Fourteen Governments Adopt Commercial Spyware Guidelines That Bind No Vendor, Carry ...

Fourteen governments adopted the first guidelines for companies that build, sell or finance commercial hacking tools on Wednesday, but the text is voluntary, carries no penalties and asks firms only to consider remedies for people they harm, according to The Record from Recorded Future News . The United Kingdom and France, which lead the effort known as the Pall Mall Process, endorsed the text at the initiative's third conference in Paris, where representatives of 43 countries gathered and fewer than half signed.

For anyone whose phone holds sensitive work, the practical meaning is blunt. Commercial spyware can give an operator deep access to a phone, including its messages and location. The guidelines bind no vendor, so protection still depends on buyer governments writing the rules into purchasing and export decisions, and on engineering safeguards that the government consultation behind the process already questioned.

What Do Pall Mall Guidelines Say Spyware Vendors Should Do?

The text covers firms that develop, sell or finance what diplomats call commercial cyber intrusion capabilities , or CCICs, a label for spyware, exploits and other tools and services sold to carry out intrusions. As The Record reports , the core asks are:

Know your customer. Vet buyers before selling.

Build in safeguards. Add technical controls that make misuse harder.

Watch and report. Keep systems to monitor and report abuse.

Know when to stop. Halt sales and support when serious misuse is a credible risk.

Think victims. Consider remedies for people harmed in human rights abuses.

Governments endorsed the text, not industry bodies, and it carries no sanctions for companies that ignore it. The Record reports that the UK Foreign Office said the aim is to discourage irresponsible activity across the market, add transparency for regulators, vendors and customers, and clarify obligations for businesses. France's foreign ministry called the guidelines voluntary in nature while insisting that "A voluntary code is not, however, an optional code."

Fewer Than Half Signed, So Enforcement Falls On Buyer Governments

The named endorsers include the UK, France, the United States, Germany, Italy and Japan. The separate 2025 Code of Practice for States has 27 signatories, the NCSC says , nearly double the 14 governments that adopted the industry text. Tech Policy Press reported in July that Israel and India were not participating , two states where commercial intrusion vendors are based.

Because the text has no penalties, enforcement pressure is expected to come from governments that buy these tools or license their export. The 2025 states' code phrases that buying lever softly: it asks governments only to explore opportunities to exclude irresponsible vendors from procurement, not to do so. The UK's National Cyber Security Centre has said at least 80 countries bought commercial cyber intrusion software over the past decade, so the buyer pool is wide.

Endorsing governments are also targets. A German delegation received Apple notifications while traveling with Chancellor Friedrich Merz; the group included ministry staff, lawmakers and journalists. Germany's Federal Office for Information Security (BSI) told recipients to assume their devices were infected, though it did not know how many were actually compromised versus only targeted. The late-October Apple batch reached 99 countries , according to BGR, and a 2024 Apple support document put its cumulative total at more than 150 countries in total.

Technical Safeguards Carry Limits Government Consultation Already Documented

The Record says the guidelines call for technical safeguards against misuse but gives no specifics. The closest public evidence is the UK and France's 2024 consultation on good practices, which drew 73 responses : 21 from states, 31 from industry and 21 from academia and civil society. Respondents proposed remote kill switches that let vendors or customers restrict use in cases of misuse, tools delivered with obfuscated and encrypted code, and usage logs built into the tool.

The same respondents flagged hard limits. Kill switches apply only to end-to-end products, because a sold vulnerability or exploit cannot be revoked. Many were skeptical that comprehensive auditing is possible, since customers may not buy a product that might be spying on them, and vendors have limited ability to investigate or force sovereign customers to act. Customer vetting runs into shell companies that hide the ultimate end user, and government statements cannot always be relied on. The published summary states that it does not represent either government's policy , and it predates the final text.

Banking offers a contrast: customer vetting there is backed by statutes and penalties such as the Bank Secrecy Act, a legal backbone the spyware guidelines lack.

Government-Built Tools Fall Outside Scope; Serbia's NoviSpy Shows Risk

The Pall Mall Process does not extend to government-developed intrusion tools, Tech Policy Press notes . Serbia illustrates the gap. In December 2024, Amnesty International attributed NoviSpy to Serbia's security agency, the BIA, with high confidence.

Amnesty also reported that Cellebrite extraction tools unlocked phones before NoviSpy was installed, with exploits used in at least two cases during police interviews, a commercial-vendor link that the guidelines' customer-vetting asks are meant to address. Cellebrite said at the time that its software does not install malware, and in February 2025 it announced it would stop providing its forensic products to the relevant customers in Serbia.

Civil Society Wanted Stronger Limits, Text Offers Remedies As Option

In a Sept. 17 submission, 25 organizations and three individual experts , including Amnesty International, Access Now, Freedom House and Privacy International, set out essential elements for the industry guidelines. They asked for human rights due diligence, remedies for victims, corporate disclosure of safeguards, and a ban on sales to non-state actors outside narrow exceptions. The text as reported asks companies only to consider remedies.

Legal scholar Fionnuala Ní Aoláin , a former UN special rapporteur, argues the process "moves us from a denialism of use to an embrace of use." Tech Policy Press also reports concerns NSO Group: without a robust exclusion capacity, critics worry the process could be used to rehabilitate vendors, though diplomatic sources say sanctioned companies will not be consulted. NSO touted its involvement in a Jan. 7 transparency report; a Foreign Office official said a consultation submission is not a formal commitment or participation, and Citizen Lab's John Scott-Railton urged organizers to disqualify the company. In June, Meta accused NSO of violating a U.S. court injunction through new phishing attempts against WhatsApp users and asked a federal court to hold it in contempt.

Participants questioned whether the initiative can change how these tools are traded and used, and some noted that Britain and France are trying to restrict other states' access while promoting their own spyware industries. France's foreign ministry said work will continue as artificial intelligence, automation and new business models raise fresh questions.

What Can Readers Do While Rules Stay Voluntary?

Device-level defenses matter more than the paperwork. Apple says people with good reason to believe they are targeted can enable Lockdown Mode even without a threat notification, and it points anyone who receives one to Access Now's Digital Security Helpline.

Three signals will show whether the text changes behavior. First, whether the endorsing governments write the guidelines into procurement and export licensing decisions. Second, whether any commercial spyware firm publicly commits and whether governments exclude those that do not. Third, which countries join , since the 2025 states' code has 27 signatories and the industry text has 14.

The decision framework is short. The guidelines give the industry its first written yardstick for conduct, but they bind no one, depend on buyer governments for teeth, rest on technical safeguards with documented limits, and leave government-built tools untouched. Until buyers act, a phone's own protections remain the main defense.

Frequently Asked Questions

What is the Pall Mall Process?

It is a diplomatic effort led by the UK and France, launched at Lancaster House in February 2024, to rein in the commercial spyware and hacking-tool trade. Its first product aimed at governments was a voluntary Code of Practice for States, launched in Paris in April 2025 and backed by 21 participating governments at launch. It builds on four pillars: accountability, precision, oversight and transparency.

Are the Pall Mall guidelines legally binding?

No. According to The Record, they are voluntary and carry no penalties , so compliance depends on company choices and on pressure from governments that buy or license these tools.

Can spyware vendors technically stop a customer from misusing their tools?

Only partly. Respondents to the UK-French consultation noted that kill switches cannot revoke an exploit that has already been sold, doubted that comprehensive auditing is possible, and said vendors have limited power over sovereign buyers. Which safeguards the final text names has not been reported in detail.

How can I protect my phone from commercial spyware?

Turn on Apple's Lockdown Mode if you use an iPhone and keep software updated, and Access Now if you receive a threat notification, as Apple's support page recommends . A missing notification does not guarantee a clean device.