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Contractor hoped to sell social media surveillance to oppressive regimes
Western companies are still interested in selling surveillance tools to governments that could easily abuse them. The Intercept claims to have leaked documents suggesting that Circinus, the defense contractor run by Trump fundraiser Elliott Broidy, planned to sell social media surveillance tools to governments still known for suppressing free speech, including Tunisia and the UAE. Circinus' tools harvest sites like Facebook and Twitter in a bid to find and identify "detractors" -- that is, political dissidents. While the software only sifts through public data, it's likely this information would be used to punish critics who could otherwise count on a degree of anonymity.
