How Israeli cyber weapons are taking over Latin America

Israel is notorious for selling arms and cyber surveillance technologies to governments around the world, and Latin America is no exception.

The Israeli middlemen overseeing Latin America's cyber market.

Salvadoran police bought the cyber surveillance technology through EyeTech Solutions, one of the main Israeli intermediaries selling spyware across Latin America.

The Mexico-based Israeli firm is run by Yaniv Zangilevitch, a former spy official in the Israeli army and personal friend of Salvadoran President Nayib Bukele.

Former Mexican public security official, Tomás Zerón de Lucio, also holds relationships with Israeli cyber tech middlemen like Avishay Samuel Neriya.

Neriya is partners with another Israeli businessman, Uri Emmanuel Ansbacher, at BSD Security Systems, which sold espionage systems to Mexican security agencies.

According to Mexican magazine, Proceso, Ansbacher was the main intermediary for Israeli companies selling cyber surveillance technology to Mexican security agencies like the Attorney General's Office, the National Defense Secretariat, and the National Intelligence and Security Center.

Mexican security analyst Paloma Mendoza-Cortés explained that offensive cyber technology is being used by the Mexican government in several illegal ways, including to track journalists, human rights defenders, academic critics, and other opponents and by political opposition groups to spy on the government or other parties.

Cyber surveillance, a permanent risk in Latin America.

The aforementioned intermediaries and other firms orchestrate sales from Israeli cyber companies like Cognyte, Circles, and Cellebrite Solutions, which operate in Mexico and in other Latin American countries.

"State governments acquiring technologies that could be used for unlawful purposes is a permanent risk in Latin America," Mendoza-Cortés said, explaining the largest markets for offensive cyber weapons are in Colombia, Mexico, and throughout Central America.

Mendoza-Cortés explained Israeli cyber weapons have become immensely popular in Latin America due to corruption.