Transcription
Hello guys and gals, me Mudahar. And uh, you know, one thing that I find funny is anytime I talk about a nation like Israel, I always get like a few comments going, "Oh my god, Mood has taken a stand against the people that control the world." Or it's either, "Look at that anti-semitism." And it always shows me that people don't really watch the video at all other than jump in and make a baseless comment for no reason.
Now look, I'm in my 30s, so I'm just going to just give you an honest upfront understanding. If you've watched me for any length of time, I hope that you realize that I'm not somebody that hates people for immutable characteristics. Doesn't really appeal to me. Does doesn't really like fly by me. Call me a wokey if you want. Uh, I'm just a normal [ __ ] person.
Look, at the end of the day, this is a video about computer security, computer surveillance, the crazy world that we live in. I have a lot of stuff to discuss and none of it has to do with the anti-semitism or, oh my god, it's the Jews. No. But in reality of it, ladies and gentlemen, I have a lot of uh people that in my life that are Jewish, that are good friends of mine, people that are from the nation of Israel, people that aren't, people that actually do condemn the nation of Israel for for what for their own reasons.
Now, me, I have been basically pointed out as, oh, Muda, that guy's a that guy that guy's an Israel lover. And I'm like, you know, at the end of the day, I don't really like the Israeli government. I really don't. I don't think that their war is necessarily done with moral impunity or anything, but I also don't like their country for a lot of reasons, especially when it comes to the government because there's a lot of spying and surveillance that occurs from the nation of Israel. Not to say that there aren't great tech companies that exist out there. Uh, there are, but uh, today we're going to be talking about surveillance.
And I think one of the scariest things that happens in today's day and age where I think a lot of governments now are bypassing warrants by going directly to the nation of Israel and using their insanely good cyber security divisions to break into people's personal devices. So again, I just want to go into this. I'm not a fan of anti-semitism. I think anti-semitism is literally one of those things that is the most beneficial to the leadership of Israel. Like anytime they can just like choose to uh uh sort of uh sort of endorse or sort of like excuse their actions is just say look, everyone hates us, anti-semitism. And again, they'll use it as a as a shield in a way too.
Uh, so before we continue, I just want to say like, listen guys, the Jews are Jewish people. They're they're practicers of Judaism. Okay? They're practicers of a religion. They're a race of people. And Israel is a nation that is composed of many Jews and many minorities. Okay. The fact that I have to be saying this as as a human being shows how how [ __ ] far low we've dropped as a society when it comes to engaging with topics with any nuance. I've criticized the Chinese government for surveillance and [ __ ] up things. But never in those videos have has anybody ever gone like, "Wow, damn M, do you hate Chinese people? You know how [ __ ] stupid you sound?" We have learned in the past few months the state takes actions even if the individuals of a state hates them. Okay? Democracy is a [ __ ] scam in certain cases, as much as I love it. But anyways, let's get back to the meat and potatoes of the video, ladies and gentlemen.
So, one of the things that I saw earlier on, like throughout this month, was apparently there was an unreovable Israeli spyware from Samsung phones. Now, this is a Samsung Fold device. It's one of the most premium devices out there. This does not fall under the bandwagon of what consists of that spooky uh, you know, Israeli unreovable malware. So to give you an idea, a controversy came around where there was a pre-installed application known as AppCloud founded by an Israeli founded startup. Now AppCloud for anybody that doesn't know comes from IronSource. Now IronSource is linked to uh Unity and it's mostly for mobile gaming stuff. And the thing about it is uh, they kind of came into uh prominence over here because ultimately they were partnered with Samsung as they were launching their devices in the Middle East and North Africa, which as you can imagine, Israel is, you know, a part of. It's it's a nation that sits in there and they're not exactly friendly with all the other Arab nations. Okay, just just look it up if you want the [ __ ] history. I'm not a history major or a geopolitical expert. I'll let you figure that out. But IronSource, for instance, had already integrated its devices into more than 30 markets. And of course, when you look at it, IronSource will now be their sole partner on newly released A series and M series devices.
Now, for A series and M series devices, those are Samsung's lower to mid-end devices, not their super high-end Galaxy or competing with the iPhone bracket level of devices. But to give you an idea, there was a lot of discussion about this and people started looking into AppCloud itself which appeared to be unreovable. Now I don't have a phone from that region so I can't exactly confirm this myself but you look at the notifications list and people are looking at the application at full network access, viewing network connections, view the Wi-Fi connections, run that [ __ ] at startup, download files without notifications. So yeah, these are notifications or sorry, not notifications, permissions that look scary. And one thing about Android and iOS permissions is they sometimes look scarier than they actually are. Like you know when you download an application that allows you to connect to the internet and you read have full network access. Some people think, whoa, that's scary. Well, how the [ __ ] do you think the application that needs to connect to the internet is going to connect to the internet? Yes, it needs this functionality. In reality, the only way to really ascertain if some spying is going on is to look through the network stack, actually run tests, which I haven't seen necessarily done in this situation.
Now, ultimately, it is weird to me to see that Israeli uh companies or Israeli affiliated companies are looking this deeply into the region, uh, you know, a region that they have a lot of controversies in. Why they're grabbing all this information? Is it just again, basic analytics? Or is it possibly grabbing more information that they need that they can send back home in the name of security or whatever other thing? Again, there's a reasonable like, you know, uh, suspicion that people have. And this is also just one of the reasons why I wouldn't use any software that has these kind of capabilities from any country, doesn't necessarily just have to be Israel. For instance, now people inside the world of Samsung phones have been talking about how to disable AppCloud and sometimes it does get disabled but according to users, it does reenable itself after certain system updates. So, it's kind of like walking into Microsoft Windows. You can debloat it all you want, but it always comes back. It's like [ __ ] William Afton or some crazy [ __ ].
But the thing about it is obviously when this was discussed, these are serious privacy issues that anybody is going to have. And I think Malwarebytes put it puts it the best. You shouldn't have to buy a higher-end phone to get basic [ __ ] privacy. There's a lot of phones from the United States. Hell, there's a reason why I don't use Windows 11 simply because I don't really trust Microsoft and, you know, their connection to the United States government and having that software run on my device. It's one of the reasons I use Linux. With Linux, I know when I run my computer and run software underneath it, what is actually going on? I can pull up any log. I can pull up any system like uh parameter. I can pull up anything and see what's going on. I can't easily do that with closed sourced operating systems like Windows and yada yada yada.
So, you know, this whole conversation around Israel, I think really got sparked up because of the anti-semitism angle, right? And just because, oh, it's Israel, the scariest country in the world when it comes to this kind of [ __ ]. But really, I want to shift attention now to something that I think is more important and more apt to Israel and how bad they can be when it comes to violating our privacy and our rights and working with governments against us.
Now, there's been a lot of discussion too when it comes to things like the Israeli Defense Forces. For instance, even Microsoft, which proudly worked with these companies for a while, actually stopped because they got a whole bunch of backlash where they said, "Hey, listen. You know, a newspaper wrote about us working with the IDF, and we explained at the time that multiple individuals have asserted that the IDF is using Azure for the storage of data files for phone calls obtained through broad surveillance of civilians in Gaza." And of course, obviously, Microsoft is like, whoa, wait a second. We were okay with getting checks, but once we started getting the bad PR, hold on, we don't work with them anymore. You know, I think it's a broad spectrum of like how much US companies like to work with agencies in Israel, especially law enforcement agencies, when it comes to bypassing our simple rights.
Now, for anybody that hasn't followed, back in the day, there was something known as the Apple FBI encryption dispute. Now, for anybody that doesn't know, there was a mass shooting in 2015 that had happened in San Bernardino in California. Now, the FBI had actually asked Apple if they could help decrypt this. Now, at the time, Apple was like, uh, we don't really have the ability to do that because ultimately with things like encryption, you know, you really just lock the phone away and throw the key. If Apple could back door into your device, that means the government can look into any personal like information, anything from anybody's device at any moment. And sometimes that can also mean a hacker could also get access at some point into that system and look through people's devices. Encryption is one of those things. Privacy is one of those things that's all or nothing.
So ultimately at this moment in time while FBI and Apple kind of, you know, duped this out in court, the FBI went to a company in Israel known as Cellebrite. Now Cellebrite is one of those companies where if you go to their actual website, they'll talk about how they efficiently access, extract, secure, and manage digital evidence. So they kind of build themselves up as like, hey, we're counterterrorism, we work with law enforcement, all that and bag of chips. But the thing about it is these are mercenary cyber security companies that oftentimes just get hired out whenever law enforcement needs to bypass warrants in this case, right? Like for instance, there have been actual millions of dollars from your tax money in the United States spent with a government agency known as ICE. Now, if you don't know what ICE is, they're the Immigrations and Customs Enforcement Division. They're the guys that have the masked agents running around the country and, you know, grabbing people up for deportation. Now, whatever your political stance on that is, I don't give a [ __ ]. Okay? Again, I'm somebody that is looking at this to show you what the future looks like for anybody, regardless of your political affiliations.
So, for instance, I spent $5 million on social media and dark web monitoring. Ultimately, they spent millions of dollars working with agencies and technologies like Cobwebs' AI powered social media surveillance tech and the ability for them to also send zero-day malware to people. Now, in some cases, some of the software is purchased through Israeli cyber security divisions. And here's the thing about malware that is used to zero-day hack into your device. Ultimately, you need a warrant to be able to look through people's personal information, right? That's something that is like a cornerstone of any good legal framework, right? You can't just allow a government to come in, look through your cell phone or look through your house without some form of judicial warrant, right? Otherwise, governments can be like Nazi [ __ ] Germany, right? They can be like authoritarian governments that just walk into your life, look through whatever, and in some cases, all right, as as scary as it sounds, maybe used to plant political like evidence against their opposition and use that to send people to jail for a long time, like you will find in authoritarian countries.
Ultimately, you need a good judicial system, and that system relies on warrants. Now, what happens if you don't need the warrant? You can just call up your friends in another sovereign nation and have them do the hacks for you on anybody that you may not like. Well, that's unfortunately the grim reality. And here's the thing, people look at this and and think it's good now, especially if you align with a certain political side. But remember, the pendulum always swings back and forth. You know, at some point the wokies will get into power. And when the wokies do get into power, imagine having a framework like this enabled where now they can use this level of warrantless surveillance against their rivals. Again, this always leads to an unneeded retribution and ultimately it's a complete net negative for our privacy and our actual like, you know, peace of mind. We should not be living in a state where surveillance becomes a norm uh rather than like an insane exception, right? This should only be something that is allowed against people that are, you know, proven in a court to require this kind of [ __ ].
Okay, we are reaching a point where like the same [ __ ] that was used against the mob, right? Actual mafias, actual transnational criminal operations, just broadly used against the average person in some cases because they may have made a social media post that isn't necessarily accepted by the government or they might just be randomly fingered because they might be dissident. One of the things about this kind of surveillance is how much it actually is targeting people that really just want to speak against the government. There's a lot of people in Israel, for instance, right, that want to speak against their actual government. Unfortunately, it seems as if three years ago when I was researching this too, Israeli citizens themselves, people that were dissident to their like regime, to their like political leaders were targeted apparently by Pegasus software.
Now, we talked about Pegasus in the past. We actually talked about it quite recently too. Pegasus is a suite of, you know, cyber attack tools that can be used to break into people's personal devices that can be used to surveil individuals that may be targeted for being, you know, political prisoners. And in a lot of ways, there are journalists internationally that are targeted by this every time. It's to a point where Apple, I believe, introduced Lockdown Mode specifically because world leaders, journalists, people are being targeted by this malware and Apple had to respond because ultimately that's all these companies have, right? Is that if they're going to sell you privacy, they want you to at least have privacy without [ __ ] with some peace of mind.
So in this case, there was an investigation conducted by an Israeli business site known as Calcalist. And over there, they said that there were actual targets that were local mayors in Israel, leaders of political protests against the former prime minister, Benjamin Netanyahu, and former government employees. But according to the report, the surveillance was done without the court supervision required for Israeli citizens and without monitoring of how the data was used. So this is a claim obviously that the Israeli police services are going to deny because why the [ __ ] would they why the [ __ ] would they admit and say, "Yeah, by the way, we were breaking the law, so all of our investigations are null and void on them." Yeah, this is an issue that you would find in any normal country, right? Like in in the United States, imagine if the NYPD was broadly surveilling you without any form of warrant order or whatnot. You would probably be [ __ ] mad.
But the thing about it is it makes being a political dissident. It makes being a journalist that much scarier. Journalists honestly put their life on the line when they talk about this kind of stuff. Because really, you're fighting against a government and a state that is able to look into every aspect of your life. And if they find you to genuinely be a threat, they can do whatever they want to ruin your life and make speaking against them that much more difficult. If they make an example of one person, that means society is set back literally by decades without the ability to speak against actual injustices. And that, no matter what side you're on, is a problem.
And again, these are like Israeli journalists who bring up the idea and the actual like showcasing of invoices in the 2.7 million shekel amount which again were used to purchase from the Israeli police department from a group known as NSO. And again, some of these people are, you know, again, filled with graduates from one of Israel's top leading military investigation agency, which is Unit 8200. Now, again, this is like sort of an entire industry that they're known for, right? This is an entire industry and unfortunately it is this level of malware, it is this level of, you know, stuff that is used against other sovereign nations too.
You know, it's crazy to think that we live in a world where warrants, right, can easily be bypassed because you can make one call to another sovereign nation and they can do all of the dirty work for you, right? It's like just outsource your actual domestic like issues. Just outsource all of that crap to the other part of the world and hopefully have it bypass all the legal channels that you kind of claim to love. This is like one of the reasons why like again, I talk about this stuff because ultimately it is the same [ __ ] that has caused big tech companies like WhatsApp to absolutely take groups like NSO to court over this kind of stuff because they noticed how many thousands of journalists were being targeted through their platform because of malware like this. If you don't believe me, just look up these legal documents for yourself. I can show you them on the screen right now.
Again, I don't want to talk about this stuff because it's conspiratorial. I want to talk about this stuff while I'm showing you facts. You know, when I talk about like, hey, there is a rise in things like fascism or government surveillance. It's not because I'm saying this because I have some crazy derangement syndrome. It's because there are government agencies that are purchasing software that is specifically used to target people without warrants. This is the behavior of governments that want to spy on people rather than, I think, truly help.
Now, I don't want to be completely naive. I think that obviously in some cases mass surveillance probably prevented things like another 9/11, but let's be real, throwing the baby out with the bathwater and living in a society where you are constantly being monitored or watched is never okay and you should always stand against that. And like ultimately at the end of the day when I talk about like the citizens living safely in their countries, a lot of this technology is built off the backbone of again when it's being used against people in war-torn areas.
So, for instance, again, there has been a lot of discussion, for instance, like this is literally a report from the actual Intercept back from April of this year where they talked about a 21-year-old Palestinian citizen of Israel, right, was arrested by the authorities for sharing three Instagram stories in the morning of October 7th. The images included a picture of a bulldozer breaking through the border fence in Gaza and a quote, "Do you support decolonization?" So, she was making memes. She was making posts over here. She was suspended from a university and faced up to five years in prison. So the big thing about this was apparently the Israeli security officials boasted of a ChatGPT-like arsenal used to monitor social media users for supporting or inciting things like terrorism. So again, we're at social media surveillance levels here.
And this kind of stuff doesn't just stop at a nation like Israel when where they're actually bordered with people that, you know, are definitely threatening them uh in a security sense. Look, if you live in a nation like Israel, there's there there's no shock. Like, I've definitely, you know, heard it from people living over there that when they hear the sirens go off, it's it's almost like second nature to them, knowing that they're being attacked every single [ __ ] day or the other day. And uh, it really puts everyone at this heightened sense of like alert, but it's weird. Like they're alerted, but they're also desensitized to it.
Ultimately, at the end of the day, this kind of technology is being used ultimately around the world. Technology that would have started its way at Shin Bet, an organization that is even spookier than I believe Mossad is. And this kind of technology is ultimately brought from Israel all the way to the rest of the world in terms of surveilling you. Look, data surveillance and data violations and again, living in this world, we need to fight back in this regard because ultimately no matter who you are, what side you're on, I think bypassing the basic warrants that we have, bypassing the basic protections that we have, living in a world where getting hacked and being targeted without knowing is a scary [ __ ] world to live in, right?
You know, it's the same discussion that I've had about countries like the United States or China or Russia or Iran or any country that actually does verifiably spy on its citizens. I mean, you don't have to be like a defender of the US to not acknowledge that programs like PRISM, not PRISM, but PRISM were used, let's be honest, to mostly spy and surveil the masses. And when you get governments to spy and surveil on you, the ability for them to violate your rights becomes just that much more easier. You know, it doesn't matter what side of the spectrum you're on. You might think that ICE buying malware to spy on a bunch of illegals is [ __ ] based, but don't forget the fact that when you allow it now, 10 years later, when you're on the [ __ ] whipping end of the spectrum, they're going to use it against you. All right? And everyone loses when you're being surveilled. Everyone loses when the elites are allowed to surveil on you with any impu without any impunity. When you let law enforcement agencies violate your basic protections by calling up a sovereign nation on the other side of the world and having them do hacks on their behalf just to violate [ __ ] for you. That should not be tolerated.
There's a reason why NSO Group, there's a reason why a lot of these companies like Cellebrite are the ones that constantly get fingered because they really are just the best of the best. And they really are a nation of mercenaries that are selling this [ __ ] to governments that are using it against the average person. And that shouldn't be okay. So again, I don't want this to be like, oh, the Jews did this. No, actually, if you look at the companies beyond this, it's a lot more than just the Jews. There's probably a fair amount of Muslims. There's probably a fair amount of Christians. Probably a fair amount of atheists working at this organization uh or these companies that are designing tools to be used against people and mass. It's a wild world we live in and I don't like the hacking that we face.
But ladies and gentlemen, if you like what you saw, please like, comment, and subscribe. Dislike if you dislike it. I am out.