India targeting high-profile journalists with spyware

NEW DELHI, Dec 28: Indias government has again targeted high-profile journalists with Pegasus spyware, Amnesty International and The Washington Post said in a joint investigation published Thursday.

Created by Israeli firm NSO Group, Pegasus can be used to access a phones messages and emails, peruse photos, eavesdrop on calls, track locations and even film the owner with the camera.

Watchdogs have documented widespread use of the spyware -- which is normally only sold to governments or security agencies -- against journalists and activists in dozens of countries, including India.
Amnesty said journalists Siddharth Varadarajan of The Wire and Anand Mangnale of The Organized Crime and Corruption Reporting Project (OCCRP) had been targeted with the spyware on their iPhones.

"Increasingly, journalists in India face the threat of unlawful surveillance simply for doing their jobs," said Donncha O Cearbhaill, head of Amnesty Internationals Security Lab. That threat compounds an already hostile climate for reporters also facing "imprisonment under draconian laws, smear campaigns, harassment, and intimidation", he added.

Indias government did not immediately respond to the report, which said the most recent identified case of spyware use occurred in October.

In 2021, New Delhi was accused of using Pegasus to surveil journalists, opposition politicians and activists, with leaked documents showing the spyware had been used against more than 1,000 Indian phone numbers.    —AFP