Pegasus Spyware Used on Hundreds of People, Says Poland's Prosecutor General

An anonymous reader shared this report from the Associated Press:

Poland's prosecutor general told the parliament on Wednesday that powerful Pegasus spyware was used against hundreds of people during the former government in Poland, among them elected officials. Adam Bodnar told lawmakers that he found the scale of the surveillance 'shocking and depressing....'

The data showed that Pegasus was used in the cases of 578 people from 2017 to 2022, and that it was used by three separate government agencies: the Central Anticorruption Bureau, the Military Counterintelligence Service and the Internal Security Agency. The data show that it was used against six people in 2017; 100 in 2018; 140 in 2019; 161 in 2020; 162 in 2021; and then nine in 2022, when it stopped....

Bodnar said that the software generated 'enormous knowledge' about the 'private and professional lives' of those put under surveillance. He also stressed that the Polish state doesn't have full control over the data that is gathered because the system operates on the basis of a license that was granted by an Israeli company.

'Pegasus gives its operators complete access to a mobile device, allowing them to extract passwords, photos, messages, contacts and browsing history and activate the microphone and camera for real-time eavesdropping.'

Read more of this story at Slashdot.