ISLAMABAD – The mobile phones of at least two dozen Pakistani seniordefence and intelligence officials were allegedly targeted with technologyowned by the Israeli spyware company NSO Group, reveals a British newspaperreportlink.
The alleged breach of privacy was discovered during an analysis of 1,400people whose phones were the focus of hacking attempts in a two-week periodearlier this year, the report says quoting sources familiar with the matterwho wished not to be named.
The malware’s users exploited a vulnerability in WhatsApp software toaccess messages and data on the targets’ phones.
The discovery of the breach in May prompted WhatsApp, which is owned byFacebook, to file a lawsuit against Israeli Spyware company NSO in Octoberin which it accused the company of “unauthorised access and abuse” of itsservices.
“The alleged targeting of Pakistani officials gives a first insight intohow NSO’s signature “Pegasus” spyware could have been used for“state-on-state” espionage,” read the report.
“This kind of spyware is marketed as designed for criminal investigations.But the open secret is that it also winds up being used for politicalsurveillance and government-on-government spying,” John Scott-Railton, asenior researcher at the Citizen Lab, an academic research group located atthe University of Toronto that has worked with WhatsApp to help identifyvictims of the alleged hacks, told the newspaper.
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“While it is not clear who wanted to target Pakistani government officials,the details are likely to fuel speculation that India could have been usingNSO technology for domestic and international surveillance,” said thereport.
“The government of the Indian prime minister, Narendra Modi, is facingquestions from human rights activists about whether it has bought NSOtechnology after it emerged that 121 WhatsApp users in India were allegedlytargeted earlier this year.”
India was first linked to NSO in 2018, when a report by the Citizen Labidentified 36 Pegasus “operators” who were found to be using the malware in45 countries. One operator, which the Citizen Lab identified and codenamed“Ganges”, was found to have been active since 2017 and had infected mobilephones in five locations: India, Bangladesh, Brazil, Hong Kong and Pakistan.
The Citizen Lab did not identify who it believed was behind “Ganges” butthe data in its report indicated that most of the networks with infectionswere in India.
