JAKARTA - After being found to have claimed many victims, the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) even has permission to use the Pegasus NSO spyware and has tested the software's capabilities.
The US law enforcement agency confirmed that the software, which is capable of sneakily infecting phones and accessing cameras, microphones, contacts, texts and more, was never used to support any investigation.
However, according to a report by The Washington Post, there are rumors within the FBI and the Department of Justice (DOJ) about how the FBI will spread spyware. The news comes after The New York Times (NYTimes) released a massive report last week, including details about the FBI's ties to Israel-based NSO.
The FBI not only tested spyware on cell phones using foreign SIM cards, but also had discussions about the legality of a version of Pegasus that could be used in the United States (US), called Phantom.
Of course this is worrying news, as NSO has repeatedly claimed that Pegasus cannot be used on phone numbers with country code +1 and is only allowed to be used in countries outside the US.
If the Phantom is a version of the same Pegasus, then the company is saying very different things to the public and law enforcement agencies.
The NYTimes argued that the FBI decided it would not use Pegasus for international or domestic use. It claims the FBI will only routinely identify, evaluate, test solutions and technical issues for a variety of reasons, including possible operational and security issues they may put in the wrong hands.
Launching The Verge, Thursday, February 3, the NYTimes report is worth reading, since the beginning of last summer, NSO has often faced difficulties. The company was blacklisted by the US government. These events severely limited how he could do business with the US-based technology company.
Further investigations have also linked the spyware to the murder of journalist Jamal Khashoggi, the hacking of a US State Department cell phone and political surveillance in Poland. Because, it is known Pegasus should only be sold to government agencies approved by the Israeli government.
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