Pegasus spyware download
Pegasus has created a new controversy in India. Do you have any idea that Pegasus spyware is not a common-purpose spyware, which is purchased or downloaded online?
It has been developed by an Israeli company, whose name is NSO.
According to the company, it only works to collect data from mobile phones of specific persons who are involved in criminal and terrorist activities.
According to NSO Group, it works only with the authorized government. Pegasus was came to the public eye for its use by the governments of Panama and Mexico.
As per sources, it is said that it has 60 customers in 40 countries, out of which 51 percent users are intelligence agencies, 38 law enforcement agencies and 11 percent are military-related users.
But recent controversy highlights the large-scale misuse of Pegasus Spyware by governments of many countries to influence their control, which is autocratic in nature.
In recent periods many countries have been misusing against their own Political leaders, Political rivals, Prominent journalists, Human Rights activists and legal authorities.
It is a sign of going to be autocratic governance, and the Indian government was also exposed by big journalism organizations.
What is Pegasus Spyware
Pegasus is a spyware software designed by the Israeli cyberarms firm NSO Group that can be installed secretly on phones (and other devices) running most versions of iOS and Android.
According to the 2021 Project Pegasus disclosures, current Pegasus spyware can hack all recent iOS versions up to iOS 14.6. As per the Washington Post and other notable media sources.
It is hi-tech spyware that not only monitors keystroke of all types of activities of a mobile i.e. texts; emails; and web searches, it also takes full control of the phone and enables phone call, location tracking, camera and microphone access.
This process allows NSO Group to hijack both the mobile phone's microphone and camera, effectively putting it into a constant tracking device.
The company was previously owned by Francisco Partners, an American private equity firm, before being acquired by the founders in 2019.
NSO claims to provide "authorized governments with technology that helps them in fighting terror and crime, has published contract clauses requiring clients to use its products only for criminal and national security investigations.
The Company claims to have an industry-leading human rights approach. It's a Trojan horse that can be sent "flying through the air" to infect phones
The name Pagasus Origin
It was name after the mythical winged horse horse character, Pegasus.
Pegasus was identified in August 2018 following the failed attempt to install it on a device and the security holes it exploited.
Pegasus could read text messages, track calls, collect passwords, track location, access the microphone and camera of the target device, and harvest information from apps as of 2016.
The spyware controversy received much attention in the media. It was called the "most sophisticated" smartphone attack ever, and it was the first time a malicious remote hack using jailbreak to get full access to an iPhone had been identified.
According to intelligence collected by the Israeli newspaper Haaretz on August 23, 2020, the NSO Group sold Pegasus spyware software to the United Arab Emirates and other Gulf States.
The paid hundreds of millions of dollars for surveillance of anti-regime activists, journalists, and political leaders from rival countries, with Israeli government guidance and negotiation.
Later, in December 2020, Al Jazeera's investigative show The Tip of the Iceberg, Spy Partners, aired exclusive footage of Pegasus and its infiltration into the phones of journalists and activists, which Israel abused to spy on its opponents and even supporters.
Pegasus was still being used against high-profile targets in July 2021, according to broad media coverage of the Project Pegasus revelations. and an in-depth research conducted by human rights organisation Amnesty International.
Pegasus was able to infect all recent iOS versions up to the most recent update, iOS 14.6, using a zero-click iMessage attack, according to the report.
It's important noting that the NSO Group has confirmed Pegasus' existence. The Israeli firm has stated, however, that it only offers the tools to governments and that it is not accountable for their misuse.
Pegasus: the advanced spyware technology that threats for democracy
How does Pegasus hack a phone?
One of the prime reasons why Pegasus is preferred by government's organizations who use it is because of its capability to hack phones.
The phone hacking is practically untraceable, and the user is unaware that their device has been hacked.
When a hacker detects a phone that needs to be hacked, they send the targeted victim a malicious website link, which, if clicked, installs Pegasus on the phone.
It can also be installed via a software bug in voice calls done through apps such as WhatsApp. In fact, this call method is so powerful and secret that Pegasus might be installed on a phone just by making a missed call to the user.
What could Pegasus do?
Pegasus can potentially spy on the targeted person completely and thoroughly once it is installed on the phone.
Pegasus had access to even encrypted chats, such as those sent through WhatsApp.
Pegasus can read messages, track calls, follow user activity within apps, collect location data, access video cameras in phones, and listen through their microphones, according to security researchers.
What did Kaspersky researchers described in 2017
Pegasus was a clever spyware at the same time. It is doing everything it can to avoid being noticed when spying on a victim.
This is what Kaspersky researchers noted once more that its another amazing feature about Pegasus is that it makes a strong effort to hide itself.
If it can't communicate with its command-and-control (C&C) server for more than 60 days, or if it detects that it was installed on the wrong device with the wrong SIM card.
Keep in mind one thing, this is targeted surveillance; NSO's clients weren't going for random victims), the malware will self-destruct.
What is the current status of Pegasus?
So, what exactly is going on with Pegasus right now, and should you be concerned? In terms of the classic Pegasus, it is no longer as useful as it once was.
The present buzz surrounding it comes from its prior exploits rather than its current ones.
When the information became public, Apple released an update to iOS 9 to close the faults that the malware was exploiting to get access to an iPhone.
When the details of Pegasus's attack on WhatsApp and Android were publicly disclosed, Google and WhatsApp quickly corrected the security breaches that Pegasus was targeting.
To put it another way, if you have an iPhone running iOS 14 or an Android phone with the latest version of essential apps like WhatsApp loaded, you won't have to worry about classic Pegasus.
However, this does not mean that your phone is fully secure. There is no such thing as a hack-proof computer or phone.
Pegasus infects devices by targeting zero-day security breaches. This means they target security vulnerabilities in phones, laptops, and apps that even Google, Apple, Facebook, and other companies are unaware of Pegasus.
NSO Group may even exist, as well as an upgraded version of Pegasus or other spyware that the average person is unaware of.
Classic Pegasus, on the other hand, is not anything to be worried about in 2021.
It's also worth noting that a spyware tool like Pegasus is highly costly. The cost is in the millions of dollars, and only major organizations or governments can afford it.
In truth, NSO Group has previously stated that it solely sells software to governments. Pegasus-like systems aren't meant for mass snooping. They're designed to spy on specific people.
Frequently Asked Questions (FAQ)
What is in the data leak?
The data leak which includes more than 50,000 phone numbers, they are likely to have been targeted by government clients of NSO Group. which has been working since 2016.
The information also includes the time and date that numbers were chosen or submitted into a system.
The list was initially shared with 16 media organizations, including the Guardian, by Forbidden Stories, a Paris-based nonprofit journalism organization, and Amnesty International.
As part of the Pegasus strategy, almost 80 journalists engaged for several months. The forensic analyses were carried out by Amnesty's Security Lab, a technical partner on the project.
What does the leak indicate?
The team claims the data reveals potential targets selected by NSO's government clients ahead of possible surveillance.
While the addition of a number in the data indicates purpose, it does not reveal whether or not an attempt was made to infect the phone with malware such as Pegasus, the company's hallmark surveillance tool, or whether the attempt was successful.
The discovery of a small number of landline phones and US numbers in the data, which NSO claims are “technically impossible” to access with its tools, indicates that some targets were selected by NSO clients even if they could not be infected with Pegasus.
Forensic analyses of a small group of smartphones with numbers on the list, on the other hand, found close connections between the period and date of a number in the data.
The period of activity started by Pegasus activity in some cases was as little as a few seconds.
What did forensic analysis reveal?
Amnesty International examined 67 smartphones suspected of being used for spyware attacks.
23 of them were infected successfully, while 14 exhibited evidence of attempted infiltration. The tests on the remaining 30 were unclear, in part because the handsets had been replaced.
The number of Android devices was 20%, which didn't exhibit any signs of infection.
However, unlike iPhones, Android phones do not store the types of information essential for Amnesty's research.
Pegasus-linked SMS messages were found on three Android phones, showing that they had been targeted.
Amnesty International displayed “backup copies” of 4 iPhones with the help of Citizen Lab, a Pegasus hacking related research group at the University of Toronto. It confirmed that iPhones were targeted by Pegasus.
Amnesty International's forensic methodologies were also peer-reviewed by Citizen Lab, which declared them to be valid.
Which NSO clients were selecting numbers?
While the data is processed into clusters that correspond to individual NSO clients, it is unknown which NSO client selected which number.
NSO claims to have 60 clients in 40 countries but refuses to reveal who they are.
Media partners were able to identify ten governments believed to be responsible for selecting the targets by closely examining the pattern of targeting by individual clients in the leaked data:
- Azerbaijan,
- Bahrain,
- Kazakhstan,
- Mexico,
- Morocco,
- Rwanda,
- Saudi Arabia,
- Hungary,
- India, and
- the United Arab Emirates.
Citizen Lab also found proof that all ten were NSO clients.
What does NSO Group say?
The full statement from NSO Group may be seen here. The firm has always stated that it does not have access to its customers' target data.
NSO said that the consortium had formed "incorrect assumptions" regarding which clients use the company's technology through its lawyers.
The 50,000 figure was "exaggerated," according to the report, and the list could not be a list of numbers "targeted by governments employing Pegasus."
NSO had reason to suppose the list obtained by the consortium "is not a list of numbers targeted by governments using Pegasus, but rather may be part of a greater list of numbers used by NSO Group clients for other purposes," according to the lawyers.
Replying to another questions, the lawyers stated the Organizations findings were based on "misleading interpretation of leaked data from available and obvious basic information, such as HLR Lookup services," according to the lawyers.
It has no bearing on the list of Pegasus or any other NSO products' customers' targets... we still do not see any correlation of these lists to anything related to use of NSO Group technologies"
What is HLR lookup data?
The HLR, or home location register, is a database that is necessary for the operation of mobile phone networks.
Such registers keep track of phone users' networks and general locations, as well as other identifying information that is routinely used in call and text routing.
HLR data, according to telecoms and surveillance specialists, can be employed in the early stages of a surveillance operation to determine whether it is possible to connect to a phone.
According to the consortium, NSO clients can execute HLR lookup requests through an interface on the Pegasus system.
It's unknown whether Pegasus operators must do HRL lookups through its interface in order to use its software; an NSO source suggested that clients may execute HLR lookups through an NSO system for reasons unrelated to Pegasus.