"My phone has been under surveillance for 7 months. When I heard about it I freaked out, the government can identify my sources"

Investigative journalist Sabolch Fanny revealed that the spyware software "Pegasus" was installed on his cell phone - and was one of the first to take legal action against NSO.

In a candid conversation he talks about the shock and the work in one of the last media outlets in Hungary that are not controlled by Urban.

interview

His dew

29/06/2022

Wednesday, 29 June 2022, 00:01 Updated: 07:22

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Tal Shalev and Sabolch Fanny (PR)

At that time he was also working on an investigative article on the connection between Urban and Netanyahu.

He says in an interview that there was a direct connection between Netanyahu's visit to Hungary and a reverse visit by a Hungarian national security adviser to Israel at the time of the operation of Pegasus against targets in Hungary.

What does an investigative journalist do who discovers one bright day that he has become a target for government surveillance?

As part of this week's international press freedom conference, an interview conducted by Tal Shalev with Sabulj Fanny, a Hungarian investigative journalist who discovered last year that the "Pegasus" spyware was installed on his smartphone, will be broadcast.

Fanny was one of the first to take legal action against NSO and filed a lawsuit against them.

According to an investigation by the British Guardian newspaper, the Hungarian leader used the services of the Israeli cyber company NSO to monitor the phones of at least 10 lawyers, a politician and at least five journalists.

Fanny works for the Hungarian news site Direct 36, one of the last Hungarian media outlets not controlled by Prime Minister Victor Urban.

Fanny's phone was hacked at least 11 times over a period of seven months in 2019.

This emerges from an analysis of the device's data performed as part of the "Pegasus Project".

In all cases, the break-ins occurred just days after he appealed to Hungarian government bodies for a response to the articles he was working on.

It is assumed that this is how the authorities sought to find out what investigations he was likely to publish and tried to trace his sources.

One of the break-ins occurred while he was working on an article dealing with an international investment bank with Russian support, which pushed for the establishment of branches in Budapest - and is suspected as a cover story of intelligence agencies from Moscow.

A Hungarian press photographer who assisted Fanny in working on the article was also a target for espionage using NSO software.

At that time he was also working on an investigative article on the connection between Urban and Netanyahu.

He says in an interview that there was a direct connection between Netanyahu's visit to Hungary and a reverse visit by a Hungarian national security adviser to Israel at the time of the operation of Pegasus against targets in Hungary.

Fanny has won awards for coverage in foreign and security fields and other sensitive issues.

He has a network of thousands of contacts in various countries, including the United States, where he studied with the support of the Fulbright Scholarship for a year

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To the full article

"Positive return result"

"My phone number was the first Hungarian number they identified, and then they knew for sure that there was a story here that a Hungarian journalist was not supposed to be included in this list."

You are a political reporter and investigative journalist, very excited for me to meet you.

You were one of the five Hungarian journalists spied on by Pegasus and a participant in the "Pegasus Project", which actually revealed that the surveillance software was activated against over 180 journalists around the world.

But I want to start from scratch.

When was the first time you discovered that you had become the target of Pegasus software?

"I think it was around March last year, when I was approached by journalists from the 'Sudoitscha Zeitung' from Bavaria (Germany). They asked for my phone number and also the phone number of other Hungarian journalists, and media company owners. They did not tell me why they should These phone numbers, but of course, we'll be pretty clear later, you know, they're checking to see if these phone numbers match a leaked database that contained more than 50,000 phone numbers selected as Pegasus software tracking targets. So they contacted me because I was interviewed in 2020. About the epidemic to the media from Paris "Forbidden Stories", which investigated the whole tracking story of the Pegasus tracking software. And because they already had my phone number, when they went through their contact list in order to make a match with the leaked database, to see if My phone number was the first Hungarian number they recognized,"Then they knew for sure that there was a story here that a Hungarian journalist should not have been included in this list."

"It was kind of a process. First, I was not told my phone was hacked. They were just, you know, curious about certain things. They asked for the phone number and then they told me nothing. But by then it was possible to put together the puzzle pieces, For example, why do these German and French journalists need your phone number? And the phone number of other Hungarian journalists, why are they so secretive? This is a follow-up story, and then they asked me to let Amnesty International analyze my phone, do a technical scan of the phone, and the result was positive.

"This scan showed that my phone had been under surveillance for more than seven months. And of course, when I was told that, I freaked out, I was mostly worried about my sources, because in those days, I was working on some explosive stories. And I immediately thought you know, heck, the government can "Just identify my sources and maybe they can chase them or fire them or make their lives difficult. So that was pretty shocking."

Hungarian Prime Minister Victor Urban (Photo: Reuters)

"In fact, all the Hungarian journalists who were under surveillance were working on stories that were sensitive to the government, either because we were proven to be corrupt, or because we showed that the government does not really care about state sovereignty."

Did you immediately know that this was the government that followed you?

"Yes, it was absolutely clear. There were other cases across Europe and around the world where Pegasus software was used for espionage. A foreign country spied on another country. In the case of Hungary, it was quite clear that this was my government. I have been working as an investigative journalist for more than eight years, and I Focuses mainly on trying to find out, what kind of influences from foreign factors exist in Hungary, how foreign countries corrupt the Hungarian elite and the government of Prime Minister Victor Urban.

I worked mainly on exposing Russian influence in Hungary, Chinese influence.

And I was also working at the time, on a story about Benjamin Netanyahu and his close relationship with Victor Urban. "

"Yes, so we identified at least five or six Hungarian journalists, including me, in this leaked database. There was a colleague of mine, Andres Sabo, who works for the same media outlet, called Direkt36. He also worked on the issue of Russian influence in Hungary. And we had another journalist, Brigita C 'Ikas who worked on the issue of EU misappropriation of money in Hungary, corruption, corruption in the judiciary, corruption among police forces.

' They do not really care about state sovereignty, they do not care about national security.

They let the Russians do what they want in our country. "

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