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ICE's $2 Million Contract With a Spyware Vendor Is Under White House Review

Immigration and Customs Enforcement's contract with Paragon Solutions faces scrutiny over whether it complies with the Biden administration's executive order on spyware, WIRED has learned.

“We know the dangers mercenary spyware poses when sold to dictatorships, but there is also plenty of evidence of harms in democracies,” says John Scott-Railton, a senior researcher at the University of Toronto’s Citizen Lab who has been instrumental in exposing spyware-related abuses. Only 11 of the 27 EU member states have joined the US-led initiative stipulated in the “Joint Statement on Efforts to Counter the Proliferation and Misuse of Commercial Spyware,” which now counts 21 signatories, including Australia, Canada, Costa Rica, Japan, and South Korea. The European Commission published on October 16 new guidelines on the export of cyber-surveillance items, including spyware; however, it has yet to respond to the EU Parliament's call to draft a legislative proposal or admonish countries for their misuse of the technology.

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