Over 300 Phones of Indian Ministers, Journalists, Judges & Businessmen Hacked Using Pegasus Spyware: The Wire Report

Mobile Phones of Ministers, Journalists, Judges & Businessmen Hacked Using Pegasus Spyware

NEW DELHI: More than 300 verified mobile phone numbers, including of two serving ministers, over 40 journalists, three opposition leaders, and one sitting judge besides scores of business persons and activists in India could have been targeted for hacking through Israeli spyware sold only to government agencies, an international media consortium reported on Sunday.

The government, however, dismissed allegations of any kind of surveillance on its part on specific people, saying it "has no concrete basis or truth associated with it whatsoever".

The report was published by The Wire news portal from India as also 16 other international publications including Washington Post, The Guardian, and Le Monde, as media partners to an investigation conducted by Paris-based media non-profit organization Forbidden Stories and rights group Amnesty International into a leaked list of more than 50,000 phone numbers from across the world that are believed to have been the target of surveillance through Pegasus software of Israeli surveillance company NSO Group.

The report came just a day before the start of the Monsoon Session of Parliament and could see the matter being raised in two houses, Lok Sabha and Rajya Sabha, beginning tomorrow. Some opposition leaders are also expected to give notices for adjournment or debate on this issue.

The Wire said the numbers of those in the database from India include over 40 journalists, three major opposition figures, one constitutional authority, two serving ministers in the Narendra Modi government, current and former heads and officials of security organizations, and scores of businesspersons, as also a sitting judge.

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