The European Commission has found “evidence” of Pegasus spyware infiltrating the mobile phones of a number of officials, targeting in particular the Commissioner for Justice, Didier Reynders, according to a letter published Thursday.
In the letter dated Monday, Reynders told European MP Sophie Enfield, who received an alert from Apple in November last year that her cell phone could be the target of a possible attack by the Pegasus software, developed by Israel’s NSO. Collection.
According to the message carried by Agence France-Presse (AFP) today, other members of the committee have received similar notifications.
The alerts sparked an investigation that “did not confirm that Pegasus was able to infect the personal or professional equipment of the Commissioner” of justice or any other employee.
However, several checks of these devices “led to the discovery of evidence of hacking,” the letter adds, which states that “it is impossible to attribute these clues with certainty to a specific perpetrator.”
The letter does not provide further details about the outcome of the investigation currently underway, as the committee cited security reasons for not being informed.
Asked about the matter today, a European Commission spokesperson declined to say how many mobile phones were affected.
For its part, NSO said it was ready to “cooperate with any investigation to establish the truth,” according to a company spokesperson, who stressed that “to date, there is no conclusive evidence of a breach.”
The letter from the Commissioner and his colleague Johannes Hahn comes in response to a request for information from Dutch MEP Sophie Ent Feld, rapporteur of the European Parliament’s Commission of Inquiry into the use of Pegasus and other “spyware” programs against journalists. politicians and civil society actors.
The European Commission has sent letters to Hungary, Poland and Spain about the use of Pegasus, raising concerns about compliance with European privacy protection standards.
According to the European Commission, Hungary and Poland responded that the use of the “software” was a matter of “national security” and not community law – something Brussels objects to – while Spain has yet to comment.
Greek MP Nikos Androllakis filed a complaint with the Greek Supreme Court on Tuesday over an attempt to spy on his mobile phone by Predator, a “spyware” similar to Pegasus.
This attempt was flagged by a service set up by the European Parliament to allow MEPs to control the presence of illegal surveillance software on their phones.
Pegasus was designed to target criminals and terrorists, but it was allegedly used to hack the mobile phones of international political leaders, journalists, human rights activists or corporate managers.
