Citizen Lab

We are monitored by applications, even when we are not monitored by services. This is now the environment in which we operate - an environment that Professor Ronald Deibert identifies as "surveillance capitalism."

Meanwhile, Serbian security institutions have procured many digital surveillance tools, including the most intrusive equipment, capable of secretly penetrating and controlling users' devices and analysing huge amounts of data in detail.

Tusk's announcement is important because it means the liberal opposition has received support from maverick politician Pawel Kukiz, whose four MPs are currently key to PiS maintaining its parliamentary majority. To support the opposition request, Kukiz has asked for the commission to have a broader remit, investigating surveillance under several governments, including Civic Platform ones.

Kwiatkowski said that the Audit Office had already pointed out in 2018 that the expenditure was illegal according to Polish law, because such purchases by the CBA should come from the state budget and face proper parliamentary scrutiny.

In research published on Monday, Citizen Lab, an Institute of the University of Toronto that specializes in surveillance issues, listed 25 countries and agencies - including Serbia's Security Information Agency - that use the software of the Israeli company Circles, which enables the user to locate every phone in the country in seconds.