Tech

Senior Member of European Parliament Targeted for Spreading Spyware Abuse


BRUSSELS – As an increasing number of politicians, activists and journalists have been attacked with spyware, including prime ministers and prominent dissidents within the European Union, The world’s largest democracy club, the European Parliament, in April began checking members’ phones.

About 200 devices participated, it reached the first active level.

Parliamentary technology experts have revealed a senior European Parliamentarian from Greece and the leader of a major opposition party there were targeted with spyware last year.

Politician Nikos Androulakis, who became leader of Greece’s third-largest political party, the centre-left PASOK-KINAL, late last year, submitted his personal mobile device to the technology lab. New spyware discovered at the European Parliament in Brussels.

Late last month, experts informed Mr Androulakis that, in September 2021, weeks after announcing he would be the candidate to lead the opposition party in his home country, he had received a text message. The copy with the link may have installed the spyware Predator, a scammer. version of The famous spyware Pegasuson his phone, he clicked it.

“Look at this serious friend, there is something to be gained,” the text said with the link.

Mr Androulakis, who did not recognize the sender, did not fall into the trap so his phone was not infected with the virus.

The discovery of this attempt, following cases in Spain, Hungary and Poland, raises concerns that, even in a bloc that claims to be the world’s standard-bearer for democracy and the rule of law, rights, such technology is being used for nefarious political purposes.

The European Commission, the EU’s executive body, has delayed the matter with national authorities, but the pressure on the Commission to act is growing, especially since it already has staff of its own. I was targeted by spyware.

In a letter sent to a European Parliament deputy minister on July 25 and seen by The New York Times, the European Commission said that its top justice official Didier Reynders and several of his staff received a warning from Apple in November that its phones had been compromised by spyware. The infection alert, and letter, was first reported by Reuters.

In a letter to Sophie in ‘t Veld, a Dutch lawmaker who chairs the European Parliament’s special committee on spyware, the European Commission said its experts were unable to confirmed the infection but found “some indication of compromise” and could not be sure who was behind them.

Ms in ‘t Veld, a senior member of Parliament, said: “Governments are buying these things and it’s very hard for them to resist the temptation to use it for political purposes.

“It’s too early to tell what’s going on here, but it doesn’t look good, does it?” She talked about Mr. Androulakis’s case. “It doesn’t matter if the phone wasn’t compromised, the political fact is that there was an attempt,” she added.

The Greek government said in a statement on Monday that authorities urgently need to investigate the incident. It has staunchly denied the use of Predator.

The Predator software is marketed by a company called Cytrox, based in North Macedonia. The company’s website no longer exists, and an email requesting comment to the only address listed elsewhere online, apparently belonging to its chief executive officer, was bounced.

Meta and Google have documented the use of links that look like reality, mimicking official Greek websites, used to infect personal mobile devices with spyware. The link sent to Mr Androulakis is from one of the fake websites recorded by Meta. The attempt followed a similar attempt to infect the phone of Thanasis Koukakis, a Greek investigative journalist, although a text message succeeded after Mr. Koukakis clicked the link.

In the summer of 2021, the Greek government denied being behind the infection of Mr. Koukakis’ phone.

Androulakis, the leader of the Greek opposition, filed a lawsuit in Greece’s highest court on Monday to try to force the Greek authorities to investigate.

“Revealing who is behind these appalling activities and who they are acting for is not a personal matter, it is a democratic duty,” Mr. Androulakis said after filing the lawsuit in Athens.

Citizen Labthe world’s leading experts on spyware, based at the University of Toronto, said in a report on the Predator that it is being used by the governments of Egypt, Greece, Indonesia, Madagascar and Saudi Arabia. The lab says it’s highly unlikely that companies or individuals could purchase spyware that costs hundreds of thousands of dollars.

Predator spyware is a less sophisticated version of Pegasus, a piece of software developed by the Israeli company NSO Group, ostensibly to help governments catch criminals and terrorists. The software allows the user to monitor every aspect of the target’s phone – including calls, messages, photos and videos. Predator requires the target to click the link; Pegasus does not.

In November, the Biden administration The NSO group is blacklisted, says it knowingly provides spyware that has been used by foreign governments to target dissidents, human rights activists, journalists and others. At the same time, Apple sues NSO to block it from infecting the iPhone; Meta (then Facebook) also sued NSO in 2019 for its attempt to infect users through WhatsApp.

Last year, a forensic investigation by Citizen Lab, Amnesty International and an international media organization revealed that a number of governments, including members of the European Union, have deployed Pegasus to track citizens’ scores their.

The European Parliament has begun investigating these claims, and during a visit to Israel discovered that at least 14 EU governments had purchased Pegasus, with two of these contracts terminated by the NSO group. Chaim Gelfand, NSO’s general counsel and chief compliance officer, said at least one of those terminations was because the government was using the software for “purposes other than fighting serious crime and terrorism.” .

“Every client that we sell to, we do a pre-qualification to assess the legislation in that country,” Mr Gelfand told the commission last month.

Citizens in at least six EU countries have been targeted by spyware, According to a recent study commissioned by European legislators. Among those attacked were Prime Minister of Spain, Pedro Sánchez, and the country’s defense minister. Others believed to have been targeted include Charles Michel, Belgium’s prime minister at the time, Mr Reynders, the EU’s top judicial official, and President Emmanuel Macron of France.

In Hungary, authorities targeted at least 39 people, including journalists, with Pegasus software, according to investigative news agency Direkt36. An official investigation concluded that the Hungarian government acted in accordance with the law.

The Polish government confirmed in January that it had acquired Pegasus, but denied allegations of using it to spy on government critics, despite reports from local media about multiple hacks.

In Spain, one Citizen Lab’s reportconfirmed by forensic research by Amnesty International, which revealed that a number of Catalan public figures were targeted with surveillance software, mainly after the failed 2017 referendum on Catalan independence.



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