Spyware software Pegasus was created by an Israeli spyware company to track down terrorist organizations and global cartels.
A research that published on Sunday by many mass media informationand news organizations discovered that the Pegasus spyware has been used to track journalists and activists around the world.
A team of more than a dozen media outlets from around the world worked together to look at how the Pegasus spyware created by the Israeli company NSO Group, was used to monitor phones belonging to journalists, business executives and human rights activists.
The investigation uncovered spyware on a phone belonging to Hatice Cengiz, fiancée of Jamal Khashoggi, the journalist who was assassinated in 2018 by the Saudi government for his work. The report also found that Khashoggi's wife, Hanan Elatr, was the target of the spyware, but investigators could not confirm if her phone was infected.
A forensic analysis found that the spyware was used in attempts to track 37 smartphones belonging to journalists and activists. The numbers belonging to these phones were found in a list leaked to the human rights organization Amnesty International and the non-profit Hidden Stories based in Paris.
The leaked list contained more than 50.000 telephone numbers in countries that regularly conduct urban surveillance and are known to be NSO Group customers. The forensic analysis was performed by Amnesty International's security laboratory.
NSO Group's Pegasus spyware has a pretty sophisticated technology. THE Mission messages κειμένου που περιέχουν έναν σύνδεσμο σε ένα στόχο φτάνει να μολυνθεί η συσκευή αν ο στόχος κάνει click στο link. Μετά ο εισβολέας έχει απεριόριστη πρόσβαση στη συσκευή του στόχου του αφού μπορεί να διαβάσει από μηνύματα ηλεκτρονικού ταχυδρομείου και μηνύματα κειμένου που είναι αποθηκευμένα, μέχρι να ενεργοποιήσει την κάμερα και το μικρόφωνο. Στη συνέχεια, το λογισμικό υποκλοπής μεταδίδει τα data from the compromised phone to the attacker.
