US court finds against Pegasus spyware

There could be implications for India where there have been allegations of the malware being used.

- Online report

In a summary judgement, Judge Phyllis Hamilton of the US District Court in Oakland, Northern District of California has found Israeli-mercenary's surveillance firm NSO Group Technologies (also known as Q Cyber Technologies) liable for the hacking of Meta's Whatsapp through its state of the art military grade malware Pegasus.

Live Law reports that the Court found NSO violated the Computer Fraud & Abuse Act, and Comprehensive Computer Data Access & Fraud Act by sending malicious messages through WhatsApp servers to hack users. It also found NSO for breaching its contract by violating WhatsApp's Terms of Service.

A trial will now proceed only on the issue of damages.

The summary judgement dated December 20 states "Thus, the Court grants summary judgement in plaintiffs' favour on the CFAA claim under both section (a)(2) and (a)(4), on theory that defendants exceeded their authorisation. Defendants appear to fully acknowledge that the WIS sent messages through WhatsApp servers that caused Pegasus to be installed on target users' devices and that the WIS was then able to obtain protected information by having it sent from the target users, through the WhatsApp servers, and back to the WIS...defendants argue that Pegasus was operated by their clients, and thus defendants did not collect any information. Defendants further argue that terms such as 'illegal', 'unauthorised', and 'harmful' as used in terms of service are vague and ambiguous.