• About Us
  • Who Are We
  • Work With Us
Monday, June 23, 2025
No Result
View All Result
The Globe Post
39 °f
New York
44 ° Fri
46 ° Sat
40 ° Sun
41 ° Mon
No Result
View All Result
The Globe Post
No Result
View All Result
Home World

European Companies Sold Spyware to Despots: Media

Staff Writer by Staff Writer
10/06/23
in World
A woman checks the website of Israel-made Pegasus spyware

A woman checks the website of Israel-made Pegasus spyware. Photo: AFP

Share on FacebookShare on Twitter

European companies sold powerful spyware to authoritarian regimes which have used it against dissenters, a group of investigative media said Thursday.

According to the probe — by European Investigative Collaborations (EIC) and spearheaded by the French site Mediapart and Germany’s Der Spiegel weekly — European companies “supplied dictators cyber-surveillance tools for more than a decade,” EIC said in a statement.

“During the last decade the Western world has encouraged and applauded the digital tools that empower democracy activism in countries under authoritarian regimes,” it said. “But at the same time European companies have supplied such authoritarian regimes the digital back doors to turn any digital device into powerful spying tools against dissenters,” it said.

The Predator Files investigation, named after the software, said the sellers benefited from “the passive complicity of many European governments.”

The investigation focused on the Intellexa Alliance, a group of companies through which EIC said Predator software had been supplied to authoritarian states.

Intellaxa is run by former Israeli intelligence officials mostly based in Europe, and was targeted by US sanctions in July.

“Activists, journalists and academics have been targeted, as have European and US officials,” it said.

The findings of the investigation run by 15 media are based on hundreds of confidential documents obtained by Mediapart and Der Spiegel and analyzed with the help of the Security Lab of Amnesty International, a human rights organization.

Amnesty called Intellexa “a complex, morphing group of interconnected companies” and Predator “its highly invasive spyware.”

“Intellexa alliance’s products have been found in at least 25 countries across Europe, Asia, the Middle East and Africa and have been used to undermine human rights, press freedom, and social movements across the globe,” Amnesty said.

“Highly invasive surveillance products are being traded on a near industrial scale and are free to operate in the shadows without oversight or any genuine accountability,” it added.

Mediapart said that a French company, Nexa, had sold Predator to “at least three autocracies: Egypt, Vietnam and Madagascar.”

Mediapart said the spyware had also been sold to Qatar, Congo Brazzaville, the United Arab Emirates, and Pakistan “under the complacent eyes of the French secret services.”

Criminal charges against Nexa and four of its managers, brought in 2021 over spyware sales, were downgraded a year later, making their trial unlikely, legal sources told AFP.

EIC said its members would publish further details over the coming days.

The recent revelations follow a 2021 scandal around Pegasus, a spyware sold by Israeli company NSO Group, with several media reporting that it had been used to illegally spy on more than 50,000 individuals.

ShareTweet
Staff Writer

Staff Writer

AFP with The Globe Post

Related Posts

Emmanuel Macron
World

France to Remember Charlie Hebdo Attacks 10 Years On

by Staff Writer with AFP
January 6, 2025
Emmanuel Macron
World

Macron Calls for ‘Ruthless’ Govt Response After Teacher Killed

by Staff Writer
October 16, 2023
Air France flights
World

Niger Bans French Aircraft From Its Airspace: Aviation Authority 

by Staff Writer
September 25, 2023
Man holding up a colored LGBT flag
World

France Sets Up Embassy Fund to Defend LGBTQ Rights

by Staff Writer
September 19, 2023
migrants
Refugees

Migrant Channel Crossings Top 100,000 Since 2018: UK Data

by Staff Writer
August 11, 2023
Heavily armed police inspect the area near a Jehovah's Witness church where several people have been killed in a shooting in Hamburg, northern Germany
World

Eight Dead in Shooting at Jehovah’s Witness Hall in Germany

by Staff Writer
March 10, 2023
Next Post
Fire and smoke rise above buildings in Gaza City during an Israeli airstrike

Israel, Gaza Reel as Death Toll Soars Above 1,100 in War With Hamas

A woman stocks a bathroom with free pads and tampons

Vienna Drugstores Offer Free Period Products for Women in Need

Please login to join discussion

Recommended

An Iranian protester

Iran’s Nuclear Program: From Its Origins to Today’s Dispute

June 23, 2025
Protesters and police clash during the “No Kings” protest in Los Angeles, California on June 14, 2025.

US Appeals Court Allows Trump Control of National Guard in LA

June 20, 2025
Donald Trump

Fact vs. Fiction: The Trump Administration’s Dubious War on Reverse Discrimination

June 18, 2025
Iranian missiles and Israeli interceptors light up the sky over Beirut, Lebanon, on June 14, 2025. Iran launched multiple missiles toward Israeli targets, triggering interception attempts above several regional capitals, including Beirut.

Israel-Iran Conflict: Latest Developments

June 18, 2025
Tens of thousands of protestors shut down Fifth Avenue in Manhattan on Saturday, April 5, 2025, protesting the Trump administration's abuse of the separation of federal powers as well as the deep cuts to governmental services overseen by presidential advisor Elon Musk.

Civil Society Is Holding the Line. Will Washington Notice?

June 17, 2025
An Iranian walking in front of a wall painting of the Iranian flag in Tehran

How Much Damage Has Israel Inflicted on Iran’s Nuclear Program?

June 16, 2025

Opinion

Donald Trump

Fact vs. Fiction: The Trump Administration’s Dubious War on Reverse Discrimination

June 18, 2025
Tens of thousands of protestors shut down Fifth Avenue in Manhattan on Saturday, April 5, 2025, protesting the Trump administration's abuse of the separation of federal powers as well as the deep cuts to governmental services overseen by presidential advisor Elon Musk.

Civil Society Is Holding the Line. Will Washington Notice?

June 17, 2025
A Black Lives Matter mural in New York City.

Fuhgeddaboudit! America’s Erasure of History

April 2, 2025
Bust of Deputy Rubens Paiva in the Chamber of Deputies

Democratic Brazilians Are Still Here

March 18, 2025
A woman from Guatemala

Dispatch From Central America

January 28, 2025
US President Donald Trump

Dear Trump Supporters: Is This the America You Wanted?

January 28, 2025
Facebook Twitter

Newsletter

Do you like our reporting?
SUBSCRIBE

About Us

The Globe Post

The Globe Post is part of Globe Post Media, a U.S. digital news organization that is publishing the world's best targeted news sites.

submit oped

© 2018 The Globe Post

No Result
View All Result
  • National
  • World
  • Business
  • Interviews
  • Lifestyle
  • Democracy at Risk
    • Media Freedom
  • Opinion
    • Editorials
    • Columns
    • Book Reviews
    • Stage
  • Submit Op-ed

© 2018 The Globe Post