Senator Wyden urges GAO to audit federal use of hacking and spyware tools

Democratic Senator Ron Wyden has formally petitioned the U.S. Government Accountability Office to conduct a comprehensive audit of federal hacking and spyware practices. The request targets the FBI, Drug Enforcement Administration, ICE’s Homeland Security Investigations, and the Secret Service, all of which have employed such tools for over two decades without public reporting on scope or frequency. Wyden argues that, unlike wiretap and pen-register disclosures, the government does not issue annual summaries of digital intrusion activities.

His letter asks the GAO to produce an unclassified report covering possible misuse, safeguards, acquisition and storage procedures, and the way agencies disclose risks to courts. The senator cited the case of former L3Harris executive Peter Williams, who stole advanced hacking tools that were later used by Russian and Chinese actors, to underscore the security stakes. Historical examples, such as the FBI’s 1999 deployment of malware to access a mobster’s encrypted file, illustrate the longstanding nature of these capabilities.