A lawyer has filed a lawsuit against the company's two founders and an executive after he was allegedly hacked with government-grade spyware created by notorious surveillance technology maker NSO Group. This appears to be the first attempt to hold those involved in a spyware company accountable for hacking crimes, rather than the spyware companies themselves.
On Wednesday, Barcelona-based human rights nonprofit Iridia accused NSO founders Omri Ravi and Shareef Julio, as well as Yuval Somek, an executive at two affiliated companies, of hacking crimes earlier this week. announced that it has filed a complaint with a Catalan court. .
Mr. Iridia is represented by attorney Andrew van den Eynde, a lawyer and university professor specializing in cybersecurity. According to a 2022 investigation by Citizen Lab, a nonprofit that has been investigating government spyware for more than a decade, van den Eynde has committed extensive crimes against at least 65 Catalans linked to the region's independence attempts. He was one of the victims of a hacking campaign. This was performed using NSO's Pegasus software. Amnesty International independently confirmed Citizen Lab's findings.
Van den Eynde and Iridia filed a lawsuit against NSO in a Barcelona court in 2022. Until this week, the lawsuit named NSO as defendants, as well as two Luxembourg-based NSO affiliates, Osy Technologies and Q Cyber Technologies. Today, the nonprofit organization and its lawyers asked the judge overseeing the case to expand the lawsuit to include Lavie, Julio, and Somek.
“The heads of NSO Group need to explain their concrete activities,” legal representatives for Iridia and Van den Eynde said in a complaint written in Catalan.
“Van den Eynde was spied on to gain access to the legal strategies of his clients and the cases he was handling, creating a cascading effect of rights infringement. By spying on him, all of his contacts were was indirectly spied upon,” Iridia wrote. press release. “Furthermore, this surveillance is carried out without any criminal proceedings being instituted against him and therefore without judicial regulation.”
The complaint alleges that the three executives participated and cooperated in the “selling of illegal software” and illegal use of software.
Gil Reiner, NSO's vice president of global communications, told TechCrunch that the company would not comment.
Shareef did not respond to messages seeking comment. Ravi referred questions to his attorney, Hedan Orenstein.
“I understand that the plaintiffs are seeking to name Omri as a defendant. But are there any specific allegations of conduct attributable to Omri? In theory, your You may be asked to include both your name and my name,” Orenstein told TechCrunch.
Contact Us Want more information about NSO Group? Or other spyware companies and incidents of abuse of their technology? From a non-work device, contact Signal (+1 917 257 1382) or Telegram and Keybase @lorenzofb or email You can contact Lorenzo Franceschi-Bicchierai securely by email. You can also contact TechCrunch via SecureDrop.
Van den Eynde told TechCrunch that he is not happy about being a victim because he wants to focus on his work and his interests in technology.
“The truth is that Pikachu (I never say the name of the spyware to make it harder for emails to be leaked, lol) is the victim of an act, but I'm trying not to escalate this situation. ” he said in an email. .
Other victims of the alleged hacking are pressuring the Spanish government to reveal details of the alleged surveillance against them. In 2020, Motherboard first reported that the Spanish intelligence agency Centro de Inteligencia Nacional (National Intelligence Center, CNI) had purchased NSO spyware. Spain's government initially denied accusations that it was responsible for the alleged hacking of Catalan politicians, insisting it “does not spy on political opponents.”
The CNI said its operations were supervised by Spain's Supreme Court and were carried out “in full accordance with the legal system and with absolute respect for the applicable laws.” Former director Paz Esteban later testified before Spain's parliament that 18 members of the independence movement had been spied on with judicial authorization.
At the time of the alleged hacking, Mr. van den Eynde was a member of the Escala Republica de Catalunya, which was involved in the umbrella phrase for independence that Catalan politicians refer to as “El Processo.” He represented several politicians of the (Catalan Republican Left). Describe this movement and the steps taken to separate Catalonia from Spain. The most controversial of these measures was an independence referendum called by the Catalan government on October 1, 2017, which was later declared illegal by Spain's Constitutional Court.
There are several lawsuits against NSO around the world, including those brought by Apple and WhatsApp in the United States. Both cases are ongoing.