Forbidden Stories and Amnesty International were provided access to a leak of more than 50,000 phone numbers targeted by those using NSO Group’s Pegasus software. NSO denies any wrongdoing.
(Ilustration: tommy/Getty Images) Spyware from Israeli firm NSO Group has been secretly installed on tens of thousands of smartphones, many of which are owned by heads of state, activists, and journalists, according to a report from Paris-based media non-profit Forbidden Stories and Amnesty International. NSO’s Pegasus software can be installed on a phone without any action from its owner; sending a text message is all that’s required in some cases. Pegasus then has access to the phone’s messages, emails, media, microphone, camera, calls and contacts. Forbidden Stories and Amnesty International were provided access to a leak of more than 50,000 phone numbers targeted by NSO clients. Those clients, the report says, include officials in 11 countries: Azerbaijan, Bahrain, Hungary, India, Kazakhstan, Mexico, Morocco, Rwanda, Saudi Arabia, Togo, and the United Arab Emirates (UAE). Both groups have partnered with media organizations— The Guardian, Le Monde, Süddeutsche Zeitung and The Washington Post —for a series of stories about those 50,000 targets.
