Spyware used to hack State Department employees

WASHINGTON — The phones of 11 U.S. State Department employees were hacked using technology from Israel’s NSO Group, the world’s most infamous hacker-for-hire company, a person familiar with the matter said Friday.

The employees were all located in Uganda and included some foreign service officers, said the person, who was not authorized to speak publicly about an ongoing investigation.

Some local Ugandan employees of the department appear to have been among the 11 hacked, the person said.

The hacking is the first known instance of NSO Group’s spyware, known as Pegasus, being used against U.S. government personnel. It was not immediately known what individual or entity used the NSO technology to hack into the accounts, or what information was sought.

“We have been acutely concerned that commercial spyware like NSO Group software poses a serious counterintelligence and security risk to U.S. personnel,” White House press secretary Jen Psaki said Friday.

News of the hacks, first reported by Reuters, comes a month after the U.S. Commerce Department blacklisted NSO Group, barring U.S. technology from being used by the company. And Apple sued NSO Group last week seeking to effectively shut down its hacking of all iPhones and other Apple products, calling the Israeli company “amoral 21st century mercenaries.”

The State Department employees were hacked on their iPhones, the person familiar with the matter said.

NSO Group said in a statement that it had terminated the “relevant customers’ access” to its hacking system, but did not identify the customers. The company said its spying technology is blocked from hacking phones based in the U.S. and only sells to licensed customers.

If the allegations turn out to be true “they are a blunt violation” of contract terms and NSO Group “will take legal action against these customers,” it added.

Marketed to governments for use against terrorists and criminals, Pegasus has been abused by NSO customers to spy on rights activists, journalists and politicians from Saudi Arabia to Mexico, including such highprofile targets as the fiancee of Jamal Khashoggi, the Saudi journalist murdered in his country’s consulate in Istanbul.