The Atlantic

Who Is Selling Hacking Subscriptions to Governments?

The same powerful surveillance tools have cropped up in at least two countries—and researchers are looking for the missing link.
Source: Aziz Taher / Reuters

BEIRUT—Just north of a perennially jammed arterial, sandwiched between the French embassy complex and a university administration building, a beige monolith with a vertical slash of reflective windows is set back from the road, guarded by a row of high barriers and men in fatigues with long guns. The building belongs to Lebanon’s General Directorate of General Security, one of the country’s several security agencies, which is in charge of national-security intelligence. According to a bombshell new report, this building is also the home base for a wide-ranging spying operation that spanned five years and more than 20 countries.

The report, published Thursday by the American security-research company Lookout and the

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