Day: August 7, 2023

The use of sophisticated spyware to hack into the devices of journalists and human rights defenders during a period of conflict in Armenia has alarmed analysts.

A joint investigation by digital rights organizations, including Amnesty International, found evidence of the surveillance software on devices belonging to 12 people, including a former government spokesperson.

The apparent targeting took place between October 2020 and December 2022, including during key moments in the Nagorno-Karabakh conflict, Amnesty reported.

The region has been at the center of a decades-long dispute between Azerbaijan and Armenia, which have fought two wars over the mountainous territory.

Elina Castillo Jiménez, a digital surveillance researcher at Amnesty International’s Security Laboratory, told VOA that her organization’s research — published earlier this year — confirmed that at least a dozen public figures in Armenia were targeted, including a former spokesperson for the Ministry of Foreign Affairs and a representative of the United Nations.

Others had reported on the conflict, including for VOA’s sister network Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty; provided analysis; had sensitive conversations related to the conflict; or in some cases worked for organizations known to be critical of the government, the researchers found.

“The conflict may have been one of the reasons for the targeting,” Castillo said.

If, as Amnesty and others suspect, the timing is connected to the conflict, it would mark the first documented use of Pegasus in the context of an international conflict.

Researchers have found previously that Pegasus was used extensively in Azerbaijan to target civil society representatives, opposition figures and journalists, including the award-winning investigative reporter Khadija Ismayilova.

VOA reached out via email to the embassies of Armenia and Azerbaijan in Washington for comment but as of publication had not received a response.

Pegasus is a spyware marketed to governments by the Israeli digital security company NSO Group. The global investigative collaboration, The Pegasus Project, has been tracking the spyware’s use against human rights defenders, critics and others.

Since 2021, the U.S government has imposed measures on NSO over the hacking revelations, saying its tools were used for “transnational repression.” U.S actions include export limits on NSO Group and a March 2023 executive order that restricts the U.S. government’s use of commercial spyware like Pegasus.

VOA reached out to the NSO Group for comment but as of publication had not received a response.

Castillo said that Pegasus has the capability to infiltrate both iOS and Android phones.

Pegasus spyware is a “zero-click” mobile surveillance program. It can attack devices without any interaction from the individual who is targeted, gaining complete control over a phone or laptop and in effect transforming it into a spying tool against its owner, she said.

“The way that Pegasus operates is that it is capable of using elements within your iPhones or Androids,” said Castillo. “Imagine that it embed(s) something in your phone, and through that, then it can take control over it.”

The implications of the spyware are not lost on Ruben Melikyan. The lawyer, based in Armenia’s capital, Yerevan, is among those whose devices were infected.

An outspoken government critic, Melikyan has represented a range of opposition parliamentarians and activists.

The lawyer said he has concerns that the software could have allowed hackers to gain access to his data and information related to his clients.

“As a lawyer, my phone contained confidential information, and its compromise made me uneasy, particularly regarding the protection of my current and former clients’ rights.” he said.

Melikyan told VOA that his phone had been targeted twice: in May 2021, when he was monitoring Armenian elections, and again during a tense period in the Armenia and Azerbaijan conflict in December 2022.

Castillo said she believes targeting individuals with Pegasus is a violation of “international humanitarian law” and that evidence shows it is “an absolute menace to people doing human rights work.”

She said the researchers are not able to confirm who commissioned the use of the spyware, but “we do believe that it is a government customer.”

When the findings were released this year, an NSO Group spokesperson said it was unable to comment but that earlier allegations of “improper use of our technologies” had led to the termination of contracts.

Amnesty International researchers are also investigating the potential use of a commercial spyware, Predator, which was found on Armenian servers.

“We have the evidence that suggests that it was used. However, further investigation is needed,” Castillo said, adding that their findings so far suggest that Pegasus is just “one of the threats against journalists and human rights defenders.”

This story originated in VOA’s Armenia Service.
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Indigenous leaders from across South America called Monday for bold steps to protect the Amazon and their ancestral lands, ahead of a summit on saving the world’s biggest rainforest.

Brazilian President Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva will host fellow regional leaders Tuesday and Wednesday for the first summit in 14 years of the eight-nation Amazon Cooperation Treaty Organization, seeking a roadmap to stop the destruction of one of Earth’s crucial buffers against climate change.

Native leaders who took part in pre-summit talks last weekend in the host city, Belem, called on Lula and his counterparts to create new Indigenous reservations — one of the best ways to protect nature, according to experts — and rethink the way the world views the rainforest.

“The forest isn’t an oil well, it’s not a gold mine. It’s our temple,” said Nemo Guiquita, head of Ecuadoran Indigenous confederation CONFENIAE, which represents 1,500 Amazon communities.

“We hope our views will be included in the [summit’s] final statement,” she told Agence France-Press, saying politicians should not be the only ones deciding the future of the Amazon.

“We’re calling on world leaders to work hard to promote conservation. Our struggle isn’t just for Indigenous peoples, it’s for the entire world, so future generations can survive on this planet.”

Brazilian Indigenous Affairs Minister Sonia Guajajara called the summit a “historic moment” for Indigenous peoples.

“We’re not just thinking about the next four years, we’re thinking about the next 40,” she told AFP.

The participating countries — Bolivia, Brazil, Colombia, Ecuador, Guyana, Peru, Suriname and Venezuela — are due to discuss strategies to fight deforestation and organized crime in the Amazon and seek sustainable development for the region.

Colombian Indigenous leader Dario Mejia, a member of the Zenu people and representative on a United Nations panel on Indigenous issues, urged world leaders to fundamentally rethink the idea of “economic development.”

“There have been many different names for the market economy. First, ‘progress.’ Then. ‘development.’ Now, ‘the bioeconomy’ or ‘transition economy,'” he said.

“But if we don’t overcome the values of cut-throat competition, of permanent war on nature, it’s going to be very difficult to overcome the environmental crisis. … I want to hope [the summit] will prove an important step for us all.” 
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Raging waters that ate away at riverbanks, destroyed at least two buildings and undermined others were receding Monday in Alaska’s capital city after a glacial dam outburst last weekend, authorities said. 

Levels along the Mendenhall River had started falling by Sunday, but the city said the riverbanks remained unstable. Onlookers gathered on a bridge over the river and along the banks of the swollen Mendenhall Lake to take photos and videos Sunday. A home was propped precariously along the eroded riverbank as milky-colored water whisked past. 

There were no reports of any injuries or deaths. The city said it was working to assess the damage. 

Such floods occur when glaciers melt and pour massive amounts of water into nearby lakes. A study released earlier this year found such floods pose a risk to about 15 million people worldwide, more than half of them in India, Pakistan, Peru and China. 

Suicide Basin — a side basin of the Mendenhall Glacier — has released water that has caused sporadic flooding along the Mendenhall Lake and Mendenhall River since 2011, according to the National Weather Service. However, the maximum water level in the lake Saturday night exceeded the previous record flood stage set in July 2016, the weather service reported. 

Nicole Ferrin, a warning coordination meteorologist with the National Weather Service, said that while it’s not uncommon for these types of floods to happen, this one was extreme. 

“The amount of erosion that happened from the fast-moving water was unprecedented,” she said. 

Water levels crested late Saturday night. Video posted on social media showed a home teetering at the edge of the riverbank collapsing into the river. 

The Mendenhall Glacier in Juneau attracts hundreds of thousands of visitors each year, but the awe-inspiring glacier continues to recede amid global warming. 
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A mother is suing the city of Detroit, saying unreliable facial recognition technology led to her being falsely arrested for carjacking while she was eight months pregnant. 

Porcha Woodruff was getting her two children ready for school the morning of February 16 when a half-dozen police officers showed up at her door to arrest her, taking her away in handcuffs, the 32-year-old Detroit woman said in a federal lawsuit.

“They presented her with an arrest warrant for robbery and carjacking, leaving her baffled and assuming it was a joke, given her visibly pregnant state,” her attorney wrote in a lawsuit accusing the city of false arrest. 

The suit, filed Thursday, argues that police relied on facial recognition technology that should not be trusted, given “inherent flaws and unreliability, particularly when attempting to identify Black individuals” such as Woodruff.

Some experts say facial recognition technology is more prone to error when analyzing the faces of people of color.

In a statement Sunday, the Wayne County prosecutor’s office said the warrant that led to Woodruff’s arrest was on solid ground, NBC News reported.

“The warrant was appropriate based upon the facts,” it said.

The case began in late January, when police investigating a reported carjacking by a gunman used imagery from a gas station’s security video to track down a woman believed to have been involved in the crime, according to the suit.

Facial recognition analysis from the video identified Woodruff as a possible match, the suit said.

Woodruff’s picture from a 2015 arrest was in a set of photos shown to the carjacking victim, who picked her out, according to the lawsuit.

Woodruff was freed on bond the day of her arrest and the charges against her were later dropped due to insufficient evidence, the civil complaint maintained. 

“This case highlights the significant flaws associated with using facial recognition technology to identify criminal suspects,” the suit argued.

Woodruff’s suit seeks unspecified financial damages plus legal fees. 
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Russia said Monday it plans to launch a lunar lander this week after multiple delays, hoping to return to the Moon for the first time in nearly fifty years.

Russian space agency Roscosmos said it had scheduled the launch of the Luna-25 lander for the early hours of Friday.  

With the lunar mission, Russia’s first since 1976, Moscow is seeking to restart and build on the Soviet Union’s pioneering space program.  

The launch is the first mission of Moscow’s new lunar project and comes as President Vladimir Putin looks to strengthen cooperation in space with China after ties with the West broke down following the start of Moscow’s offensive in Ukraine last year.  

Engineers have assembled a Soyuz rocket at the Vostochny cosmodrome in the Russian Far East for the launch of the lander, Roscosmos said.  

“The Luna-25 will have to practise soft landing, take and analyze soil samples and conduct long-term scientific research,” Roscosmos said in a statement.  

The four-legged lander, which weighs around 800 kilograms (1,750 pounds) , is expected to touch down in the region of the lunar south pole. By contrast, most previous Moon landings have occurred near the lunar equator.  

The spacecraft is expected to reach the Moon around five days after launch.

‘Total sanctions’

After Putin sent troops to Ukraine last year, the European Space Agency (ESA) said it would not cooperate with Moscow on the upcoming Luna-25 launch as well as future 26 and 27 missions.  

Despite the pullout, Moscow said it would go ahead with its lunar plans and replace ESA equipment with Russian-made scientific instruments.  

Speaking at the Vostochny cosmodrome last year, Putin said the Soviet Union put the first man into space in 1961 despite “total” sanctions.  

The Kremlin chief insisted Moscow would similarly continue to develop its lunar program despite current Western sanctions in response to the assault in Ukraine. 

“We are guided by the ambition of our ancestors to move forward, despite any difficulties and any attempts to prevent us in this movement from the outside,” Putin said.

In June, the head of Russia’s space agency Roscosmos, Yuri Borisov, described the upcoming launch as high-risk.  

“This mission involves landing at the south pole. No one in the world has ever done such things,” he said during a meeting with Putin.  

“The probability of successful completion of such missions is estimated at around 70 percent.”

Evacuation

Ahead of Friday’s launch, local authorities said that residents would be evacuated from the village of Shakhtinsky in the far-eastern region of Khabarovsk, where the rocket’s boosters are expected to fall.  

During the last Soviet Moon mission in 1976, the Luna-24 brough back samples of lunar soil.  

With Sputnik, the Soviet Union launched the first man-made satellite into space in 1957 and later sent into orbit the first animal, a dog named Laika, the first man, Yuri Gagarin, and the first woman, Valentina Tereshkova.   

But compared with the Soviet era, modern Russia has struggled to innovate and its space industry is fighting to secure state funding while the Kremlin prioritizes military spending.  

Russia’s space agency is still reliant on Soviet-designed technology and has faced a number of setbacks, including corruption scandals and botched launches.   

Moscow is also falling behind in the global space race, facing tough competition from the United States and China.
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U.S. scientists have achieved net energy gain in a fusion reaction for the second time since December, the Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory said on Sunday.

Scientists at the California-based lab repeated the fusion ignition breakthrough in an experiment in the National Ignition Facility (NIF) on July 30 that produced a higher energy yield than in December, a Lawrence Livermore spokesperson said.

Final results are still being analyzed, the spokesperson added.

Lawrence Livermore achieved a net energy gain in a fusion experiment using lasers on Dec. 5, 2022. The scientists focused a laser on a target of fuel to fuse two light atoms into a denser one, releasing the energy.

That experiment briefly achieved what’s known as fusion ignition by generating 3.15 megajoules of energy output after the laser delivered 2.05 megajoules to the target, the Energy Department said.

In other words, it produced more energy from fusion than the laser energy used to drive it, the department said.

The Energy Department called it “a major scientific breakthrough decades in the making that will pave the way for advancements in national defense and the future of clean power.”

Scientists have known for about a century that fusion powers the sun and have pursued developing fusion on Earth for decades. Such a breakthrough could one day help curb climate change if companies can scale up the technology to a commercial level in the coming decades.
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