Uncovering an operation using NSO Group’s Pegasus spyware and Trident exploit framework to target Mexican journalists, lawyers, and even a minor child.

We are releasing a more comprehensive “checklist” consolidating our thoughts on how best to confront the lack of accountability in the commercial spyware trade.

This post recaps Citizen Lab’s major research reports for 2016, which span issues surrounding censorship, surveillance, privacy, and cybersecurity as they relate to fitness trackers, political dissidents, social media users, and more.

This report describes an espionage operation using government-exclusive spyware to target Mexican government food scientists and two public health advocates.

This report discusses the targeting of Egyptian NGOs by Nile Phish, a large-scale phishing campaign. Almost all of the targets we identified are also implicated in Case 173, a sprawling legal case brought by the Egyptian government against NGOs, which has been referred to as an “unprecedented crackdown” on Egypt’s civil society. Nile Phish operators demonstrate an intimate knowledge of Egyptian NGOs, and are able to roll out phishing attacks within hours of government actions, such as arrests.

December 29 – Hamburg, Germany

Senior Research Fellow Bill Marczak was featured in a Vanity Fair article exploring his discovery of the spyware used to target UAE dissident Ahmed Mansoor, detailed in a recent Citizen Lab report.

This report describes how a government targeted an internationally recognized human rights defender, Ahmed Mansoor, with the Trident, a chain of zero-day exploits designed to infect his iPhone with sophisticated commercial spyware.

Jump to: Citizen Lab Reports External Publications Submissions Op-Eds, Letters, & Comments Books Guides Joint Reports OpenNet Initiative   Citizen Lab Reports Rebekah Brown, Marcus Michaelsen, Matt Brooks, and Siena Anstis. “Weaponized Words: Uyghur Language Software Hijacked to Deliver Malware,” Citizen Lab Report No. 185, University of Toronto, April 28, 2025. Alberto Fittarelli, M. Scott,… Read more »