Telephone spyware targets El Salvador’s independent journalists
According to an investigation carried out by two international organizations and confirmed by Amnesty International (AI), cell phones of journalists and human rights advocates in El Salvador were infected with the invasive Israeli Pegasus spyware.
A joint investigation through Access Now, an organization that advocates for the protection of digital rights, and Citizen Lab, a University of Toronto laboratory specializing in cybersecurity, has identified the broad use of the Pegasus spyware program in El Salvador.
The Pegasus program infects and harvests information from all activities conducted on a smartphone, including the user’s location, the sites they visit and their personal contacts. In addition, these technological tools can convert the user’s personal telephone into a vehicle for secret recording.
Amnesty International added: “Technical experts from Amnesty International’s Security Laboratory have reviewed the report and independently verified the forensic evidence demonstrating the abusive use of Pegasus in El Salvador”.
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