The UK Prime Minister’s Office has been targeted by Pegasus spyware over the past two years.
Citizen Lab, a Canadian non-profit, has been tracking the use of the spyware, produced by Israel’s NSO group, in recent years.
NSO Group is being sued by WhatsApp and Apple as their customers were targeted by the covert malware. It also emerged last year that the iPhones of nine US State Department officials were compromised by the spyware.
Citizen Lab revealed yesterday that in 2020 and 2021 it was forced to notify the UK government after identifying “multiple suspected instances of Pegasus spyware infections within official UK networks.”
Citizen Lab director, Ron Deibert has said:
“Given that a UK-based lawyer involved in a lawsuit against NSO Group was hacked with Pegasus in 2019, we felt compelled to ensure that the UK government was aware of the ongoing spyware threat, and took appropriate action to mitigate it.”
