Ron Deibert
@rondeibert
Director of The Citizen Lab at the University of Toronto's Munk School of Global Affairs & Public Policy Author of Chasing Shadows
WATCH: documentary produced by @nzz.ch on spyware abuses 👇 The doc includes interviews with @ciropellegrino.bsky.social , an Italian journalist whose phone we @citizenlab.ca discovered was hacked with Paragon spyware, and others. Full reel here (w subtitles): www.youtube.com/watch?app=de...
Yet another short-term cash grab that will likely come back to haunt AKA "moralizing" is out of style; let's win bigly at any expense Canada's AI champion Cohere in partnership with the UAE www.businesswire.com/news/home/20...
Canada's 🇨🇦 proposed lawful access law (Bill C22) is so bad it even has US Senators (like @wyden.senate.gov) worried it will create national security spying risks for Americans 🇺🇸! www.wyden.senate.gov/imo/media/do...
Russia Used Israeli Tech in Case Against Activist, @citizenlab.ca Report Says news.bloomberglaw.com/ip-law/russi...
While Five Eyes (including 🇨🇦) issue statement warning about cyber risks of AI, need to "prioritize foundational cyber security practices and controls" & how "Secure-by-design and secure-by-default must become standard practice" Canada is passing a lawful access bill that does the exact opposite
Last year, we @citizenlab.ca uncovered evidence that the Ontario Provincial Police is a likely customer of a spyware vendor called Paragon -- also used currently by 🇺🇸 ICE citizenlab.ca/research/a-f...
Wow @mozilla.org "identified and fixed an unprecedented number of latent security bugs in Firefox with the help of Claude Mythos Preview and other AI models" The graph is jaw dropping h/t @adamsenft.bsky.social hacks.mozilla.org/2026/05/behi...
Oh and here's the photo of the UN officials inspecting the poster after I refused to let Egyptian security take it away (2009). The poster is framed and hung on the wall of the inside of @citizenlab.ca to this day :)
Interesting coincidence: I faced a similar type of pressure in 2009 in Egypt 🇪🇬 because of China 🇨🇳 at the UN's Internet Governance Forum (IGF) China forced UN officials to shut down our book launch because our book mentioned Tibet. Big standoff between security & me news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/technol...
Penlink, the subject of our @citizenlab.ca report, is the same company that US 🇺🇸 @wyden.senate.gov and 70 other congresspeople called a "shady data broker" last month in their call for an investigation Our report confirms ICE & DHS West Virginia are customers www.wyden.senate.gov/imo/media/do...
ON 🇨🇦 Premier Doug Ford is scaling back access to information b/c he's worried "the communist Chinese" will request his cellphone records @stephaniecarvin.bsky.social and I splashed some "that's ridiculous" cold water on logic (More likely he's hiding something) www.thestar.com/politics/pro...
And about this below 👇 As a 🇨🇦, this doesn't exactly make me feel good.
About this part below 👇 I've got breaking news for you Anthropic: The US government is fascist
Judge awards British critic of Saudis $4.1 million, finds the regime hacked his devices therecord.media/london-judge... @suzannesmalley.bsky.social @billmarczak.org
The Canadian 🇨🇦 govt, and its Minister of AI and Innovation, is rushing headlong into full blown AI. All gas, no brakes, no real consultation So we're launching the People’s Consultation on AI You can find out more here 👇: www.peoplesaiconsultation.ca/news-updates/
As my @utoronto.ca colleague Jason Stanley puts it: "fascist ideology conflicts *in principle* with expertise, science, and truth"
So thrilled to see the paperback edition of Chasing Shadows (chasingshadowsbook.ca) - including a lovely endorsement by the great @margaretatwood.bsky.social (thank you Margaret!) Includes a new afterword which picks up where I left off, focusing on the techno-fascist descent in the US🇺🇸
I love the idea of a privacy-oriented LLM, but the use of China's DeepSeek as the underlying engine is an issue
Among the key international institutions it is withdrawing from are the Freedom Online Coalition & the Venice Commission What does it say about a state that is withdrawing from these?
Neat idea for sure, but too bad about the censorship on the backend b/c it uses China's 🇨🇳 DeepSeek
In the immediate aftermath of the US attack on Venezuela, the rump govt and its security apparatus has quickly turned to domestic repression. Journalists arrested, phones seized and inspected. www.washingtonpost.com/world/2026/0...