President Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador denied this Tuesday that under his administration journalists or opponents are spied on, in response to a recent report that revealed the use of the program pegasusof the Israeli company NSO Groupat least three people, between 2019 and 2021.
A report by Citizen Lab, a digital watchdog group at the University of Toronto’s Munk School of Global Affairs and Public Policy, found that the phones of two journalists and a human rights activist were infected by the spyware during that period.
It is not true that journalists or opponents are spied on, we are not the same. I made a commitment that no one was going to be spied on,” AMLO said in his usual morning conference.
The three investigators filed a complaint with the Attorney General of the Republic (FGR) to investigate the alleged “interventions of private communications without judicial authorization,” according to Leopoldo Maldonado, director of Article 19.
President López Obrador, who took office at the end of 2018, promised not to deploy this technology – which can be used to remotely break into phones and is normally only sold to states or law enforcement – after a scandal over its use broke out under its predecessor’s government.
The interception of private communications is only allowed with the prior consent of a judge for reasons such as national security, and doing so without authorization can be punished with up to 12 years in prison.
NSO Group said it couldn’t validate Citizen Lab’s conclusions without seeing data it said the research group doesn’t share. The firm added that it does not manage Pegasus or collect information about clients or who they monitor, and that it terminates contracts when it discovers any irregularity in its use.
Ricardo Raphael, one of the journalists whose phone was infected with Pegasus in 2019 and 2020, urged others to speak up: “I highly doubt we are the only people infected,” he said.
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