The number of French President Emmanuel Macron and members of the government is on a list of potential targets for the Pegasus software, which is used by some states to spy on personalities, said Laurent Richard, head of the organization Forbidden Stories, on Tuesday and confirmed information from World.
Daily The world revealed on Tuesday, July 20, that these figures, including the number of former Prime Minister Edouard Philippe and 14 members of the government, appeared “in the list of numbers selected by a security service in the Moroccan state, users of the spy program Pegasus, for potential piracy.” from the French president has been used regularly by Emmanuel Macron since at least 2017 and until recently, according to the newspaper.
“We found these phone numbers, but we obviously could not conduct a technical investigation on Emmanuel Macron’s phone” to verify that he was infected with this software and therefore “who does not tell us if the president was really spied,” the director of Forbidden Stories explained, on The LCI news channel. But according to him, whether the president was spied on or not, it shows “at least that there was an interest in doing so”.
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“If the facts are true, they are obviously very serious. All light will be shed on these press revelations “, the presidency replied, questioned by AFP to find out if the head of state had” potentially been spied “via Pegasus.
For its part, the Israeli company NSO – which markets Pegasus – insuresnever could the French president have been targeted, but again impossible to verify the statements because the company does not have access to its customers’ information.
In a statement sent to “Project Pegasus”, NSO confirms that: “Emmanuel Macron has not, and has never been, a target or chosen as such by customers”. But NSO does not specify what this statement is based on.
According to the investigators of the various media who worked on this Pegasus deal, it will be remembered that the Moroccan state is a user of this spy program. What Rabat denied Monday. Morocco would have intercepted about 10,000 numbers including 10% in France.
Other information about Morocco, this time from the investigative cell of Radio France, partner of the international media consortium, King Mohammed VI himself and his entourage would be on the list.
Forbidden Stories and the Amnesty International Association received a list of 50,000 phone numbers that NSO clients have chosen since 2016 for potential surveillance and shared it with a consortium of 17 media outlets that revealed their existence on Sunday.
►Also read:Pegasus, Israeli software used to spy on journalists and activists around the world
(With AFP)
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