- Russia appears to be targeting journalists with spyware known as Pegasus.
- Pegasus is a “zero-click” software, hacking phones by sending texts that don’t need to be opened.
- The software has targeted dozens of journalists, activists, and politicians in recent years.
Earlier this summer, Russian journalist Galina Timchenko received a troubling alert from Apple: Her iPhone might have been the target of a state-sponsored spyware attack.
Tech and privacy experts later said they believed that Timchenko, leader of independent media outlet Meduza, had been targeted by the “zero-click” spyware Pegasus, The New York Times reported.
This would mark the first reported instance of Russian state officials targeting a journalist with Pegasus spyware, which has the ability to hack iPhones by sending iMessages that work without users even clicking on them, the Times reported.
Several other journalists affiliated with independent Russian media outlets reported receiving similar warnings from Apple on Thursday, according to the Times. One of these journalists — Yevegny Erlich — even warned his sources to stop contacting him with information after receiving the alert.
In 2021, Amnesty International and several other organizations reported that clients around the world used the software to hack phones belonging to dozens of journalists, activists, politicians, and business executives, Insider previously reported.
NSO Group — the Israeli company that created Pegasus — has denied Amnesty's report.
Later that same year, a report revealed several US State Department employees living in or focusing on Uganda had also been hacked by the software, Insider reported.