Tag Archive for: Pegasus

Why does US accuse China of hacking but say nothing about Pegasus?

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Cyber theft Photo: Xinhua

Cyber theft Photo: Xinhua

China has condemned the US government for turning a blind eye toward Israel’s Pegasus spyware, while opting to smear China over the issue of cybersecurity with unwarranted charges.

Pegasus spyware, developed by the Israeli firm NSO Group, could be covertly installed on mobile phones without the awareness of phone users. It is reported that the spyware targets politicians, journalists and businesspeople around the world.

The Pegasus spyware case once again demonstrates that cybersecurity is a common threat that challenges all countries around the world, Zhao Lijian, a spokesperson of China’s Foreign Ministry, said on Thursday. 

Zhao said that countries should join hands to cope with threats through dialogue on the basis of mutual respect and equality, but surprisingly, the US government, which always talks about safeguarding cybersecurity, has remained silent over the spyware. Instead, the US is busy ganging up with its allies to slander and smear China with unwarranted charges, which reflected its guilty conscience, Zhao said. 

The US government was pretending to be blind to the Pegasus spyware, which was exposed as undertaking surveillance of politicians, journalists and business people, and some Chinese diplomats were among the victims, media reports showed.

China’s strong condemnation on Thursday came after unusually broad collusion among Western powers to publicly blame China for cyberattacks. Those participating included the US, the EU, Australia, Britain, Canada, Japan, and New Zealand.

However, the facts show that China has been a major victim of cyberattacks. China captured more than 42 million malicious program samples in 2020. The overseas sources of these malicious program samples were mainly the US, India and etc, the National Computer Network Emergency Response Technical Team/Coordination Center of China (CNCERT/CC) said on Wednesday.

About 55.41 million IP addresses in China were attacked by malicious programs, accounting for 14.2 percent of all IP addresses in the country. The attacked IP addresses were mainly based in East China’s Shandong, Jiangsu and Zhejiang provinces, and South China’s Guangdong Province, the report said. 

Chinese tech…

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Centre must give a categorical response to Pegasus row: Justice B N Srikrishna | Latest News India

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Retired Supreme Court judge Justice B N Srikrishna, who authored the first draft of the data protection bill in 2018, says the Narendra Modi government should probe the alleged phone hacking of ministers, politicians, activists and journalists, and also explicitly state if any of its agencies uses Israeli military-grade spyware Pegasus.

Justice Srikrishna, who was appointed by this government to identify and address issues in data protection in India in 2017, described the response of the government, which has thus far denied its involvement in any illegal surveillance as “unsatisfactory”.

“Even the French government has ordered an inquiry so we need to do that too,” said Justice Srikrishna. “I am not at all satisfied with the government’s response. They need to give a categorical answer about who’s behind the hacking.”

As unearthed by a collaborative investigation involving 17 media organisations, and reported by The Wire, which is one of the 17, the phone numbers of Union ministers Ashwini Vaishnaw and Prahlad Patel, opposition leaders Rahul Gandhi and Abhishek Banerjee, activists, and 38 journalists, including three from HT and one from its sister publication Mint, were potential targets of spyware.

While NSO Group, the Israeli firm that makes Pegasus, has maintained that only governments are its clients, India’s IT minister Ashwini Vaishnaw has called the investigation an “attempt to malign Indian democracy and its well-established institutions”.

Home minister Amit Shah has questioned the timing of the revelations that came out just a day before the start of the monsoon session of Parliament. “Aap chronology samajhiye! (Understand the chronology) This is a report by the disrupters for the obstructers. Disrupters are global organisations which do not like India to progress. Obstructers are political players in India who do not want India to progress,” he had said.

“It has nothing to do with timing. That is irrelevant,” said Justice Srikrishna. “An important question is being asked in Parliament and they (government) should answer it. That is how democracy is strengthened. They should give an open answer so that such issues are frankly dealt…

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FAQ: What to know about Pegasus spyware and how to protect your phone

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The company won’t say, citing confidentiality agreements. Citizen Lab has documented suspected Pegasus infections in 45 locations: Algeria, Bahrain, Bangladesh, Brazil, Canada, Egypt, France, Greece, India, Iraq, Israel, Ivory Coast, Jordan, Kazakhstan, Kenya, Kuwait, Kyrgyzstan, Latvia, Lebanon, Libya, Mexico, Morocco, the Netherlands, Oman, Pakistan, the Palestinian territories, Poland, Qatar, Rwanda, Saudi Arabia, Singapore, South Africa, Switzerland, Tajikistan, Thailand, Togo, Tunisia, Turkey, the United Arab Emirates, Uganda, the United Kingdom, the United States, Uzbekistan, Yemen and Zambia. However, the presence of infected phones does not necessarily mean a country’s government is a client.

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Pegasus Spyware Targets Investigative Journalists in Mexico

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Colleagues of slain Javier Valdez Cárdenas, known for investigating drug cartels, were targeted just days after his death.
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