This article details a supply chain threat where an employee of government malware vendor Trenchant illicitly sold powerful hacking tools to a Russian company, leading to their proliferation to Russian state actors and potentially Chinese criminals. The primary attack vector is the unauthorized acquisition and deployment of these advanced, government-grade exploits against targets. This incident highlights a critical failure in the controls surrounding offensive cyber tools and underscores the significant risk when such capabilities are diverted from their intended, authorized users.
This week Joseph talks to Lorenzo Franceschi-Bicchierai, a journalist at TechCrunch. Lorenzo has possibly the deepest understanding of one of the wildest cybersecurity stories in years: how an employee of Trenchant, a government malware vendor that is supposed to only sell to the ‘good’ guys, secretly sold a bunch of hacking tools to a Russian company. Those tools, it looks like, then ended up with the Russian government and possibly Chinese criminals too. It’s a really insane story about how powerful hacking tech can fall into the wrong hands. Listen to the weekly podcast on Apple Podcasts , Spotify , or YouTube . Become a paid subscriber for access to this episode's bonus content and to power our journalism. If you become a paid subscriber, check your inbox for an email from our podcast host Transistor for a link to the subscribers-only version! You can also add that subscribers feed to your podcast app of choice and never miss an episode that way. The email should also contain the subscribers-only unlisted YouTube link for the extended video version too. It will also be in the show notes in your podcast player. 0:00 - Guest Introduction: Lorenzo Franceschi-Bicchierai 02:52 – What Is Trenchant? 03:52 – Secrecy & Evolution of Exploit Industry 05:05 – Modern Spyware Industry Landscape 08:34 – Discovery of Peter Williams 10:31 – Apple Spyware Notifications Context 13:03 – Early Reporting Strategy 14:13 – Indictment & Confirmation 15:34 – What Peter Williams Did 18:17 – Economics of Zero-Day Market 24:53 – Google Discovers “Corona” Exploit Kit 28:11 – Shift to Mass Exploitation in China 31:03 – How Did It Spread? (Speculation) 34:36 – Link Back to Trenchant Leak 36:27 – Security Failure & Industry Implications 41:04 – Ethical Stakes & Real-World Harm 43:15 – Motive & Final Reflections Inside the story of the US defense contractor who leaked hacking tools to Russia US military contractor likely built iPhone hacking tools used by Russian spies in Ukraine