Source: Amnesty International –
Responding to a Lighthouse Reports publication documenting how First Wap, a surveillance company registered in Indonesia, has allegedly been covertly selling its products to state and private actors by exploiting gaps in export control regulations, Elina Castillo Jiménez, Advocacy and Policy Advisor for the Security Lab at Amnesty International, said:
“This investigation is just the latest evidence on the failure of export controls to prevent the proliferation of dangerous surveillance technologies. It shows how companies are successfully bypassing export regulations by conducting the bulk of their cross-border operations from jurisdictions where oversight can be avoided, such as Indonesia.
“As Amnesty and other partners have repeatedly demonstrated, a murky web of suppliers, brokers and resellers are used by state and private actors to procure surveillance products. This is enabled by a lack of regulation in certain jurisdictions and a lack of oversight in others.
“Regulators must immediately investigate the allegation that a European telecommunications network was used by First Wap to spy on people around the world. If companies are able to access networks in Europe to conduct surveillance operations on the continent or abroad, it is clear that self-regulation is failing and stronger oversight is urgently needed.
Elina Castillo Jiménez, Advocacy and Policy Advisor for the Security Lab at Amnesty International