Pegasus spyware scandal: years of questions, no answers for Mexico victims

An illustration shows a smartphone with the website of Israel's NSO Group which features 'Pegasus' spyware. Mexico alone spent more than US$160mil (RM678mil) on Pegasus over a decade, the government says, giving ministries the power to spy on ordinary people and opponents of the then-government alike. — AFP

LOS ANGELES/MEXICO CITY: A decade after Mexico became a testbed for the global spy tool now known as Pegasus, prosecutors still cannot say who ordered the mass surveillance of innocent civilians and government critics, people familiar with the investigation said.

What is more, the office leading the probe was one of the entities that first bought the military-grade Israeli spyware, whose global reach – enabling the remote surveillance of smartphones – has raised fears of unprecedented snooping on civilians.