Without you suspecting the slightest thing, they know everything about you.
The GPS position, telephone conversations, photo albums, web browsing history, discussions on social networks, e-mails ... These software programs allow you to spy on the digital activities of a person without their knowledge. calls stalkerware.
Sold legally on application stores, well known to parents who watch their offspring from afar, they have also become pernicious tools illegally exploited in a context of domestic violence.
Because once installed on a smartphone, the software is almost undetectable by the owner of the mobile.
A phenomenon that worries associations and organizations for the defense of women's rights.
According to the latest report by cybersecurity specialist Kaspersky, France is not spared: it ranks 11th among the most affected countries in the world, and 4th at European level.
"I was entitled to threatening remarks"
Sophie
(the first name has been changed)
is one of the victims.
“I lived for two years with an abusive partner.
First, he monitored the calls on my smartphone in my presence, I even had to give him my code and, one day, nothing.
He no longer took it from me but I was entitled to threatening remarks like:
You are having a good laugh with your colleague so and so.
It's okay ?
Do you mind picking up guys?
….
and I pass on the insults, sometimes the blows, testifies this Parisian of 35 years.
I then realized that he had installed this kind of software on my device.
It was in 2019. That explained his allusions.
During yet another interrogation, which confirmed to me that he controlled my movements and my exchanges, I left him and threw my smartphone in anger into the Seine to get rid of this psychological weight.
It was a mistake because I could have supported a complaint with that ”, warns the thirty-something.
She's right.
The possession of this type of software, on the observer side, is punishable by five years' imprisonment and a fine of 150,000 euros.
According to a study conducted by the Center Hubertine Auclert in 2018, 90% of the women questioned, victims of domestic violence, had also been the object of cyberviolence.
Among them, 21% have been monitored by spyware used by their attacking partner and 69% believe that they have accessed their personal information without their consent.
A global coalition against this scourge
In 2019, Kaspersky founded a coalition, of which the Center Hubertine Auclert is now part, in order to fight against this form of cyberviolence.
It now has 30 members from five continents.
Goals ?
Improve industry detection of harassment software, promote mutual learning among non-profit organizations as well as businesses, and finally raise awareness.
If in 2019 the number of people affected worldwide was higher than the following year (67,500, against 53,870 in 2020), the latest report from the company shows that the situation has not improved. .
In early 2020, the Center published a #cyberviolence prevention website: a guide to using digital tools, surfing the internet and communicating on social networks in complete safety.
👉 https://t.co/M3gNc9tOOq # DigitalBattle pic.twitter.com/9ZJ4efq6bV
- Women-Men IDF (@CentreHubertine) March 4, 2021
Indeed, this decrease can be explained in particular by the particular situation linked to the health crisis.
Since stalkerware is most often used to control the life of a spouse outside the home, preventive measures (curfews, confinement), which have forced people to stay at home, have thus been able to limit its uses.
Moreover, the most significant decrease is observed between March and June 2020, the date of the first confinements.
At the same time, at the same time, domestic violence intensified.
"The subject of stalkerware is really emerging"
“We see that the number of users affected by stalkerware remains high, and we are even detecting new samples of this spyware every day.
It is important to remember that behind these global figures, there is the individual story of each victim, ”insists Arnaud Dechoux, Head of Public Affairs at Kaspersky France.
“We are extremely proud to be part of the Coalition Against Stalkerware, and to see the results after a little over a year of existence.
The subject of stalkerware is really emerging, and the fruitful initiatives between the private and public partners of the coalition make it possible to better support and protect victims of domestic violence ”, rejoices Iman Karzabi, project manager at the Regional Observatory of Violence Against Women. women of the Hubertine Auclert Center.
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In November 2020, Kaspersky, on the initiative of French researcher Félix Aimé, also developed a free tool intended for victim support associations.
Called TinyCheck, it is able to detect the presence of spyware on a mobile device ... without the person who installed the software realizing it.
A detail which is not a detail since, unmasked, an aggressor can redouble violence against his victim.