NSO Group: Origins

August 11, 2021

I read “Israel Tries to Limit Fallout from the Pegasus Spyware Scandal.”

I noted this statement which is has been previously bandied about:

Israel has been trying to limit the damage the Pegasus spyware scandal is threatening to do to France-Israel relations. The Moroccan intelligence service used the software, made by an Israeli company with close ties to Israel’s defense and intelligence establishments, to spy on dozens of French officials, including fourteen current and former cabinet ministers, among them President Emmanuel Macron and former prime minister Edouard Phillipe.

The write up reports:

There were reasons for Macron’s irritation: The NSO Group was established in 2009 by three Israelis — Niv Carmi, Shalev Hulio, and Omri Lavie. Contrary to popular belief, the three were not veterans of the vaunted Unit 8200, the IDF’s signal intelligence branch (although many of the company’s employees are). It is generally accepted by intelligence services around the world that many Israeli high-tech companies share information they glean from their contracts abroad with the Israeli security services, if they think such information is vital to Israel’s security (this is why the Committee on Foreign Investment in the United States, or CFIUS, has been reluctant to allow Israeli cyber companies access to the U.S. market).

Interesting.

Stephen E Arnold, August 11, 2021

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