This edition of Social Media CyberWatch looks at new developments in privacy research, legal debates, and online service provider policies and decisions.

This post describes the results of a comprehensive global Internet scan for the command and control servers of FinFisher’s surveillance software. It also details the discovery of a campaign using FinFisher in Ethiopia that may have been used to target individuals linked to an opposition group. Additionally, it provides examination of a FinSpy Mobile sample found in the wild, which appears to have been used in Vietnam.

A new post written by Andrei Soldatov and Irina Borogan as part of the joint project by Privacy International, Agentura.Ru and the Citizen Lab on Russia’s surveillance state.

Citizen Lab Post-Doctoral Fellow Philippa Gill and Senior Analytics and Visualization Developer Greg Wiseman will participate at this year’s Boston Freedom in Online Communications Day (BFOC), taking place on 8 March 2013.

This edition of the Middle East and North Africa CyberWatch covers topics such as censorship and surveillance, blogger and netizen arrests, cyber attacks and technological developments from the region.

This Social Media CyberWatch looks at the rebirth of CISPA, death of bill C-30, EU privacy lobbying, Facebook and Google Play privacy concerns, and various web tracking policy developments such as Do Not Track and third-party cookies implementations.

This report details Iran’s increasing Internet controls since 2009, when protests against the victory of Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmedinejad rocked the country. The election protest campaign–dubbed the “Green Movement”–was marked for the high use of social media and other information and communication technologies (ICT) to organize protests and disseminate information.

Titled “Teachers’ pension plan invests in Internet surveillance firm,” the Toronto Star editorial connects the investment group that manages the Ontario Teachers Pension Plan (OTPP) with Blue Coat Systems.

This edition of the Middle East and North Africa CyberWatch covers topics such as censorship and surveillance, blogger and netizen arrests, cyber attacks and technological developments from the region.