A few days back a report from Citizen lab Claims that 36 personal phones belonging to Al Jazeera journalists, producers, anchors, and executives were hacked in a spyware campaign between July and August 2020. The report claims that The attackers reportedly used Pegasus technology provided by the Israeli firm NSO Group.
What is NSO Group ?
NSO Group Technologies is an Israeli technology firm whose spyware called Pegasus enables the remote surveillance of smartphones. Their products are used exclusively by government intelligence and law enforcement agencies to fight crime and terror.- from Wikipedia.
Due to the more advance Tech used in NSO Group – the attacks have used a zero-click exploit to compromise iPhones via iMessage, meaning the attacks happened without the victims needing to do anything which is a really scary part of this entire attack.
Several High Profile Companies are worried.
Facebook-owned WhatsApp sued the spyware vendor last year, alleging that its software was used to hack 1,400 devices via a vulnerability in the messaging service.
Now Microsoft, Google, and other several high-profile companies join hands to fight against the NSO bussiness model that could be incredibly dangerous if they fall into the wrong hands. And NSO Group tools also used by private companies which are more concerning than in the hands of Government agencies.
A blog post by Microsoft also raises the same issues that could be potentially dangerous if these tools get into the wrong hands.
Last week’s attack was enough to describe how dangerous it can be once it falls into the wrong hands. Companies should work together and figure out something to keep these dangerous tools away from the black hats.
