PSNA has written to the Minister of Immigration, Michael Wood, urging him to immediately end his ministry’s contract with Cobweb Technologies – an Israeli internet surveillance company implicated in abuses of privacy rights, targeting of journalists, activists, opposition politicians and government officials around the world.

Radio New Zealand revealed today that the Immigration Ministry is using Cobweb Technologies for internet surveillance, despite Cobweb’s history of abusing human rights.

It’s no surprise the company was started by members of the Israeli Defence Force which has been implicated in widespread abuses in surveillance of Palestinians, the most surveilled population in the world.

Meta, the owner of Facebook and multiple other social media platforms, kicked Cobweb Technologies and six other surveillance companies off all their platforms last year after a months-long investigation into the activities of what they describe as "cyber mercenaries".

Meta’s report says:

“Given the severity of their violations, we have banned them from our services…We also alerted around 50,000 people who we believe were targeted by these malicious activities worldwide…”

“Our investigation identified customers in Bangladesh, Hong Kong, the United States, New Zealand, Mexico, Saudi Arabia, Poland, and other countries. In addition to targeting related to law enforcement activities, we also observed frequent targeting of activists, opposition politicians and government officials in Hong Kong and Mexico”

This government’s use of Cobweb Technologies makes a mockery of the Prime Minister’s leadership of the “Christchurch Call” which is pressuring social media platforms like Facebook to act against those who assist in the abuse of human rights, while itself employing a known human rights abusing company.

Meta has asked government to act on these companies saying:

“Our hope is to contribute to the broader understanding of the harms this industry represents worldwide and call on the democratic governments to take further steps to help protect people and impose oversight on the sellers of ubiquitous spyware”

“Why is New Zealand not responding to this appeal? Why are we acting like phonies, urging social media platforms to be responsible while we are acting irresponsibly?” asks PSNA National Chair John Minto.

“Our government’s position is sickeningly hypocritical”

“Cobweb Technologies should be gone by lunchtime tomorrow”

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