Surveillance and the suppression of civil society in Serbia
amnesty.org
amnesty.org
In recent discussions at Senate estimates, it was revealed that Services Australia, the administrator of Centrelink, has been sharing smartphone-hacking technology, specifically Cellebrite’s Universal Forensic Extraction Device, with the Department of Education and other undisclosed agencies.
This move aims to assist in the investigation of suspected fraud committed against various government schemes and subsidies.
While Services Australia insists the technology is only used for serious non-compliance investigations, not general customer compliance issues, concerns have been raised about privacy, data retention, and adherence to international agreements on spyware proliferation.
From 2022:
How does Cellebrite work?
It takes just a few seconds for police to scan a mobile phone with technology such as Cellebrite. They usually download the entire contents of the phone and gain an enormous level of intelligence.
Police can scan a device during a stop and search on reasonable grounds, patrolling in a vehicle, or while questioning a suspect – often without the knowledge of the person.
Usually, they are seeking confirmation of drug dealing, child sexual abuse, murder or gang activity involving assault or robbery.
I find it helpful to see this as a case study. Instead of seeing as only a portrait of one country ("and my country is different"), consider it as an illustration ("my country could feel like that, too").
Note that the report goes well beyond the title.
1. Norway was the source of the Cellebrite technology?!
> Additionally, the Norwegian Ministry of Foreign Affairs, which donated the Cellebrite UFED technology, and the United Nations Office for Project Services (UNOPS), which managed procurement for the Norwegian government’s grant to Serbia’s Ministry of Interior, failed to conduct an adequate due diligence process to assess and mitigate for the potential risks of this technology to human rights and to provide safeguards against its abuse
2. The "chilling effect" (page 10) notes apply to anyone in a position resisting the government, in any country.
3. The details section is more specific about everything, and none of the facts are good.
I think the details here go beyond "surveillance is happening everywhere", so I think it's wrong to dismiss this as some kind of fluff or hit piece. Even if other places are also bad, see the truth in this as well.
>You have become a shop for far-left ideologues who choose their causes based on party doctrine.
Take not of the pro-Israel agenda that grafted itself on this issue.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VA4e0NqyYMw
>You'll find us in the shadows >And all the world's a stage
But now, ask yourself: if you need to work a regular job and do regular stuff (i.e. you're not super rich), how easy is it to go through life without a smartphone? Banks often require one for two-factor authentication. Many businesses communicate through Whatsapp around the world. My condominium's condo fees are only viewable through an app. Etc. If a person HATES smartphones, and NEVER wants to use one, it would be difficult, no question. So, that person is FORCED to use one.
Some people like them, but others hate them and have to use them anyway. Whether you like it or not, we are forced to carry these surveillance devices around because many components of modern infrastructure are starting to require smartphoines.
The only difference between Serbia and here is that Serbian police do it, whereas in the West, all of society collaborates in a downward spiral to do it, which is also heralded and encouraged by law enforcement here too.
References
1. https://arstechnica.com/tech-policy/2025/01/apple-agrees-to-...
Yet these articles, from well known organisations, extensively investigating (even featuring 0 day revelations) the decline of civil society in lieu of ever more pervasive surveillance and manipulation of opinion, only seem to ever focus on geopolitical adversaries of the US.
Not much else to say about it, it just is not true.
I know people living in Portugal, first hand, with pretty beefy and expensive laptops.
I think the limit in Portugal for cash transactions is around €3k. You can buy a pretty great laptop with that
"No smart phone" merely removes some of the fine detail from the GB's of data that the 3-letters have about you.
According to what metric?
> But it is not only safe, you will very easily make friends as people are much more open to forming friendships.
Are you generalizing "The west" here a bit?
I lived in Belgrade and Nis for half a year. Did not feel too safe if you go far from center or too close to main bus station. I think I liked Novi Sad more than other two.
Regarding peace, I gathered that many people there support Putin's war so there's that. But people are different. Serbs specifically have an axe to grind because of the bombings (of course their government also committed a genocide but whatabout this, whatabout that).
[1]: https://www.amnesty.org/en/documents/org60/6795/2023/en/
Serbia might keep tabs on some political activists -- like every other country -- but to the best of my knowledge nobody has been charged as a result of this snooping -- and the AI report itself corroborates this:
> "33 people were arrested or detained for informational interviews during the August protest, subjected to long questioning, search of their apartments, and seizure and search of their telephones and computers. Not one of them has been formally charged at the time of this report’s publication"
This report is a thin, politically-motivated hit piece. Risible, really.
Sadly, I expect we're going to see a lot more of this sort of thing directed against Serbia, Hungary, and Slovakia in the near future. (And to a lesser extent perhaps also Croatia and Slovenia.) "Get with the program, or else" is the message here.
in Russia, Serbia's good friend, let's just say there are people charged for things like this (or for something else convenient) and sit in jail for years. This is not very publicized. But yeah I talked to some of those people who now sit in jail. And also I talked to plenty Europeans who say "everything is bad and censorship, Putin will free us all" (while in a russia it is illegal to tell somebody how to use VPN). It would be funny if it was not sad.
IIRC, the current number is >1200 and >650.
A lot of those charges are against people who were just memeing on social media, e.g.:
> https://www.westmidlands.police.uk/news/west-midlands/news/n...
> https://www.bbc.com/news/articles/cr548zdmz3jo
> https://www.cheshire.police.uk/news/cheshire/news/articles/2...
Those sentences are not light! And, "will they change anything," the BBC asks? But somehow Serbia is the digital prison. It's equal parts laughable and terrifying.
You seem to imply this is either unexpected or unfortunate? What is it you refer to as "the program"?
There is a big difference between on the one hand Hungrary and Slovakia, and Serbia on the other.
Hungary and Slovakia are EU members. The EU isn't some sort of trade union, it's a political union of liberal democracies. Independent judiciaries, free press and so on are "the program". Serbia can go with "the program" when and if they want (they have been candidates for a long time). Of course they aren't to be free of criticism if they lean towards authoritarianism, but unlike EU countries there isn't much more to do about it than complain about it. And of course it's the job of liberal democracies, and all media and organizations in liberal democracies to do just that: complain. Yet you seem surprised.