Pegasus Spyware attacks 45 countries; human rights abuse
According to recent reports, an Israeli-based cyber-warfare named Pegasus Spyware witnessed significant expansions in 45 countries. Between August 2016 and August 2018, six countries Bahrain, Kazakhstan, Mexico, Morocco, Saudi Arabia, and the United Arab Emirates were attacked.
Citizen Lab Research Report
The Citizen Lab in the University of Toronto led by Bill Marczak tracked pegasus spyware and found its connection with NSO’s group produced by Tel Aviv-based NSO Group.
The research and development organization revealed, “We developed and used a novel fingerprinting technique - Athena to group 36 distinct spyware systems, each one run by a separate operator.”
They identified 45 countries where pegasus bots were active through VPNs and satellite internet connection.
According to the researchers, at least 10 pegasus operators were running cross-border surveillance to abuse the countries with spyware.
It is a lawful surveillance tool for criminal or national security investigations generally used by governments. However, Citizen Lab revealed that the technology was abused to spy on the members of civil society.
For example, three operations were already running in Mexico, despite active surveillance. The surveillance also extends into Saudi Arabia to target an Amnesty International staff member and a Saudi human rights activists.
UAE-based human rights activist Ahmed Mansoor was also targeted by pegasus spyware from FinFisher and Hacking Team.
Citizen Lab also exposed an attack back in 2016 where iPhones were targeted.
Identified 45 countries: Algeria, Bahrain, Cote d’Ivoire, Egypt, France, Greece, India, Iraq, Bangladesh, Brazil, Canada, Israel, Jordan, Kazakhstan, Kenya, Kuwait, Kyrgyzstan, Morocco, the Netherlands, Oman, Pakistan, Palestine, Poland, Latvia, Lebanon, Libya, Mexico, Qatar, Rwanda, Saudi Arabia, Singapore, Thailand, Togo, Tunisia, Turkey, the UAE, South Africa, Switzerland, Tajikistan, Uganda, the United Kingdom, Yemen, the United States, Uzbekistan and Zambia.
How Pegasus Malware attacks?
The malware uses social engineering and encourages their targets to click specially crafted exploit links that would penetrate a device’s security features furthermore allowing operators to access the device without the user’s knowledge or permission.
Most of the exploit links have a political theme used to promote elections. It spreads through phishing! Clicking on links triggers an automated attempt to install malware.
Once the malware activates, it conducts surveillance by targeting private data like passwords, contact lists, banking information, text messages and live voice calls to capture user’s phone activity. This could be only protected by pegasus spyware removal tool.
Israel-based NSO’s competitors Gamma International (a German/UK company which markets FinFisher/FinSpy) and Hacking Team (Italy), fell victim to a high-profile breach in the year 2015.
Katie Moussouris, the founder of Luta Security, said that human rights abuse using pegasus is a big problem. She also argued against developing further orders to target the NSO Group and similar firms.
Instead, efforts should focus on punishing or sanctioning criminals or those repressive regimes using software to abuse human rights.
On 18 September 2018, NSO while defending itself said The product is licensed to operate in countries under Business Ethics Framework and does not operate outside of approved countries. For example, the product is specifically designed to not operate in the USA.
The expanding user base of spyware is enabling many states to spy into the digital lives of their people, but also into the phones, computers and tabs around the globe.
As per Citizen Lab reports continued supply of NSO Group’s services has led to controversial governments increasing doubts about the effectiveness of countries society.
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