Italian lawmakers say Italy used spyware to target phones of immigration activists, but not against journalist

An Italian parliamentary committee has confirmed that the Italian government has used spyware created by the Israeli Company Paragon to hack a number of workers working to save the sea immigrants. The committee, however, said that the investigation decided that a prominent Italian journalist was not among the victims, the spyware attacks kept the main question about the unlucky.

Parliamentary Committee for the protection of the Republic, known as Kopasir, Reveal a report On Thursday, it completed a one -month investigation on the use of Paragon spyware known as graphite across Italy. Israeli newspaper Hartz Writing first about the reportThe

In January, WhatsApp begins sending notifications to about 90 users of itsThey warn that they were targeted with paragon spyware. Several Man In Italy Came forward After receiving notifications, encouraging a scandal in Italy, who has a long history of hosting Spyware OrganizationAs well Own Spyware Use And ObjectionThe

From that, he has investigated the allegations to clarify exactly what happened to Copassi.

Copassi has specifically investigated the target Luca Cassarini And Zeuspe caciaBoth MediterraneanAn Italian non -profit with the mission to rescue immigrants trying to cross the Mediterranean. In both of them, the committee reached the conclusion that their Italian intelligence agencies were legally targeted as part of an investigation into the allegations of illegal immigration in the country.

However the Copassi Committee has decided that there is no evidence of this Francesco CancetoA journalist who warned him from WhatsApp that he was the target of Paragon’s Spyware, targeting it by Italian intelligence agencies.

The committee wrote that its representatives were able to ask audit logs for the spyware database and cancelato phone number of the intelligence agencies and did not find any relevant record. The committee said that it did not find evidence of any legal requests of spying from the data department to the country’s top prosecutor office, or for protection, or DishesA top Italian government department that oversees the activities of two intelligence agencies, AISE and AISI in the country.

The report states that Paragon has foreign government customers that can be possiblely targeting the Italians, keeping the door open so that the target of cancelato’s phone can be explained. Copassi has not provided any evidence to support this theory.

Cancelet Fanpage.ITWhich is an Italian news website Known for several investigationsA Youth wing Prime Minister Georgigia Meloni led the far -right ruling party in Italy. The investigation revealed that the members personally made racist comments and gave fascist songs and slogans.

A noticed from Apple at the end of April did not mention any of the cancellation of Canceto Cero Pelagrino He was target with official spywareThe It is unclear whether Pelagrino was targeted with Paragon’s spyware and the Apple did not say the notice.

The Italian government, as well as Copassir, did not respond to any request for commenting, especially about Cancelto and Pelagrino.

Canceleto responded to the report In an article published on FridayIn this he questioned Copassir’s decision in his case and asked for more and better explanations.

“Case off? Not at all,” Cancelto wrote.

The report, a human rights organization, investigated spyware abuse (including recent torture cases in Italy), on behalf of Senior researcher John Scott-Relton of Citizen Lab, investigated who was looking at Canceloto.

“This report has created a problem for Paragon Solutions because the report has the most politically sensitive case: who is targeting this journalist? The result cannot make Paragon happy,” Scott-Releleton tells Techcranch. “Since Francesco Cancellato’s case remains fully unattractive, all the eyes are back to the paragon for an answer.”

Scott-Rellatton also said that Citizens Lab is still investigating the cancellation case and analyzing its phones and data. This also confirmed the Cancelto TechCrunch.

Paragon did not respond to any request for the comment.

Copassir’s cases were also investigated Malti FerrariChapelin on the rescue of the rescue of the Mediterranean; And David YambioPrivilege LibyaWhich is active in Italy. Copassir said that the Ferr had not found evidence that it was noticed, but there was evidence that there was evidence that Yambi was also a legal goal of monitoring, though not with Paragon’s spyware.

New details

As part of an investigation into the Italian government’s spyware use, he started looking for information about the use of paragons in the country of Copassi, as well as other government agencies, as well as the Citizens Lab and WhatsApp owner Meta.

According to the report, the anti -national prosecutor told Copassir that no prosecutor office in Italy had acquired or used Paragon’s spyware. (In Italy, every local prosecutor has some freedom to collect spyware.) The Caribbean Military Police, the National Polyzia de Stato and the Financial Crimes Agency Gardia Gardia DI Finnza have given the same answer.

Paragon told Copassir that it had an agreement with two intelligence agencies in Italy, Simple And ICThe According to the report, representatives of Copassi went to the DIS, as well as the two agencies and examined the spyware database and audit logs and found out who they noticed, including how agencies used Paragon spyware. Representatives have reached the conclusion that there is no abuse of surveillance of people who have come forward as spyware target in the past few months.

The Copassir report also reveals new details on how Paragon’s Spyware System works behind the screen. Copassir said that it was verified that to use the spyware of the paragon, an operator should log in with a username and password, and every installation of the spyware leaves details, which is located on a server controlled by the customer and is not accessible by the paragon. However, according to Copassir, the customer will not be able to delete data from audit logs on their servers.

The committee also unveiled the relationship between Paragon and its Italian intelligence customers, AIS and AISI, saying that they have since withdraw their contracts with Paragon since then.

Italy’s foreign intelligence agency Ice, which started using graphite on January 28, 2021 after signing the contract a month ago, “Illegal immigration, fugitive exploration, fuel smuggling, counter -trafficking, terrorism and organized crime, as well as organized crimes, are used for investigation.

In doing so, the report states that AISE is a “highly limited” but the phone users have targeted an undefined number and accessed both real-time and stored contacts sent to end-to-end encrypted applications.

Copassi said that the Italian domestic intelligence agency AIC started using graphite in early 2021 and its canceled agreement expired, as November 2021, like AISI, the ISI used to achieve the real-time communications with a small but unparalleled number of graphs when it was used in a small number of cases. It comes to the target.

For the deployment of each spyware, agencies have said that it had appropriate legal approval, the report said.

Copassir said he had the opportunity to review and verify the paragon contracts with Italian customers that there was any clause that prohibit the use of spyware against journalists and human rights workers.

In March, after the investigation, Citizen Lab has published a report on Paragon That Naming The governments of Australia, Canada, Cyprus, Denmark, Israel and Singapore are probably a customer of spyware makers.

Last year, this art of American Private Equity Giant Paragon said the news For an agreement that can reach $ 900 million.