US Courts Will Publish Government Spyware Use Data Starting in 2029

U.S. courts will begin publishing how often judges authorize spyware and hacking tools to intercept communications, giving businesses, privacy professionals, and policymakers a clearer record of government surveillance activity. The Administrative Office of the U.S. Courts told Senator Ron Wyden that it will add a new “spyware/hacking” category to its annual Wiretap Report. The category will be tracked in the 2028 report, which is expected to be published in 2029. The change covers network investigative techniques, or NITs, used by law enforcement to intercept communications in real time.

Courts Set New Spyware Reporting Category

The Administrative Office of the U.S. Courts has published annual Wiretap Reports for nearly two decades. These reports provide information about wiretaps authorized by federal and state judges, including where they were conducted, which type of judge approved them, and the crimes under investigation. The new category will add spyware and hacking tools to that reporting system. Before the information can be included, the judiciary will need to update its reporting forms and procedures. The first report containing the new category will cover activity recorded during 2028.

The new reporting will focus on spyware used to intercept communications while they are being transmitted. That can include calls and messages sent through services such as Signal and WhatsApp. The distinction matters because government hacking can involve different types of surveillance. A wiretap captures communications in real time, while a search can involve remotely accessing a device to obtain information that is already stored on it. The upcoming data will cover the former but not the latter.

Spyware Data Will Have a Limited Scope

The new category will not provide a complete count of every government spyware operation. Instead, it will show how often judges authorize wiretaps that use spyware or hacking techniques. Searches that remotely extract photographs, files, location information, or other stored data will remain outside the count because they are treated as searches rather than wiretaps.

Senator Ron Wyden has sought greater transparency around government surveillance since 2017. He welcomed the judiciary's decision while also calling for further congressional action. “The American people remain largely in the dark about the different ways that the government is spying on them,” Wyden said in a statement to TechCrunch. He also called for Congress to advance the Government Surveillance Transparency Act, a bill he and other lawmakers reintroduced earlier in 2026, cited by TechCrunch.

What The Change Means for Businesses

The new reporting will give cybersecurity companies, privacy teams, legal departments, and policymakers a clearer record of court-authorized spyware use in the U.S. It may also make it easier to distinguish between surveillance that intercepts communications and government searches that retrieve information already stored on a device. The first publicly available figures are expected in 2029, when the judiciary publishes its 2028 Wiretap Report with the new “spyware/hacking” category.