Category Archives: NSO Group

Facebook reinstates NSO Group employee accounts amid ongoing lawsuit

Posted on by

After a months-long court battle, Facebook has reinstated four accounts of people employed by Israeli software surveillance firm NSO Group, according to Israeli news outlet CTech. NSO Group employees had alleged in a suit filed last November that Facebook had unfairly blocked them from their personal accounts when Facebook’s WhatsApp sued the surveillance firm in October. An Israeli court had previously ordered Facebook to unblock the accounts in February. Last month, the court rejected Facebook’s appeal, according to CTech. It’s the latest legal scuffle between the social media giant and NSO Group, which is being sued in California over allegations its software was used to spy on thousands of WhatsApp users. In a statement to CTech, Facebook indicated the decision to reinstate the accounts would not affect the lawsuit. “Throughout the entire proceedings in Israel, NSO Group operated behind the scenes to sabotage our efforts to make it admit its responsibility for attacks […]

The post Facebook reinstates NSO Group employee accounts amid ongoing lawsuit appeared first on CyberScoop.

Continue reading Facebook reinstates NSO Group employee accounts amid ongoing lawsuit→

Moroccan journalist targeted by NSO Group spyware, Amnesty International says

Posted on by

Amnesty International said Sunday its security team found evidence of abuse on a Moroccan journalist’s cell phone that can be tied back to spyware developed by NSO Group. The journalist, Omar Radi, was targeted by surveillance software capable of tracking texts, calls, emails, camera, and more — just days after NSO Group, the Israeli surveillance software company, announced it would stop its products from being used to perpetuate human rights abuses, according to Amnesty International. Although the attackers behind the targeting are unconfirmed, Amnesty says evidence indicates the Moroccan government is behind the surveillance. NSO Group has repeatedly said it only sells its technology to governments. The targeting of Radi came at a time when he was being repeatedly harassed by the Moroccan government between January 2019 and January 2020. Radi was targeted by a series of network injection attacks, which allowed attackers to intercept and manipulate targets’ internet traffic, Amnesty International said. […]

The post Moroccan journalist targeted by NSO Group spyware, Amnesty International says appeared first on CyberScoop.

Continue reading Moroccan journalist targeted by NSO Group spyware, Amnesty International says→

Research shows human rights activists in India were targeted with spyware, including NSO’s Pegasus

Posted on by

Human rights activists in India were targeted by a coordinated spyware campaign from January to October of 2019, according to research published Monday by Amnesty International and the University of Toronto’s Citizen Lab. Nine activists in total were targeted, eight of which have been calling for the release of 11 people jailed during protests related to the violent uprising in Bhima Koregaon, India in 2018. The targets were sent spearphishing emails with malicious links and files that, if clicked, would infect the victims’ computers with spyware capable of tracking their communications. Three of the activists were targeted by Pegasus, a notorious spyware program developed by Israeli surveillance software firm NSO Group, according to Amnesty and Citizen Lab. Human rights defenders in India have been victimized by spyware in the past. But the research shows that surveillance software has been leveraged multiple times against activists linked to the Bhima Koregaon activists. One […]

The post Research shows human rights activists in India were targeted with spyware, including NSO’s Pegasus appeared first on CyberScoop.

Continue reading Research shows human rights activists in India were targeted with spyware, including NSO’s Pegasus→

Congress wants to know who is using spyware against the US

Posted on by

A 2021 intelligence funding draft bill mandates a report on surveillance vendors and which countries or other actors are using spyware. Continue reading Congress wants to know who is using spyware against the US→

Rod Rosenstein is working with NSO Group, the Israeli firm accused of spying on dissidents

Posted on by

Rod Rosenstein, a former deputy attorney general at the Department of Justice, has been providing counsel on cybersecurity and national security to NSO Group, the Israeli software surveillance firm accused of spying on human rights activists and journalists, according to court documents obtained by CyberScoop. Rosenstein’s work with NSO Group was revealed in court documents in relation to a lawsuit WhatsApp filed against the company, accusing them of surveilling over 1,000 WhatsApp users. “I have counseled NSO about cyber and national security issues and assisted the defense team” in the WhatsApp v. NSO Group case, Rosenstein said in the signed declaration. Rosenstein has been employed King & Spalding, the firm representing NSO Group, since January of this year. He previously served as deputy attorney general from 2017 through May 2019. The filing is an attempt to rebut WhatsApp’s claims that King & Spalding has a conflict of interest in the case because it has represented […]

The post Rod Rosenstein is working with NSO Group, the Israeli firm accused of spying on dissidents appeared first on CyberScoop.

Continue reading Rod Rosenstein is working with NSO Group, the Israeli firm accused of spying on dissidents→

Former Ghana government officials sentenced to jail for doing business with NSO Group

Posted on by

Three former government officials in Ghana have been sentenced to jail for purchasing spyware products from Israeli software surveillance company NSO Group. The country’s former national security coordinator, Salifu Osman, and director-general of the country’s telecommunications authority, William Tetteh Tevie, were sentenced to five years in prison, according to Ghana Business News and other local news outlets. A former board chairman of the telecommunications authority, Eugene Baffoe-Bonnie, was sentenced to six years because he allegedly made $200,000 from the deal, according to Graphic Online. The case, which has been in the country’s high court since 2017, hinged on the argument that officials had caused significant financial loss in the country due to their $4 million purchase of NSO Group’s signature Pegasus spyware. The National Communications Authority (NCA) allegedly bought the surveillance product through a reseller in order to track suspected terrorism, according to Graphic Online, which attended the court session Tuesday. It […]

The post Former Ghana government officials sentenced to jail for doing business with NSO Group appeared first on CyberScoop.

Continue reading Former Ghana government officials sentenced to jail for doing business with NSO Group→

NSO Group partly disputes claim about use of U.S.-based servers in WhatsApp spy campaign

Posted on by

Israeli surveillance software company NSO Group is back in court disputing WhatsApp’s claims that it used U.S.-based infrastructure to launch spyware against thousands of WhatsApp users last year. In court documents filed Thursday, NSO Group rejected Facebook-owned WhatsApp’s allegations that NSO Group used servers from a Los Angeles-based hosting provider, QuadraNet, over 700 times to target WhatsApp users. “Plaintiffs’ new claims about QuadraNet are false: NSO did not contract with QuadraNet to use its California servers,” the filing reads. NSO Group claimed in the filings that even if its spyware, Pegasus, did use QuadraNet servers, it was third-party activity. The company sells its software around the globe to intelligence and law enforcement agencies. “If Pegasus messages did pass through QuadraNet servers, they would have been sent by NSO’s customers, not NSO,” the filing states. “We repeat: NSO Group does not operate the Pegasus technology for its clients,” the spokesperson added. NSO Group CEO Shalev Hulio said […]

The post NSO Group partly disputes claim about use of U.S.-based servers in WhatsApp spy campaign appeared first on CyberScoop.

Continue reading NSO Group partly disputes claim about use of U.S.-based servers in WhatsApp spy campaign→

Facebook claims NSO Group’s lawyers have conflict of interest in WhatsApp case

Posted on by

In the ongoing legal battle between Facebook and software surveillance company NSO Group, the social media giant is trying to get NSO Group’s legal counsel dismissed because of an alleged conflict of interest. In a court filing made public this week, Facebook asked a federal judge to disqualify law firm King & Spalding from representing NSO Group because the firm previously represented Facebook-owned WhatsApp in a different sealed case that is “substantially related” to the NSO Group one. King & Spalding, an Atlanta-based firm with a range of big corporate clients, has denied there is a conflict of interest, according to the filing. It is the latest twist in a legal tussle that began in October, when Facebook sued NSO Group, alleging that the Israeli company violated a federal anti-hacking law when its malware was used to infect some 1,400 mobile devices, including those of human rights advocates. NSO Group denies the […]

The post Facebook claims NSO Group’s lawyers have conflict of interest in WhatsApp case appeared first on CyberScoop.

Continue reading Facebook claims NSO Group’s lawyers have conflict of interest in WhatsApp case→

Facebook: NSO Group used U.S.-based servers in operations against WhatsApp users

Posted on by

Lawyers for WhatsApp’s parent company alleged in documents filed Thursday that NSO Group, the Israeli software surveillance firm accused of spying on over a thousand WhatsApp users, has used U.S.-based servers to launch its attacks. In court documents, Facebook-owned WhatsApp claims NSO Group used a server run by Los Angeles-based hosting provider QuadraNet “more than 700 times during the attack to direct NSO’s malware to WhatsApp user devices in April and May 2019.” Additionally, NSO Group used a remote server hosted by Amazon to target WhatsApp users, WhatsApp software engineer Claudiu Gheorghe said in the filing. The filing is a blow to NSO Group’s claims that its signature product, Pegasus, isn’t capable of running operations in the United States. “That invasion of WhatsApp’s servers and users’ devices constitutes unlawful computer hacking at the heart of the [Computer Fraud and Abuse Act]’s unauthorized-access offense,” WhatsApp claims in the filing. The filing is […]

The post Facebook: NSO Group used U.S.-based servers in operations against WhatsApp users appeared first on CyberScoop.

Continue reading Facebook: NSO Group used U.S.-based servers in operations against WhatsApp users→