Technology and Scienceupdated 40m ago2 min read
Israeli Ad-Tech Discover-Tech Used Online Ads To Target Devices With Spyware
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Discover-Tech used global ad network to track users and enable spyware deployment. Spyware infected Al Jazeera devices via zero-click online ads, dubbed AdFection.
Ads as a spyware pipeline
Cybersecurity researchers said the Israeli digital advertising company Discover-Tech used a wide online advertising network to track users and target their devices, including aiding the distribution of spyware developed by an Israeli company specializing in surveillance technologies. Citizen Lab said Discover-Tech ads appeared across more than 120,000 websites and 75,000 apps, and the researchers said the company could identify and track users when they visited websites or used apps containing malicious ads.
Confant co-founder Jérôme Dangu said Discover-Tech was broadcasting at least ten million ads daily worldwide, and he added that cookie matching enabled the company to continue tracking users even beyond the ads it directly serves. Citizen Lab researcher Wolf Kristel told Reuters that online advertising mechanisms constitute a managed security threat, and he said this threat affects countries, the private sector, civil society, and all users.
Zero-click targeting at Al Jazeera
Al Jazeera Media Network said it “condemns the targeting of devices belonging to several of its employees with spyware” and pledged to continue to “protect its employees and systems”. Citizen Lab concluded that spyware from Candiru, an Israeli spyware firm blacklisted by the United States government in 2021, was planted on devices used by Al Jazeera and other companies using the first-known instance of “zero-click” targeted advertising.
Citizen Lab said it could verify the incident after Al Jazeera provided its network logs, and the report said the spyware compromised 45 Windows-based devices inside Al Jazeera’s network during 2024 and 2025. Al Jazeera said its in-house technology team first discovered unusual patterns on devices used by some journalists in 2024, and the pattern continued into 2025.
Platforms cut ties, regulators face
Google said it cooperated with the investigation by Citizen Lab and Confant and decided to ban Discover-Tech from its advertising platforms for systematic policy violations. IAB Europe said it suspended Discover-Tech’s accreditation among its global authorized suppliers after an audit revealed policy violations, and Comcast said its subsidiary BizWaks removed Discover-Tech from its platform after recent activities.
Citizen Lab and Confiant described the operation as a weaponization of ad infrastructure for advanced staging, preliminary targeting, and payload delivery, and Confiant said it was characterized by exceptional technical sophistication and surgical micro-targeting. The Committee to Protect Journalists called on Israeli and other relevant authorities to investigate and hold to account those responsible, and CPJ deputy director of research Jonathan Rozen said, “The mass surveillance architecture supporting online advertising is being harnessed for other purposes and puts journalists at risk.”