Bulgarian Surveillance Firm Circles Sold Phone Spy Tools to Repressive States: Report
Article 0 Comments A Bulgaria-based company sold controversial surveillance technology to governments in countries with records of repression, enabling authorities to track mobile phones and eavesdrop on private communications, according to documents obtained by Human Rights Watch. The surveillance firm Circles offered tools capable of spying on phone calls, messages and internet activity, according to a Human Rights Watch report published Thursday. The documents — a trove of Bulgarian export records covering sales by Circles between 2018 and 2023 — show that the Bulgarian government approved Circles transactions with law enforcement and intelligence agencies in countries including Azerbaijan, Bahrain, El Salvador, Guatemala, Jordan, Malaysia, Morocco, Panama, Serbia and the United Arab Emirates. The findings raise fresh questions about how European Union export controls meant to curb the sale of powerful spy tools are being enforced. Many of Circles’ customers are in countries ranked either “not free” or “partly free” by Freedom House, the nonprofit that tracks political rights and civil liberties worldwide. Human Rights Watch said the records provide evidence that European companies are still supplying surveillance capabilities to governments that could use them against critics, journalists and political opponents despite EU regulations introduced in 2021 to rein in such...
