Digital Audit: Mastercard

Enterprise Technology Stack & Vendor Relationships

Mastercard’s security and data-analytics stack in the Israeli technology ecosystem has been built substantially through direct acquisition of Israeli-origin firms rather than through vendor-customer procurement contracts. In May 2020 Mastercard acquired Cytegic, an Israeli cyber-risk quantification startup founded by Elon Kaplan and Gerard Sabbah, with its Israel-based team continuing development under Mastercard’s Data & Services division ¹²³. Mastercard separately acquired RiskRecon, a Salt Lake City-based cyber-risk assessment firm, in December 2019, and NuData, a Canada-based behavioral-biometrics fraud-prevention firm, in 2017; no Israel nexus was identified for either of these two acquisitions ⁴⁵⁶. In September 2024 Mastercard announced acquisition of Recorded Future, a US-headquartered (Somerville, MA) global threat-intelligence firm valued at $2.65 billion, with the deal finalized in December 2024 ⁷⁸⁹; Recorded Future is reported to serve governments of 45 countries among more than 1,900 clients globally, including US defense, intelligence and law-enforcement agencies and Ukrainian cyber-defense bodies ¹⁰. No public evidence identified of Mastercard holding direct licensing, subscription, or integration relationships as a customer of Check Point, Wiz, CyberArk, NICE, Verint, Claroty, or Palo Alto Networks, nor of named systems integrators or consultancies mandating Israeli-origin technology for Mastercard’s major technology programmes.

Surveillance, Biometrics & Retail Technology

Mastercard operates its own in-store biometric authentication product, the “Mastercard Biometric Checkout Program,” which enables facial- or palm-based payment authentication and was launched in May 2022 ¹¹. No public evidence identified connects the underlying biometric-capture technology to an Israeli-origin vendor such as Trigo, BriefCam, AnyVision/Oosto, or Trax. No public evidence identified of Mastercard use of Israeli-origin predictive-policing, sentiment-analysis, social-media-monitoring, or workforce-surveillance tools, nor of Israeli biometric or surveillance technology reaching Mastercard indirectly via bundled or managed security-service suites.

Cloud Infrastructure, Data Residency & Sovereign Cloud Participation

No public evidence identified that Mastercard operates, leases, or co-locates data-centre infrastructure within Israel. No public evidence identified of Mastercard participation in Project Nimbus or any comparable Israeli government cloud or data-sovereignty programme; publicly documented Project Nimbus participants are limited to other providers, and Mastercard does not appear among them. No public evidence identified of Mastercard providing data-sovereignty or infrastructure-resilience services explicitly marketed to Israeli state or military institutions. Mastercard’s most concrete documented link to Israeli national payments infrastructure is instead an equity stake in the country’s card-clearing switch, SHVA, addressed in the R&D Footprint section below ¹²¹³¹⁴.

Defence, Intelligence & Security Sector Technology Relationships

Mastercard’s clearest defence/intelligence-sector nexus runs through its September–December 2024 acquisition of Recorded Future. Recorded Future’s CEO, Christopher Ahlberg, publicly stated in a tweet (reported by Forbes) that the company “proudly provides intelligence to the Israeli National Cyber Directorate and have done so for a long time,” and separately stated “I have personally leaned in and made points that, yes, I’m pro-Israel,” while declining to name specific Israeli customers in the interview itself ¹⁰. This relationship with Israel’s National Cyber Directorate (INCD) predates Mastercard’s acquisition and, per the CEO’s own characterization, is long-running; whether Mastercard continued servicing INCD after the December 2024 closing is not confirmed by any source identified in this research. Recorded Future is also reported to be “a major provider for myriad American defense, intelligence and law enforcement agencies,” including the NSA, Cyber Command, Secret Service and ICE, and to provide defensive cyber services to Ukrainian agencies, with no further breakdown identified of Israeli military- or defense-ministry-specific (as distinct from civilian cyber-agency) contracts ¹⁰. No public evidence identified of direct Mastercard contracts with the Israeli Ministry of Defence, the IDF, or Israeli intelligence agencies such as Shin Bet or Mossad for IT, communications, hosting, or analytics services. No public evidence identified of dual-use deployment of Mastercard’s commercial technology for military, intelligence, or law-enforcement surveillance in Israel or the Occupied Palestinian Territories. No public evidence identified of Mastercard development, sale, licensing, or maintenance of offensive cyber capabilities or zero-day exploit tools, nor of deployment of such tools by Israeli state actors using Mastercard technology; available sourcing characterizes Recorded Future as a defensive threat-intelligence platform ¹⁰.

AI, Algorithmic & Autonomous Systems

Mastercard’s principal AI asset with an Israeli nexus is Dynamic Yield, an Israeli AI-driven personalization platform founded in 2012 by Liad Agmon and Omri Mendellevich, sold by its founders to McDonald’s in 2019 for roughly $300 million and subsequently re-sold to Mastercard, with the acquisition closing in April 2022 for approximately $320 million ^15161718. Dynamic Yield’s CEO at the time of the Mastercard deal, Ori Bauer, is reported to have served in Mamram, the IDF’s central computing services unit, during mandatory military service ¹⁵¹⁶. No public evidence identified of Mastercard providing AI/ML, computer-vision, or autonomous decision-support systems to Israeli state, military, or security bodies. No public evidence identified that Mastercard’s AI models - including Dynamic Yield’s personalization engine or its fraud-detection AI - were trained on or granted access to civilian population data, intercepted communications, or surveillance-derived datasets originating from Israel or the Occupied Palestinian Territories. No public evidence identified of Mastercard provision of autonomous targeting, automated threat-detection, or autonomous tracking systems to Israeli military or security forces.

Technology Ecosystem & R&D Footprint

Mastercard maintains a technology R&D centre in Ramat Gan’s “One Tower” (Exchange District), shared with subsidiary Dynamic Yield, with headcount reported in the range of 300–500 personnel conducting AI-driven R&D ¹⁷¹⁸¹⁹. In May 2020, Mastercard and Enel X jointly established the FinSec Innovation Lab in the Gav-Yam Negev High-Tech Park in Beersheba, after winning a 2019 government tender issued jointly by the Israel Innovation Authority, the Israel National Cyber Directorate, and the Israeli Ministry of Finance, with NIS 13 million (~$3.7 million) in funding and a three-year mandate to work with early-stage Israeli startups on fintech and cybersecurity proof-of-concept development ^202122232425. This constitutes a direct, funded partnership arrangement with three Israeli state bodies; whether the lab continued operating past its stated three-year term (i.e., beyond 2023) is not confirmed by available sourcing. Mastercard’s acquisitions with an Israeli nexus include Cytegic (May 2020) ¹²³ and Dynamic Yield (closed April 2022) ^15161718, alongside Recorded Future, which is not itself Israeli-domiciled but carries a documented, longstanding Israeli-government (INCD) customer relationship ⁷⁸¹⁰⁹. Separately, Mastercard holds a 10% equity stake in Automatic Bank Services Ltd. (“SHVA”), Israel’s monopoly national payment-card clearing switch operating the country’s interbank card-clearing and ATM network; the stake, purchased from Bank Hapoalim, was approved by Bank of Israel Governor Amir Yaron and became effective April 30, 2019, with Visa separately holding a parallel 10% stake purchased from Bank Leumi in 2018 ¹²¹³¹⁴. No divestiture of the SHVA stake has been reported, though its status as of 2026 is not independently confirmed by sourcing gathered. No public evidence identified of Mastercard patent, licensing, or co-development arrangements with the Technion, Hebrew University, or the Weizmann Institute specifically.

Civil Society Scrutiny & Regulatory History

Bank Hapoalim and Mizrahi Tefahot Bank - both documented Mastercard-network card issuers in Israel - are profiled by the Who Profits and AFSC Investigate databases for operating branches and ATMs in West Bank settlements including Ariel and Ma’ale Adumim ^26272829. Mastercard’s relationship to settlement activity via this network is indirect, running through network fees on transactions processed by settlement-branch-operating banks rather than direct operational presence; no primary document was located naming Mastercard itself in the OHCHR Database of Business Enterprises pursuant to HRC Resolutions 31/36 and 53/25, and Mastercard does not appear to be a listed entity in that database based on available sourcing ³⁰. The July 2025 report of the UN Special Rapporteur, “From economy of occupation to economy of genocide” (A/HRC/59/23), names 48 corporations and institutions across military, technology, financial, and academic sectors, but Mastercard is not identified in available reporting as one of the named entities ³¹³². Mastercard Vice President of Government Affairs and Policy Raisa Sheynberg is named as a board member of the Gaza Humanitarian Foundation (GHF), the Trump-administration-backed, Israeli-security-cabinet-approved Gaza aid distribution mechanism approved in early May 2025 ^33343536. GHF has been publicly criticized by NGOs as “politicised” and has faced scrutiny over Israeli military involvement in distribution-site security and reports of casualties near aid sites ³⁷; this is a personal board role of a named Mastercard executive, and no evidence was found that Mastercard as a company is institutionally connected to GHF beyond this individual’s dual role. No public evidence identified of an organized boycott or divestment campaign specifically targeting Mastercard’s technology provision to Israel, and Mastercard does not appear among primary BDS Movement-listed targets in current campaign materials. No public evidence identified of regulatory inquiries, export-control actions, or sanctions-related investigations involving Mastercard’s technology sales or services to Israeli state entities. No public evidence identified of a Mastercard corporate statement addressing the ICJ Advisory Opinion of July 19, 2024, or the ICC arrest warrants of November 2024, nor of any documented modification to Israeli operations following either milestone.

End Notes