Israeli ad tech company targeted Starlink internet users in suspected attempt at espionage

Experts at a digital defense firm recently found that an Israeli ad tech company heavily targeted users of Starlink's satellite internet service, likely to spy on them, according to six people familiar with the matter.

Researchers at TrendAI, a unit of Tokyo-based cybersecurity company Trend Micro, concluded the Israeli company Discover-Tech was one of the biggest sources of digital ads shown to users of SpaceX's Starlink service and that the ads were likely being used to geolocate or otherwise surveil them, according to the six people.

The researchers, who drew on digital advertising data in TrendAI's telemetry for their conclusions, found that Discover-Tech had become one of the world’s leading bidders for ads aimed at Starlink users and that it was the No. 1 bidder on Starlink traffic in more than 100 countries, including several where Starlink itself was banned or restricted. Bidding refers to the complex auction system advertisers use to secure space inside people's browsers and apps.

SpaceX did not respond to requests for comment. Discover-Tech and its chief executive did not respond to requests for comment over the past two weeks.

TrendAI released a report on October 15 about the targeting of Starlink users but did not name Discover-Tech, instead saying the party responsible was “an ad tech entity” which it called “Shadow-Earth-79.” The six sources said Shadow-Earth-79 is TrendAI’s codename for Discover-Tech.

TrendAI did not directly address questions about why its report did not identify Shadow-Earth-79 by name, saying in a statement that its approach to attribution was aimed at reducing the risk of mistakes and avoiding "hype-driven labels" or "unstable actor names that can mislead defenders, distort risk prioritization, and trigger inappropriate response actions."

Finding ways to track Starlink users has become a cottage industry as governments around the world try to get a grip on the spread of satellite internet terminals. Because they route data through SpaceX-operated satellites rather than nationally regulated telecommunications firms, the terminals can sidestep local internet restrictions, communicate in hostile areas, or coordinate action across battlefields. Starlink has become a particularly important resource in Ukraine, whose military relies on the service for frontline communications and directing drone strikes.

In May, Israeli newspaper Haaretz and the website Intelligence Online separately reported that Israeli-owned businesses were pitching clients on ways to identify and track Starlink users. Haaretz said exploiting ad data appeared to play a key role in the process.

Canadian watchdog, New York ad tech firm, name Discover-Tech 

The same day TrendAI published its report on Shadow-Earth-79, Canadian cyber watchdog Citizen Lab and New York advertising technology firm Confiant named Discover-Tech.

Both groups said the Israeli company abused the ad-bidding process, which can leak internet-user data back to the bidder.

Over time, bidders can collect that leaked data, collate it, and merge it with other information to de-anonymize users, follow them around the web and, in some cases, set them up for targeting with surveillance software.

Citizen Lab and Confiant said the ads had been shown inside dozens of sensitive networks belonging to media organizations, governments and tech firms.

In response to the investigations, Google, Comcast, and other companies said they had removed Discover-Tech from their ad platforms.

At least one big US tech company and one international organization recently launched internal inquiries into whether Discover-Tech's ads targeted their employees, according to one of the people and a seventh person familiar with the matter.

TrendAI's report cited suspicious bidding patterns that suggested Shadow-Earth-79 was running "targeting and tracking infrastructure rather than a commercial advertising operation."

In addition to noting the "obvious skew" towards buying ads aimed at Starlink users, the report said that Shadow-Earth-79 was the top buyer of ads in Syria, Libya, Yemen, and South Sudan and was the No. 2 ad buyer in Afghanistan even though "the demand for legitimate Western advertising in sanctioned or active-conflict states is effectively zero." It said the entity won "an implausibly dominant share" of bids in several countries including Hungary, Israel, Egypt, Azerbaijan, and Venezuela.

Researchers drop plan to name Discover-Tech in suspicions due to legal concerns

TrendAI researchers were convinced Discover-Tech was behind the suspicious bidding activity and discussed naming the company in TrendAI's report, according to the six people familiar with the matter. But they eventually dropped the idea of publicly attributing the activity to a named company after TrendAI executives raised legal concerns, five of the sources said.

Self-censorship is common in the cybersecurity industry, especially when executives fear that exposing surveillance operations could draw retribution, industry experts say.

Earlier this year, US cybersecurity company Palo Alto stripped explicit references to China from a report on a global cyberespionage campaign even though its researchers were confident the hacking could be pinned on Beijing, Reuters reported at the time. Reuters said the report was watered down over fears that calling out China would harm Palo Alto's operations there, which were already under scrutiny after a Beijing directive ordered domestic companies not to use its products. Palo Alto said the lack of attribution in its report was not correlated with "procurement regulations in China" and that any suggestion otherwise was "speculative and false."