Mysterious company with government ties plays key internet role

TrustCor Systems vouches for the legitimacy of websites. But its physical address is a UPS Store in Toronto.

By Joseph Menn

Nov 8 2022


An offshore company that is trusted by the major web browsers and other tech companies to vouch for the legitimacy of websites has connections to contractors for U.S. intelligence agencies and law enforcement, according to security researchers, documents and interviews.

Google’s Chrome, Apple’s Safari, nonprofit Firefox and others allow the company, TrustCor Systems, to act as what’s known as a root certificate authority, a powerful spot in the internet’s infrastructure that guarantees websites are not fake, guiding users to them seamlessly.

The company’s Panamanian registration records show that it has the identical slate of officers, agents and partners as a spyware maker identified this year as an affiliate of Arizona-based Packet Forensics, which public contracting records and company documents show has sold communication interception services to U.S. government agencies for more than a decade.

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continua qui: <https://www.washingtonpost.com/technology/2022/11/08/trustcor-internet-addresses-government-connections/>