Mythical Beasts and where to find them: Mapping the global spyware market and its threats to national security and human rights

Issue Brief Mar 21, 2025

To win the AI race, the US needs an all-of-the-above energy strategy

By Joseph Webster

To ensure US AI leadership, the United States must harness all forms of energy, allow a level playing field, and remove red tape constraining the buildout of critical enablers, especially transmission lines and grid enhancing technologies.
Artificial Intelligence China
Mythical Beasts and where to find them: Mapping the global spyware market and its threats to national security and human rights

MENASource Feb 26, 2025

How the Houthis’ strikes on US MQ-9 Reaper drones serve a wider regional agenda

By Leonardo Jacopo Maria Mazzucco

The United States needs to adjust its drone deployment strategy to ensure that MQ-9 Reapers are less vulnerable to the militant group’s attacks. 
Defense Policy Defense Technologies
Mythical Beasts and where to find them: Mapping the global spyware market and its threats to national security and human rights

New Atlanticist Feb 18, 2025

What’s missing from the AI debate? Patience.

By Trey Herr

The AI sector is evolving quickly, fueled by a self-reinforcing cycle of investment, commentary, and ambition. In this race for compute, patience is important to sorting out sustainable innovation from speculative excess.
Artificial Intelligence Defense Technologies

Democracy & Tech Initiative

The DFRLab’s Democracy & Tech Initiative creates policy practices that align global stakeholders toward tech and governance that reinforces, rather than undermines, open societies. This initiative builds on the DFRLab’s leadership in the OSINT field, empowering global communities to promote transparency and accountability.

Explore the program

Content

Report

Sep 4, 2024

Mythical Beasts and where to find them: Mapping the global spyware market and its threats to national security and human rights

By Jen Roberts, Trey Herr, Nitansha Bansal, and Nancy Messieh, with Emma Taylor, Jean Le Roux, and Sopo Gelava

The Mythical Beasts project pulls back the curtain on the connections between 435 entities across forty-two countries in the global spyware market.

Cybersecurity

Conflict, Risk, and Tech

Sep 4, 2024

Mythical Beasts and where to find them: Data and methodology

By Jen Roberts, Trey Herr, Nitansha Bansal, and Nancy Messieh, with Emma Taylor, Jean Le Roux, and Sopo Gelava

Learn more about the methodology and dataset behind Mythical Beasts and where to find them: Mapping the global spyware market and its threats to national security and human rights

Cybersecurity

Report

Sep 4, 2024

Mythical Beasts and where to find them

By Jen Roberts, Trey Herr, Nitansha Bansal, and Nancy Messieh, with Emma Taylor, Jean Le Roux, and Sopo Gelava

Mythical Beasts and Where to Find Them: Mapping the Global Spyware Market and its Threats to National Security and Human Rights is concerned with the commercial market for spyware and provides data on market participants.

Cybersecurity

Report

Sep 4, 2024

Forging the 5G future: Strategic imperatives for the US and its allies

By Ngor Luong

5G technology is a critical pillar of U.S. national security, economic prosperity, and geopolitical influence in the twenty-first century.

China Technology & Innovation

UkraineAlert

Sep 4, 2024

Indian PM Modi visits Ukraine to open new foreign policy horizons

By Mridula Ghosh

Indian PM Narendra Modi paid an historic visit to Kyiv in late August as Delhi seeks to counter negative perceptions of its close economic and defense ties with Moscow and underline its status as an emerging geopolitical power in its own right, writes Mridula Ghosh.

Conflict Defense Industry

UkraineAlert

Sep 3, 2024

Moscow escalates nuclear threats as Ukraine erases Russia’s red lines

By Peter Dickinson

The Kremlin has this week vowed to revise its nuclear doctrine as Moscow seeks to regain the fear factor after Ukraine's invasion of Russia's Kursk region made a mockery Putin's nuclear red lines, writes Peter Dickinson.

Conflict Defense Industry

In the News

Aug 29, 2024

Rodriguez on Nexus Interview on defense technology

By Atlantic Council

On August 21, Stephen Rodriguez, Senior Advisor at Forward Defense and Director of FD's Commission on Software-Defined Warfare, interviewed with Applied Intuition Defense at the Nexus 24 symposium. Rodriguez spoke on challenges and innovations in the defense technology sector, including on public-private sector relations, investment, and business practices.

Defense Industry Defense Policy

In the News

Aug 28, 2024

Webster quoted in Carbon Brief on US tariffs on Chinese EVs

By Joseph Webster

China Energy & Environment

UkraineAlert

Aug 27, 2024

Putin hopes Belarus border bluff can disrupt Ukraine’s invasion of Russia

By Peter Dickinson

With his overstretched army struggling to repel Ukraine's invasion of Russia, Vladimir Putin has pressed Belarusian dictator Alyaksandr Lukashenka to mass troops on the Ukrainian border, but Belarus is unlikely to join the war, writes Peter Dickinson.

Belarus Conflict

In the News

Aug 26, 2024

Webster featured in Wall Street Journal on Canadian tariffs on Chinese EVs

By Joseph Webster

China Energy & Environment
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Experts

Expert bio

Newton Howard

Nonresident Senior Fellow, N7 Initiative

Rafik Hariri Center & Middle East programs

Artificial Intelligence English

European Leadership Accelerator Participant

Inês Bravo Figueiredo

Co-President, Volt Portugal

Millennium Leadership Program

Central Europe Economy & Business

Fellow

Trevor H. Rudolph

Nonresident Senior Fellow

GeoTech Center

Cybersecurity Europe & Eurasia

European Leadership Accelerator Participant

Martin-Sebastian Abel

Co-Founder & Managing Director, TransitionPlan

Millennium Leadership Program

Central Europe Economy & Business

Fellow

Reem Goussous

Nonresident senior fellow

Rafik Hariri Center & Middle East programs Rafik Hariri Center for the Middle East

Americas Arabic

Fellow

Aminata Niang

Visiting Fellow

Freedom and Prosperity Center

Africa Future of Work
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