As NSO Group faced mounting criticism last year that its hacking software was being used illegally against journalists, dissidents and campaigners around the world, the Israeli spyware company unveiled a new policy that it said showed its commitment to human rights.
Now an investigation has alleged that another journalist, Omar Radi in Morocco, was targeted with NSO’s Pegasus software and put under surveillance just days after the company made that promise.
The investigation by Amnesty International alleges that Radi, a Rabat-based investigative journalist, was targeted three times and spied on after his phone was infected with an NSO tool. The mechanism allegedly used to target Radi, a so-called “network injection attack”, can be deployed without the victim clicking an infected link and is believed to have been used against another Moroccan journalist.
NSO does not publish a list of its government clients, but an earlier investigation by researchers at Citizen Lab identified Morocco as one of 45 countries where the company’s spyware was active.
The Guardian is publishing this report in coordination with Forbidden Stories, a collaborative journalism network that highlights the work of journalists who are threatened, jailed or killed.
