The Biden administration added two new foreign technology companies to its export embargo list, accusing the companies of selling cyber intrusion tools that pose a global threat to digital privacy and security.
The Commerce Department said it is adding Intellexa with corporate holdings in Greece and Ireland and Citrix with holdings in Hungary and North Macedonia to its entity list, which normally bars US companies from engaging in business activity with them. Is.
The action is the latest by the Biden administration to attempt to regulate around the growing and lucrative spyware industry, where companies sell high-powered digital surveillance tools to law enforcement and intelligence agencies around the world that target smartphones and covertly able to infiltrate. Device. US officials have said that the proliferation of such devices could endanger US national security and violate human rights.
“This rule reaffirms the protection of human rights around the world as a fundamental US foreign policy interest,” said Don Graves, Deputy Secretary of the Department of Commerce. American technology to reach their nefarious goals.”
Intellexa did not immediately respond to a request for comment. citrox could not be reached.
While vendors of digital intrusion software say their tools are vital to tracking violent criminals and national security threats, Western governments and privacy advocates say the tools are used to target journalists, political opponents, human rights advocates and others. The instruments are frequently misused by both authoritarian and democratic governments. No suspicion of wrongdoing.
Reports of increased use of hacking tools purchased from companies in Israel and elsewhere have fueled calls in Europe and the US to restrict their use. NSO Group, an Israeli technology company, was previously blacklisted by the Biden administration in 2021 along with three other vendors. The Wall Street Journal reported in May that that action and negative public attention hurt NSO Group’s business, and the firm was forced to turn over control by lenders with plans to keep its controversial spyware business afloat. Recently taken new ownership.
Earlier this year, President Biden issued the first executive order of its kind limiting the use of commercial spyware within the federal government, although it does not outright ban its use for offensive purposes or testing. At the time, the administration also disclosed that it believed at least 50 US personnel working overseas were at risk from such spyware, far higher than previous estimates.
Cybersecurity researchers at the Citizen Lab at the University of Toronto previously linked Citrix to surveillance software called Predator, which was able to infect iPhones via a single-click link sent over WhatsApp. The research group found Predator customers in several countries, including Armenia, Egypt, Greece, Indonesia and Saudi Arabia, and linked the tool to hackings against Egyptian political dissidents.
Citizen Lab also concluded that Citrix was part of the “Intelxa Alliance,” a broad term for a group of spyware vendors that appears to have formed around 2019.
Tuesday’s action follows a recent pledge by the US and several allies to work together to reduce the misuse of commercial spyware.