I agree with you. You would have to find some accurate definition for "What is a democracy?", e.g. look at the freedom of press, freedom of election (E.g. are there any inconsistencies in the last elections), conflicts in a country. Based on a lot of factors you could probably say "This is a democracy" or "This is somewhere between".

But still no good solution.

And criminal would be too far, as such spyware should only be used against extremely serious crimes, e.g. warcrimes or terrorism