Speakers at Virus Bulletin painted grim pictures of the threats to physical safety and civil liberties posed by commercial spyware and high-end surveillance software often sold to governments.

Now that a proposed revision to the Wassenaar Arrangement has been rejected, it will be up to the Trump administration to decide whether to attempt to renegotiate again.

The White House, lawmakers said yesterday, wants to renegotiate the divisive U.S. implementation of the Wassenaar Arrangement rules as they relate to intrusion software. A draft of the rules was pulled off the table in July by the Commerce Department’s Bureau of Industry and Security (BIS) following a 90-comment period during which advocates in the...