This article considers the purchasing of hacking technology by governments and the role of government procurement processes in regulating the hacking market and reducing risks to the buyer. While the proliferation of hacking technology for government actors has led to various proposed solutions for accountability, little consideration has been given to public purchasing of this technology. This article explores whether public contracting processes could be used to help minimize the risks that arise from the use of government hacking technology, and, if so, the types of contractual clauses and institutional supports that might be useful to achieve that goal. In exploring this issue, this article considers theories of government by contract and the publicization of the private sector. These theories posit that public contracting can be used as a vehicle to impose public considerations—for example, certain policy goals—on the private sector. It argues that requirements of transparency and accountability that inhere on the public sector could be transferred in part to the private sector through the vehicle of a public contract and explores how public contracts for government hacking technology could be structured in order to reduce risks posed by the use of this technology.

本文考虑了政府对黑客技术的购买以及政府采购流程在规范黑客市场和降低购买者风险方面的作用。尽管针对政府行为者的黑客技术的激增导致提出了各种问责制的解决方案，但很少有人考虑购买该技术。本文探讨了是否可以使用公共合同程序来最大程度地减少使用政府黑客技术所带来的风险，如果可以，则可以使用有助于实现该目标的合同条款和机构支持的类型。在探讨这个问题时，本文考虑了契约式政府理论和私营部门的公开化。这些理论认为，公共合同可以用作将公共考虑（例如某些政策目标）强加给私营部门的工具。它认为，公共部门内部对透明度和问责制的要求可以通过公共合同的手段部分地转移到私营部门，并探讨了如何构建政府黑客技术的公共合同，以减少由黑客入侵造成的风险。使用这项技术。