Spanish judge to question Israeli cyber intelligence head over Pegasus scandal

OVIEDO, Spain – The Spanish High Court has said that it has called the CEO of Israeli cyber intelligence company NSO Group, Shalev Hulio, to testify as part of an investigation into the Pegasus hacking scandal.

Judge Jose Luis Calama will personally travel to Israel to question Hulio, whose software was used to hack the telephones of high-level Spanish politicians.

Pegasus spyware, which allows hackers to tap into virtually all the data on a mobile phone, has been successfully deployed against Spanish Prime Minister Pedro Sanchez and other Spanish ministers.

Most of those hacks occurred during the peak of political tensions with Morocco, after the rebel leader of Western Sahara was found to have been refuge in Spain last spring.

63 other Catalan politicians were also targeted with Pegasus, according to a report by the research group Citizen Lab. The Spanish intelligence agency has admitted to legally hacking some of those phones but has not confirmed the use of Pegasus spyware.

As part of the investigation, the judge is also gathering testimony from Spanish Parliamentary Affairs Minister Felix Bolanos.

According to NSO Group, all of the company’s products, including Pegasus spyware “are used exclusively by government intelligence and law enforcement agencies to fight crime and terror.”