Targeted Threats
Investigations into the prevalence and impact of digital espionage operations against civil society groups. For our research on Digital Transnational Repression, visit this page to explore our reports, media mentions, and resources.
Featured in Targeted Threats
Digital Transnational Repression Explained
Citizen Lab produced an animated explainer video on digital transnational repression in Canada that also highlight some of the stories of the interviewees while also protecting their identities.
Latest Research
JUICYJAM: How Thai Authorities Use Online Doxxing to Suppress Dissent
A sustained, coordinated social media harassment and doxxing campaign – which we codenamed JUICYJAM – targeting the pro-democracy movement in Thailand has run uninterrupted, and unchallenged, since at least August 2020. Through our analysis of public social media posts we determined that the campaign was not only inauthentic, but the information revealed could not have been reasonably sourced from a private individual.
Gender-Based Digital Transnational Repression and the Authoritarian Targeting of Women in the Diaspora
The Citizen Lab’s Marcus Michaelsen and Siena Anstis published a research article in the peer-reviewed journal Democratization about the gendered forms of digital threats faced by women human rights defenders and journalists in exile and in the diaspora. Click here to read the article.
Virtù o vizio? Un primo sguardo alle operazioni in espansione dello spyware di Paragon
Un’introduzione a Paragon Solutions. Paragon Solutions è stata fondata in Israele nel 2019 e vende uno spyware chiamato Graphite. L’azienda si descrive come diversa dagli altri produttori, affermando di disporre di salvaguardie per prevenire i tipi di abusi di spyware per cui NSO Group e altri fornitori sono noti. Analisi dell’infrastruttura dello spyware Paragon. Sulla… Read more »
Virtue or Vice? A First Look at Paragon’s Proliferating Spyware Operations
In our first investigation into Israel-based spyware company, Paragon Solutions, we begin to untangle multiple threads connected to the proliferation of Paragon’s mercenary spyware operations across the globe. This report includes an infrastructure analysis of Paragon’s spyware product, called Graphite; a forensic analysis of infected devices belonging to members of civil society; and a closer look at the use of Paragon spyware in both Canada and Italy.
Silenced by Surveillance: The Impacts of Digital Transnational Repression on Journalists, Human Rights Defenders, and Dissidents in Exile
The Citizen Lab’s Siena Anstis and Ron Deibert examine the phenomenon of digital transnational repression in “Silenced by Surveillance: The Impacts of Digital Transnational Repression on Journalists, Human Rights Defenders, and Dissidents in Exile”, published by Knight First Amendment Institute at Columbia University. Read the essay here.