive chairman, David Friedman, a former U.S. ambassador to Israel and onetime bankruptcy lawyer for President Trump, said he wants to use his ties to the Trump administration to help rebuild the company’s spyware business in the U.S.
“If the administration, as I expect they’ll be, is receptive to considering any opportunity that might keep Americans safer, it will consider us,” said Friedman, who splits his time between Florida and Israel.
This is naked influence peddling.
In 2021, the Biden administration placed NSO on an export-prohibition list that restricted the firm from obtaining some types of technology from the U.S. In 2023, President Biden signed an executive order banning government agencies and departments from using commercial spyware that “poses risks to national security or has been misused by foreign actors to enable human rights abuses around the world.”
Unless Biden’s executive order is rescinded, it is unlikely U.S. government agencies would do business with NSO.
[…] Intelligence agencies such as the U.S. National Security Agency and the U.K.’s Government Communications Headquarters routinely use hacking tools. NSO often sells such cyber capabilities to countries that don’t have their own.NSO’s products would be “additive” to existing technologies used by U.S. law enforcement and intelligence agencies, Friedman said. He said he’s aiming to recruit U.S. law-enforcement agencies, including police forces, among the company’s customers.
[…] Friedman said his pitch to the U.S. government is that NSO’s products will make America safer. NSO says its products can be used by government agencies to fight terrorism and crime by allowing them access to encrypted messaging systems such as WhatsApp.
“NSO is a company with a long history of going against American interests and supporting the hacking of American officials. In what world can such a person be trusted to properly oversee a company like NSO Group?” Scott-Railton told TechCrunch last month, referring to Simonds.
“Going further, my real concern is that NSO has strenuously tried to enter the United States and sell their product to American police forces in U.S. cities. This dictator tech does not belong anywhere near Americans, or our constitutionally protect[ed] rights or freedoms.”
These “American” frontmen likely only purchased this company knowing full well they could pressure Trump to reverse the ban and help get these Israelis back on their feet spying on Americans and their other enemies throughout the world.
It’s truly beyond parody how sold-out our country is to the Israel Lobby.
They’ve hollowed out our nation and now they’re dancing on our graves.