Apple Drops Lawsuit Against NSO Group
Ryan Naraine (via Hacker News):
Apple has abruptly withdrawn its lawsuit against NSO Group, citing increased risk that the legal battle might unintentionally reveal sensitive vulnerability data and difficulties in acquiring essential information from the spyware vendor.
In a court filing Friday, Apple said continuing the lawsuit now poses “too significant a risk” of exposing the anti-exploitation and threat intelligence efforts needed to fend off the very adversaries involved in the legal dispute.
[…]
Apple also cited concerns that NSO Group and unidentified officials in Israel may have taken actions to avoid producing information during discovery. “This means that going forward with this case will potentially involve disclosure to third parties of the information Apple uses to defeat spyware while Defendants and others create significant obstacles to obtaining an effective remedy,” the company said.
It also downplays the effects of a successful suit — a win would, according to Apple, “no longer have the same impact as it would have had in 2021” because there are plenty of NSO Group competitors.
WhatsApp appears to be continuing its suit against NSO Group. On the same day Apple filed its request to dismiss its case, WhatsApp attorneys were scheduling depositions (PDF).
Previously:
Update (2024-09-25): Tim Cushing:
In July, documents obtained by Distributed Denial of Secrets (DDoS) revealed the desperate measures NSO Group deployed to avoid having to turn over internal information during discovery in multiple lawsuits, including one filed by Apple. Knowing that discovery was inevitable, NSO met with Israeli government officials and asked them to secure a blocking order from the nation’s courts to prevent having to comply with discovery requests.
The government secured these orders and went to work shortly after WhatsApp served NSO with its discovery requests. According to the paperwork, the government needed to seize a bunch of the company’s internal documents for “national security” reasons, speculating disingenuously and wildly that turning over any information about NSO’s Pegasus phone-hacking malware would make the nation itself less secure.
Shortly thereafter, the Israeli government engaged in a performative raid of NSO’s offices to seize anything NSO felt might be disadvantageous in these lawsuits.
