The Pegasus Project reported that governments used Pegasus, commercial spyware developed by Israeli cyber-arms company NSO Group, to target journalists, opposition politicians, activists, business people, and other civilians. The software was designed for covert device surveillance, turning smartphones into sources of communications and personal information. The disclosures raised allegations that governments were using powerful intrusion tools against critics and reporters rather than restricting them to lawful, necessary, and proportionate investigations.
The scandal also exposed the accountability gap created by the private sale of state-grade spyware. NSO Group’s technology became the focus of international investigations, civil-liberties criticism, and renewed demands for export controls and limits on commercial surveillance vendors. The supplied source additionally reports that, in 2025, Citizen Lab found evidence that the Italian government targeted three European investigative journalists with Paragon Solutions spyware, showing that the market continued beyond Pegasus.
