Israeli Advertising Firm Targeted Starlink Users in 100 Countries

Researchers at the TrendAI unit of Japanese security firm Trend Micro found that Israeli ad-tech company Discover-Tech was the largest bidder on ads directed at users of SpaceX's Starlink service in over 100 countries, according to six people familiar with the work cited by Reuters.

The sources said the ads appeared in several countries where Starlink is banned or restricted, and that the likely purpose was to determine user locations or monitor them. TrendAI published a report on October 15 in which it named the company "Shadow-Earth-79," before sources confirmed it was Discover-Tech.

The report noted that the company was the largest buyer of ads in Syria, Libya, Yemen, and South Sudan, where there is no genuine demand for Western ads, concluding with medium-to-high confidence that it was a targeting and tracking infrastructure rather than a commercial ad operation.

In the same context, Canadian group Citizen Lab said the company used targeted ads to help deliver spyware to devices, including those of Al Jazeera. Google and other advertising platforms severed ties with the company, while Discover-Tech and SpaceX did not respond to queries from Reuters.

What do these terms mean?

Ad auction: A split-second selling process to display an ad to a user, in which advertisers submit competing bids.

Ad tech: A sector encompassing platforms and tools that select appropriate ads, measure their impact, and target audiences.

Geolocation: Inferring a person's location from device data, network data, or the ads they view.

Spyware: Malicious software installed on a device to monitor user activity and steal data.