The software of an Italian company specializing in communications surveillance was used to pirate smartphones and spy on their users in Italy and Kazakhstan.
This was revealed by Google, which denounces a "flourishing" cyber espionage industry.
"These companies facilitate the proliferation of dangerous piracy tools and arm governments that otherwise would not be able to develop these skills," claims the American high-tech giant.
Google engineers explain that the victims, users of smartphones with Android (Google) and iOS (Apple), received a link that installs malicious applications, then allowing them to spy on their activity on their mobile or extract documents.
In some cases, hackers act with the complicity of internet providers,
and the apps resemble those of well-known operators.
According to Google, the software in question is that of RCS Lab, an Italian company that "provides cutting-edge technological solutions to security services for the surveillance of communications".
