UAE Human Rights Activist Ahmed Mansoor hit by Spyware – Evidence of Abuse – Cybercrime

In this report, Citizen Lab Security Researcher Morgan Marquis-Boire describes analysis performed on malicious software used to compromise a high profile dissident residing in the United Arab Emirates. The findings indicate that the software is a commercial surveillance backdoor distributed by an Italian company known as Hacking Team. The report also describes the potential involvement of vulnerabilities sold by the French company, VUPEN. continue reading original source

A report by a Google researcher has connected commercially-made malware with attacks on Middle East dissidents, an increasingly common occurrence that has fueled controversy over the selling and buying of information on software flaws.

Ahmed Mansoor a human-rights activist based in the United Arab Emirates has become the latest victim of such an attack, this time using malware known as Crisis, which appears to be a program sold by the Italian firm Hacking Team, according to a report posted on Sept. 10 by the University of Toronto’s CitizenLab and authored by Google researcher Morgan Marquis-Boire. Crisis, also known as DaVinci, was originally discovered by antivirus firms in July and noted for its ability to infect computers running either Microsoft Windows or Apple Mac OS X as well as its focus on spreading to virtual machine instances.

In July, Ahmed Mansoor, an outspoken blogger from the United Arab Emirates and a member of the “U.A.E. Five” — a group of Emirati activists jailed last year for criticizing government leaders — opened a suspicious e-mail with a Microsoft Word attachment that, when opened, deployed spyware that could monitor his every keystroke, record his passwords, social networking and instant messenger chats and even his voice conversations through his computer’s microphone. Mr. Mansoor told Bloomberg that because of that innocent mistake– clicking on a malicious e-mail attachment– he was inexplicably beaten by unknown assailants.

In leaked product literature, Hacking Team refers to the Trojan as the Remote Control System (RCS).

In the latest analysis, CitizenLab—part of the Munk School of Global Affairs at the University of Toronto—found that an attack on activist Ahmed Mansoor used the Crisis tool to exploit a vulnerability discovered by French offensive cyber-security firm VUPEN. The monitoring program was configured to send information to servers hosted by the Royal Group, a corporation based in the UAE.

VUPEN has denied selling the details of the flaw.

In July, Ahmed Mansoor, an outspoken blogger from the United Arab Emirates and a member of the “U.A.E. Five” — a group of Emirati activists jailed last year for criticizing government leaders — opened a suspicious e-mail with a Microsoft Word attachment that, when opened, deployed spyware that could monitor his every keystroke, record his passwords, social networking and instant messenger chats and even his voice conversations through his computer’s microphone. Mr. Mansoor told Bloomberg that because of that innocent mistake– clicking on a malicious e-mail attachment– he was inexplicably beaten by unknown assailants.

In the case of Mr. Mansoor, the spyware eavesdropped from a server that, as of August, was registered to a post office box in Abu Dhabi that matched the corporate headquarters of the Royal Group, a U.A.E. conglomerate. In the case of Mamfakinch, the spyware was controlled by an I.P. address hosted in Rabat, Morocco’s capital.

Executives at the Royal Group could not be reached for comment. A representative at Morocco’s consulate in New York did not respond to a request for comment.

source

 

Unbelievable Smear Campaign against detained UAE blogger Ahmed Mansoor

DUBAI (Reuters) – The family of Ahmed Mansoor a blogger on trial for calling for political change in the United Arab Emirates has condemned what it calls a smear campaign against him and urged the government to try to rein in people calling for his death.

United Arab Emirates Blogger Trial 2011 Ahmed Mansoor Human Rights Activist

Ahmed Mansoor is one of five activists accused of encouraging protests, insulting the country’s rulers and disrupting public order earlier this year, in a case described by rights groups as a travesty of justice.

In a statement distributed by his lawyer Mohammed al-Roken, Mansoor’s family said a widely-circulated voice message inviting people to kill him in the run-up to the latest court hearing was proof of an organised effort to provoke violence against him.

The voice message consisted of a poem which names Mansoor and concludes: “Anyone who kills him is excused,” the statement said.

“Our son Ahmed has been subjected to all kinds of incitement and betrayal and doubt in his devotion and insults and slurs against him and his father and elderly mother,” the statement added.

“We call on the authorities and public opinion to intervene to prevent ongoing infringements against our son.”

The family said messages spread via the Internet, phone and television channels had also demanded Mansoor’s citizenship be revoked.

“What has happened during this period is strange to the morals and values of Emirati society and a blatant interference in the work of the judiciary, which turns public opinion against Ahmed and his imprisoned friends in an unprecedented way.”

Mansoor, the main defendant in the trial, is accused of running a website where others could express anti-government views.

“Ahmed Mansoor is innocent and he has not yet been convicted of any crime and it has not been proven at all that he wrote or said anything to insult (the rulers),” his family said.

The UAE, the world’s third biggest oil exporter, has not seen the kind of protests that have rocked Tunisia, Egypt, Libya, Yemen, Bahrain and Syria.

A verdict in the trial, which began in June, is expected in late November.

read also and sign the PETITON to Free the 5 UAE Activists

read also ……

Emirates Activists’ Trial Denounced As Violation Of International Law

UAE Activists boycotted to appear in court

Dubai – The case of Bin Gaith and four others returned to court Sunday in Abu Dhabi, where they face accusations of threatening the UAE’s stability by joining Internet campaigns calling for a greater public voice in the country’s affairs.

The 42-year-old Emirati, a decorated former air force pilot who holds degrees in law and international trade, comes from a prominent Dubai family with a long history of serving its rulers. He’s lectured at one of the country’s showcase institutions, the Abu Dhabi branch of Paris’ Sorbonne university, and worked as a legal adviser for the Emirates’ armed forces.

Yet the United Arab Emirates now considers him a potential enemy of the state.

The five activists – jailed since April – boycotted the session as part of demands for bail and to protest their treatement as alleged state security risks.

.For the first time, however, authorities opened the previously closed-door hearings to the public.

The police officer in charge of bringing the five defendants to the hearing told the State Security Court that they “refused to come,” without any further explanation, an AFP reporter said. One of their lawyers, Mohamed al-Roken, told the court that the defendants accused of insulting top United Arab Emirates officials refused to attend the hearing after their demands were not met.

The five men, four of whom are Emirati and one stateless, are demanding to “obtain all documents related to the trial, allow the defence to question all witnesses,” as well as an “end to their ill-treatment,” Roken told the court.
“They are denied their basic rights. Their rights were violated,” said Roken, as the wife Wedad al-Muhairi of one of the defendants, Nasser bin Gaith, broke down in tears. “They are treated worse than criminals,” he said.  (source Gulf Times)

In court Sunday, prosecutors played a video montage of patriotic images – including the UAE’s founder Sheik Zayed bin Sultan Al Nayhan – in an apparent attempt to mock the activists’ calls for reforms.

“They are all Emirati!” shouted defense lawyer Mohammed Roken. “They are all sons of Zayed!”

On April 17, bin Gaith’s regular column ran in an Abu Dhabi financial paper, Roayam Iqtisadiyya. Students at the Sorbonne were in class, waiting for bin Gaith to give one of the last classes before exams. He never showed up.

A day earlier, state security agents lured him from his Dubai villa to Abu Dhabi, the capital, and arrested him on the spot, his family said.

source StarNews….original written by Barbara Surk ……continue reading

and Gulf Times

Democracy and Human Rights-Middle East Unrest – Repression in the United Arab Emirates

June 2011 – source The Nation

For the past four months, hundreds of thousands of voices demanding variations on a theme—democracy, human rights, an end to torture, a stop to corruption—have echoed from Morocco to Yemen, each with its own local variation. In the United Arab Emirates, a federation of seven small semi-autonomous sheikdoms, that voice sounded a little hoarse. More like a whisper, you might say. And then it went silent.

Unrest and Protest Middle East 2011 - Human Rights - Repression in the United Arab Emirates - Anna Louie Sussman The Nations

Since April 8 , 2011 the Emirati government has arrested five prominent Emiratis—activists, bloggers and an academic—for signing a petition calling for reform, and thrown them in jail, where they remain to this day. They are being held without charges, although they are in contact with their families and lawyers.

The five detainees are among over 160 professionals who on March 9 submitted what has to be one of the gentlest pleas for political reform in recent history, which included a request to make the Federal National Council, the UAE’s powerless legislative body, at least open to universal contestation. On February 24 President Sheik Khalifa bin Zayed Al Nahyan announced he was doubling the pool of eligible voters, to around 12,000. That is still less than 2 percent of the Emirati population.

(For the record, here’s what Emirati rabble-rousing sounds like: “Please We, the undersigned, a group of people of the United Arab Emirates, rise up to serve your Generous Highness and Their Highnesses Members of Supreme Council of the Federation of deep appreciation and respect…” the petition begins. “Out of our deep concern for this nation, and its people, who are your sons…” it continues. A fiery battle cry it is not.)

But even this was too much. On April 8, at 3 am, several police asked Ahmed Mansoor, one of the signatories, a blogger and a member of the Human Rights Watch advisory committee, to come down to “answer some questions about his car.” (Incidentally, this was the same approach that security officials used to take Naji Hamdan, a United States citizen who allegedly was tortured in custody.) Fearing a trap, he refused to come down, but was taken away by a second group of security officers that same afternoon.

Two days later Nasser bin Ghaith, a prominent Emirati economist and lecturer at the Abu Dhabi branch of the University of Paris-Sorbonne, was also carted away. His ostensible crime was urging the UAE, on television shows and in panel discussions, to become more transparent, as a means to further economic development. In subsequent days, three other online activists, Fahad Salim Dalk, Hassan Ali al-Khamis and Ahmed Abdul Khaleq, were arrested. In the weeks that followed, the government dissolved the boards of two of the country’s oldest civil society organizations, the Jurists’ Association and the Teachers’ Association, for signing a similar petition.

continue reading The Nation

UAE human rights activist Ahmed Mansoor detained after death threats

Duba April 9, 2011 – Ahmed Mansoor, Human Rights Activist and Blogger from the United Arab Emirates , was taken from his apartment in Dubai on Friday April 8, 2011 afternoon,  he has not been heard from since he was taken from his Dubai apartment Friday, his wife said.

Twitter Account of Ahmed Mansoor

CNN report that Lt. General Dhahi Khalfan Tamim, the commander-in-chief of Dubai police, said he was not aware whether Mansoor had been arrested, but promised to look into it.

The last posts  from the Website and the Twitter Account of Ahmed Mansoor

Came up to me at 3:50 They came to take me in at 3:50 am

April 8, 2011

The security guard of my building came to my apartment at 3:50 am few minutes ago. I could tell immediately that there is something wrong. i reluctantly opened and asked him what? he said there are three policemen waiting for you in the main entrance, i told him are you sure they are policemen? he said yes. they told me to tell to go and see them down, i told him what they need? he said they say something related to the car. i told him then send them up to my apartment. closed the door and called Dubai police immediately, and i told him the story that i was told by the guard, and i told them that i have been receiving death threats and that i can not go down like this. they told me you are right and we will send some one to check, stay home. after minutes somebody from Dubai police called me from his mobile and asked me guide him to the place, i did, he told me i will call you back.

From Ahmed Mansoors Website http://emarati.katib.org/2011/04/08/جاؤوا-لاعتقالي-اليوم-الساعة-350-صباحاً-they-came/

he called me back after minutes telling that they are suspecting your car and would like to take it. i told him if they want to take the car they can do that in the morning, not 2:50 am. or they are the State Security making their old trick i further said. he said now will you come down or not? i told him if they want the car they can take it, he said what about your belongings, i said there is nothing valuable there, they can take it.

this method is well known method of the State Security because they do not have an arrest warrant, they make such tricks to bring you down and take you. i’m ready to go, but they should either do it the right way or by force.

I refused to go down from my apartment and started writing this email. not sure if they took the car or not, i will not soon know. the scenario is that if they take it, they can put whatever they like inside and make a case against me. i’m declaring here that my car is clean of unlawful material, it has a swiss style knife that put there today after receiving 6 death threats and some papers of no great importance.

 

Regards,

Ahmed Mansoor

________________________

Death threats against me and on the verge of dismissal from work

Ahmed Mansoor wrote April  7, 2011

Dear all,

I would like to inform you all that I’m facing an unprecedented campaign against me, the result, until yesterday, before the middle of the night, six clear and direct death threats with their real names, phone numbers and some were using their real photos in their facebook profile. They were all UAE citizens and belong to the tribe called ”Al Mazrouei”. The Campaigns and the outrageous insults against me by some individuals were posted in the blogs, Twitter, Facebook and BlackBerry.  All this campaign came after we posted the petition dircted to the head of state and rulers of the Emirates calling for reform in the FNC (the parliament) to extend legislative and regulatory power to it, and after our appearance in some media channels talking about these demands, revolutions in the region, and implications the sensitive time in the region. The strange matter is that most of those who death threatened me declared their full names, phone numbers and some were using their real photos apparently in their facebook profile!

Post by Ahmed Mansoor Dubai from his Website

additionally, Etisalat (the Teleocom provider), which owns the largest share in my company that I work for (Thuraya Teleocm. Comp.) decided suddenly that they need to move Ahmed Masnoor, to work in their group subsidiary in Paksitan. Although I have no relation with Etisalat whatsoever and my contract is directly with Thuraya and Thuraya does not have an office in Pakistan or elsewhere other than UAE.

I still do not understand under what legal stand does Etisalat order Thuraya to take this action.  Management in my company (Chief Human Resource Officer first, then CEO the same day – yesterday, 6 April 2011) told me that the matter is not in their hand and they have no control over it.

There was no doubt in my mind that the matter was an order from the State Security to find a mechanism to get rid of me.

They would get rid of me in all cases in a politically correct way, if I accept, I go to Pakistan, if I don’t I will be fired.

I certainly refused to go to Pakistan regardless of the offer. I certainly refused to go to Pakistan regardless of the offer. I never signed a contract with Etisalat, and my contract is directly with Thuraya. I never signed a contract with Etisalat, and my contract is directly with Thuraya. The management of my company was professional and friendly and appreciating to my work, they dealt with me on that basis, it was beyond their hands.

Thought they did not state it, it was clear to all of us that this came from the State Security due to my activism in Human Rights, demand for political reform and late appearance in many TV shows.

I expect that they will soon send me termination letter as I refused to go to Pakistan. I expect that they will soon send me termination letter as I refused to go to Pakistan.

Just wanted to keep you in the picture. Just wanted to keep you in the picture.

Regards, Regards,

Ahmed Mansoor

___________________________

UAE: “internet thugs” attacking militants

March 17, 2011

Following the trend in Egypt, Yemen, Libya and Bahrain, some Emirati “Internet Thugs” have been attacking activists, Jurists and the signatories of a recent petition that called for a reform of the Federal National Council (Parliament) which has been signed by more than 400 citizens after it was published on the Internet.

The Internet, especially the Facebook, Twitter and online discussion forums, has been witnessing an unprecedented attack from some Internet users on activists, noticeably after the revolution of Egypt. The Internet, especially the Facebook, Twitter and online discussion forums, has been witnessing an unprecedented attack from some Internet users on activists, noticeably after the revolution of Egypt. Attacks however peaked after the reach of protests to Oman and Bahrain. Attacks however peaked after the reach of protests to Oman and Bahrain.

Internet Thugs have been using verbal abuses and insults, threats of physical harm, and recently distributed a electronic circular describing activists as traitors and posting their photos around a gallows (see link below), in a Simi-replica of the scenario that accused Bahraini activist of coup plot. Internet Thugs have been using verbal abuses and insults, threats of physical harm, and recently distributed a electronic circular describing activists as traitors and posting their photos around a gallows (see link below), in a Simi-replica of the scenario that accused Bahraini activist of coup plot.

Some activists believe that these thugs may belong to security agencies; as UAE usually, and quickly, block such Internet sites, while no action has been taken so far towards these thugs so far, especially that many UAE laws criminalize such acts. Some activists believe that these thugs may belong to security agencies; as UAE usually, and quickly, block such Internet sites, while no action has been taken so far towards these thugs so far, especially that many UAE laws criminalize such acts.

Some activists whom their photos appeared in the electronic circular hold the security authorities responsible for their personal security and request them to stop the systematic abuse against them. Some activists whom their photos appeared in the electronic circular hold the security authorities responsible for their personal security and request them to stop the systematic abuse against them.

Internet penetration in UAE is one of the most in the Arab world compared to number of the population, opposition and dissents sites however are usually blocked quickly. Internet penetration in UAE is one of the most in the Arab world compared to number of the population, opposition and dissents sites however are usually blocked quickly. Reports have also indicated the targeting and harassments of Internet activists by the State Security. Reports have also indicated the targeting and harassments of Internet activists by the State Security.

– – – –
Link to electronic circular that describe Activist as traitors and shows their photos around a gallows: http://a8.sphotos.ak.fbcdn.net/hphotos-ak-snc6/190586_210556472295289_100000228123468_976955_36405_n.jpg Link to electronic circular that describe Activist as traitors and shows their photos around a gallows: http://a8.sphotos.ak.fbcdn.net/hphotos-ak-snc6/190586_210556472295289_100000228123468_976955_36405_n.jpg

United Arab Emirates intellectuals petitioned their ruler for free and democratic elections

source CNN

A group of 133 United Arab Emirates nationals have petitioned the president of the country for direct elections.

It includes academics, former government officials, journalists and activists, said Ahmed Mansoor, one of the petitioners.

The petition comes in the midst of a wave of unrest and political change across the region that has brought new leadership to Egypt and Tunisia.

The petition is addressed to President Sheikh Khalifa bin Zayed Al Nahyan and the members of the Supreme Council of the seven Emirates that form the U.A.E.

In addition to elections, the group is also asking that the Federal National Council be granted legislative powers. The body only works in an advisory capacity and has no regulatory powers.

“The group called for a comprehensive reform of the parliamentary system of the Federal National Council (the Parliament), and included demands for free elections by all citizens,” Mansoor said in an email. “It also demanded reform of legislation governing the work of the Parliament to include legislative and monitoring authorities and calling for necessary constitutional amendments to ensure that.”

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