Ronan Farrow Warns That Average Americans Are at High Risk of Being Hacked in HBO Doc ‘Surveilled’

variety.com:

Addie Morfoot Contributor In the HBO documentary “Surveilled,” Pulitzer Prize-winning journalist Ronan Farrow travels across the globe to investigate and expose the dark underbelly of the multi-billion-dollar advanced spyware industry.

The film reveals that repressive regimes aren’t alone in using spyware to hack into citizens’ cell phones and computers clandestinely; democratic governments are also guilty of spying on unknowing individuals. “In recent years, we have seen a succession of Western democracies, where people really thought, “It can’t happen here” have these scandals where the use of commercial spyware technology spirals out of control despite constitutions in place that should prevent it,” says Farrow, whose most recent article for the New Yorker details how the Trump administration could expand the use of commercial spyware in the U.S.

The article examines the Department of Homeland Security’s recently signed two-million-dollar contract with the Israeli spyware company Paragon. “A number of experts told me that the Department of Homeland Security acquiring this technology doesn’t necessarily mean, even if it’s intended for ICE (Immigration and Customs Enforcement), that it will only be used by ICE for immigration purposes,” says Farrow. “Not that we should lack concern about ICE marrying up Donald Trump‘s promise of mass deportation with advanced spyware technology.

But a lot of the privacy law experts that I spoke with told me that we should all really be concerned even if you don’t think of yourself as being in a vulnerable category.