US Leads Global Market in Spyware Investments
The spyware industry is in the midst of a boom, with investors increasingly drawn to this ethically fraught yet highly profitable sector, according to new research by the Atlantic Council. The majority of funding is flowing to companies in the United States and Israel, with American investment in spyware tripling over the past year.
Surge in Investors
The study examined 561 organizations across 46 countries between 1992 and 2024. Researchers identified 34 new investors in 2024, bringing the global total to 128, up from 94 in 2023.
American investors showed the greatest surge of interest: in 2024, 20 new US investor companies entered the spyware space, raising the total to 31. That figure alone matches the combined number of investors in the EU and Switzerland (31), and surpasses Israel (26). Italy, long considered a spyware hub, leads Europe with 12 investors.
Notable US Players
Among the US firms backing spyware companies are D.E. Shaw & Co., Millennium Management, trading giant Jane Street, and financial services firm Ameriprise Financial. All of them have invested in Cognyte, an Israeli lawful intercept provider linked to human rights abuses in Azerbaijan, Indonesia, and other countries.
Another prominent example is the acquisition of Israeli spyware vendor Paragon Solutions by AE Industrial Partners, a Florida-based private equity firm specializing in national security.
Policy vs. Investment
The report highlights a stark contradiction: while US policymakers have sought to curb the spread and misuse of spyware—sometimes through aggressive measures—American investors continue funding the very companies Washington aims to restrict.
For example, Israeli spyware provider Saito Tech (formerly Candiru) has been on the US Department of Commerce’s entity list since 2021. Despite that, in 2024 it received new backing from US firm Integrity Partners.
Expanding Global Market
Beyond financing, the spyware ecosystem itself is expanding. Researchers identified:
- 4 new vendors
- 7 new resellers or brokers
- 10 new service providers
- 55 new individuals linked to the industry
Recent entrants include Israeli vendor Bindecy, Italian vendor SIO, resellers such as Panamanian KBH and Mexican Comercializadora de Soluciones Integrales Mecale (both tied to NSO Group products), and new service providers like UK-based Coretech Security and UAE-based ZeroZenX.
The Broker Problem
The report underscores the central role of resellers and brokers, describing them as an “understudied group of actors.”
“These organizations act as intermediaries, obscuring the links between sellers, suppliers, and buyers. Often, intermediaries introduce vendors to new regional markets. This creates a sprawling and opaque spyware supply chain, making it extremely difficult to untangle corporate structures, jurisdictional manipulations, and accountability measures,” the authors told Wired.
