Mexico Probes Whether Pegasus Spyware Purchases Were Legal

By Staff, Agencies

The Mexican attorney general's office said it is investigating the purchase of Pegasus spyware by the previous administration and whether it was carried out legally.

In a Sunday statement, the office referred to existing probes of two people – including a prominent ex-official – into the use of Pegasus spyware, days after the current government denied it had spied on journalists or critics.

Pegasus belongs to “Israeli” spyware firm NSO Group, which says it typically only sells the software to governments or law enforcement organizations.

In the statement, Mexican prosecutors said they were looking at the prior attorney general's office’s acquisition of Pegasus for $23 million, trying to establish if it was done with proper justification or following requisite public tender procedures.

In the second probe, the office said that judicial authorities had received evidence that NSO had been "illegally selling" Pegasus without providing more details.

The attorney general's announcement was issued nearly two weeks after President Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador denied his officials spied on journalists or opponents.

"Adversaries will come up with anything to make a fuss," he said, according to Axios. 

This was shortly after digital watchdog Citizen Lab said it found that phones belonging to two journalists and a human rights activist were infected with Pegasus between 2019 and 2021. NSO Group said it could not validate Citizen Lab's analysis without seeing data that it said the research group does not share.

Earlier this month, NSO told Reuters it licenses Pegasus only to law enforcement and intelligence agencies of sovereign states and government agencies following “Israeli” government approval and terminates contracts when wrongdoing is detected.

NSO noted it does not operate Pegasus, has no visibility on its usage, and does not collect information about customers.