The Israeli "Pegasus" was used to monitor journalists in El Salvador

Getting tangled up again?

The Israeli NSO spyware "Pegasus" was found on the phones of 35 journalists criticizing the government in El Salvador, according to a study by international digital rights bodies

Niv Lillian

13/01/2022

Thursday, 13 January 2022, 11:23 Updated: 11:26

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The Israeli cyber company NSO was declared "acting against the American security interest" 3.11.21 (Photo: Reuters)

The NSO group has repeatedly denied involvement in its improper use of its Pegasus spyware, but its misuse continues: The latest report comes from El Salvador, where Pegasus software has been found on 37 devices belonging to 35 journalists and human rights activists, since last November.

This is the first time that improper use of software has been discovered in the country, and one of the few cases in South American countries.

Recall in this context that in 2017 researchers found that the Mexican government uses "Pegasus".

The findings, published by Egged of digital rights organizations, including the Canadian "Citizen Love" - ​​which specializes in the treatment of "Pegasus" and "Amnesty International".

Show that despite NSO's insistence that its products are used solely to track down terrorists and criminals, governments continue to use its products towards civilian purposes, and that the company is not doing enough to restrain its customers.

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23 of the devices belong to journalists associated with the Salvadoran news site "El Faro", three more to journalists related to "Gato Anchardo", the two media outlets have more than once published critical articles about the El Salvadoran government, which has also taken revengeful steps against them from official press conferences. And in the case of El Farrow - also repeated tax reviews and accusations of tax evasion.

In general, President Naive Bukla's El Salvador regime is not a fan of the free media.

Among the devices infected with the Israeli spyware were also journalists from other media outlets, and independent years, in addition to devices belonging to civic organizations, such as "Christosel", "Faudish Democracy" and "Transparency for Justice", some were infected no less than 40 times, according to the report Of "Wired."

Among the devices infected with the Israeli spyware were also journalists from other media (Photo: AP)

"It was quite shocking, to be honest, to see the extent and consistency of one person's infections against which the software was run multiple times," says Natalia Karpiva, a legal-technology consultant at Access Now, one of the organizations investigating the El Salvador spy campaign.

"Technology (Pegasus) allows access to everything you do on your phone. We have heard many times before NSO say they will work to implement policies that support human rights. This, along with the fact that governments are not transparent about the purchase and use of this spyware. "Responsibility. Monitoring civic organizations with these tools should not be the norm," Krapiva concludes.

NSO did not respond to Wired's request for comment.

• technology

• Privacy and security

Tags

• Pegasus

• NSO