Filenews 10 February 2025
After Pegasus and the Predator, a new surveillance spyware is coming to the fore as it is involved in a wiretapping case in Europe. This is Graphite, a product of the Israeli company Paragon Solutions, which has emerged as a leader in this field in the last year. According to revelations by the Italian government on Wednesday night, among the 90 identified targets of the software are devices in Cyprus and Greece, raising fresh concerns about the extent of surveillance in the region. Among the targets are journalists.
How the thread arrived in Athens
The scandal was exposed in Italy by Francesco Cancellato, editor-in-chief of the investigative website Fanpage, which is critical of Meloni's government and has published investigations into its immigration policy. Cancellato was the first to announce that his cell phone had been infected, followed by two more confirmed victims, members of nongovernmental organizations working on human rights and migration.
The Italian government categorically denies that Italian agencies used the software to monitor these targets and said it was stopping its use by state agencies. Paragon Solutions, for its part, said it was its decision to suspend its cooperation with Italy.
It should be noted that this is not the first time that activists and journalists dealing with migration have been monitored in a European Union country.
The Graphite infections were identified with the assistance of the University of Toronto's Citizen Lab, the only research group specializing in detecting cyberthreats. It was Citizen Lab that had first detected Pegasus and Predator in Greece and had offered its services to the Greek authorities to investigate the case. but did not receive a response.
As for the targets, they learned that they were being tracked by receiving a notification from the WhatsApp app, informing them that their mobile phone had been targeted. In order to protect their privacy, WhatsApp does not give the details of those who have been targeted, but informs them personally. So we do not know how many or what the monitored targets are in Greece.
Many journalists on target
Many of the 90 European targets are journalists and members of civil society organisations in Greece, Cyprus, Belgium, Latvia, Lithuania, Austria, the Czech Republic, Denmark, Germany, the Netherlands, Portugal, Spain and Sweden. The company has mobilized the competent authorities in the above countries. As the initial investigation concerns a very short period of time, it is estimated that the targets identified by WhatsApp and Citizen Lab will be multiple.
Who is Paragon Solutions. The company that sells Graphite has been making headlines for cybersecurity experts for the past year, promising to stand out where NSO and Intellexa, the companies linked to the Pegasus and Predator abuse scandals, failed.
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