French Security Agency Confirms Pegasus Hack on Two Journalists’ Phones

ANSSI had conducted technical analyses of the phones of Mediapart’s Edwy Plenel & Lenaig Bredoux.

(Photo: The Quint)

Making the first confirmation of Pegasus spyware being used for targeted surveillance, French National Agency for the Security of Information Systems (ANSSI) confirmed the presence of the Israeli-made spyware on the phones of two journalists from the country's online investigative journal Mediapart, the publication reported on Thursday, 29 July.

"The study carried out by ANSSI reached the same conclusions as those of Amnesty International's Security Lab on the reality of the Pegasus infection, on its modalities, dates, and duration", Mediapart reported.

ANSSI had conducted technical analyses of the phones of Mediapart’s co-founder and publishing editor Edwy Plenel and reporter Lenaig Bredoux, Scroll reported.

Mediapart is among the 16 media organisations that have been publishing reports of the ‘Pegasus Project’ investigation that revealed that Pegasus had been used to snoop on journalists, opposition leaders, government officials, and rights activists, among others.

As reported by The Wire, the Indian media outlet part of the international consortium of 17 organizations exploring Pegasus Project, phones of Opposition leaders like Rahul Gandhi, political strategist Prashant Kishor, Supreme Court judges, ministers and journalists were among the potential surveillance targets.

The Pegasus leaks have led to global outrage, with several countries having started a probe to investigate allegations and the extent of the possible surveillance being done.

While the Indian government has claimed that the allegations “have no concrete basis or truth associated with it whatsoever”, prosecutors in Paris have opened a probe to investigate the complaints from Mediapart and Le Canard Enchaine, after French President Emmanuel Macron’s name came up as a potential targets

"NSO sells its technologies solely to law enforcement and intelligence agencies of vetted governments for the sole purpose of saving lives through preventing crime and terror acts."

NSO Group said in a statement.

(With inputs from Mediapart and Scroll)