批評者抨擊間諜軟體製造商NSO的透明度聲明，因其正尋求進入美國市場

Topics

Latest

AI

Amazon

Apps

Biotech & Health

Climate

Cloud Computing

Commerce

Crypto

Enterprise

EVs

Fintech

Fundraising

Gadgets

Gaming

Google

Government & Policy

Hardware

Instagram

Layoffs

Media & Entertainment

Meta

Microsoft

Privacy

Robotics

Security

Social

Space

Startups

TikTok

Transportation

Venture

More from TechCrunch

Staff

Events

Startup Battlefield

StrictlyVC

Newsletters

Podcasts

Videos

Partner Content

TechCrunch Brand Studio

Crunchboard

Contact Us

Critics pan spyware maker NSO’s transparency claims amid its push to enter US market

NSO Group, one of the most well-known and controversial makers of government spyware, released a new transparency report on Wednesday, as the company enters what it described as “a new phase of accountability.”

But the report, unlike NSO’s previous annual disclosures, lacks details about how many customers the company rejected, investigated, suspended, or terminated due to human rights abuses involving its surveillance tools. While the report contains promises to respect human rights and have controls to demand its customers do the same, the report provides no concrete evidence supporting either.

Experts and critics who have followed NSO and the spyware market for years believe the report is part of an effort and campaign by the company to get the U.S. government to remove the company from a blocklist — technically called the Entity List — as it hopes to enter the U.S. market with new financial backers and executives at the helm.

Last year, a group of U.S. investors acquired the company, and since then, NSO has been undergoing a transition that included high-profile personnel changes: former Trump official David Friedman was appointed the new executive chairman; CEO Yaron Shohat stepped down; and Omri Lavie, the last remaining founder who was still involved in the company, also left, as Israeli newspaper Haaretz reported.

“When NSO’s products are in the right hands within the right countries, the world is a far safer place. That will always be our overriding mission,” Friedman wrote in the report, which does not mention any country where NSO operates.

Natalia Krapiva, the senior tech-legal counsel at Access Now, a digital rights organization that investigates spyware abuses, told TechCrunch: “NSO is clearly on a campaign to get removed from the U.S. Entity List and one of the key things they need to show is that they have dramatically changed as a company since they were listed.”

“Changing the leadership is one part and this transparency report is another,” said Krapiva.

“However, we have seen this before with NSO and other spyware companies over the years where they change names and leadership and publish empty transparency or ethics reports but the abuses continue.”

“This is nothing but another attempt at window dressing and the U.S. government should not be taken for a fool,” said Krapiva.

Ever since the Biden administration added NSO to the Entity List, the company has lobbied to have its restrictions lifted. After President Donald Trump took office again last year, NSO intensified these efforts. But, as of May last year, NSO had failed to sway the new administration.

In late December, the Trump administration lifted sanctions against three executives tied to the Intellexa spyware consortium, in what some saw as a sign of a shift in the administration’s attitude toward spyware makers.

A lack of details

This year’s transparency report, which covers 2025, has fewer details than reports from previous years.

In an earlier transparency report covering 2024, for example, NSO said it opened three investigations of potential misuse. Without naming the customers, the company said it cut ties with one, and imposed on another customer “alternative remediation measures,” including mandating human rights training, monitoring the customer activities, and requesting more information about how the customer uses the system. NSO did not provide any information about the third investigation.

NSO also said that during 2024, the company rejected more than $20 million “in new business opportunities due to human rights concerns.”

In the transparency report published the prior year, covering 2022 and 2023, NSO said it suspended or terminated six government customers, without naming them, and claiming these actions resulted in a revenue loss of $57 million.

In 2021, NSO said it had “disconnected” the systems of five customers since 2016 following an investigation of misuse, resulting in more than $100 million in “estimated loss of revenue,” and it also said that it “discontinued engagements” with five customers due to “concerns regarding human rights.”

NSO’s newest transparency report does not include the total number of customers NSO has, statistics have been consistently present in previous reports.

TechCrunch asked NSO spokesperson Gil Lanier to provide similar statistics and figures, but did not receive answers by press time.

John Scott-Railton, a senior researcher at The Citizen Lab, a human rights organization that has investigated spyware abuses for more than a decade, criticized NSO.

“I was expecting information, numbers,” Scott-Railton told TechCrunch. “Nothing in this document allows outsiders to verify NSO’s claims, which is business as usual from a company that has a decade long history of making claims that later turned out to be misrepresentation.”

Topics

Senior Reporter, Cybersecurity

Lorenzo Franceschi-Bicchierai is a Senior Writer at TechCrunch, where he covers hacking, cybersecurity, surveillance, and privacy.

You can contact or verify outreach from Lorenzo by emailing [email protected], via encrypted message at +1 917 257 1382 on Signal, and @lorenzofb on Keybase/Telegram.

Plan ahead for the 2026 StrictlyVC events. Hear straight-from-the-source candid insights in on-stage fireside sessions and meet the builders and backers shaping the industry. Join the waitlist to get first access to the lowest-priced tickets and important updates.